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Who Will Win The 2024 Ohio State Quarterback Battle? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning for Friday, May third, I'm your host toal
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  Moore, the Akron game in one hundred and twenty days, the game against
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  Michigan in two hundred and eleven days. Transfer portal window closed on Tuesday night.
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  I wanted to give it a little bit of time to make sure all
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  the paperwork had really gone through before we officially proclaimed Ohio State has hung on
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  to all five of its scholarship quarterbacks. But against all odds, it appears
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  that Ohio State has hung on to all five of its scholarship quarterbacks following spring
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  ball. So want to talk about why and where that leaves this year's battle
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  for the starting quarterback job. We're gonna be doing that with our buddy,
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  Tony Gerdaman Fuck Huddle dot com. Tony, you know, I know everyone.
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  We're supposed to be the all seeing, all knowing everything. I will
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  raise my hand and say I did not think there was particularly a high chance
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  that Ohio State was going to hang on to all five of its scholarship quarterbacks
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  in the weeks following the end of spring practice. Are you surprised at all
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  about the fact that all five guys all decided to stick around for the for
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  the season. I will admit that there are times this spring watching the team
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  at practice and seeing what I'm seeing, thinking there's no way that all five
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  guys are here in May or June, July, August and so on.
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  Does that make me wrong? I don't. We're not here to talk about
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  that, but it I mean, you have five quarterbacks as that's a luxury,
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  and you don't necessarily expect to stay luxurious for long in the quarterback world
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  with the transfer portal. But yeah, there was definitely a time this spring
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  where it's like, well, you know, there's it's it's they won't have
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  five, they'll have The question was, well, they at least have four.
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  That was the probably the bigger question, like, well, if you
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  were to handicap the number, like what are the most likely numbers? I
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  think you're five, and then is it five or four? Is the most
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  most likely number? Then is the next likely most likely number? Five or
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  three? Yeah? I would have probably said four, then three, then
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  five, because you have seen over the years the quarterback position is a very
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  unique one in college football, where you go back in certain classes and you
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  look at the top ten quarterbacks in the class, and eight or nine of
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  them finish their college careers somewhere other than where they started. And these are
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  the top, top level players, and that this is generally the you know,
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  the deep end of the pond where Ohio State is fishing in its quarterback
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  recruiting. And because you can only generally play one guy at a time,
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  that means you've got guys who are very talented, very well known, very
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  sought after, who are then have to make a decision if I'm not going
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  to start, do I stick around or do I go somewhere else where I
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  would be very sought after, very talented, and probably be able to start
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  this year. And that's that a decision that generally a huge percentage of highly
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  touted quarterbacks have decided. If I'm not starting, I'm going to hit the
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  portal. I'm going to go somewhere else. And sometimes that works out,
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  and sometimes that doesn't. You see, you know, for every Joe Burrow,
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  there are probably multiple guys who have made two, three, four stops.
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  A lot of the guys who Ohio State has had in recruiting classes in
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  the past. Emrie Jones, for example, had a multiple stop career and
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  never really panned out, so you can you know, Hate Martel had a
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  multiple career stop, a multiple stop career and never really panned out. You
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  can go back through a lot of those guys and you keep hopping, you
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  keep hopping. Now I'm blanking on the name, But there was the guy
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  who started at USC and then went to Georgia and then went to JT.
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  Daniels hit JT Daniels, Yeah, and then went to I think the Pit
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  and then went to Rice and then retired last year. I mean that is
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  you know, that's basically your you know, like working for IBM years ago,
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  where you're just constantly moving every year. That that feels like that's kind
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  of almost more than norm in the college quarterback career than having everyone stick around.
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  And I don't know what quite attribute this to. Is that is it
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  what this season could be at Ohio State is that the quarterback competition really is
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  still fairly open and theoretically you could have any number of guys, and you
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  know, the true freshmen are true freshmen, so you're not necessarily expecting to
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  go in and play right away. And theoretically, if Will Howard starts,
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  Will Howard is out of eligibility next year. If Devin Brown starts, Devin
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  Brown could leave for the NFL after next year, and then Lincoln Keenholst,
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  Julian Saying, and Aaron Noland all could potentially be the starter a year from
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  now. What do you chalk that up to? Well, before I answered
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  that, I'll just mention there were eleven quarterbacks drafted in the NFL draft this
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  past year. Seven of them were transfers, at transferred to at some point
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  and to the top two Kayleb Williams and Jane Daniels were transfers, and then
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  Drake May stayed at North Carolina, JJ Michael Pennix was a transfer. JJ
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  McCarthy stayed at Michigan. Bow Knicks was a transfer. Spencer Rtland was a
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  transfer. I believe, Jordan Travis was always Florida State, and then you
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  have Joe Milton who is a transfer, Devin Larry was a transfer, Michael
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  Pratt, who I think was always at two lane. So that's you know,
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  seven of the eleven transferred from one place to the other. Now,
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  why why did we not see any transfers. My theory on this is that
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  Devin Brown believes that this is a battle and then he is still firmly in
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  the competition, and Will Howard believes that as well. Now we've seen what
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  Joe Burrow firmly believed that he was in a competition as well, and he's
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  like, it doesn't matter. I'm going to LSU. You know, I'm
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  going to hit the portal. But I think those two guys are still legitimately
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  believing that they're vying for the battle. Lincoln Keynolds this spring said if I
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  don't win the job this spring or this you know, I think it was
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  talking specifically about the spring, I will just use the experience to help me
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  try to win the job next year. Like if I don't win it this
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  year, that's gonna help me try to win it next year. So he's
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  always been talking about next year as an Ohio State quarterback and this year helping
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  him be a better Ohio State quarterback next year. So I think it's okay
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  to believe what he said. And then, like you said, with the
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  two freshmen, neither one of them came in expecting to win the job.
