Tully Tuesday's Volume 41. What the hell was that?

I’ve never been this low as a fan in my Ohio State tenure. Now granted. I started on an extremely high note, my freshman year was a National Championship. The next 4 years I saw Ohio State beat Michigan 4 straight times and lose a total of just 7 times during my time in Columbus. I came in at one of the best periods in the history of the program. For all the shit he gets for off the field stuff, that was all masterminded by Urban Meyer.

The program has continued to be one of the elite programs in football since Ryan Day took over. They are top 3 in recruiting year over year, have been in the playoff more often than they’ve been left out. But there has been a glaring hole in the program over the last 4 years where the team has fallen short to Michigan.

I’ve gone back and forth for years with my friends on the hypothetical of would you rather go 1-11 with a win over Michigan or 12-1 with the blemish being a loss to Michigan, even with a National Championship. The fact that we even have that conversation should tell you how important winning in this rivalry is.

I can handle losing. I really can, I’m a Cowboys fan after all.

I can’t handle losing the same exact way 4 years in a row. I can’t handle doing the same shit when it’s not working over and over again. I can’t handle losing to a team that throws for 62 yards and 2 interceptions. You just can’t lose that game. You cannot. You cannot not throw the ball to your best player for the entire second half. You cannot blame the wind. You play outside. The wind is the same every year. Throw a goddamn screen if you’re worried about the wind. Be mad that the other team stormed your field. But be mad about the last time it happened on their field, and the time before that. You don’t get the excuses when you’re a 20 point favorite at home. There is zero reason Ohio State even after the disaster first 45 minutes of the game shouldn’t have won the game after Jack Sawyer made the INT. There is also zero reason to punt after going 3 and out on that drive. It was 4th and 2. You either fail and they score with enough time for you to answer, or you punt for a net of 30 yards and they score with little time left. Don’t even get me started on the Clock management north of the 2 minute warning. He held his timeouts and got the ball back with 1 minute left rather than taking them on the front end of the warning.

Everybody is shouting for Day to be fired, and I’ve long been a defender of his. I think he is a great guy and a really good football coach. Whatever block he has in his brain with Michigan is concerning enough to move on. I think he can get the job done, but how long is too long for the boosters and admin? I really think a trip to the National Championship is the only circumstance in which he stays in Columbus next year, whether that be on his own accord or he is forced out by Administration or the Boosters.

But give me a replacement, Mike Vrabel? Dan Lanning? Nick Saban? Alright I’m there. I don’t know if there is a right answer outside of those guys. I think at this point fans would take a 3 or 4 loss season if one of those losses didn’t come from Michigan.

I’m frustrated, and I’m sure a lot of Ohio State folks are in the same lot as me. There is a way Ohio State plays football and they did not remotely resemble that team on Saturday. If you want to be a run first team, get a run first quarterback and do it. Sure, Howard can run, but he’s not breaking away and blowing a game open the way Braxton Miller, JT Barrett, and Justin Fields could. And before you go there, Trevor Lawrence had an 80 yard touchdown run against these same Buckeyes a few years ago.

Recruit better on the offensive line. Make sure your kicker is one of the top 5 kickers in the country like Michigan did this off-season.

Ohio State’s weaknesses going into the game was their offensive line and their kicker. Michigan’s strengths were their defensive line, their ball control, and their kicker.

Ohio State’s “plan” was to play the game between those units. There was no effort to expose the glaring weaknesses on Michigan’s defense, and there was not near enough aggression to take the kicking game out of the game and saying we don’t think your offense is good enough to make us pay. Which was true. 13 points wins you this game 1 time since 1996 and Ohio State played to score one more point than Michigan rather than the margins of 14,29,3,23,29 in the last 5 wins in this rivalry. Michigan wins the scrappy low scoring games; Ohio State blows them out. That has been the history of this rivalry for 25 years now.

I don’t think a result shy of a National Championship makes this a success of a campaign for Ohio State. You’ve lost your two biggest games this year. Even winning a title with that black mark in November on your schedule would keep this from being one of the best seasons in School History. It means more, and I think Ryan Day would be the first to tell you that. It’s a part of the job, the responsibility that you will be judged based on how you perform on the last Saturday of November, and that remains a glaring stain on Ohio State in the post Urban Meyer era we are in.

And you know what the worst part of the whole disaster is? Ohio State SHOULD win the National Championship. On a neutral field there is a not a playoff team you would confidently take to beat them until probably the National Championship.

OSU will probably have their toughest test in the first round of the Playoff vs Tennessee at home. I’ll take that roll in 20 degree weather against Tennessee and their freshman quarterback. Then a neutral site game against Georgia or the Big 12 winner? Sign me up. Penn State or Indiana or even Notre Dame in the Semi-final? These are all teams Ohio State should handle soundly, particularly once they slide into a dome and start relying on the skillsets that got them where they are and not running into the Center’s ass all game.

My final note here, I’ve been getting a lot of smack for what went on Saturday, I get it. People want to talk their shit and get one back on Ohio State and I’m sure a lot of my friends are dealing with the same. I’m here for it, I’ve signed up for it. If you have a degree from the University of Michigan, step on up and have your cake, you deserve it. If that is not your case, step aside, because you don’t have a leg to stand on here, this is not about you, and you are playing make-believe. That is the same for OSU fans who have the same credentials. I’m so sick and tired of the twitter bots and Buck-I Guys of the world chirping and making fools of themselves and the Ohio State community.

Ohio State lost and Michigan won, that’s how it goes, there’s only one way to band-aid this season, and it’s right there for the taking over the next 2 months.

Tully Tuesday’s is brought to you by RoadMap Technologies and labofdata.com , RoadMap LockedIN is an online forecasting technologies that we use and our clients use to forecast out all scenarios, including Sports betting. Check it out or reach out to learn more!

Tully Tuesday’s is also brought to you by Venu. The Venu team has created an awesome tool for finding where and when the best events and plans are in town to find the perfect night for you and your friends. Download and sign up for free here Venu: Plans Made Easy on the App Store (apple.com)