Ohio State Safety Jaylen McClain Stepping Up As Vocal Leader in Second Season As Starter

Reasonable enough that a reporter asked roughly that to sophomore cornerback Devin Sanchez, who is expected to step into a starting role this season. It didn't take him long to give a name.

"Jaylen McClain," Sanchez said. "Jaylen has been real vocal out there. He's talking, he's leading the secondary. If somebody messes up on the coverage, he makes them right. So I feel like it's definitely Jaylen McClain."

After playing alongside Caleb Downs and excelling in his shadow for a season, McClain has absorbed lessons on leadership from Downs and is embracing the challenge of finding his own voice.

"I feel like losing Caleb and Sonny, they were like the lead communicators on the team and on this defense," McClain said. "So, just working on being more vocal, making myself be heard on and off the field."

Downs' unsurprising successes overshadowed a sensational sophomore season from McClain. An underrated recruit, he burst on the scene with 53 tackles and three pass breakups as a sweeping strong safety for Ohio State, laying the lumber whenever he got the opportunity.

Jaylen

Jaylen McClain breaks up the potential Ohio reception.

: Peacock pic.twitter.com/XQdqmMZNEd

— Ohio State on BTN (@OhioStateOnBTN) September 14, 2025

Don't let those big hits distract from the fact that McClain was a bedrock pass defender in Ohio State's No. 1 pass defense, too. Per Pro Football Focus, McClain received 27 targets from opposing offenses throughout the year. He allowed just 15 receptions for 84 yards and no touchdowns. That's 3.1 yards per target. The worst passing offense in all of college football last year, UMass, still managed 4.8 yards per pass attempt.

"Reps every day in practice," McClain said of what fueled his success in 2025. "Coach allows us to be in those situations a lot. And I guess I excelled because of the reps every day in practice."

Now an upperclassman at Ohio State, McClain's first look about the halls of the Woody Hayes Athletic Center this offseason found him gazing upon a lot of new faces. Fifty-one, to be exact, when the Buckeyes' transfers and freshmen are added together. 

"I feel like this was a big (offseason) because we were trying to find our identity," McClain said. "Obviously, we have a lot of new guys come in. Not a lot of people knew what the culture was and what it's like to be in this type of environment in the Ohio State weight room. So just finding that identity, seeing what people could do, making people grow. And I'd seen a lot of growth by the end of the winter."

Vocal leadership isn't something that comes naturally to McClain. He's a quieter person off the field, a man of few words in press conferences – though there's often still meaning in what he says. Still, it's pushed him beyond his comfort zone to take the mantle of communication that Sanchez noted he has.

"It's been something I've had to work on," McClain said. "I feel like, all the coaches and the staff, they challenged me to work on that and get better."

Replacing voices in the secondary has been a general emphasis for safeties coach Matt Guerrieri, so seeing McClain step up in such a way must be a confidence boost.

"Communication has been a huge stress of ours, right? A stress point for me to the guys," Guerrieri said. "I'm not saying it in a bad way. But your main communicator was Caleb Downs, right? You guys saw it; you couldn't even hear what he was saying, but you saw the directing of traffic and the way that it moves and things like that.

"So we're brutally honest with the guys. Here's the situation we had going forward. Here's how we look right now. OK, what do we have to replace? Communication, right? If you walk into our defensive back room, Matt Patricia is the one who says this, ‘Communication is your–’ ‘Job’ is the way they respond, right? That's their job. That's their livelihood. So if we have to communicate at a high level, we have to fill the shoes of guys who have communicated, which we've done already this spring."

Cornerback Jermaine Mathews Jr. and defensive end Kenyatta Jackson Jr. are now the only two Ohio State defenders with more experience as Buckeyes than McClain. Knowledge makes it easier to communicate. It brings confidence. It allows for a quick trigger.

"It makes it a lot faster, obviously, because you're able to expect things, see things and be able to communicate things out to other people so other people can play fast as well," McClain said.

McClain knows the voice Ohio State needs him to have. He'll keep pushing this offseason to make it louder.