An Ohio State Sports Blog
Who knew?
Elbows on knees, a scowling Iman Shumpert bent forward in his chair. Someone asked if Ohio State was better than Georgia Tech. “Not at all,†Shumpert said.
So: Was Tech better than Ohio State? Said Shumpert, almost spitting the words: “A lot better.â€
Time is running out to join the MotSaG Tournament Pick’em. Don’t be left behind!
You’d think we were in the middle of the season with all the Buckeye football news going on. With the busy schedule, there isn’t time to comment on everything, but here are a few links worth checking out.
So that brings up a few thoughts: How will this affect recruiting going forward? This incoming class could potentially be the last one Tressel sees to the end. Will someone be in place to point to as the future of Ohio State Football (a la Will Muschamp at Texas)? Maybe someone like Luke Fickel? And if not Fickel, who replaces Tressel? Bo Pelini? Urban Meyer? Mark Dantonio? Who would you be in your top 3?
There’s never time to rest in Buckeye Land.
It’s that time of year again, ladies and gents. Time to put on your wizard robes and prognostication caps and fill out your brackets once again in the Annual MotSaG Tournament Pick’em.
In years past I’ve asked people to send me a request to join the fray, but that just ends up being extra work for both me and you (but mostly me). So this year I’ll include the league info here and whoever is interested in joining can do it straightway from here. So here are the details:
League: MotSaG Pick ‘Em 2010
PW: gobucks!
As always, if you don’t have the Buckeyes making it to at least the Sweet 16 (if not the Elite Eight) you’re better off elsewhere. Good Luck!
Michigan needed them to get back into the game and Evan Turner turned around and used one to stab them straight through their under .500 hearts. Sorry guys, it was just meant to be.
This was only a second round Big Ten tournament game. I know this. That being said, this shot has to rank in the top two three-pointers of all time (I’m still partial to Ron Lewis’ three against Tennessee in 2007). But man, what a shot. I hope this game is a wake-up call for the Buckeyes going in to tomorrow’s game against Illinois and the rest of the tournament. You can’t sleep on anyone at this point. Michigan had nothing to lose and everything to gain from beating Ohio State. It’s going to be that way from here on out.
It’s a good thing we’ve got the Player of the Year on our side.
Are we college football fans creepy or what? We fawn over the whims of 17 year-old boys as they decide which institution of higher learning they will commit to (hoping it’s ours!), watch their every move for three to four years (or, in the case of Todd Boeckman, seven or eight (I know, they’re called doctors)). Then, after all they’ve done, after they’ve entertained us, made us laugh and cry, we dissect them in the most inhuman way possible (AKA the NFL Combine). So let’s throw in another way we can be creepy (maybe creepy is too harsh a word. Either way, it’s a little strange) by following our favorite Buckeyes on Twitter.
Twitter has been around for a while now, but let’s be honest: it didn’t get interesting until the Big Aristotle started tweeting. Since then, athletes have been one of the reasons Twitter has become interesting and mainstream. I’m not saying the following Buckeye Tweeters are interesting, but some most certainly are. There are times when I don’t understand a word these kids are saying. Seriously, can’t understand a word. Sometimes, their insights and thoughts are rather deep and provoking. It’s interesting to see how the other half lives. Also: athletes nap A LOT.
With that in mind, here are the following Buckeyes you can follow (with mixed results) on Twitter. As far as I can tell, these guys are who they say they are:
Thaddeus Maximus (who happens to be following John McCain, Oprah and Kevin Rose, FWIW)
Rob Rose Jr.
Ray Small
Michael Brewster
Brian Rolle
Jack Mewhort
Jermale Hines
Andrew Sweat
Kurt Coleman
Keith Wells
Jake McQuaide
Duron Carter
Chimdi Chekwa
Antonio Pittman
Curtis Terry
Chris Beanie Wells
Roy Hall Jr.
Donte Whitner
Troy Smith
Dee Miller
Ted Ginn Jr.
Rob Sims
A.J. Trapasso
Nate Clements
Nick Mangold
Maurice wells
Maurice Hall
Matt Keller
Santonio Holmes
Jon Diebler
Dave Lighty
Evan Turner
Dallas Lauderdale
Mark Titus
Daequan Cook
Mike Conley
Ron Lewis
Jay Sullinger
Jim Jackson
Ron Stokes
Jamar Butler
Je’Kel Foster
Jared Sullinger
Christian Bryant
So there you have it. Lots of Twittering Buckeyes. This post will eventually become a static page that will be updated as more Twitter accounts become available, but this is the first draft. If we’re missing someone that you know is on Twitter, please leave us a comment.
