Skull Session: Francis Schmidt Dominated at Tulsa, Linebackers Weren't Doing Their Job, and TBDBITL is Doing Roaring '20s

I greatly appreciate all of your prayers and kind words. My mother is still not doing particularly well, but she's doing decidedly better than she was earlier this week.

Let's keep that momentum rolling!

Word of the Day: Bloviate.

 “CLOSE THE GATES OF MERCY.” You might know Francis Schmidt as the Ohio State head coach who invented the famed Gold Pants and was the first Buckeye coach ever to leave Ohio State with a winning record over Michigan.

And you'd be absolutely correct!

But I have just learned that before he became a notorious Wolverine Slayer in Columbus, Schmidt was the head coach at Tulsa (then called Kendall), where he uh... liked to run up the score.

In his first two seasons as a head coach, the dude went 18-0-2, outscoring his opponents 1,215 to 48 for an average score of about 61-2. In his very first game as a head coach, he beat a team 155-0, and it took four games for somebody to even score on him.

Granted, some of these teams might not have been much better than an average high school team, but any coach willing to run up the score that much, that consistently has my respect.

Also, it clearly carried over to The Game, where Schmidt blanked Michigan for four straight years. What a legend.

 BUT WHERE ARE THE LINEBACKERS? I saw a lot of folks worked up about the defensive line on Saturday, and my personal #take after a few rewatches is that even though the line was certainly not great, it probably wouldn't even make the top-20 problems from the game.

For the most part, Oregon just had a game plan that took the defensive line – particularly the pass rush – right out of the game. And even sometimes when it looked like the line did something especially wrong, that wasn't necessarily the case, either.

I give you The Case of the Missing Linebackers, by Matt Finkes.

He is 100% being taught to do that. You dont wrong arm pullers without being taught as part of the scheme. Designed to spill everything outside, the question is where are the LBs to replace? The design is to eliminate vertical seems, but you have to replace the gaps. 1/3 https://t.co/KHkS3Ga2cG

— Matt Finkes (@MattFinkes) September 16, 2021

When a player at this level does something once or twice, it can be a missed assignment or mental error, when they do it every time, they are coached that as part of the overall scheme. 3/3

— Matt Finkes (@MattFinkes) September 16, 2021

The passing game was similar – when the defensive line is aggressive in the pass rush, Oregon would dump the ball short over the top or out wide and put the stress on the stress on the linebackers and secondary.

Seriously – if you want to be upset about the pass rush, count how many passes Oregon even attempted that were longer than 10 or 15 yards. There were almost none, and no push rush in the world is designed to get to the quarterback that quickly.

That's not to say a great, exceptional defensive line wouldn't have helped. I'm sure Chase Young would have found a way to impact this game somehow. And I'm sure an adjustment could have been made to allow the defensive line to make more of an impact (a in-game defensive adjustment? in this economy???).

But all in all, if I'm crafting a list of defensive problems that caused Ohio State to lose on Saturday, I don't think the defensive line is anywhere near the top.

 CALL ME JAY GATSBY. It looks like The Best Damn Band in the Land is going to be bringing some speakeasy flavor at halftime this week.

This Saturday, we're taking you back in time years and giving you a taste of "The Roaring '20s." See you on the field! #GoBucks pic.twitter.com/TMH1jQRDqV

— The Ohio State University Marching Band (@TBDBITL) September 16, 2021

The good news is, I can confirm there will be no prohibition in or around the 'Shoe. The alcohol will flow.

 DRUGS ARE BAD, MMKAY. Athletes may now be officially able to profit off of their name, image and likeness, but as I'm sure you're aware, that doesn't mean it wasn't happening already for like, decades.

And in Cris Carter's case, that meant not only more money than he'd ever seen in his life, but it meant drugs. Lots of drugs.

Untold Stories Episode 29

Cris Carter shares how improper benefits at Ohio State introduced him to crack. A cautionary story for college athletes in this NIL world.pic.twitter.com/7XgdOivHhK

— Hookah Doncic (@MasterTes) September 16, 2021

"I don't know how I was able to function at that level." 

What a wild story.

I see his concern about giving young people money, but realistically, all his story proves is that young people are going to get access to that sort of money regardless.

Isn't it safer now that it's not under the table and the players can actually get some sort of help and guidance on how to handle it? His problem wasn't that he suddenly had money, it was that he had no idea what to do with it, and was on an island by himself trying to figure it out.

 SONG OF THE DAY. "Baby Shark Trap Remix" by PJ Panda.

 NOT STICKING TO SPORTS. Die, beautiful spotted lanternfly... A bitter divorce leads to the stolen brains and bodies of wealthy Americans who had paid $36,000 to have their bodies preserved to be later bought to life... 40 percent of people would have sex with a robot... Companies are so desperate to hire workers, they're getting rid of drug tests... A man accused of firing shots out of a hotel window says he was shooting at aliens...