Ohio State hires Bill O’Brien to be their new offensive coordinator | Joel Klatt Show

Joel Klatt talked about the Ohio State Buckeyes hiring Bill O’Brien to be their offensive coordinator. Ryan Day will be passing off the play-calling duties to Bill O’Brien next season. Joel questioned if it’s possible to win in the sport being your own play-caller in modern college football. 

#TheJoelKlattShow #CFB #OhioStateBuckeyes

SUBSCRIBE to get the latest Joel Klatt Show content:
https://rb.gy/7sbi9

The all-new FOX Sports App, built for the modern sports fan: https://tinyurl.com/y4uouolb

►The Joel Klatt Show YouTube Channel: https://bit.ly/joelklattshow_yt
►PBC ON FOX’s YouTube Channel: https://foxs.pt/SubscribePBCONFOX
►WWE ON FOX YouTube channel: https://foxs.pt/SubscribeWWEONFOX
►FOX Soccer’s YouTube channel: https://foxs.pt/SubscribeFOXSOCCER
►NASCAR ON FOX YouTube channel: https://foxs.pt/SubscribeNASCARonFOX
►CFB ON FOX YouTube channel: https://foxs.pt/SubscribeCFBonFOX

See more from The Joel Klatt Show: https://www.foxsports.com/shows/the-joel-klatt-show

Like The Joel Klatt Show on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JoelKlattShow/
Follow The Joel Klatt Show on Twitter: https://twitter.com/JoelKlattShow
Follow The Joel Klatt Show on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joelklattshow/

Ohio State hires Bill O’Brien to be their new offensive coordinator | Joel Klatt Show

And that’s where we get to, I thought, maybe even the biggest news out of Ohio State. And that is Ryan Day will not call the plays, and now it’s going to be Bill O’Brien, who they hire as the new offensive coordinator. Interesting, very interesting piece.

Now, I think it also goes hand in hand with what I was talking about Ryan feeling like he needed to go and get resourced and pour into other areas of the program in order to make the program, as a whole, better. Well, part of that is you got to relinquish some responsibility.

And he’s going to relinquish some of that responsibility to Bill O’Brien, who has a wealth of experience. I mean, the guy has coached Tom Brady, for crying out loud. And Bryce Young. Like, I know it wasn’t great in New England this last year, but Bill’s got a lot of experience.

And from Ryan’s perspective, I think that he was looking at this, and he thought to himself, you know what, I would rather bounce, and develop, and collaborate with a more experienced guy rather than groom an inexperienced, talented young guy with a lot of potential. Why?

Because I think they’re trying to gear up for a run now. Not trying to groom a play caller, you know. And I do– I think there’s going to be a lot of speculation about Brian Hartline in all of this. And Brian Hartline, if you don’t know,

He’s one of the best assistant coaches in America. He’s their wide receiver coach, and obviously they’ve had as good a wide receivers as any in the country, and look at what they’re doing in the National Football League. He’s a great recruiter, and he’s a great wide receiver coach.

I don’t know if Brian– and I know Brian pretty well. I don’t know if he wants to be a coordinator. I don’t know if he wants to be a play caller. I do think he has aspirations for being a head

Coach at some point in his life, but I don’t know if he wants to go the route of being an offensive coordinator and then a head coach. And I don’t think he has to. And why I don’t think he has to is, I think that the sport has changed enough

To where we can value just recruiting as much as we value calling plays. When you’re trying to build a roster, recruiting is the end all, be all, whether it’s for transfer players or high school players. OK, so he’s shown an elite level of recruiting. Well, that’s going to eventually land him a head

Coaching job at some point. OK, so he’s going to have those aspirations moving forward, and that’s why I don’t think he got the play calling duties right now as a new offensive coordinator. And now it goes to Bill O’Brien, who’s not a young guy with potential, but rather an experienced guy

That has been through it that Ryan Day can collaborate with. I think that’s what happened. All right? So you look at this, and is Bill O’Brien the play caller that Ryan Day is? No, but guess what? If I’m a Buckeye fan, I would take a lot of solace

In the fact that guess who is on the headset as well? Ryan Day, OK? And every single thing that happens in the game plan, Ryan’s going to have a 30,000-foot view and be able to poke holes in it throughout the week. And guess what, that’s going to make Bill O’Brien better.

