Ohio St DC Kerry Coombs role with team changed
Ohio State football demoted defensive coordinator Kerry Coombs, giving play calling duties to Matt Barnes
Matt Barnes is the secondary coach.
--2019 hired from Maryland by Ryan Day as assistant secondary coach and special teams coordinator
--2020 given the title of safeties coach and special teams coordinator
--2021 named the secondary coach
It seems, just from watching Ohio St's defense, their biggest problem on defense is the secondary coverage. Ryan Day must see something different. We will see how things work out as the Ryan Day experiment continues to unfold.
Video of three Cleveland.com reporters, after the game last night, talking about the Kerry Coombs move. One of them's pretty animated about it: "This is a huge frickin deal!"
September 19th, 2021 at 3:20 PM ^
Still gave up 500+ yards
September 19th, 2021 at 3:50 PM ^
...to a team that could only put up 17 points on UC Davis.
September 19th, 2021 at 3:21 PM ^
Seems like a thin résumé for an OSU DC. Probably just a stopgap solution for the rest of this season.
September 19th, 2021 at 3:53 PM ^
Agree with this comment about thin experience for the DC position. Perhaps it is recognition that what they are doing is not working, and they need change on Defense. Interesting with Coach Mattison retired, they don't have him to fall back on. Will be interesting to see how this develops into November.
September 19th, 2021 at 9:09 PM ^
He did this to us once and we let him back in, then he does it again. Fuck him!!!!!
September 19th, 2021 at 8:31 PM ^
It might be a stopgap solution, but I'm not sure they can really fire Coombs without getting a bunch of decommitments and being impacted on the recruiting front. This is already prime negative recruiting material
September 19th, 2021 at 3:22 PM ^
Poor Ohio, they have it so tough
September 19th, 2021 at 3:54 PM ^
Keeping them in my thoughts and prayers
September 19th, 2021 at 3:55 PM ^
(For the Church of Satan)
September 19th, 2021 at 4:24 PM ^
Bless their hearts.
September 19th, 2021 at 4:58 PM ^
This seems like a panic move. Moves like this rarely work. I hope they continue to look like shit on defense, drop another game soon just to sit and watch. Ryan Day hasn’t faced the kind of pressure he’s going to face this year.
September 19th, 2021 at 7:57 PM ^
Ryan Day has never faced any real adversity as a head coach before and Urban was on campus to help him if he did. The training wheels are off and it's time to see if taking a chance on a first time HC was a good idea.
September 19th, 2021 at 8:01 PM ^
He did a good job keeping Urban;s team going. Now we get to see what he does with his own team.
September 21st, 2021 at 5:02 PM ^
Still gonna be Urban's team for a bit...
September 19th, 2021 at 5:17 PM ^
*cotton-picking hearts
September 20th, 2021 at 2:18 PM ^
Always fun to watch the ripples of panic in the OSU fanbase. They're so transparently obsessive and insane. They can beat the Titanic on a race to the bottom.
September 19th, 2021 at 6:00 PM ^
Imprecatory prayers (look it up)
September 19th, 2021 at 6:23 PM ^
+1 for big words I've never heard
September 21st, 2021 at 5:12 PM ^
Hopefully it gets even tougher for them on 11/27 in Ann Arbor. With them already reeling like this and UM surging, there's never been a more likely year for Michigan to get off the schneid against the buckeyes.
September 19th, 2021 at 3:24 PM ^
I cannot remember a coach ever being demoted mid-season... Is that a thing?
September 19th, 2021 at 4:13 PM ^
Certainly seems odd. You can't significantly change schemes around now. It's mostly play calling and maybe some minor tweaks.
September 19th, 2021 at 5:00 PM ^
After three games in a row of looking like absolute dog shit, it was time. It was never going to work. Coombs is an A+ recruiter and a good CB coach, but just not a college DC.
September 19th, 2021 at 7:53 PM ^
Letting him go may have been a better way to handle it. But really, defensive problems started when Urban Meyer was still with the team. There were the Oklahoma and Iowa games in 2017, and Purdue and Maryland games in 2018.
September 19th, 2021 at 6:01 PM ^
Was he actually demoted? Or did they just remove play calling duties?
Coaches have lost play-calling duties mid-season before. Idk about any being demoted.
September 19th, 2021 at 7:12 PM ^
Well, like the guy said in the video:
If you're the coordinator and you're not coordinating anything, you're not the coordinator.
It was absolutely a demotion. No other way to spin it. He is, by default, back to a position coach.
September 19th, 2021 at 8:03 PM ^
Coordinating can be different from play calling though. It’s a more organizational role. Designing the scheme and gameplan. Then someone else actually calls the plays. That’s generally how co-coordinators work.
September 19th, 2021 at 9:49 PM ^
Sure and what we don't know yet is his actual role going forward but even if it's in a co-coordinator type role that's a demotion.
He was the sole DC. He came back to CFB to be a DC. To then be assigned - at best - a co-DC position is a demotion.
