Ohio State’s 2016 recruiting class — headlined by the likes of Nick Bosa, Jonathon Cooper, Demario McCall and others — finished as the No. 4-ranked recruiting class in the country, according to 247Sports’ composite ratings. On Sunday, that group took the field for its first-ever fall camp practice.
Buckeyes head coach Urban Meyer liked what he saw.
“A very impressive first-year group of players that went out this morning,” Meyer said after Day 1 of fall camp. “I say this often, but I hope they all play. There will certainly be some of them who play.”
Meyer’s right: He does often say how much he hates to redshirt freshmen. But the reality is, since he’s arrived at Ohio State, most of the time he has redshirted the majority of his freshman class.
Last season, the Buckeyes redshirted an eye-opening 21 members of their 2015 recruiting class. Only Jerome Baker, Eric Glover-Williams, Isaiah Prince and Denzel Ward saw playing time last fall.
Meyer said Sunday there may have been a reason for that, though.
“Last year’s group was not very mature for whatever reason,” the Buckeyes head coach said. “There’s a lot of reasons because they’re not bad people, but the problem is they looked in front of them and saw a monster that they couldn’t beat out.
“What’s the human nature?” Meyer continued. “It’s, ‘I’m not going to beat that guy out so I’m going to act like an 18-year-old.’”
It makes some sense when you think about it.
Mike Weber saw he was stuck behind Ezekiel Elliott, so maybe he didn’t do some of the things he needed to do in order to get on the field. Torrance Gibson had the likes of Michael Thomas and Jalin Marshall in the wide receiver room. Justin Hilliard — the highest-ranked recruit in the class — saw Joshua Perry, Raekwon McMillan and Darron Lee as Ohio State’s starting linebackers last year.
Perhaps there wasn’t much motivation to go out and compete the way one needs to in a Meyer-led program with that much talent at the top of the depth chart. That seems like a reasonable explanation.
That was last season, though. That won’t work this year. With 16 starters gone from last season’s team, “a monster” is what Ohio State is trying to build, not exactly what it has right now.
Both classes — the 2015 group and the newly-incorporated 2016 one — have to sense what is there for the taking. There’s plenty of playing time available and there are position battles all over the field. At Big Ten Media Days in Chicago, Meyer called it “a free-for-all for playing time.”
That makes people grow up rather quickly. Do it, or you’ll be left behind.
Meyer said he saw it Day 1 from his 2016 class. He’s starting to see it from that 2015 group, as well.
“All of a sudden, I say, ‘In three weeks, you’re playing.’ That kind of makes people mature rather quickly,” Meyer said. “They see this is open season, man. Go beat somebody out.”
