Redemption for OSU: Pryor plays like a QB

He mentioned his teammates first. In his postgame interview Friday night, he took pains to recognize the big men who blocked in front of him. He thanked them; he praised them. He gave those big men their due.

"It's crazy how well they did," Terrelle Pryor said in the afterglow of the Rose Bowl.

Sharing the praise, Pryor?

Maybe, at last, the manchild has grown up. He can now see success as not just about him, even though most people's eyes and the media attention still tend to focus solely on him.

But such notoriety comes with the territory.

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Best in Ohio? Title belongs to Bearcats

For weeks now, a friend of mine has argued that the title of best college football team in Ohio didn’t belong to the Ohio State Buckeyes anymore.

I disagreed.

I was quick to remind him that the Buckeyes were the gold standard, and for him not to acknowledge that fact would be as pointless as arguing who’s richer: Bill Gates or Warren Buffett. Gates is, of course. But does it really matter when your net worth has 10 zeroes in it? The Buckeyes have been Bill Gates in Ohio college football, and no team has been his Buffett until now. They have their rival – no, they look to have their better in the University of Cincinnati. That’s the point my friend has been making – loudly, too. But it is impossible to say he’s wrong after watching the Buckeyes lose to Purdue and the Bearcats beat South Florida last week. Whatever claim Ohio State might have held to being the state’s best college football team disappeared after a dismal performance against a 1-5 team. The Buckeyes didn’t just lose to a bad football team in Purdue; they were embarrassed by that bad football team. That loss cost coach Jim Tressel and his Buckeyes whatever bragging rights they had left inside a state deep in talent. They might not be able anymore to cherry-pick that talent as they have been able to do for the better part of a half century. That talent has another in-state option, and the 'Cats are it. Out of scraps, UC coach Brian Kelly cobbled a team that finds itself No. 5 in the AP and BCS polls, 14 spots ahead of the Buckeyes. And the way this season has gone, they will be out of the top 25 before the Bearcats lose a game. In a stunning turnaround in fortunes, the 'Cats are the Ohio team that's the talk of college football, not Ohio State; they are the team that’s angling for a National Championship. All the Buckeyes will be playing for is the Big Ten title, and even their prospects of being in contention for it are slim. Does anybody expect a football team with a technique-challenged quarterback, a porous offensive line and no running game to win anything but a trip to a lesser bowl game? The Motor City Bowl might have Ohio State in its sights. No Fiesta Bowl, no Sugar Bowl, no Orange, no Rose Bowl … heck, no EagleBank Bowl either it would seem. Should the Buckeyes beat the odds and win the Big Ten, they have given no indication that they can beat anybody decent in a conference outside the Mid-American or the Big West. They are a full recruiting cycle away from being a quality program. Their close call against Navy and their loss to Purdue prove that point. In contrast, the Bearcats have shown the makings of a Division I program with grand expectations now and a bright future. They have a coach in Kelly who has shown what Tressel hasn’t: a knack for competing against anybody. Kelly’s Bearcats look like a more polished program. They seem better coached, and they have speed and creativity. Best of all, they have a quality quarterback in Tony Pike, although he's nursing an injury. Ask any college coach in the country who would he take today: Pike or Terrelle Pryor? All would say Pike. Ask any college coach in the country what team he would least like to play this weekend: UC or OSU? All would say UC. Grudgingly, so would I.

Pryor's a long way from a big-time QB

"Athletes” like Terrelle Pryor carry a truckload of expectations with them when they commit to a Division I program.

While their athleticism might go unchallenged, it alone doesn’t ensure they will master the nuances of playing the most demanding position in college football.

After his performance Saturday against Purdue, the athletic Pryor proved two things: No. 1, he isn't improving much; and, No. 2, he isn't ready to quarterback the Buckeyes with the precision and the polish the program needs.

Now, the criticism here isn’t altogether based on the fact the No. 7 Buckeyes lost, 26-18, to an ordinary Purdue team. A week earlier, they won, and the criticism was the same. For in that game, Pryor played as badly as any quarterback could play and still come away with win.

But that performance was against Wisconsin, an unbeaten, though untested team with aspirations of winning a Big Ten title.

Purdue, of course, had no such title hopes tucked away in its locker room. The Boilermakers had been leaking losses, and their 1-5 record suggested they would be fortunate to escape with all hands healthy.

Their record did reflect the quality of the team. What their record didn’t illustrate was how having a capable quarterback like Joey Elliott can keep a game close. He was no Tim Tebow or Sam Bradford; Elliott didn’t have to be. All he needed to be was the best quarterback on the field.

And he was.

That’s the damnable part of it. For Elliott didn’t have the much-hyped credentials of quarterbacks like Pryor, USC freshman Matt Barkley or Notre Dame junior Jimmy Clausen.

