Stephen Means, Stefan Krajisnik and Andrew Gillis discuss Ohio State's offensive coordinator Chip Kelly.
Listen to Buckeye Talk, your favorite Ohio State football podcast, five days a week with Stephen Means, Stefan Krajisnik and Andrew Gillis.Stephen Means, Stefan Krajisnik and Andrew Gillis look at every angle of why it was so important that the first person Ryan Day gave up play-calling duties to is his former mentor and what that says about the program overall. In doing so, they answer a series of questions:What’s OSU’s fastball offensively?4-star edge from D.C.
I have a beef with national media lately. I clearly step on 54 points a game. That’s fourth in the country and it’s first in the big 10, 7 .99 yards per play. That’s seventh in the country and it’s first in the big 10. The yards per player kind of up around college football right now. There’s a lot of teams who are about eight and typically being at 7 .99 should lead you in the country. But again, two games passing yards per play 10, passing yards per attempt. 10 .
It’s still four games, two games. That’s kind of comparable than 12 games, two games. And the rushing attack is no doubt much better. And that’s the kind of stuff you build off of. is this offense built off of? Kelly said yesterday, when you established a run, we saw it in game one against Akron, right? Ryan Day was saying how, you know, the running game wasn’t working early, but Chip kept wanting to establish it, wanting to establish it. And eventually they broke through.
quarterback. You want to move that guy around. You want to have him using his legs because that’s part of what makes him a dynamic quarterback, right? Like that’s part of what makes him unique. And I think Ohio State has leaned into that. So a little bit chicken to the egg there where it’s like, all right, well, if Ryan Day was still calling plays, would they be doing this a little bit more with Will Howard? I would say probably.
When he got asked that question about what their fastball is, he didn’t go passing game first. And I think in years past, he would have gone with the passing game. When Ryan Day got high and he says this a lot, uses this term a lot, the idea of he wants to make the stretch the field vertically and horizontally. He wants to make defensive coordinators have to cover every area of the field because it’s all a problem.
an easy offensive defender wasn’t simple, but for a quarterback, it’s so easy to process because at its core, you know what’s going on. So that’s just one thing that I thought that the complex simplicity of it all makes it so easy for the offense to understand, so difficult for the defense to defend.So yeah, one of the things that I thought was really interesting too, this was back in like the spring or something. And I think this kind of illustrates the point.
Kudos to all of us. Andrew’s stretching things out. Stephon, complex to simplicity. Mine is run it like you throw it. Run it like you throw it. You have amazed all these different ways that you dress things up and you approach the passing game. Do the same thing with the run game. And that was, it wasn’t complex simplicity in your class. It was just simple. It was simply complex in years past. Cause it was so simple and it wasn’t working.
and he’s gotten some games under his belt. I think he’s growing an understanding of this offense. And I think it’s just because Chip has that influence where he can simplify it so much for a quarterback that when Will goes out there, it doesn’t seem as difficult as you might’ve thought, or as it might’ve looked, you know, at Kansas State or other stops that he’s been there just because of the influence that Chip has.So I didn’t go quarterback. I understand why you went in that direction.
And they’re moving guys. Now again, we understand level of talent that they have played so far, but at least the execution has looked pretty sound and solid in a way of like, okay, I can envision what that’s going to look like once you start playing better opponents.Well, I don’t know if I would go that far because I think if you remember after the the Akron game, we were kind of like the offensive line didn’t look as dominant as they should have.
East West, let’s get them moving. Let’s get them pulling. We’ve seen run designs that we haven’t seen before, and that is allowing this offensive line to be able to move a little bit in space. And that’s where they’re going to make their money. That is where I think Ohio State’s offensive line has seen the biggest impact. That’s where they’ve improved the most, I think, because, you know, again, you don’t have to do that.
you know, F it Jeremiah down there somewhere. I don’t think that that’s their fastball. Their fastball is exactly what Will Howard has done, I think, against Western Michigan, where they’re going to run the ball really well, and they’re going to use that sideline to sideline stuff. But they’re also when they throw it, it’s going to be quick. It’s going to get out of Will Howard’s hands really fast. Defenses are going to have a really hard time defending that.
and it can get them in the trouble. Now, I think Ohio State’s this 2024 roster is a little bit deeper and more talented than Oregon’s is to be fair, but it’s why they have to keep working that stuff. And it’s why Ryan Day isn’t ready to just say this, that or the third is even if through two games, Andrew is probably correct. This is what we’ve seen from Ohio State.
