Kyle McCord and Devin Brown are both confident in their ability to be Ohio State’s starting quarterback this season. Going into Thursday’s start of preseason camp, they also say they’re trying to focus on doing what they need to do to get better every day rather than on how the competition will ultimately unfold.
Entering his third year as a Buckeye, McCord is in the midst of a starting quarterback competition for the second time in his Ohio State career. As a true freshman, McCord wasn’t expected to win the competition that was ultimately won by C.J. Stroud. This time around, McCord is the perceived frontrunner as the only quarterback on the roster who has actually thrown a pass in a game for the Buckeyes.
McCord didn’t answer directly when asked Wednesday if he felt like the starting job was his to win. But he expressed confidence that he can do what he needs to do over the next month to show he’s ready to be the starter.
“I think I feel the best I have felt going into a camp before. Obviously, I've had the most experience I've had going into a camp,” McCord said. “And I think now moreso than ever, just focusing on myself, and I know I'll be in a good position if I put the best version of myself out there.”
McCord knows the expectations that come with being Ohio State’s starting quarterback. Ryan Day didn’t try to lower those during his press conference Wednesday, saying the standard set by the likes of C.J. Stroud, Justin Fields and Dwayne Haskins is for Ohio State’s quarterback to be a Heisman Trophy finalist, a first-round NFL draft pick and competing for a national championship. But McCord said those expectations don’t scare him because of the expectations he has for himself.
“No one will ever put higher expectations or a higher standard on myself than I will. And I always think that you have to go out there and play with a lot of confidence,” McCord said. “I've been watching film of like 2018, watching Dwayne and then watching J.T. (Barrett) in years before and Justin and C.J., I think they've all set a good precedent but they've all done it their own way. So I think just kind of realizing there's a lot of different ways this can be done, but like I said, I don't think anyone's ever put an expectation on myself that I didn’t expect from myself.”
While McCord certainly has his sights set on being the starting quarterback after serving as Ohio State’s No. 2 quarterback for the past two years, he isn’t treating Brown as an adversary. Rather, he feels like he and Brown are making each other better, and he expects that to continue this preseason.
“I think, Devin will say this too I think, we definitely pushed each other in the spring, which was good. I think he brought the best out of me, I brought the best out of him,” McCord said. “I think it's been a really healthy competition with each other. And so when you go out there on the field, I think you're just focused on one thing and that’s doing your job to the best of your abilities.”
McCord, whose press conference on Wednesday was followed immediately by a press conference with Brown, was correct that Brown would also paint their competition in a positive light, though Brown also believes in his own chances of being the starter.
“Whoever it is, we're just trying to be the best versions of ourselves every day,” Brown said. “We're not worried about, at the end of the practice, we're not gonna be like, ‘Oh, he did better than me this day or that,’ it's ‘How did I perform? What did I get better today? What was I really working at today to get better?’ And if I get myself better every day, that's going to be a really good few months that I built up.”
Brown’s opportunity to compete for the starting quarterback job during spring practices was cut short when he suffered a finger injury that kept him out for the final week of spring, including the spring game. But Brown doesn’t feel that set him back significantly. He said he was fully cleared from the injury just a couple of weeks into Ohio State’s summer program, and he feels he had enough time to show what he could do this spring to keep himself in the competition.
“At the end of the day, it wasn't too big of a deal. We keep everything vanilla and we don't really do much in the spring game,” Brown said. “I would have really liked to play in that. Obviously I'm very competitive, and I would have wanted to do that. But I felt like from the time that we started the spring and the time that I ended, I feel like I grew a ton. And I was able to again vocalize myself and be a leader to these guys. I felt like my play just improved, my decision-making improved and if you improve throughout a spring, I think it's a very good spring.”
McCord has the advantage of having thrown 58 in-game passes for the Buckeyes over the past two years and even starting a game against Akron in 2021, while Brown did not attempt any passes in either of his two appearances as a true freshman in 2022. But Brown doesn’t feel like that puts him at a real disadvantage because of he’s the opportunities he’s had to go up against Ohio State’s defense in practice.
“When we're lined up for the first scrimmage and we got the best D-line in the country coming at us, it's a lot different than getting some throws against a lesser team or something like that. And when it's their third guys in the game, too, it's like, ‘Am I really getting that much out of throwing a pass in the game?’” Brown said. “I mean, I'd much rather go out against our DBs, our guys like Denzel (Burke) and Davison Igbinosun. With our (receivers) like Marvin (Harrison Jr.), and being able to go like that in practice, I think it's way better than having a couple reps in a game.”
Ideally, Day says he would like to name a starting quarterback within the first two weeks of camp so that quarterback can take the majority of first-team reps as camp winds down. But Day says a clear starter needs to emerge before he will do that, and he’s not ruling out the possibility that the competition could even extend into the season. That said, Day is optimistic that either McCord or Brown can be a successful starter for the Buckeyes.
“I have a feeling that both guys are going to be starter-level,” Day said. “Right away? I don't know. Halfway through the season? I don't know. I don't know how the journey is gonna go. But it's a good problem to have if you have a couple guys that you feel like you could put into a game that can go play. But we're not there right now, and you just don't know how it's going to shake.”
Until a starter is named, McCord and Brown are both taking the mindset into preseason camp that they need to take things one day at a time and focus on getting better to put themselves in the best position possible to be ready to start.
“I think the biggest thing is just controlling the things that you can control,” McCord said. “I think sometimes it's easy to get caught up in the big picture and you don't make any progress doing that. I think the most important thing is focusing on every day and making the steps to become the best player you can possibly be.”
