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How Much Will Ohio State's Special Teams Improve In 2024? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Welcome to Buckeyes Tomorrow morning for Tuesday, June eleventh. I'm your host,
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  Tom Moore. The Akron game is in eighty one days. The game against
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  Michigan in one hundred and seventy two days. This Ohio State football season,
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  we have been talking about it basically since the moment last season ended. Is
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  probably one of the most anticipated Ohio State football seasons in recent memory and maybe
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  ever. And it feels like we have talked about just about everything that has
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  to do with this season. But then Tony Gerderman wrote the latest episode edition
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  of his fifty to fifty series looking at a bunch of different elements. We've
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  talked about this on the show before. National storylines, Ohio State specific storylines,
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  big games, all that kind of stuff, and he wrote about the
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  interesting scenarios around the Ohio State special teams this year, and I thought,
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  you know what, that is very interesting, and we haven't talked really at
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  all about the special teams. It feels like that's a little bit underreported by
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  everyone, even as we micro focus on all sorts of different pieces of the
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  Ohio State football teams. So we're going to talking about the special teams today.
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  Maybe some other stuff welcoming in Tony and Tony. This is a really
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  really interesting area because it's an area that has gotten a lot of attention from
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  Ohio State football fans in recent years, generally not for great reasons, and
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  then this year it's gonna be run in a completely different way than it has
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  been in previous years because you don't have a special teams coordinator there anymore.
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  So it feels like this is an area where this could go any of a
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  million different directions. Is does it go great and then it's okay, well,
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  now you just you had to have all these different people focusing on it,
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  or does it go terribly and it's oh, you need someone who really
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  really has to micro focus on this thing. It feels like this is an
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  area that could go just about any way possible this year. Yeah, I'm
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  with you. And the thing is when you have notable special teams, it's
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  either because they're great or they're terrible. You don't want to be you know,
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  I'd say it's better to not be known for them and just fly under
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  the radar because if nobody knows that, that means you're doing pretty well,
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  because you're either going to be frank Beemer at Virginia Tech, where they're known
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  for blocking kicks way back when, and that's something that's their staple. That's
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  what they people have come to expect, or what Ohio State has been the
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  last few years, where you're just waiting for that one gaff, that one
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  special teams thing that shouldn't happen, whether it is not everybody getting the signal
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  for a fake punt, or a linebacker leaping over the line trying to block
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  a crucial kick when that's an illegal type of play. You know, all
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  kinds of different things that we've seen over the years, and I saved myself
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  from going back and remembering all of them and digging them back up. We
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  talk enough about the ninety eight Michigan game, and you know this game and
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  that game. We don't need to drag up all of the terrible memories for
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  Buckeye fans. But you know, you can go back to the losses pretty
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  much and just find specific moments in the special teams that had that gone as
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  it was supposed to, things may have turned out differently. Yeah, and
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  you know you talked about the one, you know, the person not getting
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  the signal about a fake punt. Or the you know, there was there
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  was a time when they were going to do that in the Peach Bowl and
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  they had twelve guys on the field and Georgia called time out, and yeah,
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  there was. It has been a bunch of miscommunications, it seems like,
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  over the last couple of years on special teams, and then this year
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  they're taking a very different approach. Parker Fleming, who was the special teams
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  coordinator no longer there. He was let go at the end of last season,
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  and instead of having a new guy who's just the guy in charge of
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  special teams, they've kind of divided up the units, so you have some
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  of the position groups, some of the position coaches in charge of punt coverage
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  for example, or kickoff return. That feels like it's potentially potentially going to
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  be a really beneficial thing because you get a lot of different people looking at
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  it, and you probably bring some different ideas together and you can, you
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  know, this time of year, roll stuff around and go back and forth
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  and spitball ideas and then see whether it works on the field. It feels
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  like that is maybe a interesting and positive way to approach this, but there's
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  certainly no guarantees and you know, when you look across the landscape of college
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  football, there are very big and successful programs that have a special teams guy,
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  and they're very big and very big programs that don't have a dedicated,
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  you know, ten countable assistant special teams guy. It just feels like this
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  could go, you know, a couple different directions, just depending on how
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  these you know, how the coaches sort of mesh together, and how much
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  time they're dedicating to this. Yeah, and I think we probably probably should
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  separate special teams from the kicking specialist, because really the coordinator, a specially
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  teams coordinator isn't coaching up the kicking. They have their own personal coaches and
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  other coaches for that. So you're you're gonna have a new punter. The
