Buckeye Safeties Made Most Of Extra Work This Spring

Caleb Downs is the free space on the bingo card. The Ohio State coaches didn’t really need to worry about him much this spring. The Buckeyes’ junior All-American safety is a known quantity, so some of Ohio State’s spring practice was spent getting more work for all of the safeties who aren’t Caleb Downs.

The Buckeyes lost three starters from last year’s secondary and now must find a new starting cornerback, a new starting nickel back, and a new starting safety to play alongside the 2025 Thorpe Award favorite as the nation’s top defensive back.

Junior Malik Hartford and sophomore Jaylen McClain were the two players expected to compete for the open job at safety before spring ever began, and those expectations came to fruition.

Part of the plan this past spring was for the Buckeye safeties to get some snaps at both free safety and strong safety so that the coaches could get a fuller assessment of their possibilities. It also helped that Caleb Downs was allowed some respite this spring and spent much of his time at practice standing on the sidelines with new defensive coordinator Matt Patricia.

“I think it’s been really good with both those guys learning and competing and playing a couple of different roles, a couple of different spots,” Patricia said of Hartford and McClain this spring. “Caleb is out there for some things, and there’s other things that we’re holding him back on, so they’ve actually had an opportunity to both be out there quite a bit and really to be able to evaluate the different things that they can do skillset wise.”

Malik Hartford has played both deep safety spots in his time with the Buckeyes, while Jaylen McClain was primarily a strong safety last year as a true freshman. Caleb Downs, meanwhile, is comfortable doing both. The process moving forward into the summer and then fall camp is to go beyond an “either/or” proposition with Hartford or McClain and move into a “why not both” situation.

The spring helped get things headed in that direction.

“I think there’s some different packages that we can run with those guys on the field and different alignments that they could be in,” Patricia explained. “So it’s just a great evaluation of seeing some deep field play, some down in the box play, some maybe man-to-man coverage stuff with them. We’ve got some different things in like that intermediate zone where they’re kind of reading routes and breaking. And I would say both are really shining and showing their skill sets that we can utilize them in those situations.”

But it wasn’t just Malik Hartford and Jaylen McClain who took advantage of the extra reps. Redshirt freshman Leroy Roker spent the majority of the spring in the two deep. True freshman Faheem Delane found himself out there as well at times.

One of the other benefits of Caleb Downs being on the sideline is the simple fact that none of the safeties could look to him for help on the field. They had to fill the voids in both playmaking, direction, and leadership. And they all learned from it.

“I think there’s always opportunity when guys aren’t on the field,” Patricia said. “And certainly you want Caleb on the field. He’s really good and kind of helps settle the communication. He’s a great player. But look, when guys aren’t on the field, it’s an opportunity for someone else to go in and step into some different roles and have an opportunity to go make some plays and flash for the coaches and for their teammates. I think all of those guys have done that and have done it at different points. And now it’s just building on the consistency of that.”

Each of those players can now go back and review their mistakes, build on their experiences, and the next time they do it, it won’t be the first time. They learned, and in that process, the coaches learned more about them. So much of football is a guessing game, and the less guessing coaches have to do about players, the better for that team.

“Those other guys are now having those reps to be able to have enough built up to show that they can do it consistently and be in the right positions and make the communication and make the plays,” Patricia said. “So that’s been the best part about it for those guys, just having all of those reps. We only have so many games, so you have to get better at practice. It’s just what it is. It’s different than baseball where you play games to get better. Football, we’ve got to practice to get better. And I think having those guys to be able to have those reps has been invaluable.”

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