At Ohio State, Michael Bennett was one known as one of the most thoughtful and honest members of the Buckeyes, which captured the National Championship last month.
It made sense, then, when Bennett offered a modest projection of where he’ll end up landing — if at all — in the upcoming NFL Draft this spring.
“I’m going to expect to go seventh round and anything above that, I’m going to be thrilled with,” Bennett told reporters at the league’s annual combine in Indianapolis.
“I’m not going to expect to go first round and go second round and be disappointed. To accomplish my dream of going in the draft is going to be phenomenal.
He added: “Whatever round I go in, doesn’t matter.”
Nor does the potential suitor mean much either. “Whatever team I go to, it’s going to be the same thing: Work my ass off, get better every day and take a leadership position.”
In a way, these are the three things that seemed to define Bennett’s career at Ohio State, where he emerged as a captain and one of the team’s top defensive linemen.
Last year, for example, he had 41 tackles, 14 tackles and seven tackles for loss — only sophomore and unanimous All-American Joey Bosa and redshirt freshman linebacker Darron Lee ranked ahead of him in the latter of the final two categories.
In Indianapolis, as he undergoes tests and drills at the combine, Bennett — the intelligent and articulate star — is out to prove to people he’s got a “dual-personality disorder” that works in his favor.
“When I’m on the field, it’s a completely different person,” he said. “Very aggressive, looking to cause some havoc. I really want the person I’m playing to know that I’m a better player than he is.”
Bennett, who said he played through the national title game against Oregon with a pulled groin, has been working out away from Columbus to prepare for the combine and the draft. Savoring Ohio State’s national championship campaign has been hard at times.
“I’m enjoying it in little segments. Like every now and then I’ll think back and be like, ‘Holy crap. That’s what we did.’ I wish I was still in Columbus to be able to enjoy those segments with my teammates,” he said.
“But life doesn’t stop, for good or bad. You’ve got to learn how to enjoy it. you’ve got to learn how to take it in the moment and just keep getting better and moving forward. It’s unfortunate, but I’d much rather have something that I have to prepare for than just live on that.”
Extra Notes: B1G Title Memories, Final Thoughts on Alabama, Cutting Back on Twitter
Asked to reflect on the Big Ten Championship Game, in which Ohio State crushed Wisconsin, 59-0, Bennett said, “I think that was just the right storm.”
“A lot of emotions with Kosta, with that news breaking, and us being tired of all the doubt. A perfect storm — was finally able to show people what we could do,” he continued. “Their O-line was very big, but I think we showed people it’s not just about how big and strong you are. We’re big and strong, too. We’re fast, we’re quick we’re technically sound.”
Meyer said the game capped Bennett’s “best three weeks” as a Buckeye. “That was probably my most technically sound game,” he said.
Known for his strong — and often thoughtful and entertaining — Twitter presence, Bennett said he’s cutting back his usage of social media as he goes through the draft process.
“I know that sometimes my mind will take me to weird places so I don’t want to mess around and throw out a tweet where they’ll be like, “What were you thinking here?” I don’t know. So I just kind of slowed it down,” he said.
“I’ll make a random observation and my mind will go off on a tangent and then I’ll throw out a tweet and I’ll be like, that was probably pretty weird to people who don’t know me so I don’t do that anymore. Some of my followers don’t like that, but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do. I haven’t put out any risky tweets. My mom follows me so I’m not going to do anything stupid. I still don’t want to be perceived as a weirdo.”
Bennett offered his final thoughts on playing (and beating) Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. “Obviously, we proved that we were better than that team but the media really hypes up some stuff about teams. One person will see Alabama is better and then the media runs to it and it’s just going to track on Alabama. If you legitimately watched the film, people would think we’re better than them,” he said.
“So it was a confidence that people didn’t expect us to have, but we had that confidence. It wasn’t even ‘Silence the doubters’” It was, ‘We know we’re better than this team. Just go out and prove it.’”
