Ohio State coaching staff: Masters of motivation

January 4th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanR

While some are proclaiming this bowl season to be a wash in mediocrity and overt boredom, it’s good to see at least the players and coaches are evoking motivation towards these things. Case in point, Jim Tressel and crew are pulling out all the stops to rally the troops. They even made a DVD.

The DVD, created by Ohio State coaches, is a 10-minute compilation of insults, attacks and put-downs of the Buckeyes that followed their disastrous 41-14 loss to Florida in last year’s BCS title game.

Buckeyes players gave a thumbs-up to the concept and a thumbs-down to the content.

“I had my grandma watch it with me, and she started crying,” Boone said. “She wanted to kill somebody. She said [ESPN’s] Mark May was a liar for calling me slow.”

Asked for his favorite part, Barton employed his best sarcastic tone.

“We were excited to see the ‘PTI’ guys,” he said. “And I’m a big Mark May fan. He’s not a big fan of me, but I have his poster on the wall—Mark May in a Redskins jersey and a Pitt jersey. I remember him and Woody Paige and Skip Bayless, I’m thankful for their support.”

You know, I’m all for motivation and inspiration via the “us against the world” marta; it inspires even the weakest of hearts. However, I feel bad for the all the poor Ohio State players that are going to have to sit through “Everyone Thinks We Suck: Director’s Cut” next year during bowl season. This, of course, will include bonus scenes from this Monday’s BCS Championship game against LSU. That is unless Ohio State wins. Then the DVD will probably just include clips of Les Miles tearing someone’s head off.

A much better option in my opinion.

Well, that was easy

January 9th, 2007 | Posted by PostmanE

Relatively speaking, it’s late in the day (about 3 or so), I’ve been locked down for various unimportant and stupid reasons (including the late hour at which I retired last night), and I haven’t blogged a word about the National Championship Game yet. Since I’m deathly afraid R is going to take away my blogging license, here were a few things I noticed about the Fiesta Bowl, in no particular order:

Florida won. Well, yeah, they did. I mean, that was really something. They had better playcalling, better planning, even better players on both sides of the ball. And once Ginn went out with the injury, it looked like Smith had no answer for the Florida secondary, no one to push the boundaries on where he could deliver the football.

Wait a second - Florida won! Far more surprising than the win itself, I think, is its indefatigable nature. From about the middle of the second quarter onward, everyone at my bar knew the deal. The Florida fans were cheering every first down, and the Ohio State fans were slumped over in their Miller Lites, babbling into their buffalo french fries. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind.

Urban Meyer is a much better football mind than Jim Tressel. Or at least more imaginative. But where part of last night’s win was a function of Florida’s superior athleticism, a major part served the realization that you really, really don’t want to play Urban Meyer if he has a month to sit in a dark room and draw plays.

I worship Tim Tebow. What a monster. I can’t wait to see him loosed against the SEC for 12 full games next year. Ho, boy.

Troy Smith is overrated? One bad game is one bad game, but still … Vince Young made a killing in the draft over his National Championship performance (Wonderlic test scores aside), and Smith is the type of quarterback - i.e., not the “prototype” most scouts look for - that needed more amazing in-game tape to help his draft chances. Now, do you see him getting drafted higher than the end of first round?