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The 5 Buckeyes With The Most On The Line This Spring · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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Welcome to Buck Eyes tomorrow morning for Sunday, March third. I'm your host,
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Tom Moore. The Akron game is in one hundred and eighty one days.
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The game gets Michigan in two hundred and seventy two days. The start
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of spring practice, well that's just two days away. We're gonna be talking
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about Ohio State spring practice again today. We're gonna be doing it with our
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buddy Tony Gerdamantfuckeheddle dot com. Now I'm gonna tell you that the title or
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the idea of this show, and you're gonna say, wait a minute,
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didn't you guys do this last week? And the answer is no, But
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hold on, Thank you for listening. We always appreciate the feedback. Today's
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show is the five Buckeyes with the most on the line this spring. Right
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now, you're saying, you guys did that show last week? No,
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no, no, no, no, that was the nine buck Eyes with
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the most approved. So those are guys who played fewer than one hundred snaps
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last year. Today, mostly guys who played more than that, But it's
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also guys who are you know, it's not quite their last chance or their
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last best chance, but it might be in their best interest to have a
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real good spring and lock up a starting spot right now, because there's probably
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talented folks behind them, or this might be kind of a last opportunity for
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them. So we're gonna be talking about five of those guys and Tony.
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We're going to start at the quarterback position with Devin Brown. Devin Brown was
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locked in a positional battle last summer with Kyle McCord, ended up falling behind
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McCord at late in camp, McCord won the job. Brown played a role
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at times, kept getting hurt, finally got the starting nod in the Cotton
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Bowl, got hurt, and now Ohio State had brought into transfer quarterback Will
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Howard. It feels like if it's going to happen for Devin Brown, it
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should really happen pretty soon. Yeah, it's you think back to it only
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takes a couple of bad days for a quarterback to lose a job if it's
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that close. And from what we were told last year, it was as
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one week it was Devin Brown, next week it was Kyle leccord. What
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if that week where Kyle ercord took over towards the end of camp, Devin
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Brown would have stayed where he was. What would the situation at quarterback be
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this year if Brown and that started all last year, what would he have
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done? Would Ryan Day have felt compelled to go into the portal? And
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of course the other question is would Ryan Day have gone into the portal if
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Kyle McCord hadn't gone into the portal? And so now that Ryan Day has
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gone into the portal for a quarterback, it's one of those situations where Devin
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Brown viewed himself as the starter going into the Cotton Bowl, which he was
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probably viewed himself as the starter coming out of the Cotton Bowl, which he
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is not yet, And he was always going to have to win a job
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in fall camp. But he still will have to do that. But you
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don't want to fall behind a transfer in the spring, and they certainly don't
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want to fall behind later on because if you fall behind right now and the
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first batch of practices, the first fifteen practices, that will Howard is a
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part of how are you going to keep him from just blowing past you in
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the summer and then in fall camp as well. So this is a spring
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is going to be huge for Brown to not only establish himself as the quarterback,
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but to also maintain some sort of distance from Will Howard and it's going
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to be difficult, but it's also going to push him to be better and
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to be a better quarterback. And so in that way it will benefit Ohio
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State just not even Will Howard starting or not just Devin Brown. Getting that
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competition is going to make him a better player. Will it be good enough?
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And the next guy we're going to be talking about is someone who's going
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to be potentially very closely linked to Devin Brown, and that is the guy
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who is snapping him the ball, and that is Carson Hinsman. Carson Hinsman
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is it's sort of in a very similar position to Devin Brown, where he,
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you know, late in the season and really all season, the center
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job was his and then he had a few bad days and lost the center
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job for the Cotton Bowl, and then Ohio State brought in a veteran transfer
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and in this case it's Seth McLaughlan, the center from Alabama. So Carson
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Hinsman now has the opportunity intentionally to win back the starting job and be the
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starting center for Ohio State for the second year. Or when you look at
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the fact that, much like will Will Howard, they just brought in another
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transfer, a veteran transfer, to give them, you know, at least
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a level of confidence and a level of surety there at that position. So
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this is another one where if Carson Hinsman comes out of the spring not as
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the number one center, it feels like that might tell you a lot about
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the fact that he's probably not gonna be the number one center this fall.
