Not surprisingly, Jim Tressel has indicated he is not planning on benching Terrelle Pryor or giving backup Joe Bauserman any playing time. As I mentioned the other day, Tressel has to consider benching Pryor at some point given the way he’s playing, but that none of us should hold our breath.

Tressel did what he had to do. If he still has any hope of Pryor emerging as a good quarterback for Ohio State, he needs to publicly support the kid when he’s down.

That said, there’s no doubt in my mind that Tressel in running various scenarios in his head. Pryor seems to be getting worse, and at some point Tressel’s hand will be forced if Pryor doesn’t improve. Naturally, Tressel will do all in his control to prevent that scenario, but he’s certainly thought it through.

When he arrived at Ohio State as the biggest recruiting prize in the country, Buckeye fans were hopeful that Terrelle Pryor would be the second coming of Vince Young. Instead, Pryor looks more like the next Juice Williams.

Terrelle Pryor’s performance in yesterday’s loss to Purdue was a disaster. It wasn’t simply a bad game from a young quarterback. Pryor has been getting progressively worse throughout the season. Rather, it was a performance that raised the question of whether Terrelle Pryor can ever be a good college quarterback, let alone the NFL quarterback he dreams of becoming.

Pryor had two fumbles and two interceptions. But his stats don’t tell the story here. When you watch Pryor play, you wonder why anyone ever thought this kid could be a good college quarterback. Pryor looked like a track star thrown into the game who had never played the position before. He lacks practically all the tools one would need to play quarterback, apart from his size and speed.

* Arm strength – Pryor can throw the ball, but he hardly has a gun. Most of his long throws look like heaves rather than smooth throws.

* Accuracy – Pryor rarely makes accurate throws. Even short throws seem to be a challenge.

* Mechanics – Pryor’s footwork and throwing mechanics are a mess. He’s not a natural at all with the ball in his hands. Sure, coaching can help, but the coaches aren’t developing a natural passing talent.

* Pocket presence – The Buckeyes have a weak offensive line this season, so that makes it more difficult to develop a young quarterback. But Pryor consistently panics in the pocket. He doesn’t seem to have any sense of how much time he really has to make a throw. Not surprisingly, he often relies in his incredible athleticism to buy some time for a possible pass or run, but he often seems to make the wrong choice.

* Decision-making – He rarely seems to do the right thing. How many times have we seen him run out of bounds under pressure and take a loss of five or more yards when he easily could have just tossed the ball out of bounds? He seems to throw when he should run, and run when he has an open receiver. On blitzes, he rarely gets the ball to the hot receiver.

* Leadership and temperament – Pryor often acts like an immature kid who can’t control his emotions. He’s only nineteen years old, so we need to cut him some slack here, but compare him to freshmen like Tate Forcier at Michigan and the surfer dude playing quarterback at USC. They seem to thrive under pressure, while Pryor seems to come unglued under pressure.

Jim Tressel made a good point early in the season when some were questioning Pryor’s play – Vince Young didn’t become Vince Young until his senior season. The message was clear – young players need to develop, and it’s unrealistic to expect them to come in a perform consistently this early in a college career. Tressel prides himself on his ability to develop young players and young men. He knows players and teams will face adversity, and he wants to help them face it and overcome it.

For this reason, we shouldn’t be surprised that Tressel didn’t pull Pryor against Purdue. He should have been pulled, but Tressel doesn’t have a great option sitting on the bench, and he probably wanted to see how Pryor would react in that situation.

As an Ohio State fan, it’s hard to imagine watching Pryor play quarterback for two more seasons. The Buckeyes are loaded on defense, and they have a solid offense as well, even with a mediocre offensive line. All they need right now to compete is a quarterback who can hit open receivers and avoid turnovers. They don’t need a Vince Young or even a Troy Smith. Put Craig Krenzel on this team and the Buckeyes are competing for a national championship. Instead, we have the Terrelle Pryor train wreck, and an excellent defense is being wasted.

Pryor chose Ohio State because he wanted a program that could help him develop as a future NFL quarterback. That seems like a pipe dream now. The kid needs to focus on just being a competent college quarterback.

What should Tressel do? Would sitting Pryor help? Tressel needs to consider this if Pryor continues to turn over the football. He owes it to the other players on the team.

