Re: Ryan Day’s in-game strategy decisions, here’s a question that I would really like BAD to tackle:
Watching Ryan Day’s postgame presser made me realize that he might suffer from the same character trait that I do: slow processor. He always lauds his QBs who are fast processors and diagnose a situation quickly. That is not me. I need time to review a situation and think it over before I know what step I want to take moving forward. Most coaches that I’ve listened to postgame or at halftime already have an idea of how their teams need to improve. Not Day. He ALWAYS says that he needs to watch the film to figure out where they need to get better. Clock management and fourth down decisions are things that must be analyzed quickly. Us slow processors are disadvantaged in those situations. So my question is: do you think Day is a slow processor? And if so, what can/should he do to make sure the best decisions get made on the fly… in other words, who else should be making those decisions?
This is a good thought. I wonder if this is part of the reason why I get ambivalent about him. Because when I think broad-picture and long-term, I usually have pretty positive thoughts about Day, or I can see his flaws in context. When I'm in game mode, I'm much often thinking, "What on earth is he doing?"
Something tangential to this. Sometimes, I think Day has planned a game down to the millisecond. It's kind of a meme at this point about OSU's kicking woes, but seriously...he is about 4-5 kicks away from being indisputably one of Ohio State's greatest coaches ever. I think he actually does a pretty good job of predicting a game...that's the slow processor working correctly. But, the plan never goes exactly as stated, and that's where his slower processing bites him and puts him in these situations where it comes down to a kick. And then when you throw a rash of ridiculous kicking woes in there, you end up with games like this. I'm not sure what the answer is; sometimes college kids be 19 like that.
I know 17 percent answered they do not watch/don’t care for the press conference, but I just want to stamp that I personally really do care about the weekly news conference/vibe of the room. Thanks a ton for the coverage of it! I hope that continues! I loved how you all made some time to share thoughts about it on Around the Shoe too.
Nah...I think Ryan was trying to give a non-answer and Stephen wasn't having it. His readers and listeners expect him to go hard and ask the questions they want answered. The time for silver linings comes after the Kent State game. Right now, there needs to be some tough questions asked and some uncomfortable answers given.
I understand the thinking of making the heroic stand at the goal line like the last two years, but I gotta tell ya...Jack Sawyer and Kayden McDonald are playing on Sundays and they don't have replacements.
If it was 4th down with 1:30 to play, try and stop them again. If they score, you still have time for Julian and JJ to go win the game. But 1st down from the 1 and you try and play the "We are SPARTA!!!" game and you cost your playmakers over a minute.
We know from experience the natty is still a very real possibility. We know the team is much less experienced than teams from the past couple of years. We know the team is capable of learning and developing. I have complete confidence in the Buckeyes, players and coaches.
Repeating that this is the first Ryan Day team without 2 1st Round WRs is both disingenuous and will likely be wrong. 2019 had Olave and Wilson mixing in among a stable of vet WRs. Wilson was never a starter. Also CHJ is almost certainly going to be 1st Round pick so what are we even talking about?
By my memory Wilson was 5th in WR snaps in 2019. Unless Jeremiah is abducted by aliens, “not enough WR talent” will not be a top 10 problem with this team all year. What’s a higher percent chance, both Boyd and CHJ end up as first rounders, or neither does?
Not sure why you’re so mad about this. I double-checked. Future 1st-round OSU receivers by year in the Day era.
2019: Olave 1st in targets, Wilson 4th in targets and a regular part of the rotation
2020: Olave 1st in targets, Wilson 2nd
2021: JSN 1st in targets, Wilson 2nd, Olave 3rd
2022: MHJ 1st in targets, Emeka 2nd
2023: MHJ 1st in targets, Emeka 2nd
2024: Emeka 1st in targets, JJ 2nd, Tate 3rd
2025: JJ 1st in targets, Tate 2nd
Every year except 2019, their Top 2 WRs were future first-rounders. And Wilson was a regular contributor in 2019. If Henry or Boyd becomes a regular contributor this season and then is a 1st-round pick, then the trend would continue. If they don’t, and they remain backups to a Top 3 of JJ-McCuin-Inniss like things are now, then this will be the first time OSU doesn’t have two future 1st-rounders as regular contributors in the Day era. Not sure why you think disingenuous is the word to apply to our discussion. There is a chance that the talent ready to play behind JJ isn’t at the usual OSU standard, and the offense might feel that.
Wilson wasn’t a major part of the offense until November, most of his production came when we were up 40+ before then. To be fair, we were up 40 for most of the year lol.
