Skull Session: Caleb Downs Pranks Ryan Day, Will Howard Looks the Part of an Ohio State QB1 and Brandon Inniss Adds Juice to the Buckeyes’ Punt Return Team

By Chase Brown on September 3, 2024 at 5:00 am
Caleb Downs
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Welcome to the Skull Session.

O-H...

Have a good Tuesday.

 PRANKS AND DOLLAR BILLS. Last week, Pat Forde of Sports Illustrated published an article titled “Ohio State’s Northern Slight Turned Into a $20 Million Comeback.” In the piece, Forde examined how Ohio State’s three consecutive losses to Michigan and the Wolverines 2023 national championship* led the program’s veterans and a talented transfer class “on a quest to win a title of their own.”

While the entire article deserves a read, two portions of the 3,000-word piece stood out to me — that Caleb Downs pranked Ryan Day before committing to Ohio State and that Downs and Tuimoloau are, in all likelihood, the highest-paid Buckeyes in 2024.

CALEB DOWNS, THE PRANKSTER!

Caleb Downs had already decided he was coming to Ohio State. But he couldn’t resist putting Day through a few seconds of prankish anguish before delivering the good news.

Day had just gotten off a plane on a recruiting trip to Mobile, Ala., in January when he anxiously returned a request from Downs to FaceTime him. Downs, who grew up in tiny Hoschton, Ga., was coming off a 107-tackle freshman season at Alabama. He was now choosing between Georgia and Ohio State. Day figured this would be the deciding moment.

Day was confident. In high school, Downs had FaceTimed Day in tears to say he was turning down the Buckeyes and going to Alabama. With the help of secondary coach Tim Walton and THE Foundation, Day believed Ohio State had done enough to get Downs the second time around.

But Downs began the conversation with a sorrowful apology to Day—“I put that sad face on,” he says—then hung his head.

“Stop,” Day said. “Don’t do this again.”

“Just kidding, Coach,” Downs responded. “I’m coming.”

I have to imagine Day almost fainted when he saw Downs hang his head – and not a pretend faint as he did with Jeremiah Smith, like, a real faint. Missing on Downs out of high school crushed the head coach; missing on him a second time would have put him in a coma.

BRING ME MY MONEY!

Ultimately, Ohio State and its collectives are attempting—within NCAA rules, such as they are—to buy a title. Day made headlines two years ago by estimating that $13 million was needed to maintain the Buckeyes’ roster, a figure that many deemed exorbitant at the time. Since then, the price has gone up. Sources familiar with the overall player payroll for Ohio State football this season say it’s about $20 million.

…

Without revealing specific numbers, sources familiar with the team salary structure say Tuimoloau is the highest-paid returning Buckeyes player. Downs is the highest-paid newcomer. There is plenty to go around for the other standouts on the roster.

So Tuimoloau and Downs got paaaaaaaaid. But that doesn’t surprise me. Tuimoloau was one of the final Buckeyes to decide whether he would return for another season at Ohio State, meaning his holdout could have earned him – and probably did earn him – some extra dollars. Then, Downs was the No. 1 overall prospect in the transfer portal. Of course, someone with his talent would demand a sizeable financial investment.

No matter how much Tuimoloau, Downs or another Ohio State player’s services cost this season, Day has made it clear that his team did not need extra incentives to be Buckeyes in 2024.

“These guys love being Ohio State Buckeyes,” Day said in a radio appearance last week. “They want to win in the worst way, not only for themselves and for their teammates but also for Buckeye Nation. The way they’ve gone to work has been inspiring.”

 THE POWER OF WILL. OK. Now that I have addressed last week’s news let me return to Ohio State’s win over Akron. There’s still much to discuss – namely, how Will Howard performed in his debut for the Buckeyes.

I thought Howard looked great on Saturday.

After an inconsistent start (an expected result for someone making their first Ohio State start in front of 102,000 fans), Howard looked comfortable, confident and poised while completing 17 of 28 passes for 228 yards and three touchdowns on the afternoon. Moreover, Howard was on time, accurate and – above all else – he took care of the football while leading the team to 38 of its 52 points.

Some of Howard’s best throws came on Ohio State’s second drive of the game: a 19-yard pass on the run to Emeka Egbuka, an 8-yard pass on the run (after brushing off an Akron defender) to Smith and a beautiful 16-yard over-the-shoulder Smith to score the Buckeyes’ first touchdown of the 2024 season.

Howard continued to deliver his passes on the money as the game continued. He also showed off his speed and power on several occasions, running the football four times for 28 yards – yet he ended with 18 net yards because of a boneheaded mistake at the end of the first half, tossing a bounce pass to TreVeyon Henderson resulting in a fumble and a loss of 10 yards. 

Still, that was Howard’s lone mistake in an otherwise stellar afternoon.

“I thought he had pretty good poise the whole game,” Day said of Howard’s performance. “He took care of the football other than the one crazy decision there at the end of the first half. He tried to force something. You have to take a deep breath on that. But for his first start in the Shoe – he’s a more experienced player, but he’s in a new offense and a new environment – I’ll say this overall… I thought we sort of settled in and started to have more fun. We started to play a little looser, which is how we need to play.”

Howard echoed his coach’s sentiments, vowing that he and the Buckeyes will look better on offense this weekend.

“We need to work on starting faster, starting better, and not having those mistakes we had in the first half, me included in that,” Howard said. “But we built off of it. We came out in the second half with a ton of plays and did really well. A win is a win. When you win by as much as we did, it’s good. I’m happy we won. But there’s still a lot of stuff to clean up.”

 HE'LL GET ONE — EVENTUALLY. Eleven Warriors beat reporter Garrick Hodge beat me to it in The Hodgepodge, but I’ll still address it here: Brandon Inniss will score on a punt return this season – eventually.

When asked about special teams on Saturday, Day said Ohio State has difference-makers on kick and punt return. He specifically mentioned Inniss as someone who excites him when he has the ball in his hands.

“You could see there’s some potential there,” Day said of Inniss and Ohio State’s punt return team. “It was better today than I remember in the past. We’ll keep working on that because if we get some special teams scores, some defensive scores, that can be a huge part of our season.”

If I can be so bold as to correct Coach Day, this is a matter of when not if.

Each time Inniss caught a punt on Saturday, I believed the sophomore receiver could make a house call. Across four total punt returns, Inniss collected 60 yards – a number Eleven Warriors assistant producer Josh Poloha discovered is just 15 yards less than the 75 Ohio State recorded in 17 total punt returns last season. 

Inniss will return a punt for a touchdown this season. I believe it. He believes it.

“I’m definitely gonna score a touchdown,” Inniss said when learning Ohio State last scored on a punt return in 2014. “Ten years? I’ll get one this year.”

 PLAYERS OF THE GAME. Ohio State football named its players of the game on Sunday, with Howard earning the award on offense, Lathan Ransom on defense and Brandon Inniss on special teams.

ICYMI: Eleven Warriors implemented a new award system for the 2024 Ohio State season. Rather than name an offensive, defensive and special teams player of the game like the Buckeyes, we will name three players as Stars of the Game. The selection process mirrors the hockey tradition of naming Three Stars after each game to honor the game’s top performers. The first star is the game’s MVP, while the “second star” and “third star” recognize Ohio State’s next-best performers. 

This week, Jeremiah Smith, Ransom and JT Tuimoloau received top honors for their performances in the season opener.

Follow along with our Three Stars of the Game after each Ohio State win. New posts will arrive on Sunday afternoons throughout the season.

 SONG OF THE DAY. "Thunder" - Imagine Dragons.

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