What is up? Welcome into your daily Buckeye Blitz Wednesday stuff. First of the month, wake up, wake up! February 1st, 2023. I’m your host, Joe from the Buckeye Cast, bringing it to you every day. You know how we do it. I hope you checked out the recruiting podcast/video on Monday for your updates, portal news, all that good stuff.
Today’s topic is “Five Guys Who Gotta Show Me Something.” Five guys on the team, some of them starters, some of them will be starters, some of them will get a lot of playing time. But I have five guys who gotta show me something this year. I need to see something, okay? And I’ll get into the details on each one as I scoot up to the desk here and get close to the microphone.
All right, number one, Julian Fleming. All right, Julian Fleming came in highly touted, five-star, you know, the resume in the 2020 class. So this is his fourth year on campus. We need to see him make that next step. He had a decent year, you know, got through kind of his bumpy injury issues early on in the season, had some big catches, some big plays downfield, but just played in 11 games, had 52 targets, 34 receptions for 533 yards, six touchdowns. All right, you probably remember a lot of the big plays being that post route deep over the middle, you know, where he’s roasting a safety or something. So his reception percentage, though, is not great. That’s what I’m getting at. His reception percentage is 65 percent. He grades out at a 68 on PFF as a receiver. That’s not going to get it done. Also, perimeter blocking on in the run game, the entire wide receiver room has to improve in that area, to be honest. But you’ve got to be better at perimeter blocking in the run game. And it’s brutal to watch some of these guys just Olay a defender. It’s really bad. So Julian Fleming, you’ve got to show me something. I need to see a next jump. I know you got two other studs in the room with a Mecca and Marvin Harrison Jr. I get that. But you’ve got to be reliable. You know, you can’t have all the drops, honestly. You can’t. So we gotta clean up that drop percentage and continue working on the blocking. You’ve got to show me something.
All right, guy number two, it needs to show me something right in the same area, Gee Scott Jr. Again, same deal, came in highly touted, made the position switch. I know. So this is his fourth year on the team, you know, in the program. So where is it? There are multiple areas where you need to improve, honestly. Let’s look at blocking. You’ve got to be able to block. You’ve got to be a willing blocker. You’re not just a pretty face out there running around, you know. Making catches and catching touchdowns, hoping you get a BJ after the game. You’ve got to block. Your blocking is horrendous, so let’s look at run blocking here. Gee, you graded out a 48.6 in PFF. That is terrible. The receptions, I’m not going to hit him too hard on that. He played in 12 games. Had what we have here? Yeah, played in 12 games. Anyways, it doesn’t matter. Getting past blocking, you’re not going to be asked to pass block too much unless we’re Max protecting and keeping an extra tight end in to block. But the run blocking at 48.6 is terrible. That’s bad. We got to tighten that up, and the tight end room as a whole needs to tighten that up. Joe Royer, with his limited playing time, did not grade out well either. He was like a 54, but we’re focusing on Gee Scott here. So what else do we need to clean up from Gee Scott Jr? Well, he had seven targets, five catches, one touchdown. Okay, limited action, I get it. So what about his drops? I had two drops on the season, is what I’m coming up with. But his grades in receiving are not great either, according PFF, a 54.4. So he’s got to work on this, all right? He can’t have a guy that we’re going to line up in 12 Personnel a lot. You can’t have a guy that is a liability out there, you know? Cade is obviously your starter, but when we go into 12 Personnel, we gotta have another reliable dude. And I could easily see Joe Royer leapfrogging Gee Scott and taking some of his snaps. That could happen.
So all right, guy number three, let’s go over the defense, finish up with these three. Jack Sawyer, you gotta show me something. I’m not sure the guy played much last year. I know he did, I saw him out there, but look at these grades. Tackling a 67, missed tackles, you know, only three sacks, 11 tackles, 12 assists, four misses, that’s a problem. He’s playing that Jack role. I’m not sure it’s perfect for him. I personally prefer he’d be an edge rusher. I’m not sure that Jack position is always cracked up to be. But he’s got to improve on the tackling. He’s getting to the quarterback occasionally. He did have 17 hurries. You know, that was third on the team, and had a few batted down balls. He got some a couple hits on the quarterback, had three sacks. So he’s getting back there, but it’s got to be more consistent. That’s my thing with Jack. We know he’s got the talent, another five star. I keep saying this, it seems like another five-star talent that’s gotta show me something. You’ve got to be more consistent. You got, I don’t want to say be like JT, but you can. You’ve got to be more consistent too, honestly. But Jack has to be consistent and be better. Show me something, Jack.
Next up, Steele Chambers. Similar things here with Steele. He had a good year. I need to see more though. Let me pull up his record here. So yeah, in pass coverage, not great. He didn’t have some good pressure numbers on the quarterback. He had a total of 14 pressures and two sacks. They don’t listen too much, but he’s able to get some pressure when he does. The alarming issue here with Steel is 13 missed tackles on the year, that is third worst on the team. That’s bad, that’s real bad. So, you got to clean that up. We need to see consistency. He’s a liability in coverage as well. He grades out of 64.5 according to PFF in coverage, 61.9 in tackling, and a 67 in run defense. So, these tackling numbers, and he’s one of those guys that’ll, I think we’ve said this before, he’ll have a big game where he shows up and has a few splash plays, but then he’ll disappear for a game or two, and you won’t even see him in the stat sheet. Steele Chambers, clean up the tackling, get better in all phases.
Excuse me, burp. Next up, what do we have here? Jordan Hancock, potentially a starter in the secondary, that’s a big deal. So let’s talk about Jordan Hancock here. He’s got to get better in coverage. His coverage grade is a 41.9. He’s potentially your other corner, your second starting corner, Denzel and Jordan Hancock. This has to improve drastically, or he’s going to get jumped by one of the younger guys. There’s no two ways about it. He had seven targets allowed, four catches for a 57 receiving, only 87 yards on those. So, it didn’t allow any touchdowns, did not have any past breakups or anything like that. So, it tackling, he’s fine on tackling. He did have two misses though, that seems like a lot for only having four tackles and an assist. That, you can’t have two misses, dude. That’s like 50% of your tackling. So, Jordan Hancock, you gotta show me a lot, dude, if you’re gonna be a starter. Again, another highly touted guy coming in, this will be his third year in the program. Stay healthy, so you gotta show me something, man. All right, so I got for you today, folks. Five guys, I gotta show me something. Have a good one, hope your week’s going well. Please like and subscribe, I really appreciate it, and hit me up anytime, comment, find me on Twitter, email me, however you like to get in touch. I always hit you back. All right, talk to you later, go Bucks.