I contend that by November, one of Boyd or CHJ is a major part of the offense and that one of them will be 1st round in 2029.
Didn’t mean to come off as a jerk, it’s just my nature.
Something I haven't seen mentioned - didn't we let Miami score at the end of the game last year? I have an image of my head of Pearce breaking down the back in the hole and letting the guy walk into the endzone. I thought that was the right call then, so at least we know he's capable of making that decision (didn't work that time either of course).
As for the 4th down stuff, I feel like going for it on 4th and short past midfield is almost always defensible so I had no issue with passing up the field goal on 4th and 2, especially that deep in opposing territory with a chance to go up 3 possessions. In fact, I would've been mad if he didn't go for it. 4th and 4 is borderline for me so I was okay-ish with the punt. But with what we know now about the defense and the punter, I think you have to go for it more often. With a bend-DO-break defense, the opposing offense having 26 fewer yards to go gets your offense on the field faster.
I think Day's game management is objectively mediocre. Doug has been saying that Day would probably view himself as adaptable and would see that as a strength, as opposed to being definitively aggressive or conservative. Although I would agree that Day is not just one thing (and that that's a good thing), I think he does have tendencies: he is more aggressive early and gets more conservative as games go on. Swap when the 4th & 2 and the 4th & 4 occur, and I think he does the opposite thing in both scenarios. I really doubt Day punts on 4th and 4 from the 39 16 minutes into the game, and I can definitely see him kicking a field goal on 4th and 2 from the 13 in the 3rd quarter (would probably miss too!)
As for JJ, I think his usage should be as high as possible while maintaining efficiency. 6-10 receptions per game is appropriate (and probably necessary), but 8 incompletions when targeting him is too much and probably falls mostly on Julian. If JJ is the first read on basically every pass play, I get it, but you have to accept when he's covered and move to the next read.
@Bill Landis @Doug Lesmerises how mcuh does the fact that the Texas RB fumbling on the goal line the play before they scored impact your opinion of letting them score? Obviously a different convo if we get that fumble.
Isn't pressure at OSU a constant? If anything, per Doug's point, shouldn't there be less pressure now that you can lose 1-2 games and still make the CFP?
Are we saying the streak itself is causing more pressure than the Tressel and Urban eras or is it the ability to more easily directly attack players (I.e., more prevalent social media)?
Residual Parker Fleming curse seems as plausible as anything.
In just about every position group, there are young guys most of us in Buckeye Nation believe need more impactful playing time. WRs Boyd and Henry, DE Wilder, LB Pettijohn, Alfred, Alliegro, RB Bey, etc. Does Ryan Day leave these decisions to position coaches and they’re the ones reluctant to play the young talent? Or are position coaches pushing for the best players on the field no matter what, but Ryan Day is the one dictating more experience to reduce mistakes at the expense of best talent on the field?
I think I get more and more upset the more I learn from real ball knowers about why we lost. Right after the game, I thought it was just everything finally coming together for Texas because you could kind of see it all game, and it finally hit in the fourth quarter. But after all the pressers and analysis from BAD, I finally took off my rose-colored glasses about this season. And what I see in the mirror is an angry (and disappointed) glare.
I go back and forth between accepting the loss and realizing we’ll be ok and being super mad we blew a 20 point lead and our room for error in losing games has gone down
Can we put Sayin on a scale of Kyle McCord to CJ Stroud, and toss in Will Howard for reference? One thing that made me think of McCord was his over reliance on MHJ (that year’s WR performance on McCord or room).
I would rate Will higher than CJ on this scale. CJ lost big games (he balled out against UGA—no qualms with that one). He seemed to not love the moment etc.
I think Julian is close to CJ but neither of them love the moment enough to wink and the sideline and look like they are not overthinking the moment
On raw skill, I don't think Will can compete with CJ or Sayin, but he was undeniably a baller. Being a runner probably helped with that, and I suspect we all have natty good vibes with him (where he was admittedly awesome).
Re: Ryan Day’s in-game strategy decisions, here’s a question that I would really like BAD to tackle:
Watching Ryan Day’s postgame presser made me realize that he might suffer from the same character trait that I do: slow processor. He always lauds his QBs who are fast processors and diagnose a situation quickly. That is not me. I need time to review a situation and think it over before I know what step I want to take moving forward. Most coaches that I’ve listened to postgame or at halftime already have an idea of how their teams need to improve. Not Day. He ALWAYS says that he needs to watch the film to figure out where they need to get better. Clock management and fourth down decisions are things that must be analyzed quickly. Us slow processors are disadvantaged in those situations. So my question is: do you think Day is a slow processor? And if so, what can/should he do to make sure the best decisions get made on the fly… in other words, who else should be making those decisions?
