Every single season, Ohio State throws out one of the best teams in the country, filled with five-star players up and down the roster.
The Buckeyes are never short of talent, but this season seems very different with their talent on the roster. Some are calling it the best roster in the history of college football.
Ohio State went out this offseason and brought in some major transfer portal impact players like Caleb Downs, Will Howard, and Quinshon Judkins, returning most of their big-time players who could’ve turned pro.
While many are high on the Buckeyes roster this season, one former Ohio State player doesn’t think the roster hype is all that great.
Kirk Herbstreit Thinks Ohio State’s Roster Is OverHyped
Current ESPN College Game Day Analyst Kirk Herbstreit, who played quarterback at Ohio State in the early 90s, was on the Pat McAfee earlier this week and had some things to say about the Buckeyes roster.
In a post from Bucknuts from 247sports.com written by Brad Crawford, Herbstreit stated”At the end of the day, when was the last time Ohio State took the field with a shortage of talent?” Herbstreit said Tuesday on The Pat McAfee Show. “The last ten years, Ohio State has had NFL players all over their roster. I don’t look at this roster — I really don’t — and go, ‘Oh my God, they have Caleb Downs!’ Holy cow, Ohio State’s serious this year.’
Kirk Herbstreit says #OhioState‘s roster advantage has been overhyped.
“At the end of the day, when was the last time Ohio State took the field with a shortage of talent?”https://t.co/WjPl7ov2SG pic.twitter.com/QWLn9rnVmq
— Bucknuts (@Bucknuts247) August 28, 2024
The former Ohio State quarterback also stated, “This year, they got Will Howard, who was going to get beat out at Kansas State. ‘Holy cow! They got Will Howard!’ ‘Oh my God, they got (Quinshon) Judkins, who was a backup at Ole Miss.’ He’s not going to start at Ohio State. TreVeyon Henderson is. So, it’s about, are they going to come together? It’s about, are they going to be a team?”
Ohio State head football coach Ryan Day speaks to players during the first half of the LifeSports spring football game at Ohio Stadium on Saturday.
Herbstreit isn’t wrong here. Ohio State has had a lot of great teams in the past with maybe even deeper rosters, and you could argue that they returned a bunch of players who haven’t beaten Michigan in three years.
Of course, the roster is loaded, but the 2015 team with running back Ezekiel Elliott and defensive end Joey Bosa was much better on paper than this year’s team, and they didn’t even make the college football playoffs.
Ohio State will be great this season, but it doesn’t mean this will be the best roster in program history, and they will set the college football record books on fire.
Georgia is still the team to beat in college football, and until Ohio State proves it can get past them and beat Michigan, all this roster talk is just nonsense.
