Latest / Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning / Ross Fulton Analysis: How Will Caleb Downs Impact Ohio State's Defense In 2024?

Transcript

Ross Fulton Analysis: How Will Caleb Downs Impact Ohio State's Defense In 2024? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

• 0:00
  Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning for Monday, January twenty second. I'm your host,
• 0:04
  Tom Moore. The Akron game is in two hundred and twenty two days.
• 0:07
  The game against Michigan in three hundred and thirteen days. On yesterday's show,
• 0:11
  we brought in our buddy Ross Fulton, one of the ex's and osgurus
• 0:14
  at bucke huddle dot com, to talk about Bill O'Brien and some changes that
• 0:18
  could be coming to the Ohio State offense, how that new addition to the
• 0:21
  staff could change things for the Buckeyes in terms of stuff during the week,
• 0:25
  stuff during the game, schematically, all that kind of stuff. Now we're
• 0:29
  going to focus on the other side of the ball. Another big addition that
• 0:32
  happened at Ohio State over the weekend or on Friday anyway, and that is
• 0:36
  the addition of Caleb Downs through the transfer portal, freshman All American safety from
• 0:40
  Alabama now a sophomore potential All American safety at Ohio State. One of the
• 0:46
  biggest transfer portal additions outside of justin fields maybe in the transfer in the Ohio
• 0:52
  State transfer portal history. We're going to bring Bross back now to talk about
• 0:57
  that and the impact on the defense. And as always when we talked to
• 0:59
  Raw, yes, we are probably sponsored by Jeff Ruby Steakhouse, who probably
• 1:03
  offers nationally acclaimed USDA Prime stakes, seafood and sushi and pickable service, live
• 1:07
  entertainment, and an attention to detail that is simply unmatched. Just go to
• 1:11
  Jeff Ruby dot com slash Columbus, you check out the incredible menu and make
• 1:15
  a reservation today. All right, So let's talk a little bit about Caleb
• 1:19
  Downs. Obviously, he was a safety at Alabama. He is going to
• 1:23
  be a safety at Ohio State. But Ohio State has really three safety positions
• 1:27
  if you count that Nickel spot. So Ross, where does Caleb Downs fit
• 1:33
  in in the Jim Knowles defense? Where does he where is he gonna end
• 1:37
  up playing? Yeah, I mean it's you know, it's obviously to your
• 1:42
  lead in there in terms of like comparing to Justin Fields. I mean,
• 1:45
  he's not a quarterback, but I mean Caleb Downs is a great football player.
• 1:49
  Like he was great as a true freshman. It was really impressive.
• 1:53
  Now he's got to be probably one of the better players in college football the
• 1:56
  last few years. So for his position. So Caleb Downs could pretty much
• 2:00
  do whatever Gymerals wanted him to do. I'm sure though, that he will
• 2:06
  play the you know, quote unquote adjuster or field safety's position where Josh Proctor
• 2:10
  played this year. You know, that puts Latham Ransom at bandit or boundary
• 2:15
  safety, which is where he's been fits his skill set in terms of coming
• 2:20
  down the hill. You have Jordan Hancock as your nickel, and so you
• 2:24
  know, you get a full time like perfect fit. Here's my there,
• 2:31
  you know, borrow from the Yeah, got it, buddy, Thank you?
• 2:37
  Sorry about that. You get a basically like a perfect fit right for
• 2:40
  that spot, and it allows you to do so much like yes, he
• 2:45
  could be your deep middle of the field safety if you want him to.
• 2:46
  I mean, he has spent them past year and save Nick Saban's you know
• 2:51
  system, so lots of cover four pattern matching, you know, single high.
• 2:55
  It makes it very easy for Ohio State to adjust to motion because there's
• 3:01
  a lot of versatility there between he and Lathan Ranson in terms of like if
• 3:06
  you know, you switch sides, Moranson becomes a deep safety, Caleb Downs
• 3:09
  comes down, and so it fits both really well within any I mean,
• 3:15
  Cave Downs gets play any kind of coverage scheme. But I think it fits
• 3:19
  well with the one of the few areas where there was a question mark personnel
• 3:23
  wise next year in terms who would be that field safety. The other guy
• 3:29
  who was sort of in the mix to potentially be that field safety this year,
• 3:32
  Malie Hartford. Of course he is will obviously still be there for the
• 3:36
  spring and we'll see how this impacts his future at Ohio State. But you
• 3:39
  know, he was he played as a freshman as true freshman as well some
• 3:43
  which is very impressive to be able to be in that spot even as much
• 3:46
  as he was, and then Caleb Downs played even more as a true freshman.
