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May: Any Doubts Toward Ryan Day Is Ridiculous

JR Sports Brief / JR
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January 21, 2025 8:06 pm

May: Any Doubts Toward Ryan Day Is Ridiculous

JR Sports Brief / JR

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January 21, 2025 8:06 pm

Lettermen Row Ohio State football reporter Tim May joined JR to discuss what Ohio State's national championship means for the program, if the heat is off Ryan Day, who will be the Buckeyes quarterback next season and if the Big Ten has overtaken the SEC.

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Tim, thank you for taking the time.

Sure man, anytime you know that. Now, what we saw last night, are people gonna give Ryan Day a little bit of a break over the next few months, just a little bit? Well, the ones who don't, you know, who cares about them anyway, you know?

There are people who can't be satisfied in every walk of life, you know, and I'm not sure I've heard much rumbling about it. Yeah, eventually he does need to beat Michigan again. He has beaten Michigan once as head coach in 2019, but you know, if you can't appreciate and enjoy what Ohio State just did over the last six weeks, then you're probably not a true Ohio State football fan, you know, and or even fan of college football. I mean, winning four straight games, no one's ever done that before in the postseason of major college football and against, you know, the SEC's third best team and then against the Big Ten champion, Oregon, and then against the SEC's runner-up team, Texas, and then beating the team that beat Georgia, you know, Notre Dame. If you don't appreciate this run, then you don't really have a sense of college football tradition, history, and all those other things, and you don't have appreciation for the new era in major college football. When you talk about the new era of major college football, a lot of people are shocked to really look at the numbers and go, my god, this is a man in Ryan Day who has a coaching record now of 70 and 10.

He has an 87 percent winning percentage. Like, how much more of a better future or past could a guy have and not get the respect? Even Nick Saban took people to the woodshed for saying, you got to show this guy some love. Yeah, and you do, you know, and Nick Saban as a head coach, you know, for example, didn't win a national championship until I forgot what year was in his, I think it was his third stop as a head coach because he first started at Toledo before he went with Bill Belichick to the Cleveland Browns, and he came back and was at Michigan State.

Of course, upset that really great Ohio State 1998 team, which really got his career, jump-started his career big time. You know, he didn't win a national championship until, what, 2003 at LSU, and that guy's won more than anybody. So sometimes it takes a little longer than others, and, you know, yes, I mean, when you look at Ryan Day, who some people wanted to run out of town on the rail on November the 30th about five o'clock in the afternoon after a fourth straight loss to Michigan, when you look at his winning percentage up there in the realm of Newt Rodney, a former Notre Dame coach, I might add. I know you knew that, but some people might not. People just live it today, but, you know, Urban Meyer, you know, that winning percentage he had as a head coach, I mean, among the top three or four winning percentages of coaches who coached at least 70 games or more in major college football, it's pretty astounding.

And, yeah, and this was, as I told him, from December the 1st until January 20th, I've been around the game for a long time. This was the best coaching job I have ever witnessed, and I think that's saying something a little bit, but the way he got this, the way he went face to face with his team the day after the Michigan game in a big, you know, closed door meeting and then left the meeting and the players went face to face with each other and came out, finished the meeting arm-in-arm in basically a prayer circle, getting aligned. And I'm telling you, my man, the spiritual aspect of this team should not be snickered at. I mean, it played a major role in this, but, you know, the players took ownership of the team for one or another term, which is what any head coach should strive for.

The players holding themselves accountable and taking ownership, you know, and what they do, they ran off four straight wins by double digits in the toughest gauntlet, postseason gauntlet any team has ever run. And Tim May is joining us from lettermanrow.com, has covered Ohio State for a long time. When you talk about how this team has been able to come together, we know that the transfer portal is huge now in college football. What have you seen from the day that Will Howard arrived? And now we know that he's going to be moving forward.

Have you seen a change or did you see a change or progression? Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, it's no slam on Kansas State, but Kansas State, number one, didn't have the talent assemblage that Ohio State did or has had for a while. You know, Kansas State didn't run anywhere close to the same kind of offense that Ohio State runs.

And, you know, people have gotten the chronology of this situation a little bit backwards. When Will Howard first showed up at Ohio State, the new offensive coordinator was going to be Bill O'Brien. And then Bill O'Brien, working at Ohio State for, what, two weeks, the Boston College job came open and he jumped at it. Jeff Haffley had left there to go back to the NFL as a defensive coordinator, I think, for the Green Bay Packers, if I remember correctly. Jeff Haffley, at one time in 2019, was a defensive coordinator for a year on Ryan Day's first staff as a head coach. And anyway, Ryan Day had tried to talk Chip Kuehne over the last couple of years anyway. And Ryan Day had tried to talk Chip Kuehne into joining him way back in mid or late December because Chip Kuehne had put out feelers that he wanted to maybe step away from being a head coach and become an offensive coordinator somewhere, preferably in the National Football League. But when that didn't pan out, he was still there at UCLA and he joined Ryan Day, who, you know, I know you know that story about Ryan Day at New Hampshire. Chip Kuehne was his offensive coordinator when Ryan Day was a player, a quarterback at New Hampshire. And then Ryan Day worked for him both with the Philadelphia Eagles for a year and the San Francisco 49ers for a year.

