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It’s been an offseason of shakeups for the Ohio State Buckeye offense. The team will have a new quarterback and new offensive coordinator after yet another disappointing loss to Michigan last season.
2023 starting quarterback Kyle McCord transferred to Syracuse, and Kansas State’s Will Howard came in to replace him. But, the biggest change is luring Chip Kelly away from being the UCLA head coach to be the Ohio State offensive coordinator.
Chip Kelly’s tenure as the head coach at UCLA was up-and-down. But, there’s no questioning his proficiency as a playcaller and offensive mind. Dating back to his days at Oregon as offensive coordinator and head coach, he’s been on the cutting edge of offensive innovation.
That will take some pressure off of Ohio State head coach Ryan Day. Day, who actually was mentored at the University of New Hampshire, has taken a lot of flak the last few seasons for offensive game plans. That intensified last year. The offense was still very good by normal standards, but not up to the standard that Day had previously set there. And, their struggles in short-yardage situations continued last season.
Ultimately, Chip Kelly is being put in place to fix those issues. While many think of his offenses at Oregon as high-octane, they did do most of their damage on the ground. Ohio State has lost some of that nastiness they had in the Jim Tressel and Urban Meyer years on the ground.
Chip Kelly joined the Pat McAfee Show on Thursday to talk about his new gig, and had quite a funny quip about how the credit and blame will be shared by Buckeye fans and media.
Kelly was asked by Pat McAfee panelist “Tone Digz” about how the play-calling will work between Ryan Day, co-offensive coordinator Brian Hartline, and himself.
Simple. I said it the other day, I’ll call the good plays. And Ryan (Day) will bear the brunt of all the bad plays.
Sounds like a good plan. That being said, if they don’t beat Michigan this year, they may be both out of jobs.