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Yeah, that's gonna be one of the first things I'm looking for when we
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get to see some of practice, perhaps on Tuesday in a couple of days,
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just seeing where is Carson Hinsman lining up, if they do still have
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them competing at center, or if they've already just decided to move on from
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that, because it sure felt like they moved on from it into Cotton Bowl
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when they didn't bother playing him and they put Matt Jones over there. And
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so there's a trend in these names we're going to talk about in terms of
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a here's a guy from the portal, a starter started like eight games in
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twenty twenty two, fourteen games last year for Alabama. He's coming to play
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center now. He is Seth McLaughlin has said, I can play elsewhere,
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I'll do whatever. But they've gone into the portal to get a center.
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So what does that tell you. That tells you that they that they didn't
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get enough from that position last year. And even though Carson Hinsman is expected
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to be better than he was last year, they want somebody that is better
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than that, and this is another instance of the competition will make him better.
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But I do wonder if there's even going to be a competition, and
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if the competition Hintsman might be at right guard, and maybe that doesn't happen
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right away, maybe that's practice seven or something like that. But it's something
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we'll both be watching for sure. Definitely definitely a couple. You know,
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they'll be very close together. So I guess we'll get a good chance to
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watch both of those in track them, and we'll keep an eye on that
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all throughout the spring. Next up is a guy in a little bit of
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a different position than Carson Hinsman and Devin Brown, and that is g Scott
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Junior. He is now in during his fifth season with the Buckeyes, and
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he is right now finally finally in line to be the starting tight end he
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started as a wide receiver transfer for the tight end and then was stuck behind
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Kate Stover, which no great shame in that Cad Stover is going to go
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out as one of the best tight ends in Ohio state history, So being
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the number two guy behind him, that's not so bad. So he comes
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in now after four seasons, twenty catches, one hundred and forty yards,
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two touchdowns. He's been a role player, and the question now, Tony
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is can he win that job and hold off a talented group of younger guys
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who are behind him who would also like to be tight end number one?
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Yeah, and it's I think I wrote this last week that the winner of
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the tight end position will be ever whoever is the best blocker of the group.
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And that has been something that's been a criticism of G Scott's Kate,
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which you would understand being a former wide receiver and having to become something that
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you were expected to be. But you went through this process. You've gotten
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better every year, but this is something that's still relatively new to you compared
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to everybody else in this competition. You go into the portal, you bring
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in Will Chasmeric, who you mentioned G Scott has twenty career catches. Kas
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America has had at least twenty catches each of the past two years. So
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even though he's like the six six, two d and fifty six pound blocking
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tight end, he's also been part of the passing game. And I will
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advise people to just he also ran a jet sweep last year in the Bowl
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game, to give you an idea of the different ways. He's not just
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a blocker basically, is what I'm saying. And he can be a downfill
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threat and that's something that we've always envisioned for g. Scott. Once the
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move got made, it was, oh, yeah, this is he's going
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to be one of these NFL type tight ends that are you know, in
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the passing game. And that has taken a long time. And you said,
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Cat Stover, an NFL tight end has been in front of him.
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Now you can see like you have all of this greed agree in front of
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you and you just have to stay ahead of the person coming over here,
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like Will Chasmeric or Jelanni Thurman, who's who eventually is maybe the best of
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the bunch, but he's still young. She Scott fifth year. Obviously,
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you don't want to get passed by by somebody younger. But also I think
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all of these guys have different skill sets, So then it just becomes you
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might see g Scott out there for the majority of the snaps or for more
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snaps than anybody else, but sometimes he's just going to be a blocker.
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Sometimes he's obviously gonna be the compliment to Kasmeric or perhaps kas America is the
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compliment to him, or they're both the compliment to Jelanie Thurman. Where you
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might be out there a lot, but that doesn't mean you were the target
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among the tight ends. So it's you know, I think we're all interested
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to see what he can do as a guy that is the number one target.
