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Ohio State Recruiting: Will 2027 Be Larry Johnson's Best Class Ever? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Buckeyees tomorrow morning for Tuesday, June thirtieth. I'm
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  Speaker 1: your host, Tom or the ball State game in sixty
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  Speaker 1: the screen to check out the menu and make a
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  Speaker 1: reservation today. All right, we're going to welcome in Tony
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  Speaker 1: Gerdaman off Buckeye Insiders dot com because Larry Johnson has
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  Speaker 1: done it again, just landed a five star commitment in
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  Speaker 1: the two four to seven composite from Marcus fat Katou.
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  Speaker 1: Tony Gerdaman just joins me. Now he did an instant
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  Speaker 1: reaction show on the Buckeye Weekly Feed. But Tony, just
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  Speaker 1: for people who haven't heard that one yet, just give
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  Speaker 1: us sort of the thirty second version of what Ohio
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  Speaker 1: State's getting here.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a thirty second version I'll say he's got
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  Speaker 2: the frame kind of enters Ohio State with the same
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  Speaker 2: kind of frame as Cam Hayward when he was a
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  Speaker 2: true freshman, like six six two sixty five, two seventy
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  Speaker 2: and will continue to grow and as a guy that
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  Speaker 2: can he plays defensive end now could certainly outgrow that.
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  Speaker 2: And I think I think he can play defensive end
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  Speaker 2: a don't Ohio, especially in an odd man front where
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  Speaker 2: he's an end in the the the penny front with
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  Speaker 2: the five lineman, but maybe he has like an outside
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  Speaker 2: linebacker outside of him yet. And also he can slide
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  Speaker 2: in on passing downs. He's just we saw him in
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  Speaker 2: person at one of these spring visits, I think, and
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  Speaker 2: you're looking at him and you're like, he looks like
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  Speaker 2: he can still add weight because he's he's not slim,
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  Speaker 2: but he's not heavy. And so there's there's a lot
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  Speaker 2: that Mickey Muradi can do there.
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  Speaker 1: Comping him to Cam Hayward got me thinking. And so
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  Speaker 1: if he has a career, an NFL career as long
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  Speaker 1: as Cam Cam Hayward's, he would still be in the
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  Speaker 1: league around twenty forty five. So take one second to
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  Speaker 1: wrap your head around that, all right, Deep breath and
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  Speaker 1: we're moving on. The question on today's show is is
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  Speaker 1: this potentially the twenty twenty sixth class going to be
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  Speaker 1: Larry Johnson's best recruiting class since he's come to Ohio
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  Speaker 1: State and Larry Johnson first showed up in twenty fourteen.
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  Speaker 1: The answer, I think might be yes, but we're going
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  Speaker 1: to show our work here and we're also going to
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  Speaker 1: sort of give you the caveat that if these guys
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  Speaker 1: are signed yet. Yes, there's a long way to go
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  Speaker 1: until signing day. Yes, recruiting rankings can change. Yes, this
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  Speaker 1: will maybe also potentially hinge on whether they can add
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  Speaker 1: one more guy to this class. But let's just run
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  Speaker 1: through the class right now as it is. DJ Jacobs
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  Speaker 1: number one overall player in the class. He is a
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  Speaker 1: five star. He's currently committed to Ohio State. Marcus Fuckatou,
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  Speaker 1: as we said, number twenty six player in the class,
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  Speaker 1: five star, currently committed to the buck Eyes. Wyatt Smith
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  Speaker 1: number eighty two, four star, currently committed to the buck Eyes.
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  Speaker 1: Prince Goldsbat number ninety six, four star, currently committed to
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  Speaker 1: the buck Eyes. The potential that's four guys in the
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  Speaker 1: top one hundred currently committed to Ohio State and I
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  Speaker 1: went back to the twenty fifteen twenty fourteen class. That
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  Speaker 1: would be the first time that Larry Johnson has had
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  Speaker 1: four top one hundred players in one recruiting class. If
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  Speaker 1: these guys alster kids, stay committed, if they all stay
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  Speaker 1: ranked where they are, yes, we know, don't worry. We
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  Speaker 1: understand the fifth potential piece to this class as Carlos May.
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  Speaker 1: All four of those guys are at least sort of
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  Speaker 1: projected as edge guys. Do need someone inside. Carlos May
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  Speaker 1: is the potential fifth piece of this class. He's currently
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  Speaker 1: ranked number one thirty two in the nation as a
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  Speaker 1: four star Tony. If they can get him, that would
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  Speaker 1: give them five top one fifty players in this recruiting class.
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  Speaker 1: That is something he has never done. Larry Johnson has
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  Speaker 1: never done at Ohio State. If he can do that
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  Speaker 1: the closest they came. Do you know you want to
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  Speaker 1: give a guess to which recruiting class would have been
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  Speaker 1: the closest they've come to having five top one hundred
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  Speaker 1: and fifty players in one defensive line recruiting class.