Your point is totally valid and true but in any case here he was demoted. I don't think it'll change or mean much for the worse for OSU. The defense will likely improve as they go under either guy having either role. I don't think this is the major problem some think but it is a demotion for Coombs. No other way to spin that.
September 20th, 2021 at 5:33 AM ^
You can be the sole coordinator and not call plays though. There’s nothing inherent about being a coordinator and calling plays, though most do. Quite a few head coaches call plays on one side of the ball yet have a coordinator on that side still. Hell, Michigan had Drevno as OC but Harbaugh and Jedd Fisch/Pep Hamilton had playcalling duties the first few years. Jedd/Pep had passing game coordinator titles but never Co-OC roles.
September 19th, 2021 at 6:08 PM ^
I remember Wisconsin changing the o line coach after they came out of the gate playing bad.
https://badgerherald.com/sports/2012/09/09/bielema-fires-markus/
Michigan did the same with special teams coach under Carr after a horrendous showing.
I remember Texas doing the same with Manny Diaz and replaced him with Gerg. If only OSU would make that move.
https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2013/9/8/4706960/manny-diaz-texas-defensive-coordinator-fired
Coombs is a jackass regardless of pay if he does not move on after the season.
September 19th, 2021 at 6:19 PM ^
Oh GOD I remember that ST debacle - out at Oregon? They tried to spread punt I think - back when it was juuuuust starting to be a thing. and I think Oregon had like 3 dudes block the same punt. LIke a complete clusterfuck.
I thought it happened like one game before/after too - and then they pulled the ST coach and he was eventually removed from the staff bio pages and I thought had some kind of mental breakdown, but IDK. About as strange as the Shoop saga a year ago.
September 19th, 2021 at 6:53 PM ^
Jim Boccher. We had a loaded team that year on both sides of the ball, Steve Breaston returning kicks and Garrett Rivas placekicking - the one real question mark we had was the punt team. It was so bad that it pretty much cost us both the Oregon and Iowa games. After the Iowa game Boccher was quietly gone from the staff. We then figured out how to punt and cover and didn’t lose again in the regular season.
September 19th, 2021 at 7:48 PM ^
YES! Iowa and Oregon - this was the 1st team that we had since 97 that really had quality and experience on both sides of the ball and what KILLS us? FUCKING special teams can't fucking get a punt off and we lose 2 games we should never have lost.
unfucking believable. That and the 1st half of the MInn game where we came back up at the old HHH dome really made me questions if LC should be canned.
September 19th, 2021 at 9:17 PM ^
Yeah, falling behind big at the Metrodome made me think “Wow, Lloyd’s lost the team. I can't believe it.” But then the team miraculously came back to win and was an absolute machine the rest of the regular season. I was at the Northwestern game in Evanston (last game before OSU) watching us demolish the Cats and everyone knew we were going to do the same to the Bucks - and we did.
In the end it was a good year overall, but it definitely could have been 12-0.
September 19th, 2021 at 11:04 PM ^
For the last time, it was NOT the special teams' coach's fault...THE FIELD WAS CROWNED!!!
September 19th, 2021 at 3:24 PM ^
Whoa, I'd never seen what Kerry Coombs looks like. Looks like a cross between Bill Murray and Christopher Lloyd.
September 19th, 2021 at 4:03 PM ^
Ironic that he doesn't need combs.
September 19th, 2021 at 4:34 PM ^
Laughed real hard at this. Well done
September 19th, 2021 at 4:32 PM ^
That's pretty much what I look like these days if you subtract about half an inch of hair and change the hideous outfit to something more pleasing.
Does anyone else see several years of hard living in that picture?
September 19th, 2021 at 6:59 PM ^
Looks like an older Jimmy Clausen.
September 19th, 2021 at 7:08 PM ^
that dude's an ace recruiter?
September 19th, 2021 at 8:13 PM ^
Maybe he threatens your family if you don't sign.
September 20th, 2021 at 12:00 PM ^
Red Bull flows through his veins. Dude goes full go 100% of the time.
September 20th, 2021 at 10:15 AM ^
Wow, I’d always assumed he was black
September 20th, 2021 at 10:23 AM ^
ditto. was not expecting a white ex-marine looking curmudgeon.
he could play the villain in avatar.
September 19th, 2021 at 3:26 PM ^
This seems pretty panicky from Day, in my opinion. Not to say they don’t have reasons to be concerned about the D, but it seems like inexperience is as much to do with their issues than who’s calling plays, and changing things up mid-course is more likely to make things worse for that inexperience.
They always seem to have a horseshoe up their ass, though
September 19th, 2021 at 3:29 PM ^
This is a bit way too trigger happy if you ask me. Not the sign of a coach I'd want to support. Toxic.
September 19th, 2021 at 5:07 PM ^
"A bit way too," is a formulation I've never encountered before. Advancing new horizons in English, that's the Michigan difference!
I agree with the overall point though.
September 19th, 2021 at 3:30 PM ^
Day had to do something. Really thought he would have moved on from Coombs after their game against Alabama. Absolutely wild seeing a Heisman winning WR running unmarked or being covered man-to-man by a LB mutliple times.