In the first installment of the end-of-season report card on the Big Ten, we looked at the schools in the first half of the alphabet. Know what letter is in the first half of the alphabet? That's right. F. But then, all the other grade letters are in the first half of the alphabet too.
Even though it wasn't a great year overall for the conference, there were plenty of bright points and hopeful signs and "wait until next year" moments which should have Big Ten fans excited for next season. Either that, or we'll all look like Charlie Brown did five seconds after Lucy teed up the football. But I digress. Let's take a look at the teams in the second drawer of the Big Ten file cabinet, shall we?
Prop Bets for the College Football Junkie is a weekly post that cares not for your silly point spreads. If you have the money and the gumption, we'll lay down a weekly gauntlet of propositions that'll take you from the penthouse to the outhouse faster than you can guess the number of times Lee Corso will say "not so fast my friend." As always, this is for entertainment purposes only.
-Predictions are already out that there will be a funeral when Georgia plays Alabama. Who's exactly is still up for debate. But everyone will be wearing black and if I know SEC fans, there will most certainly be coffins to fill. With beer, Maker's Mark, likenesses of Nick Saban and John Parker Wilson, etc. So we'll put the over/under for coffins in the tailgate area at 100. Because if you can carry something in it, Georgia fans will.
-Syracuse hosts Pitt this weekend, and in case you haven't heard things are not going well for the Orange. Pitt does not traditionally travel well. But that's neither hear nor there, because Syracuse fans are not traveling well to home games this year. So, we're betting that there will actually be more Pitt fans in the Carrier Dome this weekend than Orange fans. It'll be close, so we'll go with +/-50.
After getting embarrassed by the USC Trojans two weeks ago, there were plenty of people in Columbus saying that Terrelle Pryor should take over the starting quarterback job, and that Todd Boeckman should be relegated to clipboard holding. Well, as I said at the time, if Jim Tressel wanted to give his freshman phenom a shot, it would be best to do it in the Buckeyes two games against Troy and Minnesota before moving on to face Wisconsin.
Well, Jim listened to me (or himself, whatever) and Pryor played nearly every snap last Saturday, and though the Buckeyes sputtered in the first half, Terrelle threw four touchdowns in Ohio State's victory. It looks like coach Tressel liked what he saw, because he's named Terrelle the starter this weekend against the Golden Gophers.
"I would call Terrelle the starting quarterback," Tressel told The Repository. "I don't know that that means 95 percent of the snaps or 65 percent, or whatever. But I would consider him that.
"From a knowledge standpoint, he's further along than I've ever seen a freshman quarterback. Then you add the dimension of what he can do with his feet, maybe it makes up a little bit for when you're a little shorthanded at running back compared to what you thought you were going to be. ... What's important is we do what we think is the best thing that can help us at the moment."
All of this combined with the fact that Beanie Wells should be returning this week, and now maybe the Buckeyes can start playing like the team everybody thought they were. You know the Trojans are hoping they do.
After their latest national spotlight embarrassment, this time at the hands of the USC Trojans, there isn't much to be happy about in Columbus, Ohio. Tack on the fact that many of Columbus' citizens are currently without power thanks to the remnants of Hurricane Ike hitting Ohio over the weekend, and the Buckeye faithful are downright surly at the moment.
If there was anything in the Buckeyes blowout loss that was a positive for Ohio State, it was the play of Terrelle Pryor. Pryor looked like the only Buckeye who even deserved to be on the field with the Trojans on Saturday night, as he completed seven of nine passes for 52 yards and rushed for another 40. As you'd expect after such a loss, the calls for Pryor to take over the starting job have already begun.
It may make a few people in the Buckeyes locker room uneasy, most notably coach Jim Tressel, but there would be no controversy. Pryor, an all-world talent, showed Saturday night against USC that he is ready, maybe not to run all of the plays Boeckman does, or to read defenses the way Boeckman does, or to hang with the upperclassmen the way Boeckman does, but ready to help the Buckeyes regain some of their lost national respect.