Anyway, they got their act back together in February. So, you know, Will Howard had already been here for a month, had been at Ohio State for a month before Chip Kuehne came along. And so suddenly Will Howard was going to learn from both Chip Kuehne and Ryan Day, two of the better quarterback coaches, you know, really in college football, maybe as a pair, the best pair on one team. And, you know, he jumped at it from the standpoint of he knew he had a lot to learn from footwork to the brain game to reading defenses, progressions, things like that, and became quite expert at it as the season progressed. And really his final exam on Monday night against Notre Dame, one of the top defenses in the country, was a sight to behold the way he passed it with flying colors. No pun intended on past.

Oh, yeah, we saw the passing efficiency to start the game. Tim May is here with us on the JR Sportbreeze Show on the Infinity Sports Network. Well, we know when you have success, people move on to bigger and brighter things. We know Will Howard is going to be on his way to the NFL. I mean, Ryan Day, why in the world would he decide to leave what he's done at Ohio State? I sure wouldn't leave. And then you mentioned Chip Kelly.

He certainly said, man, I don't want to deal with being at the top of the totem pole. I want to work specifically on offenses and QBs. Is there any chance that the coaching staff changes at all, especially particularly when it comes down to Chip Kelly? I'm not sure about Chip Kelly. Chip seems pretty happy with his situation. Now, you know, you've always got to have your ear open and your eyes open to offers that you think could be better or, you know, maybe, you know, whatever your, whatever your bent is. I mean, you know, the room that's going around about Oklahoma possibly having great interest in Jim Knowles, Ohio State's third year defensive coordinator, who definitely turned that unit around from where it was in 2021 to the number one total defense, number one scoring defense in the country this season. So, you know, and Ryan Day said today, you know, in our early, early, early morning press conference in Atlanta, I don't know why they scheduled those at 9 a.m. when they know everybody didn't get to bed till 3 at the earliest.

But it is what it is, right? You got to catch a plane. Well, in Atlanta, you got to catch the train sort of plane and you got to hope it leaves. The train, the taxi, the Uber, the Lyft, whatever, just to get you to the airport. Now, I guess there was a big, big, huge traffic jam at Checkpoint Charlie there getting in, you know, getting into your flight, you know, getting into your flight, but the TSA. But that's another story from this morning. I drove, so I'm a much smarter man than almost every other person. But the bottom line is, yeah, I mean, it's Ryan Day said this morning, you know, when you have a staff like this, you can have success like this.

Everybody wants to put a taproot into it, right? And draw from it. And that's we've seen that forever in in major college football. I mean, you know, Blue Ols was a defensive backs coach on the 1968 Ohio State national championship team for Woody A's. And the next thing you know, he got his first set coaching job.

I think it was at William and Mary. But, you know, this you can launch careers out of a season like this. And so long story short, I'm sure there's going to be interest in several Ohio State coaches. Now the funny thing about it is, this is the latest by far that that a college football season has gone for two teams, January 20.

Are you kidding me? And so a lot of people have already solidified things. But we'll see. I mean, you understand Oklahoma still in search of a defensive coordinator. But, you know, how precarious is that perch over there for Brent Venables and stuff?

You know, you would think the fuse is growing really short there. So we'll see what like Jim Knowles does and maybe a couple of other people on this staff. But it wouldn't be a surprise if somebody got an offer because, like I said, they're the national champs, the first of a 16 game season.

They know a lot of things that a lot of people still don't know about the new era of college football. When we think about what's actually going to take place on the field next year and who's going to be throwing the football, would you lean it heavily towards Julian Sane taking over? Well, Devin Brown put his name into the transfer portal several weeks ago, even though he was a backup quarterback even last night.

So yeah, I mean, Julian Sane would appear to be the next man up. They've got a big time signee, Tavian St. Clair. Actually, he's already in class at Ohio State. In fact, he was at the game last night, posted a picture or two of him on Twitter, watching the quarterbacks warm up. I mean, he was a much ballyhooed Ohio State raised quarterback from Belle Fountain, Ohio. And, you know, one of the top recruits in the country if you check their recruiting rankings. So you got to think he'll be in, you know, at least competing. But yeah, Julian Sane would appear to be the guy.

