Ryan Day Hit With Blunt Jeremiah Smith Warning Over One Major Playoff Concern: “It’s Going to Be Too Late”

Ohio State keeps winning, Jeremiah Smith keeps breaking records, and on the surface, everything looks great in Columbus. But not everyone watching is buying the hype, as the depth behind Smith is something that has been nagging both Ryan Day and analysts since the beginning of the season. After the Buckeyes’ 31-14 win at Iowa, one college football analyst pointed to the offense’s dependency on Smith as something that could be a hurdle to Ohio State’s playoff hopes.

Tom Fornelli of the Cover 3 podcast raised the concern, and it has little to do with Smith’s talent. His question is whether Ohio State’s other receivers and the offense as a whole are developing if the Buckeyes continue leaning so heavily on Smith in October. If that dependency carries into the postseason, Fornelli believes it could become a problem when Ohio State needs more than one reliable option.

“Ohio State is just dropping back and throwing the ball to Jeremiah Smith repeatedly,” Fornelli said on the Cover 3 podcast. “There’s no reason for them not to do it. It continues to work. But they’re going to keep doing it until somebody stops them. It’s just I worry about when somebody stops him if it’s going to be too late.”

Fornelli is convinced that at some point, Ohio State is going to run into a team that can slow Smith down, and when that happens, he is not sure the Buckeyes will know how to win without leaning on him. Among the likely playoff contenders, Notre Dame’s Leonard Moore and Georgia’s Ellis Robinson stand out as two of the few corners with that ability to make things difficult for him. But there is no obvious shutdown option other than them to take him out of a game completely.

The clock is ticking on Ohio State's playoff window, and one critical issue could derail their championship hopes. Subscribe to stay ahead of the latest developments in college football's highest stakes.

When playoff teams face a one-man show, they do not just cover him; they build their entire scheme to erase him. Top defensive coordinators will bracket Smith with safety help on every down, taking away Julian Sayin’s easy throw.

If Sayin hasn’t spent all fall trusting his second and third reads under pressure, his internal clock breaks down in big games. You cannot suddenly teach a young quarterback new progression habits in January when defensive lines are coming at him hot.

During the Illinois game, defenders tried single coverage on Smith, and he torched them for over 200 yards. Iowa came with a different plan, doubling and tripling Smith at times and using every coverage to limit his impact. But he finished with 11 catches, 206 yards, and two touchdowns.

There is still room for optimism, with Ryan Day and Arthur Smith working on other weapons behind Smith. But the timeline doesn’t allow for such luxury during the middle of the season, especially with quarterback Julian Sayin being fixated on targeting Smith.

When fellow analyst Bud Elliot said, “I do think they still have a lot of time to keep developing better guys, though,” Fornelli replied, “You can’t develop a guy if Julian Sayin never looks to him. That’s the other thing. I feel like Julian Sayin is dropping back, and it’s Jeremiah, Jeremiah, Jeremiah are his first three reads. I think Arthur Smith is spamming him.”

Arthur Smith needs to find ways to make Ohio State’s offense less dependent on Jeremiah Smith, giving Devin McCuin, Brandon Inniss and Chris Henry Jr. a bigger role before the postseason arrives. Though the staff insisted on building ways to diversify targets, the numbers of five weeks are still lopsided.

“I think they’re designing ways to get him the ball, like his numbers continue to be awesome on a per-target basis,” Bud Elliot said. “I mean, 15 targets, 206 like that somebody might take that away. You could say Texas took that away in the second half, but like Sayin also missed him a couple times in the second half. He could miss anybody else who was open as well. Texas did a nice job.”

That Texas game is the one data point that analysts have circled back to. In the second half against the Longhorns, Smith caught nothing while the rest of Ohio State’s receivers combined for two catches total. The Buckeyes blew a 20-point lead in a 24-23 loss.

It is the clearest sign that when Smith is taken out of the game, Ohio State doesn’t have a reliable backup plan. That’s a concern the Buckeyes could face against Georgia and Notre Dame. The answer to these concerns lies in whether Sayin and Arthur Smith start spreading the ball before the brutal stretch. Ohio State has the luxury of time right now, with manageable matchups against Maryland before they face Indiana.

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