Welcome to the Skull Session.
Arthur Smith: loves tight ends, hates tights.
Arthur Smith Mic'd Up pic.twitter.com/3mXc4mXLv7
— Eleven Warriors (@11W) April 1, 2026
Have a good Thursday.
ALIENS AND LAB EXPERIMENTS. With the NFL draft in three weeks, MOCK DRAFT SZN storms on.
As always, I don’t want to flood the Skull Session with a million mocks — just enough to keep you in the loop. This one technically centers on The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman, but the real value is the #content he gathered: anonymous coach quotes on Ohio State’s top prospects.
Those prospects: Arvell Reese, Sonny Styles, Carnell Tate, Caleb Downs and Kayden McDonald.
First, the projected landing spots:
- Arvell Reese → New York Jets (No. 2)
- Sonny Styles → New York Giants (No. 5)
- Carnell Tate → New Orleans Saints (No. 8)
- Caleb Downs → Cincinnati Bengals (No. 10)
- Kayden McDonald → Houston Texans (No. 28)
Now, the good stuff — what coaches are saying:
Arvell Reese: “An alien”
“They asked him to do a ton, and he’s elite at everything that they asked him to do,” said a Big Ten offensive coach. “He’s playing stack linebacker better than the guy who only plays stack linebacker, and then he goes to edge and rushes the passer better than the guys who only have to rush the passer. He’s setting the edge and is just as good as guys who are 40 pounds heavier than him. Then, he’s covering just as well as the nickel and Caleb Downs are covering.
“This guy is an alien. And he’s clearly very smart because he’s doing so much for them. He’s playing that ‘adjustor’ spot, which is what they call that position in the (Bill) Belichick tree. You’ve got to be really smart to play that spot. I think he’s incredible. I hope he goes somewhere that is going to be aggressive in how they use him. The same way as Mike Macdonald with (Nick) Emmanwori and Dallas was with Micah Parsons.”
“Man, he is super impressive,” said a Big Ten offensive coordinator. “They did so much different stuff defensively. He was so dangerous as a spy. He is really freaky. He’s different.”
Sonny Styles: “Created in a lab”
“On the film, he’s massive,” said a Big Ten running backs coach. “They just stuck Sonny in the middle and let him roam. He was really good and he can fly, but you didn’t feel him as much as you did Arvell.”
“He’s a beautiful athlete, like he was created in a lab. He looks like a power forward,” said a Big Ten OC. “I just can’t believe he was a safety, but you see that frame and that closing speed, it’s impressive, man. He’s not the same kind of player (Reese) is. He doesn’t have that kind of violence to his game, and I don’t know if he’s that instinctive out there.”
Carnell Tate: “Smooth and polished”
“He’s really smooth and polished,” said a Big Ten DB coach. “He’s not (Jeremiah Smith) where you’re just floored by his size and physical ability. Tate’s a very good wide receiver. I do wonder about his top end, and I didn’t think he was as quick as some of the other top guys they’ve put out lately. If he played at Minnesota or Michigan, I’m not sure if people are talking about him as a top-five or top-10 pick.”
“I like him. He runs really good routes and he finds a way to get behind people,” said a Big Ten DB coach. “But he doesn’t scare you. He’s not a speed threat. We didn’t roll coverage or anything, and we probably still wouldn’t if (Smith) wasn’t on their team. I hear people saying he’s gonna go top-10. I don’t think he’s top-10 good, but I don’t think this is a good draft.”
Caleb Downs: “An extremely high floor”
“Instincts-wise, he’s elite,” said a Big Ten assistant coach. “His zone awareness is as good as I’ve seen. But he doesn’t play man-to-man. I didn’t see him covering anybody and that alarmed me. They used him very well. You don’t see him making plays in the deep part of the field.”
“He has an extremely high floor,” said a Big Ten offensive coach. “I think he’ll start immediately and you won’t have to worry about him. He’s really smart and consistent, a good tackler, but I don’t think he can cover well enough in man on a legit slot or one of these freaky tight ends in the NFL.”
Kayden McDonald: “Heck of a player”
“He’s a heck of a player,” said a Big Ten OC. “He was so physical, tough and violent, and he can run better than you’d think.”
Caleb Downs might be the most undervalued player in this entire group. The critiques (mostly about his man coverage) feel a little nitpicky when you consider how dominant he is everywhere else. He processes the game at an elite level, rarely takes a false step and consistently puts himself in position to make plays. In a league that increasingly values versatility and reliability on the back end, his floor is incredibly high — and there’s still room for growth in his game. He may not be the flashiest prospect in this class, but there’s a strong case he ends up being one of the most impactful.