In the meantime, short of benching Pryor, Tressel needs to rethink what he’s trying to do on offense (the issue of Tressel calling the plays will be addressed another time). We can see he’s already tried to incorporate the option more into the offense, but we’re seeing that Pryor’s instincts aren’t much better there. Perhaps with practice he’ll get better, as the option at least plays to his running ability. Tressel should toss aside a good chunk of the playbook and go to a much simpler offense. Focus on running the football, the option, and other Wildcat-type plays, and have Pryor make much simpler throws that play off the running game. Dig up old tape from Oklahoma and Nebraska from the 1970’s, or even most of the Woody Hayes years. Keep it simple until the kid shows he can handle more.

Buckeye fans often get frustrated with Tressel’s conservative play-calling, but opening up the offense is not the solution here. He has to pull things back and start over. And, if Pryor can’t cut it in a simpler offense, then Tressel will have to make a change.

I was listening to Greg Brinda tonight on WKNR and was rather surprised to hear him discussing rumors of a possible trade of Josh Cribbs to the Dolphins for Ted Ginn, Jr. Now, I’m a huge fan of Ginn, but Cribbs is the best player on the Browns, and Ginn has been a disappointment so far.

Why is this even being discussed? Well, everyone is aware of Josh’s contract situation, and the Browns have shown a willingness to make deals, so nobody should be surprised that teams are calling to inquire about Cribbs. The Browns of course will listen when anyone calls, but I’d be surprised if they’re seriously considering any of this.

Naturally, that would change if a team starts talking about high draft picks. At that point you always have to listen. Would you trade Cribbs to Miami for Ted Ginn and a second round pick? You’d have to think about it. Can you imagine Cribbs becoming a part of Miami’s Wildcat package? I can’t blame them for thinking about this.

I’d rather see the Browns put all this aside and sign Cribbs to an extension. Then, start working Cribbs into our own Wildcat offense. They tried it in week one and then gave up, but I’m hoping they’ve been saving some of this for Pittsburgh. Cribbs was a quarterback in college, so he could be lethal in the single wing offense.

I never thought I’d see Chad Henne throwing a touchdown pass to Ted Ginn, Jr., but that’s what we saw tonight as Henne’s bomb to Ginn helped the Dolphins beat Braylon Edwards and the Jets tonight.

That was a tough loss for the Buckeyes on Saturday night. They had the game, but basically handed it to USC at the end. The defense played great all night, so you can’t blame them for the game, though the last drive was very disappointing.

-Tressel needs to give up the play calling. We’ve said this over and over again. Tressel can’t seem to manage the game properly. He’s been out-coached in big games that have turned into blowouts, and he’s also watched as his team’s have blown leads on the final drive. He needs to make a change.

-Terrelle Pryor has a long way to go. He’s a physical specimen, but his decision-making sucks. While we can criticize Tressel for his calls, Pryor had real trouble executing the game plan. He took way to many losses in the backfield. He never seems to know when he should throw the ball away. His accuracy also sucks. Based on what we saw on Saturday, this kid will never be an NFL QB. He needs to focus on being a good college QB first, and that means using his head AND his legs to move the ball.

-The D-line is awesome. We heard plenty of talk about the USC o-line, and how they had a bunch of NFL forst-rounders. Well, either their stock fell or the stock of the Buckeye d-linemen shot up as they made big plays all night.

-The o-line is pretty bad. This is a huge disappointment for the Buckeyes. They need to take a long look at their recruiting. They seem to find plenty of big white guys from Ohio, but few of them have real athleticism. Size isn’t everything, so they need to figure out how to narrow their focus on guys that can play the game.

This game was a tough one to take. Jim Tressel has been a great head coach, and it’s great to see the Buckeyes competing every year, but he needs to step up his game and adopt to the new reality. Find the best young coach out there and make him your offensive coordinator.

This is understandable in one sense given recent history, but it’s also ridiculous when you consider that Terrelle Pryor has the ability to carry a team on his back. If Tressel sticks with the option and the QB running plays we saw against Navy, then they should be able to move the ball and neutralize the problems they have on the offensive line. Pryor will need to make some big plays and avoid turnovers for the Buckeyes to win, but he’s certainly capable of doing just that.

