Remember when Michigan defensive end Chase Winovich talked that trash about a "rolly polly" Ohio State fan that "attacked" him in 2016? Billy Price avenged our corpulent brethren in a way Winovich will feel until 2020:
Billy Price pic.twitter.com/V10kmSjpAY
— J.R. (@JReidDraftScout) November 26, 2017
And that's why he'll be a first-round pick in the 2018 NFL Draft.
ICYMI:
- Buckeyes trying to avoid second letdown of the season.
- Urban Meyer and Chris Worley defended Greg Schiano.
- Scouting Report: Wisconsin is the same as always.
- Film Study: Making a comeback vs. Michigan look easy.
- Help put a life-size statue of Woody Hayes in his hometown of Newcomerstown, Ohio.
Word of the Day: Inglenook.
HERE COMES THE BIG BOY POLL. College football fans love arguing about polls almost as much as they love watching their favorite teams on Saturday. AP, the one run by a Ponzi Scheme and SIDs, the CFP poll; it doesn't matter. There will be blood if the right team is not ranked in the right place.
Tonight, Ohio State will have one team in its sights: The Alabama Crimson Tide, who got drilled last Saturday by the only good team it faced this regular season (unless you count four-loss Mississippi State).
From cbssports.com:
7. Alabama (11-1, SEC): The Crimson Tide lost the wrong game, denying themselves a chance to win the SEC. As last year taught us, though, this is not a tournament of conference champions. Alabama's resume is not as strong as Ohio State's was last year, but neither is the competition.
[...]
9. Ohio State (10-2, Big Ten): Ohio State's biggest problem is a loss at home to Oklahoma, which means the Sooners are the ceiling in the playoff for the Buckeyes. The committee has been borderline-religious about head-to-head this season, especially at the top of the rankings. Ohio State's second-biggest problem is a 31-point loss at unranked Iowa, which is the ugliest loss any of these teams have to date. The teams that lost to worse opponents at least put up a fight in their defeats. Beyond that, the Buckeyes just don't have the kind of wins or schedule that separates themselves from other good teams, especially if they need to jump a team with a better record.
I'm not worried about no Crimson Tide. (Of course it lost the one game we wanted them to win, though.)
Still, the committee seems to value who teams have beat rather than who they lost to. Which, if Ohio State beats Wisconsin, it will have a better win than anything Alabama can offer.
Plus, there's precedent for the jump:
possible precedent if 2017 Alabama is analogous to 2015 OSU: in 2015, 2-loss Stanford jumped 1-loss, no-conference-championship, idle OSU after winning the Pac 12 pic.twitter.com/JY4JkMRFlq
— cam duffner son of brett son of carl son of walter (@camduffner) November 27, 2017
So don't fret if the Buckeyes aren't ahead of the Tide tonight. Only one poll in this sport actually means anything. (But please continue to read all our posts about polls and argue on them for 300-comment threads, please. I need this job as I'm not trained to work in an office.)
LONG WAY TO WATCH A LOSS. The last Ohio State game I attended was the 2014 B1G championship, and Buckeye fans outnumbered Bucky fans by 10-1.
Not that that's surprising in a game involving Ohio State. This year, however, it sounds like the Badgers' first undefeated regular season since 1912 has fans thinking this is their year.
From madison.com:
Tickets for Saturday's University of Wisconsin Big Ten Championship football game against Ohio State are getting harder -- but not impossible -- to find.
[...]
Some, like second-year UW-Madison business student Chauncey Douglas, were disappointed when they tried to buy tickets and discovered that they were sold out.
He said he's attended all of the Badgers' home games this year and was "frustrated as hell" when he discovered the 2,000 tickets available to students were sold out.
"I did not expect that," he said.
I won't even be mad if Wisconsin wins. But, as a financial advisor registered by the great state of Wisconsin, I would advise Badger fans to save the money and catch the game at home.
Stay home and Wisconsin wins, you have saved for a CFP excursion. Go to the game and Wisconsin loses, and suddenly you're drunk, miserable, and surrounded by a Buckeye horde in downtown Indianapolis in December.
BARRETT THE CAPTAIN. Dwayne Haskins is going to be a boss for Ohio State. But Urban Meyer is loyal to Barrett for more reasons than throwing a football.
He showed one reason after Ohio State failed to lineup after Barrett called an audible midway through the second quarter while trailing by 7.
From Kyle Morgan of theozone.net:
Slight confusion by Hill and Victor pre-snap prompted Coach Meyer to run down the sideline looking to possibly call a timeout. As Meyer neared the referee, Barrett organized the formation and snapped the ball.
The Michigan linebackers, reading run blocking from Price, bit on the hard play fake to K.J. Hill and Marcus Baugh was able to sneak past the secondary for an easy pitch and catch.
Could Haskins do that? Absolutely. But Barrett has done it a lot longer.
SCHIANO IS GOOD. After Volunteer fans used the specter of systemic coverup of child abuse to torpedo a coach they saw as below their station, non-neanderthals struck back in defense of Greg Schiano Monday.
His biggest advocate, perhaps literally and figuratively, is former Rutgers Knight Eric LeGrand.
From Steve Politi of nj.com:
"I know the man. I played under him. I saw the man after my injury," LeGrand said on Sunday night. "He told me when he recruited me that he treats all of his players like family.
"And after my injury ..."
He paused. LeGrand knew I had heard -- and written -- this story before. Greg Schiano had become a second father to LeGrand when he was paralyzed from the shoulders down after making a tackle in 2010, driving an hour each night after practice to sit bedside during his recovery and make sure his injured player "had the best care in the world."
LeGrand wanted to call Schiano on Sunday night as the disaster unfolded in Tennessee, wanted to find something to say to lift his spirits, but he figured it was useless. The hate-filled mob had gotten to the former Rutgers coach already, taking a snippet of courtroom testimony that amounts to nothing more than hearsay in the Jerry Sandusky case and using it to ruin a man's reputation and maybe his career.
I honestly did not think my opinion of Tennessee football could get any lower. And then they went and did this. I'm still appalled.
IOWA STATE UPS CAMPBELL. One potential future Ohio State coach on which I'm keeping tabs, along with Texans defensive coordinator Mike Vrabel, is Iowa State's Matt Campbell.
Looks like Campbell won't be leaving Aimes anytime soon, though:
Excited to announce Matt Campbell has agreed to a new six-year
— Jamie Pollard (@IASTATEAD) November 27, 2017
contract worth $22.5M. Matt's annual salary will increase
from $2.1M to $3.5M. We will also increase the football staff's annual compensation by $1M. Go Cyclones! #raisethestandard
Looks like his buyout remains in a ballpark that has already scared off suitors.
From desmoinesregister.com:
Campbell's buyout may have scared off some suitors. Pollard was asked about it during Iowa State's weekly coaches' radio show.
"The buyout will stay in that same continuum," Pollard said. "The buyout for this year was $9 million dollars. It will be $7 million dollars next year. So that's a very fair number and one that protects both the institution and, I think, also shows that coach Campbell's committed to being here."
Good news is, Ohio State can probably afford $9 million if it ever came to that in 2056 when Meyer retires.
THOSE WMDs. A Radio Shack robbery could spur a new era of digital privacy... Two murder convictions for one fatal shot... As Bitcoin scrapes $10,000, an investment boom like no other... Mexico created decaying slums instead of affordable housing... City Hall, by Amazon.