Still don't know what Lincoln keynotes is up to. This great athlete they've got that was basically the 14th quarterback this year. And they might get somebody from the portal. You know, what we're hearing is there may be looking for like a, for want of another term, a Case Keenum type commercial where you send in the relief guy.

They might be looking for that kind of player maybe out of the portal. But we'll see how that goes. But yeah, Julian Sane from Carlsbad, California would appear to be the heir apparent at least at this point. When you think about Michigan winning last year, you think about Ohio State winning last night. What does it say to you when you take a look at the Big Ten, especially given all the changes that it's been or it's gone through and the spread of it from West Coast to East and everything in the middle? Yeah, don't leave out Penn State being a semifinalist and in Oregon being a quarter finalist, but was the number one seed in the first 12 team playoff. So it wasn't just Ohio State, obviously, it wasn't just Michigan. And the, you know, if Paul Feinbaum can admit the Big Ten now owns college football, you know, instead of the SEC, I'm not sure anybody from SEC has anything to bellyache about or gripe about when you consider that Notre Dame and Ohio State combined to eliminate the three SEC teams from the tournament. I don't think they have anything to bellyache about as far as this year, at least they were not anywhere close to being the number one conference. So every season brings something new.

But here's the thing. Big Ten teams like Oregon, like Ohio State, USC has tried to get us to act together in this realm, the NIL realm, but you know, they understand what it takes now. Michigan understands what it takes now. You know what they put together for that freshman quarterback, Bryce Underwood, that they got, you know, basically from their home state, like an 11 or $12 million package over four years from an NIL standpoint. It sounds like a signing bonus to me, but what do I know? And then Penn State has the wherewithal to compete.

Your NIL situation is still going to sway, still going to hold sway in the next several years, if and when or if they can ever get a lasso around NIL and make it a little more equitable for everybody. But you know, Ohio State, everybody knows what Ohio State, what the number was they used in there, the $20, $21 million or chest that it was able to accumulate. But it was mainly to keep guys at Ohio State, not to go out and get guys out of the portal.

Yeah, they got some key players out of the portal for damn sure. Quinn Shawn Judkin, she scored three touchdowns. You know, Will Howard, Seth McLaughlin, who unfortunately tore his Achilles tendon with two games to go, did that in practice, but he was the Remington Award winner, the center who started for a couple of seasons at Alabama, graduate transfer, who transferred in, but to Ohio State.

And man, was he a stud on that line until he got hurt. But you know, Caleb Downs transferred up from Alabama after Nick Saban shocked him by suddenly retiring. So there were a lot of circumstances on why Ohio State ended up with a few of these transfers.

And of course, Julian Sayan was like, like I said, Davian St. Clair was there last night on the sideline, right? Ohio State's signee and quarterback. Julian Sayan did the same thing with Alabama a year earlier. You know, was already enrolled at Alabama and took part some of their bowl practices or at least as a, you know, just kind of like on the side or whatever. But he transferred also when Nick Saban retired. So a lot of this was almost serendipity from a circumstance standpoint of enriching Ohio State's roster. We see that that roster is certainly enriched. I was going to say 20 mil flat. It looks like I might have missed out on a mil or two. I'm sure that was not the exact number.

But like I said, you know, do some research on Oregon and Georgia and quite a few other teams who probably spent more than that. Well, I know who didn't. That Dabo guy out in South Carolina. But we don't know what I'm gonna leave him alone for a little while. I think he's coming around a little bit. You know, he doesn't have a choice.

Otherwise, he's gonna be left behind. Talking about Dabo, talking about Dabo Sweeney. And Tim, thank you so much for the time. Where can people follow you and all of your work and all your coverage of now the champs? Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm part of the Letterman row staff. I retired like six years ago from the Columbus Dispatch and was going to be retired, but they dragged me out, made a little offer to, you know, I'm saying a little bit. But me and my wife, we couldn't travel like I wanted to because our three horses, our babysitter for our three horses moved away.

So that's another story for another one of these set downs. But lettermanrow.com, and I'm on Twitter at Tim underscore May Sports. And I do a podcast called The Tim May Show on Letterman Row and YouTube.

And the major podcast platforms every week, sometimes two a week, definitely will be having one come out late tomorrow, or early Thursday, you know, in reaction to this. I call it the seventh big Ohio State National Championship. They sometimes call it the ninth, but it's the seventh, definitely officially in the third of this century. So that's a pretty good record. Three times in 24 years. Yeah, your resume is impeccable.

Nobody can say anything about it. Yeah. I appreciate it. We're going to catch you on down the line. That's why I keep telling my listeners. Hey, you got to rock and roll. Hey, Tim, we'll catch you on down the line. Okay, you got it, man.
Whisper: medium.en / 2025-01-21 22:46:50 / 2025-01-21 22:54:19 / 7

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