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Kate Stover was probably the number three target last year, which is a
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bump up. If can she Scott maintain that level of you are this high
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end the progress, We're going to call more plays like this because you're a
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higher in the progression, you are the first read well they be able to
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utilize them in that way, And I think that's what we've all en visioned
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for him, certainly what he's envisioned for himself and making the move. But
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again it's spring you better show that Yes, this is what I can do.
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And we always talk in the spring this is where the tight ends get
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involved in the passing game, so I won't be surprised to hear him talked
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about. Yeah. I think that's going to be one of the kind of
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low key, very interesting position battles because you've got a whole bunch of different
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dynamics there. You get the long time kind of tight end number two who's
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trying to earn that first string spot, Get the transfer guy, get the
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guy who was suspended all of last year. You've got the guy who was
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a really promising true freshman last year who you know, the athleticism is off
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the charts. There's a lot of interesting stuff to watch there. You got
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the long time walk on who has sort of fought his way onto the depth
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chart. And Patrick Kurd kind of doing the old Mitch Rossi thing. So
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a lot of interesting different pieces there to keep an eye on. That'll be
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a fun one to watch all spring long. On the other side of the
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ball, I've got two names here, and these are two guys who are
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on here for very different reasons. We're gonna start with Mitchell Melton, and
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he's I think the only one of these guys who was pretty much healthy all
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last year and honestly probably could have been part of the last show. He
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played less than one hundred snaps last year, so did Devin Brown, but
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that was a function of injury, not of depth chart. So Mitchell Melton
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is someone who for a couple of years now, we keep hearing the jack
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coming. He's gonna play the jack here we go, gonna happen any day
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now, keep waiting almost there. And then last year he played sixty three
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snaps. Obviously a very talented defense of the end room. We have really
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not seen the jack. I'm kind of that's a whole separate conversation that I'm
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sure we'll have at some point this spring. I'm just not emotionally ready to
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have it again without actually seeing it on the field. But Mitchell Melton,
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it feels like this is if it's going to happen for Mitchell Melton, it
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should start happening this spring. Well, and we hear good thing about him
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in camp. That's when he's at his best, because that's when he's actually
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getting reps and we don't get to see him during the season much. But
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he's an incredibly quick pass rusher, and obviously this is gonna be a deep
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group of defensive ends. And we've talked about, well we see the Jack
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this spring, and it's still up in the air. James Lord Nina says
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it's still part of the package, but I don't know if it's gonna be
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part of the package in the spring, and generally isn't. Obviously it wasn't
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last year. And so I think right now Mitchell Melton is probably the fifth
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defensive end and he's gonna have to hold off like Edrick Cuson, and if
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we're talking about the Jack, he's gonna have to hold off CJ. Hicks
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and perhaps RVL Reees. And so he's got some young guys bearing down on
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him, but there's some veterans ahead of him. And I know we've talked
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about J. T. Twey, Bolowow, Jack Sawyer probably don't need many
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reps this spring, so that's gonna be an opportunity for Mitchell Melton to get
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in there. You've got another young guy, Joshua Mickens in there that's gonna
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beginning his first spring. We'll see how he does. But yeah, this
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is a big there's a big moment for him. It says, well,
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he has probably one more year after this due to injury if he wants Mitchell
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Mountain. But you don't want to get passed by by younger guys, even
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though he essentially already has with Kayden Curry and Kenyatta Jackson. Injuries obviously have
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played a part in that. The lack of the position that they've kind of
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made for him has also impacted his playing time. And I know there's obviously
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Jim Knowles has talked very highly of him. There's a lot of loyalty there,
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There's a lot that we'd like to get him on the field. You
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just got to do it. And the spring is an opportunity for him to
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reassert and remind the coaches that, yes, they coach coach Jay, I'm
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here, I am ready, and I've I've pretty much mastered the defense in
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terms of knowing everything I need to know and knowing all of my roles.