to the point we were making about Oregon and we’re bringing up Oregon because that’s the first big game we’re gonna play. And so that’s how we’re, and now as I said on the Tuesday part, we’re in phase two. So that’s where we’re getting to. We’re getting towards the Oregon game.I think Oregon’s also the only offense on their schedule that’s comparable to Ohio. I don’t think Penn State, mean Michigan obviously, I don’t think Penn State has an offense good enough to keep up with Ohio State.
went to go be a head coach in the ACC at ballscouts. So that’s the other reason why he was here. But it’s a bit deeper than obviously the two have a relationship that’s gone back 20, 25 years at this point with Ryan Day playing for him and working for him at different stops along the way. So Stefan, I want to start with you. Actually, no, Andrew, I’ll start with you because you were here again. And that’s with all due respect to Stefan, you were here.
I could have been pissed, but then I have to turn around and call the next play. And I have to think about what’s next and what’s next and what’s next. So I think that there are those impacts of things that matter and we can see that and those matter. But the biggest impact to me is him being in a special teams meeting room that, I mean, we don’t get to see it, but we know what’s happening. You know, the special teamers that were, you know, made available for media like a week or two ago.
Those matter, we’re not going to get to see those. So I think there has been a noticeable impact. I just don’t think we’re going to see it. And I think it’s going to happen all behind the scenes because of what Ryan Day gave up.Stefan, he did the thing again. He did it again. You haven’t seen it, but also here’s what you’ve seen.I mean, I don’t know if we’re seeing it yet. That’s my thing.
And the NFL usually head coaches aren’t calling plays until their job is on the line. And they’re like, okay, like Matt Eberfluss for the Bears last year, suddenly he started calling different plays. Yeah. You were, you were like one in seven, you were about to get canned. You better take over that defense. Right? So it’s like, it’s kind of the, I feel like in college we’d see more where they do call plays early on and then they switch NFL is kind of the inverse.
That is the one thing I do want to see in the Michigan game. It’s the thing I want to see against Oregon, right? Cause that’s where it mattered the most was against Michigan. You ran 30 seconds off the clock and tried to kick a field goal instead of being aggressive and go to the store. But here’s where I’ve actually seen it in terms of us and his dealings with us.
every other position and he knows what he knows it. You can ask him, hey, how’s the Lonnie doing? And he gave a really thorough answer. You can ask him about linebackers and Ryan, they got asked about the defensive tackle depth on Tuesday. We were, you can ask Ryan about defensive tackle depth two years ago. You just say, Larry, that’s, that’s Larry. Ask Larry about that type of stuff. I think for us in terms of how we do our jobs in terms of talking with him on Tuesdays.
I think Will Howard would have been good in Bill O ‘Brien’s offense, but I think Chip Kelly’s offense suits him a little bit more. And I said it on the pod yesterday, like it seems like Will Howard and Chip Kelly is just the perfect marriage of offensive coordinator and quarterback. And that helps with it. So I think for a lot of reasons that this was the right hire for Ryan Day. And I think it’s panning out in every way we expect that just because the relationship between those two guys.
Right, obviously Ryan Day was a GA down in Florida, I believe, when Urban Meyer was down there. So that’s where they got a chance to know each other for the first time. And then obviously Ryan Day was his offensive coordinator for two years. That’s a professional relationship. Kelly and Ryan Day is just as much about personal relationship as it is about professional relationship. And so I think that’s what makes it perfect.
Deshawn turn into one of the league’s best quarterbacks when he was there. Now in 2020, it went haywire. know, like things kind of went downhill. He made a bad trade with the Under Hopkins, the set and the other. that was where he was at. And all of a sudden he goes to Alabama, you know, and everybody kind of made the joke, the Saban School for Wayward Coaches. And he coaches a Heisman Trophy winner at quarterback.
It would have been, but I don’t think Will Howard is as efficient through the first two weeks with Bill O ‘Brien, just based off of the history. Even if I think the ceiling to which he’s going to get to with Chip Kelly is the same ceiling as Bill O ‘Brien. It just wouldn’t have gotten off, I think, to us quicker, but start there.
I’m done doing the head coaching stuff and the NIL and the transfer portal. Not that, not that chips not doing any of that, but it’s like, it’s more of a responsibility for Ryan Day than there’s Chip Kelly. Are there going to be more coaches like that? And we’re seeing it with older coaches like Chip Kelly, but like, there going to be younger coaches who like get into head coaching and they’re like, yo, like I don’t have time for this. I don’t want to do this.
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