• 3:51
  So a couple of good, good options there for Ohio State, and
• 3:53
  with the playoff coming and potentially playing as many as sixty games. If you're
• 4:00
  going through and you're playing the Big Ten Championship game, and you win the
• 4:03
  Big Ten Championship game and you go to the College Football Playoff and you get
• 4:06
  all the way to the National Championship, I mean, that's just a lot
• 4:09
  of football. So having multiple options there is not a bad thing. It
• 4:13
  also allows them with the return of Lathan Ransom, which I think is a
• 4:17
  really underrated piece in terms of the safety puzzle for this year. But also
• 4:21
  you add Caleb Downs, that means maybe Ohio State has also added a five
• 4:27
  star linebacker by the name of Sunny Styles to its roster because Sunny Styles played
• 4:30
  safety a lot last year, but he may now now, if you're comfortable
• 4:34
  with your safeties, that may allow him to play a little closer to the
• 4:38
  line of scrimmage, which may fit not just his body type, but his
• 4:41
  game may be better as well. Yeah, so okay, we you know,
• 4:47
  when they lost Lathan Ransom, as we've talked about, like that had
• 4:50
  a big impact on the defense, particularly in the amount that they were willing
• 4:55
  to play man coverage or use single high schemes. They were a little bit
• 4:59
  more protective Sunny Styalus because you know, people like to say, like,
• 5:03
  yes, I agree with the premise, Like I think it's pretty obvious by
• 5:08
  bringing in Caleb Downs that they want Sonny Stealas to play linebacker. Like we
• 5:12
  do have to remember that prior to Ransom's injury, Sunny Styles was in fact
• 5:15
  playing linebacker, right, Like, yes, he was at the quote unquote
• 5:18
  Nickels spot, but how they were using him versus heavier personnel is basically as
• 5:23
  a SAM linebacker right now. That being said, I don't think it's the
• 5:29
  best use of their personnel to have him and Jordan Hancock split reps depending on
• 5:33
  twelve or eleven personnel. Like, to me, Jordan Hancock's one of their
• 5:36
  best football players, and it was really good as a nickel both not just
• 5:43
  in coverage, but he's really physical and was really good in run support.
• 5:46
  And so I don't think that they should go back to that time share.
• 5:50
  I mean, I think Sonny Style should move to world linebacker, which I'm
• 5:54
  sure is what they have in mind. Obviously, that's the probably now with
• 5:58
  Caleb Downs at free safety now the one place on the defense where there's even
• 6:03
  like a question mark or open competition. But I just generally believe in them
• 6:09
  getting smaller on defense or you know, in the sense of like moving guys
• 6:14
  from corner to safety, safety to linebacker, et cetera. So I think
• 6:16
  this fits with it. But like they have such good dbs. Now to
• 6:21
  your part about Hartford, I mean this applies to Jermaine Matthews too, that
• 6:27
  you know, they have a couple of sophomores who I think are going to
• 6:30
  be players. And flashed on a true freshmen who are sort of gonna have
• 6:32
  to wait their time. But I think one way to deal with that you
• 6:34
  mentioned the number of games. I also think they should use you know,
• 6:40
  be you know, pretty liberal and using it dime packages to get those guys
• 6:45
  on the field, because I mean, especially you have you know, we've
• 6:47
  talked a lot about wanting to diversify the scheme, but the reality is that
• 6:51
  the guys they have now, I mean, they could run comfortab one great
• 6:55
  a big chunk of the time and be really good at it because just you
• 6:59
  have really good corners, you have two really good safeties, and then if
• 7:04
  you're playing sunny styles a little linebacker, you know, you have someone with
• 7:08
  some safety skills at the second level who can do a lot of things.
• 7:12
  And so that does, you know, have some similarities of like what the
• 7:14
  Cleveland Browns have done this year in terms of the personnel. But yeah,
• 7:18
  but I think, I mean, in terms of styles, I think it,
• 7:20
  you know, the writing's on the wall that he's going to play linebacker.