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  kicking has been pretty good over that span. It's been everything else that has
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  been the issue. And whether the kicking is as good as it was last
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  year or worse, that's just how it's how it's going to be. But
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  I would expect the actual special teams portion of things, the coverage and the
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  returning to be to be better, because can it not not going to get
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  worse? But like, at some point you've you've changed, You're getting rid
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  of the coach that wasn't living up to what they were expecting, So you
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  would expect things to get better in that in that area. And that's kind
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  of what I'm expecting. Now, what does that mean? I think if
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  you just eliminate the mistakes, you're automatically better. But there's that that's that's
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  just an easy baseline. Really, like do you want to make the special
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  teams into a weapon? Brian Day talks about how it's one third of the
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  game. You got offense, you got defense, and special teams, and
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  yet they have been so passive with their special teams over the years, where
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  you know, the return game is not part of what they do. It's
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  fair catching punts and everybody just takes a touch back now and gets the ball
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  to twenty five. There's there's no aggression there. There's very little coaching that
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  goes on because you're not doing anything. So I think there's room to become
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  a more aggressive team and special teams and you know that's coverage, that's blocking,
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  that's you know, blocking kicks, just offense, defense of the special
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  teams area. And now that you've got more guys involved and more guys taking
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  ownership of it rather than one one guys the coordinator who maybe I don't want
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  all of this falling on my head. I don't want to do I don't
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  want to be blamed for this or that. You've got more guys that are
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  looking to make something happen. Maybe and now you're you're gonna be equipped to
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  do that. Yeah, well, we'll see how that all shakes out.
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  It is an interesting point that the kicking was not really covered under the Special
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  Teams coordinator because when you go back and think about the kicking, really,
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  if you look at field goal kicking for example, really there are probably two
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  misses that really jump out to you, and one of them was at the
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  end of obviously the Peach Bowl, where Ohio State was probably a little bit
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  passive and settled for too long of a field goal, and then at the
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  end of the first half at Michigan last year where Ohio State was maybe a
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  little bit passive and settled for a long field goal. And other than that,
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  it feels like Jaden fielding has been pretty good. Noah Ruggles was pretty
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  good before him. This year. You mentioned the punter. Obviously you have
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  swapping out one Australian for another. So we will see how Nick McClarty fills
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  in for Jesse Murco's shoes at the punting spot. But yeah, how you
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  wonder, how does this year's offense, which should be pretty good but is
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  not going to have a CJ. Stroud quarterback necessarily there, how does that
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  change the approach to special teams because I think one of the reasons they've been
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  a little passive in the kick return game Tony is that it was kind of
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  well, just give the ball to c J. Stroud and let him,
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  you know, throw, throw you down the field and you'll score. You'll
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  score touchdowns pretty much every time, so it doesn't really matter where you start.
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  Just make sure you don't turn the ball over. Last year you didn't
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  have c J. Stroud and the offense, you know, at times,
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  did not put the ball in the end zone. This year you're probably more
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  of a Kyle McCord ish passing game, I mean, the running games it
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  should be substantially better, but you know, you're probably not going to have
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  a c J. Stroud quarterback. So you wonder how does that maybe factor
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  into the aggression in the kick return and punt return games. Yeah, I'm
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  with you. There's you're gonna have to find as many yards as you can
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  get. And when you had we've talked about this in the past, when
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  you have Dwayne Haskins and Justin Fields and C. J. Stroud, seventy
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  five yards is pretty easy to come by. When you don't have those guys,
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  it might be easier to go get sixty five yards instead and try to
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  get out past the twenty five yard line. And really, we have seen
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  so little from Ohio State in that regard. They had one thirty yard kickoff
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  return last year, nothing over forty yards, one of just a few Big
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  ten teams. And you know, the kickoff return has been taken away,
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  has been voluntarily taken away by coaches, and so I thought maybe we would
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  see more of it last year because of the change in offense. We did
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  not, and now I wonder if we will simply because you have new coaches
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  involved in giving their feedback. But it's still the head coach that decides,
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  no, I want to do this. No, I don't want to try
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  to kick to the two yard line and pin them at the fifteen. Let's
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  just hear you know, because really that's been eliminated as well, So you
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  just try to be like, you know what, let's just start every possession
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  at the twenty five and go from there. And I think there's room to
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  grow. When you have the weapons that Ohio State has, should be able
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  to use them. And then the special teams in the return game. You
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  use them in the coverage game, why not use them in the return game
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  effectively more effectively. Yeah, you look at USC and like Zion Branch last
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  year being a fresh true freshman kick returner for them and making some electric plays.
