The Daily Buckeye Blitz: Early 2023 Ohio State Football Defense Two Deep

What is up? Welcome to your daily Buckeye Blitz, boy Friday! Hey, finally football, probably footballers watching, but finally Friday. Anyways, hope you guys had a good week. Let’s get the weekend jump and get it started right. January 27, 2023, that is today. Today is that. I’m your host Joe from the Buckeye cast, bringing it to you.

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Anyway, let’s talk yesterday. We did the way too early 2023 offensive depth chart, the two deep today’s defense. Let’s talk defense. Let’s get into it. Let’s start up front with the big dirty nasties, defensive ends. Pretty simple here. JT is my starter, obviously not much of a question there. Dude is an animal. We just need to get that consistency out of him. This is his, excuse me, third year, coffee burps, coffee burps, third year in the program. So, no reason why he should not explode. Usually on defense, defensive line, especially as say year two, is when you really explode. That’s what the bosses have always said. Chase Young, those guys always said year two is like, you know, a rocket. So, this is year three. Let’s see greatness and consistent greatness. We saw it in flashes at times from JT. Let’s see it consistently now.

Okay, then backing him up though, I got, I got, well, we only have young guys really. We don’t know what to expect from Mitchell Melton, so I’m going to leave him on a shelf for now until he works his way back in. So, I’m going with Kenyatta Jackson. He was in the 22 class, so this is his second year, again, year two. Let’s see that jump, you know, like we talked about the other day in our year two guys that we expect to see something from. Kenyatta Jackson is definitely one of them, so I got him backing up JT at the Edge rusher.

Now, in the Jack position, since we don’t run out two legit Edge rushers, the Jack position obviously, we’re going to stick with Jack Sawyer there. No question about it. Again, he’s the same age as JT, so third year in the program. Let’s see more consistency. We’ve got to see some production. A lot of Jack talked about this the other day, so backing him up, though, I’ve got Caden Curry. Caden Curry showed flashes and limited action last year. We talked about him when we talked about defensive line the other day and guys that were going to see the second, you know, the year two guys that are going to really jump.

I think Caden Curry has a chance to do that, filling in for Jack and giving him a spell, a blow. So I got, yeah, my D-line JT, Kenyatta behind him, Jack at the Jack, and Kaden at the Jack. Check, check, all right, let’s go D-tackles. So, at your three technique, I got Tyleik Williams, big man, and just means, see consistency again. That’s I’m going to say that a lot here. Tyleik Williams, you know, he was in that 21 class as well, so third year, we got to start seeing something. So, Tyleik Williams is your starter there. Then behind him, you got Hero Kanu, the second-year guy. So, anyway, yeah, this will be his second year. So, Tyleik’s third, Hero second, because he redshirted last year. So, we need to see a leap from Hero Kanu and clogging up the middle. Now, it nose, I got, I’m gonna go with the, I know they like freaking Larry Johnson likes to play as a seniority game.

So, I got Ty Hamilton because he’s older, you know, this is his senior year. He came in in the 2020 class, so his fourth year in the program coming up, and I got him starting in front of Mike Hall Jr. It’s not, not saying I don’t like Mike Hall, but I’m predicting that Larry Johnson’s gonna play instead of my call. Mike Hall’s still going to get a lot of snaps like he did last year, and he deserves more in my opinion, but what do you get here? I got his snaps right in front of me. 266 for Mike Hall, Ty Hamilton 300. So, very close to a 50-50 split there. Tyleik had 253, by the way, and then you had some older guys chipping in like drawn cage got way too many snaps in my opinion, but anyway, that’s my big guys in the middle, Tyleik with Hero behind him, Ty Hamilton with my call behind him.

Now let’s go to linebackers. We know our starters are pretty much set in stone. You got Tommy at the Mike, and then behind him, I got Cody Simon filling in if we do go to a three linebacker set. I got Cody coming in at the strong side, the Sam linebacker, because we only play with a Mike, and it will typically in the two linebacker set.

So, my will obviously is steal the weak side, and then behind him is CJ Hicks, Captain Buckeye stud soon to be All-American, I think so. Tommy is still, and then Cody and CJ behind them. All right, let’s go to see. My thing with Cody, I want to touch on Cody Simon because this is his fourth year in the program, came in in the 2020 class, and then Steele and Eichenberg are a year older than him, so these older guys are kind of clogging it up for guys like CJ Hicks, Reid Carico, Gabe Powers. You know, I really don’t know, there’s talk to Gabe Powers might move down to D end, so let’s wait and see there, but the old guys are kind of clogging it up for the young guys to come in, and I think that’s affecting recruiting negatively as well, but we’ll see.

Let’s move the corner. I think your starters are pretty much set in stone, right? I think you got to go Denzel Burke and Jordan Hancock. Jordan Hancock is the highly touted five star, came in was injured all last year on and off, didn’t even have a fall Camp so missed a lot of playing time, but when he was in there played well, I feel, and so I’m going Denzel and Jordan Hancock at your corners. Now backing up Denzel, I got Jyaire Brown, and backing up Jordan Hancock, I got the Freshman true freshman Jermaine Matthews. Yeah, brace yourselves folks, this is what poor recruiting does to you. You got two, four, six scholarship corners. Six. We brought in none. Well, we brought in Corners in the 2020 class, but they left, so we brought in none in 2018, 2019, so anyway we’ve been through that a million times, so that’s what poor recruiting in the secondary does to you and sticks you with six scholarship line running six scholarship corners, and two are true freshmen. So I would be fine with Calvin Simpson-Hunt on that there too, they say he’s a dog. I like him, and some of those in the, I believe was the Under Armor game he was in, so definitely have to have a freshman Corner in there, so that’s what I got. I haven’t seen anything from Ryan Turner, so I don’t know what what’s going on there.

Let’s talk about the three safety positions, starter at the free, you deep man. I go Lathan Ransom. He’s got a ton of experience again, been in the program for yeah this will be his fourth year as well came in in the 2020 class with Pam Martinez and Kourt Williams so those guys are all entering their fourth year. I’m starting with Lathan, we need more consistency not giving up the big plays, not falling down. Probably shouldn’t line him up against a wide receiver that runs a 10.8 100 meters, so I’m starting Lathan there. Now backing him up, I got Kye Stokes the second year guy. This guy I’m looking for him to make big strides here, second year he’s a big hitter physical has all the tools you need just let’s see him on the field and actually produce. All right, so Lathan and Kye behind him, strong safety covering the big tight ends and closer, you know, down in the box. 

That’s where I want Sonny Styles. Sonny Styles was made to play in the box, that’s what she said. Behind him, Kourt Williams. These guys, Sonny’s a little bit taller but both big dudes. I need, so I need to see Kourt Williams healthy, honestly. Again, fourth year in the program, limited. After that, we’ve got Proctor coming back, so I’m not sure where he’s going to fit in. Maybe he’s better off instead of Kourt. I think I’m going to change that right now, is backing up Sonny Stiles. And then at the slot, I got Ja’had Carter, the portal transfer, starting. And then Cam Martinez backing him up. So that’s what I got at safety, Ransom Stokes at the strong, Styles and Proctor, at the slot, Carter and Cam Martinez. That’s all I got for you today. Talk tomorrow. Go Bucks!