Matt Hayes Vomits Forth Stupidity

The University of Southern California and Ohio State University are a few days away from engaging in a game of football, in case you hadn’t heard. Matt Hayes thinks it will live up to the hype, and his reasons are typically Hayesian.

1. Ohio State is desperate:

Desperate? Really? They’re like the second winningest program this decade.

This is a manhood game, plain and simple.

I’m not going to argue that emotion has no impact on the outcome of a football game, but the idea that OSU has more to play for than the number one team in the nation is fucking batshit. Also, if you assume that he is using ‘manhood’ as a euphemism for ’penis’ this sentence gets a lot better.

The last two times we’ve seen the Buckeyes in big games, it was utterly embarrassing.

I guess. The two times prior (Texas and Michigan in ‘06) were okay. Also, I’m not sure the 14 point loss to LSU should be thought of as utterly embarrassing.

It wasn’t so much the score as it was them coming completely unhinged mentally — something so out of character for Jim Tressel-coached teams.

Florida game: yes, complete meltdown. LSU game: beaten by a better, more experienced team in what was a reasonably competitive game for a while.

Every player who has been through those emasculating losses in the last two BCS title games knows this is a statement game.

And everyone playing for USC recognizes the same thing, and they probably have the better team.

Let’s see if they respond.

Isn’t the whole basis of this that they will, in fact, respond? I assumed that was why you headlined your column “Buckeyes and Trojans won’t disappoint” and then listed Buckeye desperation as the first reason out of five. Own your opinions, Matt.

Also, is there like a standard rule in college football journalism that you can only list five reasons in a column?

2. The matchups: It’s obvious now that Ohio State has problems with teams that run the spread option.

Well, they’ve lost to two of them – Florida and Illinos – the last two years, but they held Michigan State to 185 yards and Northwestern to 120 just last year. Those two teams run variations of the spread. If I might posit a theory that runs counter to Hayes’ mindless hyping of the spread, OSU sometimes struggles against teams with talent equal to or greater than their own, like every other team in the NCAA.

USC does not run it, and the Trojans’ pro-style offensive scheme plays into the Buckeyes’ strength: athletic bruisers in the front seven and cornerbacks who can get physical with receivers.

Possibly. If they stay in this game it will definitely be because their defense contains USC, but in one of those embarrassing losses you mentioned earlier they were playing against basically a pro-style offense.

None of the USC receivers will run away from coverage,

What? The point of running routes is to get away from coverage. Apparently the USC receivers have agreed that this would be unsporting and will not be doing it.

which will allow CBs Malcolm Jenkins and Chimdi Chekwa to jam at the line of scrimmage and disrupt the Trojans’ timing-based passing game.

Receivers in the spread offense are apparently universally unjammable. I realize you can’t jam every  receiver when there are five on the field, but you can damn well jam a couple. I’m also going to guess that USC won’t be running two-wide sets all fucking day. Hayes’ obsession with the spread as some sort of unstoppable beast is truly amazing.

3. The next USC Heisman Trophy winner. Mark Sanchez is the most physically gifted of all Pete Carroll’s quarterbacks at USC, and that’s saying plenty. He has it all: big arm, accuracy, mobility. And his teammates love him. “The biggest goofball on the team,” says USC defensive tackle Fili Maola. The biggest star, too.

This is a reason to think this will be competitive and live up to the hype? The fact that one team has a Heisman caliber QB and the other has Todd Boeckman (more on him in a moment) is a good thing?

4. USC when it matters. These aren’t the games that sidetrack what is annually the nation’s most talented team. When healthy, USC owns these games. And this Trojans team hasn’t been this healthy in two years. It’s the Stanfords and Oregon States that give the Trojans fits — games in which USC is expected to roll, but they sleepwalk until it’s too late to turn it around.

Again, not really helping your initial point…that this would be a good game. USC “owning” these games might make one believe that they will easily cover the 11-point spread.

I feel like this last point should get a drum roll or something.

5. The Terrelle Pryor factor:

Yes, asking your true freshman QB to contribute heavily in a road game against maybe the best front seven in the country is a fucking brilliant idea.

No doubt, a healthy Chris Wells is important — and until he returns healthy, this Ohio State team is fourth-best in the Big Ten.

Okay, this is actually true, I think. Let’s move back to stupidity now.

But just as important is the emergence of Pryor, the nation’s No. 1 recruit from last year.

And to beat this point to death, you should really expect him to emerge three games into his freshman season, on the road, against a frightening assembly of defensive talent.

QB Todd Boeckman doesn’t scare teams — not with his arm (because OSU has no deep speed outside), and certainly not with his legs (he’s a statue in the pocket).

Pryor has played against a I-AA team and a MAC team and hasn’t accomplished much. I don’t think anyone is frightened of him either.

Pryor, on the other hand, can completely flummox USC’s speedy defense.

He could conceivably break off a decent run or two, but flummox? Wake the fuck up, Matt.

When fast defenses are forced to think and react to options (see: zone-read play), the tempo slows, and everyone on the offense immediately gets faster.

Seriously, the zone-read deducts two-tenths of a second from every offensive player’s 40 time. That’s why the spread has never, ever been stopped and why you should think that it can be run masterfully by a true freshman in his first road game against a very, very good team. Matt Hayes, you are epically wrong.