...a tradition of hope, passion, and misery
Mike Vrabel is an intense man. He loves football and Ohio State. He hates Michigan.
Jen Vrabel tweeted a picture this morning of the aftermath of Mike’s pre-game decision to headbutt an Ohio State player- who happened to be wearing a helmet-
We consider this a small price to pay for a Buckeye victory in The Game. (Better him than us though.)
[Related: Buckeye Learnings]
On Monday, the Ohio State Buckeyes appear to have landed one of the nation’s top defensive ends for the 2013 class as St. Thomas Aquinas’ Joey Bosa announced his intentions to head to Columbus following his high school career.
Per Eleven Warrios, Bosa was said to be headed to Alabama but changed his mind after paying a visit to Urban Meyer last week. Bosa returned to Columbus for the Scarlet and Grey Game where he watched Meyer take the field for the first time as an employee of The Ohio State University.
Upon his arrival, Bosa will join the the likes of 2012 five-star recruit Noah Spence and four-star recruits Adolphus Washington, Se’Von Pittman, and Jamal Marcus on the defensive side of the ball.
This past February, Ohio State’s Mike Vrabel was deemed Big Ten recruiter of the year by ESPN. The Bosa commitment will only help bolster this unit.
[Related: Meyer Turns Up the Temperature at Scarlet and Grey Game]
Though Ohio State’s freshly hired head coach Urban Meyer is getting all of the accolades — and criticism — for his work during the 2012 recuruiting season, former linebacker and current coach Mike Vrabel has been given the nod as Big Ten “Recruiter of the Year” according to ESPN.
Vrabel moved from linebackers coach to defensive line coach with the hire of Urban Meyer. And in the process the two-year assistant helped secure one of the nation’s best defensive line classes. Five-star prospect Noah Spence (Harrisburg, Pa./Bishop McDevitt) was the biggest signing in the class, but four-star prospects Adolphus Washington (Cincinnati, Ohio/Taft), Se’Von Pittman (Canton, Ohio/McKinley) and Jamal Marcus (Durham, N.C./Hillside) give the Buckeyes four of the nation’s top 16 players at the defensive end position. Vrabel deserves much of the credit for that.
It’s worth noting that several of these defensive line recruits were flipped from their previous verbal commitments to other Big Ten programs. Spence, a Pennsylvania native, was a strong commit to the Penn State Nittany Lions prior to his decision to join Meyer and Vrabel in Columbus. Upon Meyer’s hiring, there was some concern that Vrabel could be replaced; turns out that his retention could have been a key factor in the strong and surprising recruiting efforts.
[Related: Ohio State AD Gene Smith responds to recruiting allegations]
You can see the situation playing out in your mind. Most guys I know have sat with a buddy and contemplated some wild business venture or program they could start together. Maybe you wanted to open a golf course with a friend. Perhaps the ultimate sports bar was your goal. The majority of these ventures never get past that initial dream phase. There is no way to track the success rate of the ventures that actually find themselves carried out, but you would have to imagine they are no better than the normal business start-up, which means no better than 40% survival rate after four years. (Unless it is a restaurant. Then they fail 80% of the time.)
Buckeye fans are hoping for better from new Buckeye coaches Luke Fickell and Mike Vrabel.
True, Fickell and Vrabel aren’t building a football program from scratch. They are taking over one of the most recognizable and successful brands in the country, albeit one that has a tremendous scar on it’s face and may be a bit faded from the white hot media spotlight. [Read more...]
While We’re Waiting serves as the early morning gathering of WFNY-esque information for your viewing pleasure. Have something you think we should see? Send it to our tips email at tips@waitingfornextyear.com
How long is Colt McCoy’s leash in 2011? “But there is something else that will be hanging over the heads of the Browns in 2011 and that’s the 2012 NFL Draft, specifically the #1 overall pick. At this point, it’s a foregone conclusion that Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck, about as “can’t miss” a prospect as you will ever see, will be chosen first. If the Browns spiral down into oblivion, there will be an opportunity to draft Luck.
Does that mean the Browns give up on Colt McCoy after only one season? And what do you do if he plays relatively well and the opportunity to draft Luck is still there? The Browns are going to have to determine this season if McCoy is a quarterback that can lead them to a Super Bowl – it’s a decision that will affect the franchise for years to come.” [Steve DiMatteo/Dawg Pound Daily]
While We’re Waiting serves as the early morning gathering of WFNY-esque information for your viewing pleasure. Have something you think we should see? Send it to our tips email at tips@waitingfornextyear.com
The Wall vs Irving comparison- “Kyrie Irving looked to be the much better college basketball player in his brief stint. As Beckley so often says, he played “a perfect 11 games.” I watched most of these, and was struck by the athleticism that many draftniks find lacking. Irving burned opponents on coast-to-coast drives with a control that looked effortless. He attacked with a methodical violence, often shifting pace like a pitcher changing speeds. In stylistic contrast, John Wall attacked with a predictable straight-line velocity that blurred my HD feed, but compromised Wall’s ability to keep possession. To continue the cross-sport analogy, Wall was a flame-thrower who struggled at taming his 103 MPH heaters into the strike zone.
Scouts prefer the latter skillset and they could be right. I recall not being impressed by Derrick Rose, the college player, and look at what young Derrick has already become in the NBA. Rose produced lukewarm NCAA stats, but did so with an athletic flair that draftniks correctly recognized as valuable. Wall is thought to be the next Rose and he did little to dispel such notions as a rookie. Injuries nagged an otherwise solid year and I have high expectations for his future. But I don’t think Wall will be better than Irving, a player Chad Ford compares to Mo Williams.” [Strauss/Hoopspeak.com]
With the NFL free agency season still underway, we are finally starting to see a few more names added to the roster for the Cleveland Browns. Sure, they are not exactly the Albert Haynesworths or Terrell Owens’, but any fan that anticipated big name free agents this year was bound to be disappointed. But with the recent wave of signings, these players all have something in common: their former team.
In what has been an interesting off-season from the standpoint of coaching changes as well as players themselves, we have seen quite a number of players follow their former play-callers and general managers to their new team whether through trade or free agency. Scott Pioli took the gig in Kansas City and wasted no time in acquiring Matt Cassel and Mike Vrabel. Baltimore’s Rex Ryan is the new head coach of the New York Jets, and will get to call plays for former Ravens Bart Scott and Jim Leonhard.
Thus, it should come as no surprise that Eric Mangini and George Kokinis have added a handful of players with whom our head coach is very familiar.
I’m not going to lie. Last week, when Shaun Rogers found a way to disrupt nearly every play that he was in, I had a slight flashback of William “Refrigerator” Perry. Thankfully, reading today’s Plain Dealer made me realize that I am not alone. Tony Grossi had a chance to toss the idea of a position change to the Browns brass, and surprisingly enough, it was not shot down. [Read more...]
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