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And I can keep your guys fresh, I can be fresh. And he'll
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have an opportunity to show a lot in this spring, I think, and
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someone else who has had an opportunity to show a lot on the field already,
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but who's still kind of in for a pretty important spring is Sunny Styles.
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He obviously played more than five hundred snaps last year as a safety.
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We talked to Ross Fulton about him on yesterday's morning show, so you have
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already heard a little whole bunch about Sunny Styles. But he's heading into a
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pretty big spring because there's a way this spring ends with him. If he
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chooses to stay at safety, he may be only a role player for this
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team. If he chooses to move to linebacker and ends up winning one of
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the starting linebacker jobs, well he could be potentially NFL draft eligible after this
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season and off to the NFL. As I mean, that's at least a
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possibility because remember en roll the year early. This is one Tawny. We've
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talked a bunch about Sunday Styles obviously this spring because he has been one of
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the most requested topics on this and pretty much every show and every message board
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around the Ohio state football sphere. But this is a spring that I think
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could go a couple very different ways for Sunny Styles, where you know,
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thence there, you know the athleticism's there, and it's just a matter of
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can they find a spot where he can take advantage of all of that.
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Yeah, and that's probably gonna be the number one position. Everybody is watching
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just to see where he is lining up, and at least with you know,
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I said, we'll be watching Carson Hinsman. They're all going to be
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warming up as offensive lineman, so you really won't be able to know what
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he's doing until they line up in the five. With sunny styles, we'll
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be able to know right away, okay, he's still in safety. The
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next time we're in okay, he's still in safety. And then the first
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time we see him he is like, oh, lining up in the linebackers,
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everybody's gonna be on their phone, you know, texting or tweeting it
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out, or don't tweet it from practice it's not allowed. But right away
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you'll have an idea. And I understand they like the novelty or the rarity,
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the uniqueness of having somebody that big at safety. But the reason you
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don't generally have somebody that big at safety is because it's a liability and coverage.
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And see pictures of him, he still listened at six four two thirty,
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I would be I do not believe he is still to thirty. If
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you look at some of the pictures that Ohio State is putting out, he
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looks like a linebacker. Not that he hasn't always looked linebacker ish, but
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the way he's looking right now and the availability for playing time to the positional
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availability now they may want to have him do a bunch of or several different
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things. I just how many snaps are available to him at safety and can
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he be so versatile that sure on first down he is at nicol and on
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second down he's at will. I don't know if that's asking too much of
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him or if we're just making more of it than we need to. So
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yeah, I have no idea what's going to shake out there. I think
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obviously we've talked about it in the past. His best option, I believe
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is to move to linebacker full time. We'll see how long that takes to
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maybe that's already been dude, Ryan Days talk just said then we'll talk about
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it. They'll talk to the family about it. Matt Gerary and James Lauren
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Nidister both said, you know, we'll see how it goes. So Tom,
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we'll see how it goes well. We will see how it goes and
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we will see how it goes starting on Tuesday, when we're there for the
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first spring practice of the season. We actually have some sort of sneak preview
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interviews coming on Monday as well, So it is going to be a week
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filled with Ohio State spring football content. Pray it's not quite football season,
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but it's almost football season. It's a type of football season, and this
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type of this time of year, we'll take it. That is that's pretty
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good. So we will be there for all of that good stuff this week,
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and we hope you guys can join us at buckey Huddle dot com to
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talk about it all. Tony, Kevin and I covering the team, Mark
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covering recruiting, our whole team of ex's and those gurus making you a smarter
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football fan, telling you what they're seeing and what it all maybe means all
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at bucke huddle dot com and also, of course we'll have all those interviews
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at YouTube dot com slash bucke Huddle as well. Make sure you're subscribed there.
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We'll try and get you some camp video coming this week. As Tony
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said, no tweeting from practice. We got we got rules to follow,
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but there is we will. We are usually able to give give you some
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practice video as well, so get a little sneak peek inside what is going
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on at the Woody Hayes f Botec Center all this week at bucke huddle dot
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com. Then we'll do it for today. Thank you guys all for joining
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us. Have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.