ICYMI:
- Former Ohio State defensive captain Chico Nelson passed away at 46 on Tuesday.
- Chris Spielman is leaving ESPN, where he's been since 2001, for FOX Sports.
FROM ALMOST WASHING OUT TO THIRD-ROUND PICK. Adolphus Washington, a former five-star signee from Cincinnati, wanted to quit Ohio State football once upon a time. That, however, was before he held a conversation with his father, Adolphus Washington Sr.
After Washington Sr. nixed the idea of Junior leaving the Buckeyes, the younger Washington approached Urban Meyer and asked for a meeting. Meyer acquiesced and told him to bring his father.
The straight talk that followed helped salvage Washington's career.
From buffalobills.com:
“I always felt like I was doing enough, but obviously I wasn’t, and when I got in the office I thought coach Meyer was going to sugarcoat some things, but he didn’t sugar coat anything,” said Washington. “He kept it all the way real with me and gave me a list of things I had to do to step up my game and my dad was all for it. It was what it was.”
“He was calm about it, but he was straightforward,” said Washington Senior of coach Meyer’s conversation with his son. “He didn’t pull any punches. He looked at me and once he and I found out we were on the same team together he looked at me and said, ‘It’s going to cost him games if he doesn’t straighten up. I’m not going to kick him off the team, but it will cost him games. So I’m just letting you know now if you drive up to a game and he’s not playing you’ll know why.’”
[...]
“When he called me earlier that week he said, ‘The coaches are against me,’” said Washington Sr. “They’re yelling at me all the time. I said, ‘Son listen, when they don’t yell at you that’s when you’ve got a problem. When they’re yelling at you that’s okay.’”
Washington had been supplanted on the defensive line by Joey Bosa, so props to Papa Washington and Meyer for righting this young man's path. History speaks for itself: The odds of leaving Meyer's program and still making it to the NFL are slim.
MENSA FOUNDER AND HIS RELATIONSHIP WITH FORMER BOSS. Tom Herman, who you might not know founded MENSA, the organization for geniuses, in 1947, no longer resides in Columbus, Ohio.
His Houston Cougars are gunning for a playoff spot in 2016, and Coogs fans would be wise to be thankful for the tutorship Herman received from Urban Meyer while at Ohio State. It's a blueprint that resurrected their program.
From rivals.com:
"This is a bit of Columbus south if you will, or Ohio State south," Herman said as we sat down with him for an exclusive sit-down interview in the U of H football offices. "There is probably about 90-percent of what we do is based on what I learned from coach Meyer."
Herman is quick to admit that he and Meyer may not have identical personalities but their approach is very much the same and Herman carried many lessons that he picked up at Ohio State forward with him.
"I think the plan and the accountability and the alignment of everybody that touches your student athlete from your assistant coaches to your strength staff to your training room to your academic people, everybody that touches your student athlete, the message has to be the same," Herman added. "That was one of the biggest things that I learned from him, that alignment throughout the department of everybody that touches your football team."
If Meyer were half the intergalactic crime boss his enemies painted him as when he came to Ohio State, he would've frozen Herman in carbonate instead of letting him take his program to the American Athletic Conference, which in retrospect should've been a felony as well.
I want to buy into Herman as Meyer's heir, but Ohio State has been on a coaching heater since 2001. ARE WE THAT LUCKY? (That was rhetorical. I already liquidated all $207 in my life savings account and sent it to an internet casino.)
CAVS FRONT OFFICE SIGNS OFF ON JENT HIRE. Ohio State fans loved the return of Chris Jent to Thad Matta's bench. As it turns out, the general manger and coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers thinks it's swell too.
From dispatch.com:
“I think it’s great,” Lebron James said inside the Cleveland Clinic Courts. “Obviously I know how much (Jent) loves Ohio, how much he loves Ohio State and I think it’s great for the program to get a basketball mind like that. I’ve got a long history with him, and it’s great to see him back in Columbus.”
[...]
“We were able to put in a lot of work when he was here as an assistant,” James said. “Also, in a few offseasons we put in a lot of work to just help improve my game, and I give him a lot of credit.”
Speaking of the Cavs, I see their fans are froggy after a 9-0 run against bad playoff teams. It's heartwarming to know there's zero chance that ends up backfiring.
LET'S GET IT, RAINBOW WARRIORS. Don't look now, folks, but the space–time continuum ensures the college football season is drawing closer by the second. ESPN and ABC announced their opening weekend slate, and let's just say y'all may want to clear your schedules Labor Day weekend.
It starts with Herman's Fightin' MENSAs against Oklahoma, and Hawaii taxing Michigan at home.
From espnmediazone.com:
| DATE | TIME (P.M.) | CONTEST |
|---|---|---|
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 12:00 | No. 5 OKLAHOMA vs. 18 HOUSTON |
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 12:00 | HAWAII at No. 3 MICHIGAN |
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 3:30 | No. 6 LOUISIANA STATE vs. WISCONSIN |
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 5:30 | No. 13 GEORGIA vs. No. 19 NORTH CAROLINA |
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 8:00 | No. 12 SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA vs. No. 1 ALABAMA |
| SAT, SEPT. 3 | 9:00 | No. 2 CLEMSON at AUBURN |
| SUN, SEPT. 4 | 7:30 | No. 9 NOTRE DAME at TEXAS |
| MON, SEPT 5 | 8:00 | No. 14 MISSISSIPPI STATE vs. No. 4 FLORIDA STATE |
The games with a "vs" between opponents mean it will be played at non-campus arenas. I'm not complaining, though, because as we all know college football is intended to be played in soulless NFL arenas.
MICHIGAN: WE'RE NO. 3! Like me, you might've guffawed at the "No. 3" ranking ranking attached to Michigan in the above table. Apparently people are tabbing Michigan as a "dark horse playoff contender."
From espn.com:
There’s no question Jim Harbaugh has revitalized his alma mater and shaken up the national landscape, and the hype is certainly building for his second season at Michigan. But there is still uncertainty lingering at the most important position on the field, even with Wilton Speight taking the lead in the quarterback derby. And the program’s biggest rivals have home-field advantage when they play the Wolverines: If they can manage to exact revenge on Michigan State in late October, there’s still a huge test looming a month later at Ohio State in a series hasn’t been kind to the Wolverines lately. The early lines already have the Buckeyes favored in The Game, thanks in part to Urban Meyer’s head start in stockpiling talent, so it seems premature to tab Michigan for one of those four coveted playoff spots.
Michigan will lose at least three times in 2016, and one of those will be to Ohio State on Nov. 26. Fave this tweet!
THOSE WMDs. Recently declassified photos show start of Soviet space program... Industry advice for this year's journalism graduates... Yellowstone bison calf euthanized after being abducted by tourists... Dad suggests arriving at airport 14 hours early... J.R. Swish loves Cavs fans.