• 7:25
  Talking about him playing being a will linebacker with some safety skills, it
• 7:29
  kind of takes me back to the Pete Warner days where Pete. They used
• 7:31
  Pete Warner in that kind of role a little bit, and it allowed them
• 7:35
  to be a little more creative, and it was sometimes like, why is
• 7:38
  Pete Werner the deep safety on this play? And it didn't happen a lot,
• 7:41
  but you can kind of get away with it sometimes. We were asked
• 7:45
  on the Friday Live Show, right as the Caleb do Downs news broke,
• 7:49
  you know, does this mean o Higo state it's going to play more single
• 7:51
  high go back to, you know, the Kerry Combs type defense. And
• 7:57
  I said, you know what, I'm just gonna have Ross on the morning
• 8:00
  show and I'll ask Ross my my thought at you know, as we were
• 8:03
  answering it, I sort of said, I'm expecting this is going to allow
• 8:07
  them to be a little more diverse in what they do and you can kind
• 8:11
  of pick and choose whatever you want to do. Is that what you're expecting
• 8:13
  to diversify the scheme? Or does this I mean, like you said,
• 8:18
  you maybe can get away with just kind of playing the you know, the
• 8:22
  cover one. What are you expecting the impact of this debate? I mean,
• 8:26
  I guess the irony you say is both could be true, right,
• 8:28
  Like you have a veteran, very talented defensive backfield that could do a lot
• 8:31
  of things, have done a lot of things. I actually do think that
• 8:37
  they will probably play more single high certainly than they were at the end of
• 8:41
  last year, because again, like you want to take advantage of your talent
• 8:45
  and like you have guys that can man people up, and like, you
• 8:46
  know, for as much as we've sort of seen the downsides, and like
• 8:52
  like any other scheme, if you do something too much right, offenses can
• 8:54
  exploit it. But like it is in fact true that like if you can
• 8:58
  man people up and play single high and bring an extra body in the box,
• 9:03
  you could be it's pretty tough as a def against opposing offenses. Like
• 9:07
  again I use the Cleveland Browns an example from this past year, where you
• 9:11
  know, they had three really good corners. They had styles like linebacker and
• 9:16
  you know, could bring him on the edge and then you could play four
• 9:20
  down and bring a lot of pressure up front. So I do think that
• 9:22
  they will probably if I had a guess, I bet they play a majority
• 9:26
  of Cover one. But that said, like like the Cleveland Browns, like
• 9:28
  eventually you get exploited if you do that too often. So this does give
• 9:33
  them the ability to change it up, and like we've seen, you know,
• 9:35
  Knowles increasingly change it up. So I mean, I do expect some
• 9:39
  Cover two you know, hopefully if they're going to continue to use Cover four
• 9:43
  concepts, they get a little bit more aggressive with them and a little bit
• 9:46
  more diversified and just that soft Cover four that we saw against Michigan. But
• 9:52
  you know, they were a really good defense this year with and now they're
• 9:54
  both bringing everyone back and have added an All American at safety. So you
• 10:01
  know, I mean, I really don't think it's like pervoctly to say it
• 10:03
  could be like to be one of the best defenses the Ohigho States ever had.
• 10:09
  Well, whenever we talk about, you know, the best defense is
• 10:11
  Ohio States ever had, everyone wants to know. Okay, so what defense
• 10:13
  is this going to be like, because you've seen some great Ohio State two
• 10:16
  thousand and two Ohio State defense was a great Ohio State defense that was very
• 10:20
  different than the two thousand and sixteen Ohio State defense. With the twenty nineteen
• 10:24
  Ohio State defense, so you know, I mean twenty nineteen, they don't
• 10:28
  necessarily have a Chase Young this season, but you know, is there is
• 10:33
  there an Ohio State defense from the past that you kind of think in terms
• 10:37
  of maybe results or just sort of personnel and what they're going to try to
• 10:41
  do that this maybe reminds you the most of Yeah, I mean, I
• 10:45
  think it could be kind of like those Jim Heacock defenses, more like in
• 10:48
  the later Trust years, but just with like the sort of the use of
• 10:52
  the four two five, you know nickel. I mean, Jordan Hancock is
• 10:56
  we can call him the corner, but he plays as well as like a
• 10:58
  nickel as like any of those you know, Tomorrow High and Tyler Moler guys
• 11:01
  did. But you know again, I just it's even hard because I agree
• 11:07
  they don't have a Chase Young, but like, I don't know, I
• 11:09
  mean, I'm expecting a lot out of JT and JOCKH. Sawyer next year.