Hype can be a player’s undoing. It can lead to inflated expectations that no athlete can live up to, and maybe that’s the problem with Terrelle Pryor: He’s a prisoner of this hype.

In two seasons, he’s developed little. He’s a mechanical passer who locks in on a receiver. He has the touch of a blacksmith, chucking dink-and-dunk passes with helter-skelter accuracy all over the landscape. His pocket presence and awkward footwork resemble a passer who’s in the lineup for his second or third game.

At some point – and that point looks as if it has arrived -- coach Jim Tressel must reevaluate what he has in the underwhelming Pryor, a sophomore. It could be that Tressel entrusted his offense to Pryor too soon. Maybe, just maybe, Pryor’s athleticism works best for Ohio State at a wide receiver and not at quarterback.

For Tressel, a conclusion like the latter might be unthinkable. Dare he bench Pryor? How can he? Ohio State coaches chased Pryor with a dogged determination not used on very many football recruits. It made sense that Tressel go all out to land Pryor, the darling of elite programs from coast to coast.

Could the coach really risk seeing Pryor sign with Michigan?

Two years later, Tressel and the Buckeyes might be better for it had they let Pryor go to Michigan or somewhere else. He has done nothing to show people that he’s capable of greatness. He has shown only mediocrity, which is what frustrates Buckeyes fans.

They longed to see a quarterback who could win championships, a quarterback who could create magic with his legs and with his arms. Buckeyes fans thought they had that magical quarterback in Terrelle Pryor.

They thought wrong.

Pryor's arm holds all the hope for OSU titles

You can’t be a Buckeyes fan without walking around with expectations as grand as that canyon in Arizona, even while they're staring at a mountain of evidence to the contrary. For what do people who shed Scarlet and Gray tears expect this season -- a National Championship?

That is, of course, what the faithful expect; it is always so at Ohio State.

They share the same inflated dreams as men and women who root for Florida, Southern Cal, Texas, LSU or any of the other college football powerhouses. It’s BSC title or bust, which explains why OSU fans -- and even sportscasters -- are so hard on Terrelle Pryor.

They’ve forgotten, however, Pryor is a sophomore, simply a gifted underclassman who has plenty to learn about playing quarterback. No one claims he isn’t an extraordinary talent, but no one sees him as a finished product either. His play, thus far, has been typical of an inexperienced player: as many lows as highs.

In a win over unbeaten Wisconsin, Pryor had plenty of lows last Saturday. His play was hardly a performance for the video archives, except for critics to examine in the years ahead if he doesn’t show progress.

His progress has been agonizingly slow, making all the lofty talk about how good Pryor was going to be sound like the talk that surrounded Justin Zwick when he came into the program earlier this decade. It’s difficult to point out what Zwick did during four seasons at Ohio State, aside from retarding the progress of Troy Smith.

Expectations can be funny things, because they can keep coaches from using their best judgment. Coach Jim Tressel used poor judgment in sticking with Zwick too long. Is it possible Tressel’s doing the same with Pryor? It’s not as if Tressell has another Troy Smith tucked away on the bench. Buckeyes fans could use one, though.

They can’t entertain the thought of a National Championship until their Buckeyes, who play Purdue this afternoon, learn to use the forward pass as more than a tease. They can't think of winning the Big Ten either unless Pryor learns to throw. His legs do dazzle, turning routine plays into SportsCenter highlights. But his arm is what will cement his greatness, if greatness is achievable in a program that can shackle it.

For the road to greatness comes littered with risk, and Tressel isn’t a coach who tolerates risky play. Because he doesn’t, he keeps Pryor from achieving what his potential says he should achieve. He should be showing many of the football traits Tim Tebow displayed at Florida as a sophomore.

Watching Pryor, you see nothing in his play that resembles Tebow's. Is Pryor the offensive threat Tebow was a sophomore? Is Pryor as good now as Tebow was as a freshman?

That’s what troubles Buckeyes fans, because most think the answer to the latter is “no.” They keep waiting for Pryor's breakout performance, the game that will start to define what Pryor can be. He needs to be more than he is now if the Buckeyes are to make this season or the next one hold hopes of a National Championship.

I don’t think the planets aligned for that title this season. Not just because of Pryor, but because the Buckeyes have too many loose pieces to firm up for me to believe they are contenders for anything more than a Big Ten title.

Not even that title is thinkable without better play from Pryor. For he won’t be able to count each week on the OSU defense, as it did against Wisconsin, scoring touchdowns against Penn State, Iowa or even Michigan.

He’ll have to make plays – and make those plays with his arm. With a dozen or so starts on his OSU resume, Pryor has given no indication he can. His mediocrity makes me wonder whether Buckeyes fans should temper their expectations for now till Pryor proves he can win a game with his arm.

(Photo of crowd outside Ohio Stadium by Brent Veverka)