Buckeye Bits

Rough October ahead for the Buckeyes

You have to play them all, so I guess the order should not matter that much, but take a gander at Ohio State's next four games: Michigan State, Nebraska, Illinois and Wisconsin. Three of those four are undefeated four weeks into the season. They are all ranked, while the Buckeyes are not. The middle two games are on the road and will be particularly tough. Nebraska has been foaming at the mouth since the Big Ten schedule was released, targeting that home date with the dreaded Buckeyes. The Huskers want to stamp their Big Ten membership card in that one. Illinois has always been a troublesome place for Ohio State, even when the Buckeyes were very good and the Illini were not. And Wisconsin just looks so much better than everyone else. It would not be a stretch to see Ohio State go 1-3 in this difficult month.

Why the QB cupboard looks bare

In the wake of Ohio State's passing folly at Miami, a number of callers, emailers and Twitter-izers are asking how a program like Ohio State can not have several quality QBs in the system. The answer is Terrelle Pryor. Once they got Pryor, no top level high school QB would look at Ohio State for the next two years because they knew Pryor would get all the snaps. Kids want to play, so no stud was coming to Columbus to wear a baseball cap and hold a clip board for three years. Braxton Miller came in with the ideal set up -- redshirt his first year while he learned the system and watched Pryor go out in glory as a senior, then be the starter for four years. That plan blew up when Pryor skipped town. The collateral damage is playing out in front of OSU fans. Miller is not ready to be a starter in the Big Ten, and Joe Bauserman was never going to be.

Pyror left plenty of fingerprints

No shock earlier this week when a Cleveland booster admitted that he passed out cash in envelopes to Ohio State players just for showing up at a charity event. No surprise either than the details showed the money was all handed to QB Terrelle Pryor. Running back Jordan Hall, cornerback Travis Howard, and defensive back Corey Brown were suspended for the first two games of 2011 over the deal. Pryor slinked off to the NFL before the posse caught up to him. And no matter how they try to twist the story, the bottom line is that the charity, which assists families dealing with the deaths of loved ones, is out six hundred bucks.