It probably rains diamonds on Jupiter.
No one has ever gone out there to check it out and confirm, but all the conditions are right for a never-ending Zales shower just outside of humanity's reach. Infinite wealth is just a six-year spaceship journey away!
Our solar system's gas giants are sexiest beasts in the galaxy. It's fun to think about but...Jupiter? We've never even been to Mars, which would take less than a year to get to. There are more accessible options for our precious resources.
And besides, by the time all of that planning is completed we would be looking at six years of space travel in each direction. No one has the damn time for that. Jupiter can keep its infinite gems.
I thought about those diamonds while sitting in the Miami section of the Cotton Bowl on New Year's Eve at halftime, staring at a 14-0 Hurricanes lead which felt insurmountable. Jayden Fielding had come out of the locker room ahead of the rest of the team and was awkwardly practicing field goals while TBDBITL was still performing its Stranger Things-themed halftime show.
Opposing kickers have been booed in Ohio Stadium for being less intrusive. Fielding was determined to get a few extra swings in before the 2nd half. This extra practice session could involve dodging a flugelhorn here or a mellophone there - which, hey simulated pressure isn't a bad thing.
I love the band, but wasn't disciplined enough to resist watching Fielding, despite that being an activity I've fruitlessly wished away for well over a year. Why am I still being forced to watch the program's all-time leader in most missed clutch kicks? Unanswerable question which now belongs to the cosmos. Say hi to Jupiter while you're up there.
College football players, from defensive ends to placekickers are NOW rented mercenaries on one-year contracts.
He teed up a football for what looked like a 37-yarder, since setting up shop beyond the 20 would have definitely breached TBDBITL's performance. Nearly 10 full seconds after staring down the ball, he began his operation. Took his steps and then planted his left leg while hammering the ball with his right.
It didn't look great coming off of the tee. The ball sailed toward the right upright and slammed into it, doinking off and bouncing toward the Miami sideline. TBDBITL's formation, unshaken, then marched toward the opposite endzone allowing Jackson Courville - Fielding's backup, now also out of the locker room - to set up a longer field goal. I didn't catch exactly where he placed his ball.
After a much shorter windup and operation, Courville sent a perfect rainbow, end-over-end, gliding right between the uprights with plenty of length to spare. In statistics parlance, n=1 and this was an inadequately powered observation.
But in football parlance, I had just watched a guy who missed six field goals over Ryan Day's last six losses - spanning three seasons! - bork a perfectly-centered attempt off a tee. Courville's rainbow didn't matter.
His futility wasn't reserved just for those rare games Ohio State loses. Fielding also missed field goals in victorious nailbiters against Penn State in 2023 and Nebraska in 2024. He had already missed the chance to put the Buckeyes on the board in Dallas prior to his halftime practice session.
— Random Ohio State Play Every Day (@OSUPlayEveryDay) January 2, 2026
The world where Fielding is a reliable kicker on a bright stage isn't the one any of us live in. That world is about six years away by spaceship, where it probably rains diamonds. Now that he's out of eligibility, we no longer have to use Hope as a special teams strategy. At least for field goals, anyway.
Matriculation was seemingly the only path he had to losing his position as the Buckeyes' field goal kicker. Winning the job during practice did not translate into winning on the field in clutch time. By the time the Cotton Bowl began, no reasonable person was expecting Fielding to ride off into the sunset having proven everyone wrong. Which would have been a big stage fluke.
Courville arrived back in May via the portal with an impressive resume which included multiple 50-yard field goals - something no Ohio State kicker has accomplished since Blake Haubeil did it at Northwestern in 2019 during a game the Buckeyes won by six touchdowns.
He would be in line to succeed Fielding next season, except that he is now back in the portal seeking to become some other team's mercenary. Courville leaves Ohio State having scored four points, all on PATs in games where the Buckeyes had insurmountable leads. At press time, Ohio State does not have a kicker.