Coach Speak is that magical language that all coaches use when talking with the media. No matter how grim the situation or how hated the rival in question, coaches can always fall back on this locker room dialect to speak about the subject in a way that will not offend the home fans or the rivals. Basically, it's a way to turn everything into sunshine and lollipops. As our own Brian Cook found out at the Big 10 media days, it can be a trial in frustration for reporters and bloggers alike.
But this twist on the English language isn't just for coaches. They've also passed along pointers to their players most likely to spend time in front of the reporters microphone. Luckily we have the translation of what they would say if free of inhibition.
Our subject is this article titled, Ohio State QB Boeckman watching Pryor's moves. Here are the translations of Boeckman and coach Jim Tressel speaking on freshman quarterback Terrelle Pryor.
"He's a special player, a special talent," Boeckman said on the second day of the Big Ten pre-season kickoff conference.
Translation: He thinks a lot of himself...a whole lot!
"I haven't seen what he can do on the field, so we're looking forward to seeing what he can do on Aug. 4."
Translation: I can't wait until Laurinaitis catches him running across the middle the first time. That'll shut him up.
"Going through 7-on-7 (drills), he's been asking me questions, how to do this, how to do that," Boeckman said. "It's been helpful, and beneficial, for him."
Translation: This is Todd Boeckman's team. Nothing happens out here unless Todd Boeckman says so. (Speaking of one's self in the third person is a variant of coach speak designed to let everyone know this person is crazy and won't be around long.)
When Antonio Henton is an old man, he'll have a lot of memories of his time in Columbus, Ohio as a member of the Ohio State football team. He'll be able to tell his grandchildren about the time he offered that undercover police officer $20 for sex, and about those six passes he got to throw in Ohio Stadium, one of which was for a touchdown.
Then he'll get to tell them about how the Buckeyes recruited freshman phenom quarterback Terrelle Pryor, basically ending any chance Antonio ever had of becoming a starter, and he decided to transfer to Georgia Southern.
Several sources close to the team said that Antonio Henton is expected to transfer to Georgia Southern. Coach Jim Tressel refused to confirm the move, saying only that Henton "is a good kid." As of last night, sources said Henton had not told team officials he was leaving.
It's hard to blame Henton for the decision because he didn't leave his home state of Georgia for Ohio State to sit on the bench for five years. Plus, going to a new school will help him get a fresh start after the legal troubles and suspension he had to deal with in Columbus. Not to mention that he'll be reunited with his high school coach, Rance Gillespie, who is now the offensive coordinator at Georgia Southern.
As for the Buckeyes, while Antonio's departure is not the end of the world, it doesn't leave much experience behind starter Todd Boeckman. Henton was the QB #2 on the roster, and will now be replaced by two freshman in Joe Bauserman and the aforementioned Pryor, neither of which have thrown a pass as a Buckeye.
As seen in the video, Ohio State fans aren't taking their second straight loss in the BCS title game too well. Ohio State fans have always been extremely crazy rabid about their Buckeyes, so emotional reactions to last night's loss should be expected.
To this guy's credit though, at least he kept a controlled fire to show his disdain, and didn't get arrested. The same cannot be said for some of his fellow Buckeyes supporters.
Fifteen people were arrested and several fires set around the Ohio State campus after the Buckeyes lost to LSU in the BCS championship game Monday night.
Most of the arrests were on charges of disorderly conduct or resisting arrest, though two were expected to be charged by arson investigations after trash bins were sit on fire, police spokeswoman Amanda Ford said Tuesday. Between 10 and 12 fires were reported.
If the police think that's a lot of fires, just wait until Todd Boeckman gets back on campus. They're liable to burn him at the stake and carry him around campus before tearing him apart limb from limb.
While the Buckeyes try and figure out what they're going to do without their two suspended cornerbacks, and LSU comes up with a gameplan to exploit the Buckeyes' secondary, Ohio State quarterback Todd Boeckman is just hoping he plays better against LSU than he did in OSU's last two games.
Boeckman was never a legit Heisman contender, but due to the fact Ohio State was one of the only teams in college football who wasn't losing, his name was being bandied about as a candidate. Then the final two games of the Buckeyes season came, and nobody talked about Todd again.