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  It's like Ohio State has some pretty good playmakers on offense and that they
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  have not that is not necessarily translated to special teams. We will see how
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  it translates the special teams this year, and then we will see how that
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  maybe translates to special teams next year if the and if the NCAA follows the
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  NFL's change to the kickoff rule, and that might change everything in the strategy
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  to kickoff returns all all over again. But that's that's next year's problem.
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  They're still this year to look forward to. So that special teams, you
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  did also very briefly mention you you're doing these these positional matchups. These individual
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  matchups to watch this year, and there was one that really jumped out to
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  me, Julian Fleming versus Denzelberg. Now, of course, last year that
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  was a matchup that would have happened on the practice field that the Hayes Athletic
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  Center. This year, that's going to be happening at Beaver Stadium. Julian
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  Fleming, the former five star number one overall wide receiver, played three years
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  at Ohio State and then transferred to Penn State. This year, he will
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  be getting the ball thrown to him by Drew Aller instead of Kyle McCord,
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  and he's can be matching up with Denzel Burke. And I think, you
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  know, you look at that Penn State team, they're going to have to
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  be able to throw the ball if they want to beat Ohio State. And
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  they're a little thin at wide receiver. They've lost, they've lost a couple
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  guys to the portal. That feels like if Julian Fleming has a big day,
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  Penn State has a chance to win that game. And if Julian Fleming
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  doesn't, they're going to have to really probably scratch and claw to try and
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  get to twenty twenty four twenty seven points. Yeah, and you know Ohio
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  State's going to go into that game looking to stop the run of Nick Singleton
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  Kateron Allen. So how that matchup goes with Julian Fleming is going to be
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  pretty key. And if if they can get a couple a couple of scores
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  there over Denzel Burke or Davis nigbinosn whomever, that's gonna obviously help them.
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  And so if I just wonder over the last three years that Denzel Burke has
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  been at Ohio State, when they've been together, like how many times have
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  those guys gone against each other? And they're probably sick of seeing each other.
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  So they'll get to do it one more time in Happy Valley, probably
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  a noon game time. We'll see, we'll see what Fox decides on that
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  one, but certainly a fun matchup where they know each other so well and
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  they'll know all their little tricks, all of their tendencies, and so it'll
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  be interesting to see who wins that one because I honestly, you look at
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  the success that Ohio State has had in Happy Valley, any of those games,
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  a lot of those games could have gone either way just from a couple
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  of plays here and there, So that matchup I think is going to be
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  one that will be fun to watch and really really key in how that game
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  turns out. Yeah, that's going to be one that will, yeah,
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  as you said, not only be key to how that game turns out,
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  but also just be an interesting narrative storyline to talk about as we head into
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  that. Starting as you were talking, I always thinking, Hey, wonderf
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  Penn State's going to bring Julian Fleming to Big Ten Media Days. That would
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  be fun to get a chance to talk to him for an extended stretch at
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  some point this summer before the season gets rolling. We will be there at
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  Big Ten Media Days in what six weeks or so, and then we'll be
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  at Penn State in I don't want to guess how many how many weeks,
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  probably one hundred and thirty ish days or so, that is right at the
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  end of October, as Tony said, probably in noon kickoff. Nothing official
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  yet, but we'll be there for that one. We'll be there for all
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  of them this year, and it should be a pretty entertaining year, pretty
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  exciting year for Buckeye football and a pretty exciting year at Buckeyehuddle Dot com.
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  up just after Father's Day, So if you were looking at becoming a member,
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  us, learn more about the team, get some inside information on recruiting and
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  the team, and all that fun stuff all at Buckeyhuddle dot com. That'll
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  do it for today. Thank you guys all for joining us. Have a
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  great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.