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  Speaker 2: I boy, that's a good one. I will say I
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  Speaker 2: can't even remember because I was jotting some stuff down,
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  Speaker 2: and I think I only started. I don't know that
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  Speaker 2: I counted any five defensive line classes. How about this,
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  Speaker 2: Let's say twenty seventeen.
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  Speaker 1: That is a very good guess. It is not correct.
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  Speaker 1: They only had a couple guys you remember in the
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  Speaker 1: top one fifty that year. You're remember twenty seventeen because
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  Speaker 1: it was Chase Young, and Chase Young maybe you should
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  Speaker 1: count as two or three guys, having now seen his
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  Speaker 1: full career. But twenty eighteen is the closest they've gotten.
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  Speaker 1: And that's if you include Javonte Jean Baptiste, who was
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  Speaker 1: listed as an outside linebacker but was recruited with the
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  Speaker 1: idea that they were going to have to sort of
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  Speaker 1: force feed him peanut butter sandwiches for a year before
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  Speaker 1: he could be a defensive end.
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  Speaker 2: And you could say the same thing about Goldsby in
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  Speaker 2: this class.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, yeah, absolutely, And they narrowly missed that. Tyler
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  Speaker 1: Friday was the fifth ranked defensive lineman in that class.
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  Speaker 1: He was ranked one hundred and fifty fourth. The rest
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  Speaker 1: of that class was Tron Vincent number thirty four. He
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  Speaker 1: was just missed being a five star. Tyreek Smith number
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  Speaker 1: fifty eight, Tami Togii number ninety two, Javonte John Baptiste
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  Speaker 1: number one twenty seven, and then Tyler Friday at one
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  Speaker 1: fifty four. The other class that you look at in
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  Speaker 1: terms of depth, in terms of four guys being ranked
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  Speaker 1: in the top one twenty five, that would be the
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty one class. JT. Tuoy Mooloow number two, he
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  Speaker 1: was a five star, Jack Sawyer number six, he was
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  Speaker 1: a five star. Mike Hall number thirty seven, he was
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  Speaker 1: a four star. KYLERK Williams number two one twenty four,
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  Speaker 1: he was a four star, And that one is sort
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  Speaker 1: of the gold standard of recent defensive line classes at
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  Speaker 1: Ohio State. Obviously, three of those guys were really really
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  Speaker 1: key parts of that national championship season that the Buckeyes
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  Speaker 1: had in twenty twenty four. If you're looking at that
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  Speaker 1: kind of season, and that has been one of those
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  Speaker 1: seasons where we've talked about that on message boards recently
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  Speaker 1: where it's you know, people look at that and go, well,
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  Speaker 1: obviously you're not going to have a class like that, again,
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  Speaker 1: that's not realistic. It seems like they're actually on track
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  Speaker 1: to potentially do that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the interesting thing is here. You just
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  Speaker 2: shared two classes, very highly ranked, one with five guys,
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  Speaker 2: and when you look at those names, you're like, well,
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  Speaker 2: how many of those guys were as successful as their
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  Speaker 2: rankings would have suggested they should be, and the number
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  Speaker 2: is low. Whereas you look at the twenty twenty one class,
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  Speaker 2: and those guys all contributed, all started at times, so
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  Speaker 2: you see that. The for the people who say, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: recruiting is I'm not going to buy it, it's like, well,
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  Speaker 2: the twenty twenty one class shows that it's okay to
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  Speaker 2: buy it. The twenty eighteen class shows that keep the
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  Speaker 2: receipt that sort of thing, and this class I feel
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  Speaker 2: like you just said something a couple of minutes ago
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  Speaker 2: about Larry Johnson never doing something before and possibly doing
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  Speaker 2: it now. If you're saying that and we're approaching something
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  Speaker 2: that Larry Johnson has never done, that means something to
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  Speaker 2: me because he's been around a while and he's done
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  Speaker 2: a lot, He's sent a lot of guys to the NFL,
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  Speaker 2: he's had some really good classes, and if you're going
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  Speaker 2: to tell me that based on these rankings, that's something
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  Speaker 2: that he's never done. Assuming everything goes as people think
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  Speaker 2: it may then I'm I'm going to be impressed by
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  Speaker 2: that for sure, and I think that's going to be
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  Speaker 2: a huge thing for Ohio State. Now, will it be
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  Speaker 2: more twenty eighteen or more twenty twenty one, We'll see,
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  Speaker 2: But I'm saying it's okay to be excited about a
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  Speaker 2: class that Larry Johnson has brought in that ranks higher
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  Speaker 2: than anything he's ever done before.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, Larry Johnson has been around long enough. That has
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  Speaker 1: never happened before. Mean something this is not has never
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  Speaker 1: happened before. Asterisk sample size of three seasons. This is
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  Speaker 1: a guy who's been around for a long time and
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  Speaker 1: has done it at a pretty high level for a
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  Speaker 1: long time. And if you're looking for another reason to
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  Speaker 1: be encouraged, I'm just going to read you the top
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  Speaker 1: fifty one fifty defensive lineman that Ohio State has recruited
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  Speaker 1: since we'll go go back to the twenty nineteen class.
