For The Sake Of The Ohio State Offense, The Quarterback Competition Must End

It’s time to throw in the towel on Ohio State’s quarterback competition.

For the sake of the offense, Buckeye head coach Ryan Day needs to pull the plug on the plug-and-play.

Quarterbacks Kyle McCord and Devin Brown competed in the spring and then throughout fall camp. McCord has started the first two games this year and played the bulk of both of them, but has shared first-team reps in practice.

The time for sharing is over.

McCord has been given more snaps than Brown in these first two games, and has done more with his opportunities. McCord has completed 34-of-53 passes (64.2%) for 497 yards with three touchdowns and an interception. Brown, meanwhile, has thrown just 16 passes, completing eight of them for 99 yards with no touchdowns or interceptions.

McCord has led the Buckeyes to scores on eight of his 14 drives, compared to Brown leading OSU on two scoring drives in four attempts — not counting the final drive of the Indiana game where Day finally let him throw the ball in the final minute of the game.

It would be difficult for an objective observer to have watched these first two games and come away saying anything other than McCord has a leg up on Brown.

Some may say that Brown hasn’t been given a fair shake over the first two games, but that argument is no longer relevant at this point because the offense needs to get going. And pulling one quarterback out of the game when things are going well is not how momentum gets built.

Ryan Day knew this day would come. He wanted there to be a wider gap before moving on from one of the quarterbacks. On Saturday, the gap looked like it was there. And even if it wasn’t, the clock has struck midnight.

The Buckeyes opened the season with wins over Indiana and Youngstown State. Western Kentucky comes to Columbus this week, but Notre Dame is two weeks away. The offense needs to be better than it has been in these first two games, and it’s not going to get any better by shuffling the quarterbacks.

Day essentially admitted as much after the 35-7 win over Youngstown State on Saturday when asked if there was a sense of urgency now on settling in one quarterback.

“I think that’s worth considering, yeah,” he said. “I think that’s something that we’ve got to talk about as a staff.”

When no quarterback won the job in fall camp, these first two games were always going to be the final battle ground. But the battle can’t continue forever, and at this point, the scoring needs to go to the judges.

The Ohio State offense is struggling to run the ball consistently. There are short-yardage issues once again. The offensive line isn’t where it needs to be yet.

With all of these questions searching for answers, there’s no need to also have a question mark at quarterback. Especially with so many exclamation points at receiver.

The passing game could be the one known quantity for the Buckeyes, but it must be given a chance.

No quarterback can be as sharp as they need to be by sharing first-team reps in practice and then also sharing possessions in a game. And that includes Devin Brown, who would likely be more than fine if he was given all 10 of OSU’s drives in each of the past two games.

And that’s kind of the point.

The more a quarterback plays, the better he will get.

It’s not easy to wait until the second quarter to try to make a mark. But it’s also not easy to be the starting quarterback and play for a full quarter, then sit for half of the next quarter. At this point, Ryan Day needs to start making life easier on his quarterbacks, not harder. And he undoubtedly recognizes that.

Coaches hate having quarterback competitions that linger into the season because there’s no perfect way to handle it. They can only try not making the worst of a difficult situation. There is no making the best of it.

Ryan Day has said throughout this quarterback competition that they can never lose sight of doing what is best for the team.

Now’s the time to prove it.

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