Football
Tight Ends Emerging at Just the Right Moment at OSU
By John Porentas

This may well be the year that that Buckeyes rediscover the tight end.

Tight ends were an integral part of the OSU offense early in the Jim Tressel era. Tressel made great use of Darnell Sanders in his first season at the Buckeye helm and Ben Hartsock was a mainstay in the OSU offense. Then suddenly they disappeared. It wasn't so much that Tressel decided that tight ends weren't important. It was just that the Buckeyes suddenly had so many other weapons.

Rory Nicol

"I played with Santonio Holmes, I played with Anthony Gonzalez, I played with Teddy Ginn, that's three first-round wide receivers in the four years that I've been here. That's pretty remarkable. You can't not use those assets," said current OSU tight end Rory Nicol.

As they say in football, there's only one ball, and when you have the likes of Holmes, Ginn, Gonzalez et al on the roster, you get it to them. The Buckeyes were able to do just that over the last three or so seasons, and that meant the tight ends became the forgotten men. Surprisingly, that's just fine with the tight ends, because during that time the Buckeyes were doing a lot of winning, and if things aren't broke, there isn't a lot of need to fix them, hence the OSU focus was on wide receives and not tight ends.

"To me, it's until you stop our offense why change it," said Nicol.

"If we're great at what we do and no one is stopping then there's no need to change. Until someone stops you, then you have to tweak some things."

Nobody has stopped the Buckeyes yet, but what has happened is that the bevy of outstanding wide receivers that have come through OSU over the recent years have gone on to greener pastures, as in the long green of the NFL where they are becoming millionaires, and that has left an opening for the long-suffering tight ends.

"We're in a situation this year with new people, our scheme is going to change some," said Nicol.

"We lost guys outside, we lost guys in the backfield, we lost some guys up front. Things will change."

There were indications of that in the results of the jersey scrimmage. Of the four touchdown passes caught, two of them went to tight ends, one to Nicol and one to Jake Ballard.

Perfect timing

Jake Ballard

Jim Tressel and offensive coordinator Jim Bollman have both said that OSU's current crop of running backs may be the best overall crop they have had in their time at Ohio State. Additionally, the OSU offensive line is expected to be very good this year. Having tight ends on the field to help block for that running game will be a plus, and having tight ends on the field that can block and also catch will be a nightmare for opposing defenses.

"The thing that I've learned since I've gotten here is that when you've got a great blocking tight end on the edge, not only do you help the run game immensely, you set up play action," said Nicol.

"When they have to respect you as a blocker, all of a sudden you're sneaking out on some short yardage stuff or just some play action stuff and you're wide open."

Then there is the quarterback position. The Buckeyes are going to be breaking in a new one this season, and nothing helps a new quarterback more than some completions on some nice safe routes that move the chains and keep drives alive. The tight ends serve exactly that function, especially when the running game is going well. When defenses have to make sure to check running backs, tight ends get open easily making completions to them simpler, and that could be a very good thing for the Buckeye offense particularly in the early going this season. The likely candidate to be that quarterback, Todd Boeckman, is aware of the asset he has in Nicol and Ballard.

"They're big bodies. Rory Nicol is 6-5, 245 pounds. Same thing with Jake Ballard, they're big bodies. If you get the ball anywhere around them they're going to make some plays on the ball," said Boeckman.

For the record Nicol is listed on the OSU roster at 6-5, 250 and Ballard 6-7, 255. That makes both big enough to block effectively in that running game the Buckeyes are expected to have this season. There was even some talk that Ballard could move down to offensive tackle. What makes both unique however is that both are athletic enough to have the ball skills to be effective receivers and enough speed to be a threat to defenses. Ballard was considered a Division I basketball prospect before deciding on the football route and was being courted by basketball programs in the Big Ten. He definitely has ball skills. Nicol too is very athletic and has been in the program long enough to not only be a skilled receiver but a savvy one as well.

"You've got to get to the point where the catching the ball part really isn't what you're thinking about," explained Nicol.

"There's so much more going on. You learn as a player you've got to be able to recover, know who on the defense can take what away.

"If I'm running off this defender who's the next one who can take me away. When you're thinking about all those things catching the ball is just something that's going to happen. Lets face it, we've all got talent here. Every receiver has good hands, every tight end has good hands, we've all got good speed, things like that. Those are the things where your sheer athletic ability has to take over. You've got to learn to be a smart player."

Nicol has focused on just that, and his development, along with that of Ballard, is at precisely the right moment for the Buckeyes.

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