Drew Thurman (12:58 pm)
After the Buckeyes less than stellar performance on Saturday, there has been a lot said on the forums and message boards. Honestly, most of it is incredibly negative! So I am going to take some of the trends in opinion I see, and insert some of my own opinion. It's time for some fact or fiction...
Trend in Opinion #1: The Buckeyes performance against Ohio on Saturday was a true showing of what is to come this season.
My Opinion: I have to say fiction here. First of all, the team was obviously missing Beanie. Not only does this hurt in leadership, but also for the fact that he is counted on to "overpower" weaker defenses. On top of that the team came out super flat. I attribute this to two different reasons. First of all, they were looking ahead to USC and overlooking the Bobcats. Second, Tressel's play calling was very vanilla, and I think that had an influence on the team. It's easy to go through the motions when you are running a lot of the same basic plays. Anyways, I say all of this because I do not think you will see a performance like this the rest of the year. After giving a touchdown to Ohio with the high snap, the Buckeyes woke up and scored three times rather quickly. So, this was not a true showing. Just like USC vs. Stanford last year was not a true showing of the Trojans.
Trend in Opinion #2: The lack of seperation between our wideouts and Ohio's secondary should have us worried.
My Opinion: Fact. This is something that has been a concern for the Buckeyes last season and this season. Brian Robiskie and Brian Hartline get open on their route running skills alone, but they struggle to get seperation and stretch the field. The two guys that appear to be the quickest at wideout to the eye (Small and Sanzenbacher), both play more slot than they do anything else. This does not make any sense to me! We need Small especially to be stretching the defense, and thanks to his punt return on Saturday we know he has the speed to do so.
Trend in Opinion #3: The Buckeyes defense is playing too much zone, and needs to attack more.
My Opinion: Once again I say fact. For whatever reason Heacock has employed a "bend but don't break" philosophy in our defense. The problem is that we sit back on heals and wait for things to happen rather than attacking. Sure it resulted in a few interceptions this last week against Ohio, but against better quarterbacks it looks less than impressive. I dare you to go back and watch the National Championship game again. LSU blitzed us almost every down because things happen when you have this mentality. I want our defense to have some swagger again, rather than waiting for a mistake from the offense!
Trend in Opinion #4: Todd Boeckman is not a good quarterback, and he is to blame for the stagnant offense.
My Opinion: Fiction. Let's first be honest with ourselves a say that Boeckman is not a superstar. He has never been marketed that way nor will he ever. With that said, Boeckman runs the offense well and makes very few mistakes. Think back to 2002 National Championship team. Did that team win because of a star quarterback? No! That team won because it had an incredible running attack, an aggressive defense, and made very few mistakes. The formula should pretty much be the same this year if Beanie can stay healthy.
In regards to the game against Ohio, I will still defend Boeckman. Sure Boeckman didn't have the best game of his career, but he is not the one to point the finger at. The offensive line was terrible, and would have made Tim Tebow look bad. On top of that, the wideouts were awful. Robiskie and Hartline (leaders of the unit) dropped balls all day, and looked terrible blocking as well. Todd didn't have any interceptions, and without drops should have had at least one touchdown. I realize he is not great throwing on the run, but like I said he has never been hyped as a superstar.
Those of you who think the "Terrelle Pryor Era" should begin, probably need to watch him throw a few more passes. Don't get wrong, I am as pumped as anybody to have a dual threat quaterback in the future, but he still needs time. In his first series against Ohio, he threw a ball two steps ahead of the wideout on a simple slant route. So, I can promise you that the best throwing quarterback we have is on the field.
Trend in Opinion #5: (My personal favorite) Bring back the John Copper era when we beat teams like Ohio by 40 points.
My Opinion: Fiction. Fiction. Fiction. Are you kidding me? How easy it is to forget that Copper blew weaker teams out, but never could win the big game. His teams were as good in week one as they were ever going to get. Tressel on the other hand improves his teams throughout the season every year (6-1 against UM and 1 National Championship). I mean seriously, what benefit is it to win by 40 points over a weaker opponent? Tressel has never believe in embarrassing these teams, and we should always expect him to limit the play calling in these games. That is what the Sweater Vest does, and that has been the same since he became head coach.
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