That’s going to make the entire staff better. And so in a lot of ways, I think that this can, and will, and should work out. Now, we’ll see if it does. We’ll see if it does. But that’s the way that I would look at this. OK, last thing in this topic.

This whole idea that these coaches in college football– you know, I don’t know if it’s possible anymore to actually win at the top end being your own play-caller because I don’t even know if it’s possible to do the job of what we think a head coach should be

Doing in college football right now and do it at an elite level. I think it’s too much, and it’s too scattered. As it’s currently constructed, I can’t imagine also trying to call plays. I think that’s a bridge too far. We’re asking college coaches to be elite coaches, elite GMs, and roster

Builders, and elite mentors. Because remember, in college football, the coach bears responsibility when some kid gets arrested on the team, or anything that happens on the team, or within the organization, or with an assistant. See, in the NFL, that doesn’t happen. The head coach never bears responsibility for those actions.

Those actions or just the responsibility of that adult. But with these 18- to 22-year-olds, man, I tell you what. That head coach, you know– what type of program is he running over there? My goodness. That’s the way that we think about it.

And so we want these guys to do everything at an elite level, and that’s impossible. You can’t do everything at an elite level. You know how I know that? It’s not even done at an elite level in the NFL. And they’re not even asked to be the mentor that the head

Coaches are in college. We don’t even, in the NFL, give guys now the responsibility to try to build the roster and be an elite coach. That didn’t work. We tried it in the 90s, guys. Like Mike Shanahan, and– who was it– Mike Holmgren, who got all the power.

Parcells got all the power at some point. There was only one head coach in the National Football League this year that was both the GM and the head coach. His name was Bill Belichick, and you can say he’s one of the greatest of all time, but guess what? Didn’t work this year.

The NFL has proven that you can’t even do it at the NFL level. And here’s the thing about it– at the NFL level, we try to make it easy on the guys to build the roster. That’s not afforded the college head coach. You see, at the next level, the head coach–

If he’s the decision maker and roster builder, he can have free agency. He has a salary cap guy. He knows how many resources he has. I didn’t even talk about fund raising, by the way. I didn’t even put that in my trifecta of what we expect coaches to be elite at.

But he’s got the resources. He’s got the cap number. He can go and he can sign free agents. And then he can go, and he can evaluate, and he can draft players, and then he can go into the OTAs. So it’s all compartmentalized, and it’s all super organized and structured so

That everyone can have success. But in college, it’s an absolute disaster. It’s a tornado, all right? It’s trying to do etch-a-sketch in a tornado. You can’t do it. You can’t do it. And so here you are as a head coach, and now you’re being asked to do all of these things

At an elite level, in the midst of chaos while you’re trying to build a roster, during a season, and during Bowl prep, and now I’ve got NIL, and now I’ve got a transfer period with the early signing day. And it’s a disaster. It’s crazy. Ryan understood that. So what does he understand?

He understood that he needed to get out of the play calling business so that he could pour into the roster business. He needed to delegate some of that coaching responsibility so that he could dive into the GM and the mentor side of things. And he thinks that that’s going to pay dividends

For this program moving forward. And it’s hard to argue with him. Basically, he’s built a roster that could be one of the best rosters in college football this next year. And in his mind, he’s not going to be staring at a play sheet every day on Saturday.

So now when– like, let’s say, like, the defense makes a play. He can be right there in the celebration. And in this day and age, when a player can walk out the door, don’t you think it’s valuable when that player, regardless of position or side of football, feels

Like his head coach is on his side, and cares, and is involved. Not with his head in his play sheet. I think that could be a powerful thing. So that’s part of the plan. I started all this Ohio State section off with like, have a plan moving forward.

Well, this is part of the plan. Delegate some of this coaching responsibility. Dive into the roster building. Dive into fundraising and NIL. Dive into the mentor side so that you can start to retain some of these defensive players, and then invest in the entire team and not just the offensive side,

And not just the call sheet. And see where the chips fall where– and let the chips fall where they may at the end of the day.