This is a good thought. I wonder if this is part of the reason why I get ambivalent about him. Because when I think broad-picture and long-term, I usually have pretty positive thoughts about Day, or I can see his flaws in context. When I'm in game mode, I'm much often thinking, "What on earth is he doing?"
Something tangential to this. Sometimes, I think Day has planned a game down to the millisecond. It's kind of a meme at this point about OSU's kicking woes, but seriously...he is about 4-5 kicks away from being indisputably one of Ohio State's greatest coaches ever. I think he actually does a pretty good job of predicting a game...that's the slow processor working correctly. But, the plan never goes exactly as stated, and that's where his slower processing bites him and puts him in these situations where it comes down to a kick. And then when you throw a rash of ridiculous kicking woes in there, you end up with games like this. I'm not sure what the answer is; sometimes college kids be 19 like that.
But really good insight there.
I know 17 percent answered they do not watch/don’t care for the press conference, but I just want to stamp that I personally really do care about the weekly news conference/vibe of the room. Thanks a ton for the coverage of it! I hope that continues! I loved how you all made some time to share thoughts about it on Around the Shoe too.
Would love some inside baseball on whether Doug thought Stephen went too hard.
Nah...I think Ryan was trying to give a non-answer and Stephen wasn't having it. His readers and listeners expect him to go hard and ask the questions they want answered. The time for silver linings comes after the Kent State game. Right now, there needs to be some tough questions asked and some uncomfortable answers given.
I understand the thinking of making the heroic stand at the goal line like the last two years, but I gotta tell ya...Jack Sawyer and Kayden McDonald are playing on Sundays and they don't have replacements.
If it was 4th down with 1:30 to play, try and stop them again. If they score, you still have time for Julian and JJ to go win the game. But 1st down from the 1 and you try and play the "We are SPARTA!!!" game and you cost your playmakers over a minute.
Terrible decision.
We know from experience the natty is still a very real possibility. We know the team is much less experienced than teams from the past couple of years. We know the team is capable of learning and developing. I have complete confidence in the Buckeyes, players and coaches.
Repeating that this is the first Ryan Day team without 2 1st Round WRs is both disingenuous and will likely be wrong. 2019 had Olave and Wilson mixing in among a stable of vet WRs. Wilson was never a starter. Also CHJ is almost certainly going to be 1st Round pick so what are we even talking about?
By my memory Wilson was 5th in WR snaps in 2019. Unless Jeremiah is abducted by aliens, “not enough WR talent” will not be a top 10 problem with this team all year. What’s a higher percent chance, both Boyd and CHJ end up as first rounders, or neither does?
Not sure why you’re so mad about this. I double-checked. Future 1st-round OSU receivers by year in the Day era.
2019: Olave 1st in targets, Wilson 4th in targets and a regular part of the rotation
2020: Olave 1st in targets, Wilson 2nd
2021: JSN 1st in targets, Wilson 2nd, Olave 3rd
2022: MHJ 1st in targets, Emeka 2nd
2023: MHJ 1st in targets, Emeka 2nd
2024: Emeka 1st in targets, JJ 2nd, Tate 3rd
2025: JJ 1st in targets, Tate 2nd
Every year except 2019, their Top 2 WRs were future first-rounders. And Wilson was a regular contributor in 2019. If Henry or Boyd becomes a regular contributor this season and then is a 1st-round pick, then the trend would continue. If they don’t, and they remain backups to a Top 3 of JJ-McCuin-Inniss like things are now, then this will be the first time OSU doesn’t have two future 1st-rounders as regular contributors in the Day era. Not sure why you think disingenuous is the word to apply to our discussion. There is a chance that the talent ready to play behind JJ isn’t at the usual OSU standard, and the offense might feel that.
Wilson wasn’t a major part of the offense until November, most of his production came when we were up 40+ before then. To be fair, we were up 40 for most of the year lol.
I contend that by November, one of Boyd or CHJ is a major part of the offense and that one of them will be 1st round in 2029.
Didn’t mean to come off as a jerk, it’s just my nature.
Something I haven't seen mentioned - didn't we let Miami score at the end of the game last year? I have an image of my head of Pearce breaking down the back in the hole and letting the guy walk into the endzone. I thought that was the right call then, so at least we know he's capable of making that decision (didn't work that time either of course).