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  Speaker 1: So the twenty eighteen class we just read that they had.
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  Speaker 1: In twenty nineteen, they had Zach Harrison, who played out
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  Speaker 1: as a career five star, had a really good, solid
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  Speaker 1: career off to the NFL did not recruit one in
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty twenty twenty one. You know those names, four
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  Speaker 1: guys who had very good careers at Ohio State off
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  Speaker 1: to the NFL. Twenty twenty two, they had two top
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  Speaker 1: one hundred guys, Amari Abor who transferred and didn't pan out,
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  Speaker 1: and Kenyatta Jackson who very much did. And then four
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  Speaker 1: top one fifty guys. So those two plus Hero Canoe,
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  Speaker 1: who had a decent creat Ohio State transfer to Texas.
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  Speaker 1: Still he's going to be an impact player there, and
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  Speaker 1: Cayden Curry who had a great finish, just finished up
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  Speaker 1: a great career at Ohio State. Twenty twenty three, Jason
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  Speaker 1: Moore was the only top one hundred guy. He still
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  Speaker 1: has another year left at Ohio State. The other guys
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  Speaker 1: in the top one fifty Cayden McDonald who just wrapped
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  Speaker 1: up his career and Joshua Mickens who ended up transferring.
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  Speaker 1: And then twenty twenty four one guy top fifty that
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  Speaker 1: was edarck Houston. Twenty twenty five. Two guys in the
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  Speaker 1: top one fifty Zion Great in Episitanola twenty twenty six,
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  Speaker 1: Pari Wilder was a top one hundred and Emmanuel ruffin
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  Speaker 1: top one fifty. The thing that jumps out to me there,
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  Speaker 1: Tony is. They've had lots of guys, trended, lots of
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  Speaker 1: guys over the years. They lost an entire defensive tackle
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  Speaker 1: class a year ago to the transfer portal. But it's
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  Speaker 1: these guys that we're talking about, the sort of blue
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  Speaker 1: chip guys, Top one fifty guys. Boy, there are not
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  Speaker 1: a lot of misses there. Jason Moore is still you're
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  Speaker 1: kind of grading him in complete. Joshua Mickens didn't pan
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  Speaker 1: out a mari a Board, didn't pan out everyone else there.
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  Speaker 1: Those are names that have at least been you know, okay,
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  Speaker 1: you give him if you're grading in pass fail. Those
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  Speaker 1: are all passes at the very least.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. For all of the credit that Larry Johnson gets
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  Speaker 2: as a recruiter, he also gets credit as a developer.
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  Speaker 2: And that's that's the perfect kind of thing that you
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  Speaker 2: need with your position coaches, where it's not one or
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  Speaker 2: the other. It's not somebody who's always fighting from the
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  Speaker 2: ground up because he can't recruit, but he can develop.
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  Speaker 2: And he's going to turn this two star South Dakota
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  Speaker 2: quarterback into an eventual fifth year defensive end. He's not
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  Speaker 2: going to take a number three player in a nation
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  Speaker 2: and turn them into an undrafted free agent on a
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  Speaker 2: regular basis. So he can do both of those things
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  Speaker 2: and the results are there. So I think it's this
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  Speaker 2: is always a home run higher for urban Meyer, and
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  Speaker 2: it was a home run retention for Ryan Day, and
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  Speaker 2: it hasn't always gone perfectly, and it's not going perfectly
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  Speaker 2: now that you mentioned. Twenty twenty, nobody in the top
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  Speaker 2: one fifty, and so there's some fluctuations. But the way
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  Speaker 2: things are going now, when you're able to go into
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  Speaker 2: anywhere now California, the Deep South doesn't matter, and you
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  Speaker 2: have equal footing, then Ohio State's going to have some
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  Speaker 2: intrinsic just advantages there.
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  Speaker 1: And just to sort of round out the exercise, the
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  Speaker 1: twenty seventeen class, Chase Young was the number four player
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  Speaker 1: in the nation, a five star. Haskell Garrett number seventy four,
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  Speaker 1: a four star. Twenty sixteen, that was the one of
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  Speaker 1: the classes where they had two five stars this year,
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty one and twenty sixteen, those are the three
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  Speaker 1: years they've had two five stars committed. That was Nick
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  Speaker 1: Bosa number ten overall, Jonathan Cooper number thirty two overall,
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  Speaker 1: also had Malik Barrow in that class number sixty three,
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  Speaker 1: and then Larry's first full class at Ohio State was
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  Speaker 1: Draymont Jones number sixty eight a four star, Jayshawan Cornell
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  Speaker 1: number ninety eight a four stars. So there you go.
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  Speaker 1: The question could this be Larry Johnson's best recruiting class
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  Speaker 1: at Ohio State? The answer is if things stay as
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  Speaker 1: they are right now, yes, If they add Carlos May,
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  Speaker 1: definitely yes. There's still a long way to go till
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  Speaker 1: signing day. We will be going all that way to
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  Speaker 1: Have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.