• 11:13
  I mean, it's you know, I think they continue to continue to
• 11:16
  improve. I mean, Sawyer especially is on an upwork trajectory. I think
• 11:20
  it's going to be pretty tough for opponents, especially when, like you again,
• 11:24
  there's coverage is pretty much taken care of. But you know, in
• 11:26
  terms of defensive back talent, it's hard to even think of a comparison because
• 11:31
  you're talking about five guys that are you know, I guess you'd say probably
• 11:35
  Lathan Ranson is probably more like a Day two, Day three guy. But
• 11:37
  I think by the end of next year, like the rest of them are
• 11:39
  going to like you're looking at first or second round picks. So it's a
• 11:45
  pretty impressive group. So again, I do think it allows them to do
• 11:48
  a lot obviously, like you know, hopefully they continue to even while basing
• 11:54
  and cover one, like expand the package and you know, view some of
• 11:58
  the pressure in the you know, sim pressures and you know, take advantage
• 12:03
  of styles as a linebacker, particularly a third down like I still think he's
• 12:05
  probably seemed the most comfortable this year as a blitzer or more most impactful,
• 12:11
  I should say. And so you know, I do think, I guess,
• 12:13
  if you're going to pick an area where the defense is like sort of
• 12:16
  a question market is linebacker a bit. I thought Cody Simon played very well
• 12:20
  this year and played well as a MIC in the convols, So you know,
• 12:24
  I don't think there's a concern there, but I do think, you
• 12:26
  know, obviously, if you're moving Sonny styles, that raises a few question
• 12:30
  marks. And then you know, I think we'll see whether you use someone
• 12:33
  like a CJ. Hicks as the you know, the the often discussed never
• 12:37
  seeing Jack roll and whether you know, again, I think it gets into
• 12:41
  like, do you want to do that? Because with Jack at JT and
• 12:46
  Kan Curry and Kenyatta Jackson like, you could very easily sit and four down
• 12:50
  and you have four really good defensive ends that you could play that plenty.
• 12:54
  But do you want to mix it up and use the jack and then bump
• 12:56
  JT inside? So there are a lot of possibilities there that depending on you
• 13:01
  know, I think they can be really good doing either. But I do
• 13:03
  think with more games behoove them to mix those kind of things in. All
• 13:09
  right, Well, there's a little bit of stuff for all house date football
• 13:13
  fans to be excited about these days. And if you're not sure what I'm
• 13:16
  talking about, just go ahead and rewind this about a minute and a half
• 13:18
  and listen to the last minute and a half until you figure out what I'm
• 13:20
  talking about. But boy, would be a pretty interesting Ohio State football season
• 13:24
  this year. We'll they are getting ready to start winter workouts, and of
• 13:28
  course we'll be covering all the spring ball that usually starts early March. Spring
• 13:31
  game will be probably mid April, one of tho Saturdays in mid April.
• 13:35
  I don't think the've announced the date yet, but boy, there is a
• 13:37
  lot of stuff going on right now. Oh yeah, there's a lot of
• 13:41
  stuff going on. And recruiting, Oh yeah, maybe they may they may
• 13:43
  not be done in the transfer portal. Oh boy, would this be a
• 13:46
  great time to be a member of buckeyehuddle dot com where you get access to
• 13:50
  our team coverage, recruiting coverage, excess and those coverage I'll see huddle bard
• 13:54
  presented by Jeffruby Steakhouse. Fantastic, very active, very enthusiastic community right now.
• 14:01
  That is all at bucket huddle dot com. Also, just guys,
• 14:05
  listen. I'm just gonna tell you this once. I know it's January twenty
• 14:09
  second. Valentine's Day is not that far away. So guess what happens with
• 14:15
  fantastic restaurants around Columbus. They fill up, the reservations fill up on Valentine's
• 14:20
  Day, and then you look like a dope, like can we do something
• 14:22
  off the dollar menu? Know that is not what you want to do.
• 14:24
  Valentine's Day's right around the corner. You want to go to Jeff Ruby Steakhouse,
• 14:28
  the award winning upscale steakhouse in downtown Columbus in one of the top fifty
• 14:31
  steakhouses in America. Buy Food Network, make your Valentine's Day reservations right now,
• 14:37
  just right now, Jeffruby dot com slash Columbus. You'll thank me later
• 14:43
  that we'll do it for today. Thank you guys all for joining us ever
• 14:45
  a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.