Also, USC will be relying on their running game. While that is a real threat, this should make for a closer game as long as Ohio State avoids giving up the big run. The key here is the Buckeye d-line. If they can step up like they did last year in Texas, then the Bucks have a real chance.

Finally, we have the issue of USC’s freshman QB. He may play great – he may not. Nobody really knows what will happen. But a poor performance gives the Buckeyes a real chance of winning this game.

Jim Tressel’s game management sucked, but fans shouldn’t worry much about that when evaluating the first game. The bottom line with Tressel is that he’s always learning about his teams early in the season, but despite the close scores he rarely loses games the Buckeyes are supposed to win. That said, his decision to pass on the field goal in the fourth quarter was stupid, and he should stop using his backup QB in the second quarter. Put the game away, and THEN start playing the backups.

As for the team, Terrelle Pryor looked great, and that’s the most important factor to consider when evaluating the prospects for the Buckeyes this season. Just as important, Tressel is using him properly. He ran numerous option plays, QB draws and roll-outs. They will need to ride Pryor’s legs if they want to make a splash this season. But Pryor did more than that. He threw the ball well and made completions when he also could have run the ball. This will make his running even more lethal if defenders have to respect the pass.

Brandon Saine also looked good splitting time with Dan Herron, giving the Buckeyes a solid rotation at tailback, and the young receivers also looked good.

On the downside, the offensive line doesn’t look very good. They had some good moments, but they were very inconsistent. Pryor obviously can avoid the rush so they can work around this, but the o-line has to improve if they want to beat USC.

As for the defense, they did fine, though it’s hard to learn much given that Navy was running the triple option. We’ll see how they do next week when the Trojans invade the Shoe.

Pryor is the key. If he develops as expected, the Buckeyes can beat anyone when he plays well. He seems ready to take on the challenge.

Just like Michigan fans cry after they play the Buckeyes!

As I mentioned in a previous post, the reviews of Ohio State wide receiver Brian Robiskie were mixed. That said, most thought he would be a pretty safe pick.

When the Browns picked him with their first pick in the second round, my initial reaction was that they reached with this pick. Robiskie probably would have been there with the other two picks they had in that round.

That said, most analysts agreed that Robiskie was the most “polished” receiver in the draft, and the Browns needed someone who could step in and start right away given the uncertainty at that position. Even though they haven’t traded Braylon Edwards yet, they still might make a move at some point.

In their post-draft analysis, both Mel Kiper and Steve McShay mention the Robiskie pick. Here’s Kiper’s grade.

Cleveland Browns: GRADE: B-
Alex Mack was a good pick at No. 21 and Mohamed Massaquoi was a very good pickup in the second round. I think fellow second-rounder David Veikune was a bit of a reach in that round, but not enough of one to seriously dent the Browns’ grade. They didn’t get a great receiver in Brian Robiskie in the second round, but he’s polished enough as a rookie that he could be a solid possession guy for this franchise.

McShay doesn’t like the Robiskie pick.

Cleveland Browns
2009 draft class
Best pick: WR Mohamed Massaquoi, Georgia (Second round, No. 50 overall)
Worst pick: WR Brian Robiskie, Ohio State (Second round, No. 36 overall)
Bottom line: While teams don’t usually like to take centers so early in the first round, it’s unlikely Alex Mack would have been off the board in the next few picks had the Browns not traded up to No. 21 overall to get him. You can’t fault them for bringing Mack into the fold, but they had other priority needs including wide receiver and a pass-rush upgrade that could have been addressed there. Cleveland got its receivers in the next round, though I think Robiskie was a reach because he likely won’t turn into anything more than a possession-type No. 3 receiver. I expect Massaquoi to emerge as the bigger playmaker of the two. I also liked the way the Browns hankered down on Day 2 and found versatile, instinctive playmakers like DE David Veikune, LB Kaluka Maiava and DBs Don Carey and Coye Francies.

I think Robiskie can become a very productive #2 receiver who catches everything thrown his way, so I think McShay is being too tough in him. We’ve seen Robiskie make incredible catches in the red zone, so he can be a useful weapon. He reminds me of Reggie Langhorn, and if he lives up to that status the Browns made a nice pick.

Malcolm Jenkins is the first Ohio State Buckeye to go in the 2009 NFL draft. The Saints took him at #14.