Ohio State Football Forum

Ohio State Football Forum

Ohio State football fan talk.

The Letdown 2

0 HS
Gametime's picture
September 8, 2014 at 9:38am
54 Comments

The always good Patrick Maks just dropped an article about the WRs being the biggest letdown for Ohio State, but I wrote this forum in disagreement. 

At the risk of the title sounding like a string of Bradley Cooper movies, I don't think it's fair to blame our skill guys more than they deserve.

Sure we can point to Corey Smith having a bad game and I'm sure that most of us were singing like it was church on Sunday when we actually a saw a damn slant pattern that went for a TD.

Over the course of the past several years we Ohio State fans have been subject to the same badgering from other major programs across the nation, because we keep failing to win the big game.

In the Urban Meyer Era, we've seen this coaching staff flat out OUT-COACHED in every big game against teams with lesser or equal talent, with great coordinators (MSU, Clemson, VA Tech) and it's not a recent trend.

Even in games we've won, we've had issues with the likes of reported MENSA member Tom Herman's play-calling.

I've been as big a fan of Bud Foster's defenses (I played DB in my day), but when a D-Co runs a ZERO DOUBLE EAGLE (BEAR) scheme against you, that means they have ABSOLUTELY NO RESPECT for your ability to pass the football. 

For those who don't know, that's two safeties in the box and all the corners in man to man coverage, with NO HELP over the top. 

I refuse to believe that our skill guys weren't getting separation, because I SEENT IT. The issue is the route tree that coaches Herman & Smith are teaching or calling on the passing routes.

Too often we're seeing corners routes and vertical seams. Where are the consistant slant routes? Where are the drags? Where's the late-release/check-down routes from the TE or RB? Where's inside crossing routes? Where's the double moves? No Bubble screen's, no jailbreak screens (which would've murdered that blitzing bear front), and generally it seemed like NO offensive adjustments. 

Call what works until they stop it.

I just don't understand how Devin Smith is this great deep threat and we can only figure out how to spring him once per game?

I don't understand how Jalin Marshall, Dontre Wilson, Curtis Samuel, Johnnie Dixon, etc. can do all these amazing things in space, but we DON'T GET THEM THE BALL IN SPACE (unless it's a bubble screen, which has mixed results.)

We seemingly have no 3-Step or 5-step passing game whatsoever and that needs to change. Where were all those dink & dunk passes that we were running when the game was out of hand? Why don't our receivers run routes that sit them in pockets of the coverage to make plays? WHY DID WE STOP MOVING THE POCKET & ROLLING OUT WHEN THEY WERE BLITZING?

Then another thing I saw that troubled me before this game; Last week I was on the 247sports boards and I saw these ND fans talking about how horribly OVERRATED Ed Warriner is.

They talked about how he's a horrible recruiter and that he didn't develop OL as well as he should have and now ND isn't missing on these top tier OL prospects since they've gotten rid of him. I don't know how much of this to take with a grain of salt, but after we failed to open up holes against Navy & VA Tech along with failing to give our QB more time in the passing game, I'm wondering how much of it is fan hyperbole and just how fortunate we were to have an OL of which all 5 guys (in the last two years) are in the NFL that just so happened to make him look better than he actually is.

Chris Ash's Defense did the damn thing. VA Tech's offense largely came on broken plays in which they had enough common sense to KEEP MOVING THE POCKET. Every time VA Tech tried to stay in the pocket we sacked them or caused a turnover. So for the rest of the game, VA Tech rolled out and kept our D line chasing until something opened up down-field.

When your offense can't sustain drives and convert 3rd downs, then on top of that, losing the field position & special teams battle, then this is what happens.

Urban Meyer need's to really evaluate if he has the right guys - either that, or we have to really consider whether Urban's own successes, in part, have been a product of having stellar coordinators throughout his career.

This is a forum post from a site member. It does not represent the views of Eleven Warriors unless otherwise noted.

View 54 Comments