In Ohio State's loss to Illinois and win over Michigan, Boeckman struggled a bit. He completed only 55% of his passes for only 206 yards, no touchdowns, and four interceptions. In Ohio State's first ten games, Boeckman completed 65% of his passes for 1,965 yards, 23 touchdowns and 8 interceptions.
If the Buckeyes are going to beat LSU in January, they're going to need the Boeckman from the first ten games, and Todd knows it.
"Maybe I got down on myself too much at the end," said Boeckman, who has thrown for 2,171 yards, 23 touchdowns and 12 picks while completing 65 percent of his passes. "At the beginning of the season, I was making mistakes and bouncing right back. At the end, I wasn't bouncing back as quickly. You can't let a turnover affect your entire game. I'm going to shrug those off and keep going."
Of course, it's a lot easier said than done when you don't have Glenn Dorsey barreling down on you.
The college football landscape has looked different all season. I mean, we've had Kansas, Connecticut, and Kentucky all ranked at the same time. Basketball powerhouses are now football powerhouses, and the world is in danger of spinning off it's axis.
The same could be said for the Heisman race. Can you remember the last time we were this late into the college football season, and nobody had emerged as a front runner? It was supposed to be Darren McFadden, but unfortunately Arkansas' struggles have killed that. He was followed by the Great Ewok, Tim Tebow, but he's out of the running now that Florida has three losses. So right now Boston College's Matt Ryan is the default leader since he followed up 58 minutes of playing like absolute crap with two solid minutes to beat the Hokies last Thursday.
Boeckman, who will be tested again Saturday against Wisconsin, is being mentioned as a Heisman Trophy candidate because he is leading the offense of the No. 1-ranked team in the country. Filling Smith's Heisman shoes was pressure enough on Boeckman. Now he has to steer the Buckeyes through the meat of their schedule - Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan - to legitimize the talk.
I don't know. I understand the premise as to why Boeckman should be considered, but I'm not sure I can be sold on giving him the Heisman.
"Todd Boeckman is the guy that's going to have the first chance to go out there and be nervous and have some fun," coach Jim Tressel said on Tuesday. "He's been waiting so long for this opportunity. He's been studying hard, paying close attention. He knows who we are and what we want to do."
Congratulations, Todd. There's no pressure or anything with the gig. I mean, all you have to do is replace a Heisman Trophy winner who led the Buckeyes to an appearance in the title game last January. Go get em, champ!
Boeckman came into the spring at #1 on the Ohio State depth chart, and he kept himself there by outplaying Rob Schoenhoft and Antonio Henton in practice.
Of course, practice is a lot different than playing in an actual game, and though Boeckman does have some game experience, it isn't much. The fourth-year junior has only thrown 10 passes in six games during his career in Columbus. Luckily the Buckeyes face a schedule to start the season that consists of Youngstown State and Akron before they head west to play Washington. Boeckman should be able to work out any kinks in those first two games before he faces any real challenges.
Besides, all he really has to do is turn around and hand the ball to Chris Wells.
In the first installment of the end-of-season report card on the Big Ten, we looked at the schools in the first half of the alphabet. Know what letter is in the first half of the alphabet? That's right. F. But then, all the other grade letters are in the first half of the alphabet too.
After getting embarrassed by the USC Trojans two weeks ago, there were plenty of people in Columbus saying that 
After their latest national spotlight embarrassment, this time at the hands of the USC Trojans, there isn't much to be happy about in Columbus, Ohio. Tack on the fact that many of Columbus' citizens are currently without power thanks to the remnants of Hurricane Ike hitting Ohio over the weekend, and the Buckeye faithful are downright surly at the moment.
Coach Speak is that magical language that all coaches use when talking with the media. No matter how grim the situation or how hated the rival in question, coaches can always fall back on this locker room dialect to speak about the subject in a way that will not offend the home fans or the rivals. Basically, it's a way to turn everything into sunshine and lollipops. As our own 
When 
While the Buckeyes try and figure out what they're going to do without their 
The college football landscape has looked different all season. I mean, we've had Kansas, Connecticut, and Kentucky all ranked at the same time. Basketball powerhouses are now football powerhouses, and the world is in danger of spinning off it's axis. 
It's not exactly a surprise or anything, but 