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  They're just kind of watching everything else happen. But Aaron Olan seeing what happened
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  with Julian saying and seeing that elevation, it wouldn't have been a surprise there
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  where you're like, well, now do I have a decision to make?
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  But also, Tom, I think there are benefits for a quarterback to be
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  coached by Ryan Day and coached by Chip Kelly and developed for a little bit.
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  You know, Joe Burrow graduated from Ohio State before he went off.
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  How many guys that have left and transferred out without spending a considerable amount of
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  time at Ohio State have been better off for it regarding the quarterbacks, And
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  maybe the reason they've transferred out and weren't productive is because they weren't good enough
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  to play at Ohio State so they left. But it's not a surefire next
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  step to progress to leave Ryan Day's umbrella. Yeah, that's true. I'm
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  just thinking back through obviously, you know where Joe Burrow is now. But
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  Matthew Baldwin went to TCU, had I think a knee injury and never really
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  played there. Tate Martell went to Miami, didn't really play there, went
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  to UNLV, didn't really play there. Jack Miller went to Florida, played
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  sparingly. I think he played in one of the Bowl games where they had
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  like thirty opt outs and they got killed by Oregon State. But he never
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  really turned into a regular down in Florida. They've just a lot of those
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  guys have not hand out over the you know, over the span of those
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  years. And that's I think the reality of the transfer portal is if you're
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  not you know, if you go in the portal, the grass is always
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  greener until you get there and then and then maybe it's not. And sometimes
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  it works and sometimes it doesn't. We've seen plenty of guys go into the
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  portal and have good careers where they landed, but that is, it is
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  far from a guarantee. And that's especially true at the quarterback position. So
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  so now there are still five guys in that quarterback room with the with the
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  portal window closed. So Tony, I'm going to ask you to handicap the
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  race for the Ohio State quarterback job coming out of spring right now. And
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  you can do this. You can give me percentages of likelihood that they're you
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  know, if everyone's healthy. We're just going to stipulate, if everyone's healthy,
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  percentage likelihood that each of these guys is taking the first snap against Akron
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  in one hundred and twenty days percentages. I would say right now, I'm
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  at like, what the number that I have in mind is different than the
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  fact that when I think about Ohio State this season, I picture Will Howard
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  as the quarterback. So when I'm thinking about this season, my mind is
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  one hundred percent it's Will Howard. So that kind of has to be the
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  number. But there is no such thing as what one hundred my mind Tom.
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  The way it works is the preponderance of the evidence. You know,
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  it's very legal, But I would say seventy five percent that Will Howard wins
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  it, twenty four percent for Devin Brown, and one percent for the other
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  three. Like I think it's it's either of those two. And the fact
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  that Will Howard comes in has a ton of experience, does some different things.
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  I still have questions about how good he is because we have not been
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  able to see him operate with an offense like Ohio State. In terms of
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  the skill that he has around him, he might be outstanding. I don't
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  know. You know, Kansas State has produced NFL quarterbacks before, so you
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  know he there, there's some precedents there, But like you watch him and
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  you know, I did a you know, the five game six game breakdown
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  that I did of him back in the winter. I still don't know how
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  well he throws downfield because it just wasn't a big part of Kansas State's game.
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  It's going to be a big part or a bigger part of Ohio State's
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  game with the weapons that they have. But I would say, you know,
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  like I said, in my mind's eye, he's the starter, but
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  I can't go one hundred and even saying seventy five seems like a lot.