As for the 4th down stuff, I feel like going for it on 4th and short past midfield is almost always defensible so I had no issue with passing up the field goal on 4th and 2, especially that deep in opposing territory with a chance to go up 3 possessions. In fact, I would've been mad if he didn't go for it. 4th and 4 is borderline for me so I was okay-ish with the punt. But with what we know now about the defense and the punter, I think you have to go for it more often. With a bend-DO-break defense, the opposing offense having 26 fewer yards to go gets your offense on the field faster.
I think Day's game management is objectively mediocre. Doug has been saying that Day would probably view himself as adaptable and would see that as a strength, as opposed to being definitively aggressive or conservative. Although I would agree that Day is not just one thing (and that that's a good thing), I think he does have tendencies: he is more aggressive early and gets more conservative as games go on. Swap when the 4th & 2 and the 4th & 4 occur, and I think he does the opposite thing in both scenarios. I really doubt Day punts on 4th and 4 from the 39 16 minutes into the game, and I can definitely see him kicking a field goal on 4th and 2 from the 13 in the 3rd quarter (would probably miss too!)
As for JJ, I think his usage should be as high as possible while maintaining efficiency. 6-10 receptions per game is appropriate (and probably necessary), but 8 incompletions when targeting him is too much and probably falls mostly on Julian. If JJ is the first read on basically every pass play, I get it, but you have to accept when he's covered and move to the next read.
@Bill Landis @Doug Lesmerises how mcuh does the fact that the Texas RB fumbling on the goal line the play before they scored impact your opinion of letting them score? Obviously a different convo if we get that fumble.
Not at all. “Let them fumble” isn’t a strategy
Neither is play for a last second 45 yard field goal lmao (unfortunately)
There is zero way to justify not letting them score. It was a total blunder.
I agree - don’t think it would have changed the outcome of the game the way they were playing but would have been fun to see.
Re: The Special Teams Curse
Isn't pressure at OSU a constant? If anything, per Doug's point, shouldn't there be less pressure now that you can lose 1-2 games and still make the CFP?
Are we saying the streak itself is causing more pressure than the Tressel and Urban eras or is it the ability to more easily directly attack players (I.e., more prevalent social media)?
Residual Parker Fleming curse seems as plausible as anything.
Appreciate you both so much - keep up the great work.
I just dont think hes interested in improving hes only interested in doing things his way & his way only.
In just about every position group, there are young guys most of us in Buckeye Nation believe need more impactful playing time. WRs Boyd and Henry, DE Wilder, LB Pettijohn, Alfred, Alliegro, RB Bey, etc. Does Ryan Day leave these decisions to position coaches and they’re the ones reluctant to play the young talent? Or are position coaches pushing for the best players on the field no matter what, but Ryan Day is the one dictating more experience to reduce mistakes at the expense of best talent on the field?
I think I get more and more upset the more I learn from real ball knowers about why we lost. Right after the game, I thought it was just everything finally coming together for Texas because you could kind of see it all game, and it finally hit in the fourth quarter. But after all the pressers and analysis from BAD, I finally took off my rose-colored glasses about this season. And what I see in the mirror is an angry (and disappointed) glare.
I go back and forth between accepting the loss and realizing we’ll be ok and being super mad we blew a 20 point lead and our room for error in losing games has gone down
100%. It's not the loss. It's how we lost that lingers.
At halftime, I was starting to settle into that "post-game win bliss." Having that ripped out from under me was rough.
That’s where I am. I anticipated losing to Texas in a close game on the road. However, when you go up 20 points, it has to be a win.
That was my disappointment.
Can we put Sayin on a scale of Kyle McCord to CJ Stroud, and toss in Will Howard for reference? One thing that made me think of McCord was his over reliance on MHJ (that year’s WR performance on McCord or room).
I would rate Will higher than CJ on this scale. CJ lost big games (he balled out against UGA—no qualms with that one). He seemed to not love the moment etc.
I think Julian is close to CJ but neither of them love the moment enough to wink and the sideline and look like they are not overthinking the moment
I mean if you look at the average points allowed in CJ’s 4 losses it was around 40. That’s not exactly his fault
That’s fair.
I don’t think I’m explaining it well.
There seems to be no freedom in the way Julian or CJ play the position. They look like they are thinking all the time. Not playing
On raw skill, I don't think Will can compete with CJ or Sayin, but he was undeniably a baller. Being a runner probably helped with that, and I suspect we all have natty good vibes with him (where he was admittedly awesome).