Also, just to do a little self-promoting, a few of us at MotSaG are on Twitter. I’m i_aint_yer_pa, sportsMonkey is monkeyPi, and YNBA is teamyzerman. Are you on Twitter? Let us know who you are!
Congratulations to the 2009-2010 (how would you say that? “Two-thousand nine, twenty ten”?) Ohio State Men’s Basketball team for winning the regular season Big Ten Title.
The basketball coverage around these parts has been sparse this year, due to a lack of time and definitely not a lack of interest. This season has been a treat to watch Evan Turner develop into (according to ESPN College BB analysts) the consensus National Player of the Year.
Just yesterday, Slyvester Yon-Rambo and I where discussing were ET fits in the pantheon of OSU Basketball Greats. Right now, I would rank him #3, behind John Havlicek and Jimmy Jackson. Evan’s performance in the Tournament will determine his final ceiling. If he takes this team deep into the tournament this year, he’s #2. (JJ had a better team but never made a real run in March). If (and that’s a pretty huge if) he comes back next year, averages nearly a triple-double again and leads the Buckeyes to the Final Four, we may have to rank him #1. He would certainly will have been the best player my generation has ever seen play.
So congrats again to the Buckeyes, good luck in the Big Ten Tournament and finally in the NCAA Tournament.
I do more Google searches for Vernon Gholston than the average Buckeye Fan (don’t judge!) and recently came across this article that made me sad.
Coach Rex Ryan doesn’t even bother to try to talk him up anymore and the media doesn’t even bother to ask. It’s getting harder and harder not to stamp linebacker Vernon Gholston a bust and move on.
Ouch.
Then just the other day I saw our buddies at Eleven Warriors had linked to this article from our own Ken Gordon at the Dispatch reiterating the same things.
“That’s still a work in progress, but I will say this: When we’re going back and looking at our cutups and things like that, I think this young man deserves a better chance,” Ryan said. “We need to give him more playing time.
That’s not quite as dire as a couple months ago, but it’s still disappointing.
I often wonder where motivation and drive come from for someone blessed with physical gifts beyond mere mortals (see: LeBron, Tiger, MJ, Vernon). It came so easy to Vernon at OSU (exhibit A, exhibit B). I wonder what has happened this far with Vernon. There’s no bigger fan of his than me and it pains me to see the current trajectory of his professional career. He doesn’t seem to have the drive he once had.
It’s obvious that at his point, at the highest level of competition, the blessed one has not produced. Not even a little bit. There’s no way to interpret his current production as anything other than major letdown. I’ve watched him play as a Jet when I could and never saw the fire or domination he had as a Buckeye. Maybe it was the system (going from a basic 4-3 in college to Rex Ryan’s confusing 3-4 blitz mania). Maybe it’s something else. At this point, we can just hope Ryan is able to light a fire under his rear end and he silences the critics in 2010.
What’s your take?
I wanted to post this earlier, but didn’t have a chance until today.
A lot of times we get caught up in following these young kids, these young athletes, building them up to the point of expecting too much of them. For some reason we gleefully rejoice in their failings and scoff at the “nice guys” (see: Tim Tebow, in both cases). We often dehumanize them at the same time we deify them.
This is just a quick story showing these guys can be really good people. I don’t remember Malcolm ever getting into much trouble as a Buckeye, and it’s good to see he’s still such a good, classy kind of guy:
Malcolm Jenkins came in late to the Jim Thorpe Award banquet Monday. On purpose. He didn’t want to upstage Eric Berry, the man of the hour and the 2009 Thorpe Award winner. Jenkins, the 2008 Thorpe winner, knocked down a Peyton Manning pass in the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl. Some 22 hours later, he was at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum, to help honor his successor.
Make sure you read the whole thing. Kudos to Malcolm for being a stand-up guy, congrats for winning the Super Bowl and thanks for being a great example of what a Buckeye truly is.
We all knew that after the New Mexico State game that Pryor was injured. It was mentioned more than once that he was running on gimpy wheels, whether it be a bum ankle or an injured knee. Yesterday it was made known (as far as I can tell, first by Pryor himself on Twitter) that Pryor had undergone arthroscopic surgery on his right knee.
Here’s the scary thing: On a gimpy leg, Terrelle Pryor went out against Oregon in the Rose Bowl and had the best statistical performance of his Buckeye career, winning the MVP of the game and setting the Buckeyes up for a run in 2010. All on a busted wheel.
Now that the mental aspect of the game is coming in to focus for Terrelle, imagine what he’s going to do now that he’s at 100% physically. It should be enough to keep Big Ten coaches up at night.