No matter where Downs and the others land, it’s clear Ohio State is about to have another massive NFL draft showing. Reese and Styles feel like the headliners, but the range of opinions on Tate and Downs is what makes this class especially interesting. Either way, if these quotes tell us anything, it’s that the Buckeyes aren’t just sending talent to the league — they’re sending guys coaches can’t stop talking about.
HE AIN’T EVEN STRETCH DOE. This week, Ryan Day appeared on This Is Football with Kevin Clark and shared a hilarious story about the moment Sonny Styles essentially forced him into basketball retirement.
“Well, it started when he was in seventh or eighth grade because we were recruiting Lorenzo, his older brother,” Day said. “I remember it was really the last time I ever played basketball one-on-one. We were having an event before camp started, so we went to the basketball area and were messing around. And he took two dribbles and dunked on me. And that was the last time I played basketball.”
Electric story from Ryan Day: He retired from basketball when an eighth grader dunked on him. The brother of an older recruit. It was Sonny Styles.
— Kevin Clark (@bykevinclark) April 1, 2026
A great scouting report on one of the best draft prospects a GREAT This Is Football with @ryandaytime. ESPN2 today. pic.twitter.com/4RBHM4gOm9
Just like that, Ryan Day retired. Not due to age, not due to injury — but because a middle schooler put him on a poster.
Of course, this is the same Sonny Styles who went on to become a national champion, a Block O recipient and one of the standouts at the 2026 NFL Combine. In between the dunk and those accomplishments, he was terrorizing opponents on the hardwood at Pickerington Central, throwing down dunks left and right alongside teammates like Devin Royal.
So no, it’s not exactly surprising Styles got the best of Day. Still, getting dunked on by a seventh grader is probably enough to make anyone quietly pack up the sneakers for good.
SNATCHED THEIR CHAIN. USA Today’s Matt Hayes dropped a column this week that had me cheesin’ from start to finish. Titled “Big Ten has stolen SEC mojo, and isn’t about to give it back,” it makes one thing painfully clear: the Big Ten isn’t just competing with the SEC anymore — it’s running the show.
From football to basketball and even baseball (yes, baseball), the now coast-to-coast conference is planting its flag everywhere the SEC used to claim as home turf.
Here’s how it began:
It’s undeniable now, a straight gangster move in this Wild, Wild West era of college sports.
The Big Ten has stolen the SEC mojo.
Better teams, better players, better stories. Better present — and more potentially damning — better future.
…
This is a paradigm change five years in the making, running parallel with the explosion of NIL and free player movement. This is the Big Ten flexing, and the SEC retreating.
Here’s how it continued:
Kill it, then eat it.
…
The Big Ten already has the better media rights deal, and delivers more money to a majority of its member institutions (not all of the newbies) than the SEC. The Big Ten has the bigger television markets, and the ability — though not yet realized — to dominate ratings.
There’s the possibility of an all-Big Ten final in the NCAA Tournament, which hasn’t happened since the Big 12 did it in 1988. If you think that’s crazy, hold on to your tall glass of sweet tea.
For the love of all things Ess Eee See, the Big Ten currently has the No. 1 ranked team in college baseball — a sport the Big Ten didn’t give two flips about prior to expansion. Before, that is, beginning this cutthroat philosophy of kill then eat.
And here’s how it ended:
About the same time May's Wolverines advanced to the Final Four for the first time since 2018, LSU was announcing the return hire of former disgraced coach Will Wade. The school trumpeted the move on social media by comparing Wade ― the multi-level NCAA cheater ― to Napoleon, and calling him, "General."
"We're coming back to try to hang a banner, win a national championship," Wade said, "Or I'm going to be the first coach fired from the same school twice."
Tell me you’ve stolen the SEC’s mojo without telling me.
Brilliant. Just brilliant. The Big Ten snatched its chain — and it looks a whole lot better on the B1G than it ever did on the SEC.
I’m smiling through it all. I can’t believe this is my life.
A TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE. YouTube is great. Want to relive your favorite childhood cartoons? There’s a video for that. Want to learn how to fix your car’s air conditioning? There’s a video for that, too. There’s also a video of Ohio State’s greatest plays since Ryan Day came to Columbus as an offensive coordinator in 2017.
So many good memories!
SONG OF THE DAY. "Fool's Gold" - Buffalo Traffic Jam.
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