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  It seems like it's unfair to Devin Brown, who is returning and fighting for
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  the job. But I would be at this point, I would be surprised
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  if Devin Brown starts just because you don't bring in Will Howard to have him
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  be your backup. But I do believe that this is a competition. Devin
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  Brown can absolutely win the job. I just think Will Howard's going to and
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  that I think that's probably a pretty reasonable view on things. And of course,
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  the reality is we're putting stipulations on this where everyone's healthy, well,
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  what are the odds everyone's healthy? Well? I remember Joe Burrow going into
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  camp at Ohio State and the battle for the number two position and then breaking
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  his hand, and boy did that change some things about Ohio state football history
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  in the summer camp of twenty seventeen. So you know, the reality is,
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  I think you could see three of these guys start a game this year
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  potentially if you have an injury. We've seen Devin Brown have health issues and
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  you know, have ankle injuries and miss a bunch of time. There are
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  no guarantees with a running quarterback, and all five of these guys are running
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  quarterbacks to one degree or another. That tends to correlate to more injuries,
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  just getting banged up a little more often, and with the longer schedule again,
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  I just I'm just gonna put a dollar in the jar every time we
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  talk about these sixteen to seventeen game schedule and the way that's going to test
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  your depth. But the reason we keep talking about it is because every time
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  we talk to coaches about stuff, they bring that up and they are very
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  cognizant to that. And you're someone is going to get hurt whoever that you
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  know, whether it's the starter or the backup, and number three is going
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  to become number two, and number two might become number one, and so
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  yeah, there's there's just there are a lot of possibilities in terms of how
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  this season shakes out. But is it is it beneficial to Ohio State Tony
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  to have five guys with not identical skill sets by any means, but maybe
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  similar skill sets where they all can you know, they all can pass at
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  you know, at least a let's say a B level, and they can
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  all probably run at at least a B level. And you may have some
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  a's and a pluses in there somewhere. But is that beneficial for Ohio State
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  to have really similar models of quarterback this year? Or would be more beneficial
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  for them to have the true pocket passer versus the you know, really really
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  run first kind of guy. I think we've seen over the years that when
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  there is a red zone quarterback, it works flawlessly. Tom, you can
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  go back to Tate Martel, you go back to Devin Brown. When you've
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  got that guy, that change of pace guy that can kind when nobody expects
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  it and run the ball at the quarterback position. Yeah, that's it.
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  Now, it's to have all five guys be able to do that. You
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  don't have to bring somebody in or change something up or this is your specialty.
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  I think Ryan Day has come around on the idea like it's it's not
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  bad to have a guy that can move around. But as Chip Kelly said
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  after the spring game, we're not looking for running backs that can throw.
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  You know, you want your quarterback that can move around. And that's what
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  they'll be doing. And now that they now that the difference between the starter
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  like c J. Stroud and the backup is not so vast, you're more
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  willing to lose a guy to get a guy hurt, which is like,
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  you know, that's a terrible way to put it, but you're more able
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  to withstand an injury, so you can run that guy you didn't know.
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  Justin fields, you're praying, like gosh, I hope he doesn't get more
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  hurt, because what do you have behind it. You've got a true freshman
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  and c J. Stroud in twenty twenty, but in twenty nineteen, it's
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  a different story there. Even though Chris Chaganoff did throw a bunch of touchdowns
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  shout out to Chugs, but it's not such a huge disparity between the starter
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  and the backup or you know, whatever that level is. And so you've
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  got some similar guys and as Ryan Day said, they can all do the
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  same thing. And whenever we've talked to them in the past, Mill you
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  know, well, yeah, well you have to change things up for this
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  quarterback as well. It's the Ohio State offense. We'll do whatever the quarterback
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  does well. And it's like now they can just there's no reason to change
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  things dramatically or drastically with these guys. That the more dramatic changes with the
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  freshmen and maybe Lincoln Kenolds to some aspect that they can only do so much.
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  And we saw that Lincoln Keenolds can run the heck out of the ball,
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  but that was not the issue against Missouri. It's the other things that
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  that is the real here. Yeah, and for Ling and you knows a
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  lot of those issues headed to with the offensive line. So that'll be a
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  whole different show, which where we can break down handicap where things stands,
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  because there's some questions on the offensive line for the Buckeyes as well. Buckeye
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  is certainly dealing with questions and with players that a lot of other teams would
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  absolutely kill to have. The are the these are the candidates for the places
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  where there are questions. This spring or heading into this summer not not terrible
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  problems for Ohio State as compared to a number of other top programs around the
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  nation, shaping up to be a really, really interesting year in Columbus.
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  We all love a good quarterback battle, don't we, folks. We see
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  the we see the numbers. We know you do. Always always fun to
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  talk about, always fun to watch and to handicap heading into what could be
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  a very memorable season and in Columbus, Ohio, and we will be there
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  to cover all of it. Tony, Kevin and I covering the team at
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  Buckeyehuddle dot Com, Mark cover recruiting our whole team of ex's and Nose Guruz
• 15:54
  making you a smarter football fan. Kevin and Mark hitting the road for their
• 15:58
  Southern swing coming up. Lots of content coming up with some of the top
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  recruits in the nation, especially down south. Talking, getting to meet them,
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  talk to them, find out more about them, what makes them tick,
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  what they're gonna be basing those decisions on, talk to their coaches.
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  This is where a lot of the intel that pays off down the line,
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  a lot of the relationship that payoff down the line. That all happens right
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  now, and it's all happening at bucke huddle dot com. This is kind
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  of the slow time of year at a lot of sites, not at bucke
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  huddle dot com. We got a lot of stuff coming for you for that
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  Southern Swing. We've also got our annual subscription stale running on right right now.
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  of insiders, our message board, all of that good stuff at a deeply
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  July, and then camp opens an early and bing bang boom, who knows
• 17:02
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  that annual membership you get access to all of that good stuff all at buckehuddle
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  dot com. That'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.