Skull Session: Ohio State Recruiting Expands, Kyle Young Arrives on Campus, and the Many Hats of Kerry Coombs

By D.J. Byrnes on June 23, 2017 at 4:59 am
Joe Burrow makes a face for the June 23rd 2017 Skull Session
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Another blessed Friday. If you're tripping about the time between now and football season, try and remember good things come to those who wait.

This time next year the Buckeyes and Browns will be in the first year of a dynasty the bards will sing about for 10,000 generations.

Just wait on it.

ICYMI:

Word of the Day: Cupidity.

 DAT LIFEBLOOD. As a Buckeye fan, it befuddles me whenever a talented #teen earns an offer from THE Ohio State University and his first reaction is to tweet about it, thank God, tweet a thanks to God, or anything else that isn't immediately accepting and dedicating their lives to the Scarlet and Gray.

Woody Hayes didn't stand for that nonsense. He'd corner them in a Chuck E. Cheese or wherever and wouldn't let go of a prospect's handshake until they agreed to serve in his militia.

Unfortunately, Urban Meyer can't operate like that with these Generation Z snowflakes.

Instead, Meyer erected a psychological warfare department (from two staffers in 2012 to 10 today) to convince the best young football players in America it's in their best interest to come play for the local team.

Like most departments within multimillion-dollar ventures, it's a 24/7/365 operation spearheaded by Director of Personnel Mark Pantoni

From cleveland.com:

Seven years ago when Jim Tressel was the coach and Meyer was at Florida, the recruiting coordinator position was just assigned to one of the nine assistants. For Tressel, it used to be tight ends coach John Peterson. 

Now you have GM Pantoni -- who has his fingers in everything from prospect communication to coaches' travel to visit itineraries to film breakdown -- and an entire team dedicated to film breakdown, videos, graphics, marketing and social media. 

[...]

"When it comes to our personalized graphics, we don't always just want to send a kid a picture of him wearing an Ohio State jersey and holding a Heisman," [New Media Director Zach] Swartz said. "We want to really individualize these graphics and cater to exactly what they like. It's personal. We want to get to know them. If a kid wants to be a cop one day, we want to know that and build a graphic around it." 

Though you can't do much without money, it doesn't solve all problems. You need a vision behind it, and Meyer's program brings that too.

From 247 Sports recruiting insider Barton Simmons:

Hopefully, Meyer is writing a manual on all this for the next coach, who should enjoy those same financial benefits as long as he wins like expected.

 NEW FRESHMAN ARRIVES. When 2018 four-star Kyle Young of Massillon Jackson announced his flip from Butler to Ohio State, new Buckeye head coach Chris Holtmann said his immediate goal was getting Young enrolled at the greatest university in the history of the world.

It appears Young matriculated Thursday.

Look for some pictures later today of Young in the Scarlet and Gray to surface from Ohio State basketball's suddenly resurgent Twitter account.

 A KERRY OF ALL TRADES. Urban Meyer promoted Kerry Coombs yesterday. On top of being a recruiting boss, there isn't much Coombs won't do for the team this fall:

As assistant to the defensive coordinator, gotta think Coombs will have the first interview for the vacant defensive coordinator position when Schiano inevitably bounces for a head coaching job after this season.

 EMPEROR OF JAPAN BUYS NEW TRANSPORTATION. Akita Northern Happinets center Evan Ravenel upgraded his car this week:

Since-deleted on Insta

Looks slick, but cars are terrible investments. Makes my palm sweat thinking about spending that much on something that drops in value the moment it exits the lot—an anxiety I solve by not having that kind of money.

Still, if you're looking for for a Janapese B.League team, look no further than the Happinets:

 BEEEEEERT. Bert Bielema is that guy you hated as a youth but his life became so pathetic you felt bad about the animus so you absolved him of previous sins before forever exiling him from your mind.

Bielema is 25-26 in four years at Arkansas. After losing six games last year, Bert wants his enemies to know he's finally cracked the code.

From coachingsearch.com:

“You learn more by experiencing the failures once you get there,” he said. “I thought I had it all figured out in the Big Ten. Won a lot of games, three straight championships, hadn’t done that in 30 years. I could have stayed there and done it forever. I wanted to do something that had never been done before. I wanted to put something on my back that we could do.

“We’re going to get there, but the tribulations I’ve learned were from the failures we experienced. The only way you’re going to learn is going through them.”

If we're playing the "tag yourself game," I'm the petty statistical bragging of "hadn't been done in 30 years" like they were national championships and not conference championships. Plus, he lost to the 2011 Ohio State team so it's hilarious he thinks he could've "done it forever."

Let's hope Arkansas flames out this year and he can return to the Big Ten next year as a position coach. The conference was better when everybody hated him instead of Rutgers.

 THOSE WMDs. Mourners remember Otto Warmbier at hometown funeral... Opinion: Chiropractors are bullshit... How New Zealand maintains its rugby dynasty... Ideas from the father of modern stem cell biology... Your #teen doesn't hate you; it's just summer.

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