But this is less about kickers or the program's chronic special teams liabilities over the past six seasons than it is about understanding when it's time to turn the page on a person or idea that's simply not going to happen.
College football players, from defensive ends to placekickers are rented mercenaries on one-year contracts. The guy who gives you the best chance to win in the moment is the guy who has to play in that moment. The n for Fielding in big moments was as significant as it was downright atrocious. It takes about 10 seconds in a stat sheet to see ah this guy struggles with long kicks and pressure, definitely avoid field goals in those games.
Playing him was a triumph for feelings over logic, since there is no record of Courville's performance at Ohio State in similar moments. Hoping Fielding would finally figure it out after falling apart time after time was as productive as chasing theoretical diamond showers on Jupiter. Ohio State had more accessible options for its precious resources. It should have tried literally anything else.
OHIO STATE LOST JUST SIX GAMES OVER THE PAST THREE SEASONS, BUT THOSE LOSSES INCLUDED SIX MISSED FIELD GOALS BY THE SAME KICKER.
It wasn't just at kicker. Tegra Tshabola being allowed to stay on the field - even in a rotation - was another triumph for feelings over logic. He was consistently confused, beaten, spun around and defeated. Merely phasing in substitutes didn't serve those backups, Tegra or the offensive line.
Winning in practice didn't translate to games. He's in the portal now. Hard decisions are hard!
Day has a mixed bag when it comes to moving on from players and coaches. He extended Parker Fleming when he never should have been retained, but to his credit he also told Kyle McCord after one season he would have to compete to win the job he had throughout 2023.
Hard decisions are hard - and Devin Brown was never playable, while Will Howard's ability in Day's offense was still murky and unknown. (hi Kyle's dad - if you are still reading the site, you can stop now - and no one is going to read your messages).
Jim Tressel benching senior Todd Boeckman early in 2008 to the dismay of the program's upperclassmen - especially then-junior Brian Hartline - was hard, especially since it meant freshman Terrelle Pryor, who had not been on campus long enough to have a coalition of support, would be running the offense.
But it sent the right signal to the team. And that's bigger than any single player's feelings.
Nick Saban abruptly benched his quarterback Jalen Hurts in the middle of the 2018 CFP final, which ultimately led to two things: Hurts transferring to Oklahoma and Alabama coming back to win that championship game. The loyalty and commitment in the non-Disney version of college football we're cycling through a quarter of the way through this century is to winning teams. But but but but he's earned it is how teams lose.
If it feels harsh, consider that a third (!) of all D-I football players from this past season are currently in the transfer portal. You don't have to like that, but it doesn't mean coaches should turtle and acquiesce to the way they wish things used to be. Ohio State just spent three seasons retaining and playing a kicker who failed in so many big moments it's almost cartoonish to revisit them all.
And they brought in Courville because they already had a strong read on the incumbent's performance in big moments! But they never gave him a chance. You cannot simulate the moments Fielding shanked under bright lights in any practice, or even while TBDBITL is performing at the Cotton Bowl.
That also doesn't mean anyone should forfeit empathy for the player, who was given a series of fantasy moments aspiring kickers fabricate in their backyards as children, lining up to make a game-winner in front of the whole world and then watching the football careen off the swing set instead of clearing it.
We were all rooting for him. But once it was clear he wasn't Him, it should have been Next Man Up.
Second and even third chances have to be permissible. But what Ohio State just did with its field goal operation went six years into space beyond that - and while Fielding's missed field goal was not the margin of defeat that sent the team home earlier in the tournament than anyone imagined, his retention as starter is a symptom of a larger condition.
In business, hiring well and firing well are equally important - because doing either poorly leads to bankruptcy. In football, recruiting and demoting are symbiotic. If a team doesn't have anyone playable behind the guy you're trotting onto the field, it's the staff's fault. And if that guy keeps failing in games but winning in practice, same story.
Doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result was not a winning formula for the Buckeyes' field goal operation. Next time, move on faster. Jupiter can keep its infinite gems.
