Ohio State has been a fixture in terms of programs that repeatedly put players into the NFL. You would have to go back to the 2013 draft class to find the last time that Ohio State put fewer than five players into the league by way of the draft.
In fact, Ohio State has put double-digit players in the draft through the past two classes, 16 into the first round over the past six classes and 55 total players over that same period.
It should come as no surprise that Ohio State has recruited well through the years, but that doesn’t always equate, sometimes highly-rated collegiate players don’t translate well to the NFL game and conversely, sometimes there are players who may have been lowly rated coming out of high school for one reason or another who flourish at the next level when football becomes a full-time job.
It got us to thinking about how the past dozen or so classes breakdown in terms of how the rankings numbers translate to the NFL for Ohio State. We will look at a list of questions and breakdown who we got right, who we may have missed on and a whole lot more. For the sake of this exercise, we are only going to talk about players who ended their career with the Buckeyes, so players like Joe Burrow, who signed out of high school with Ohio State, will not be counted but players like Justin Fields and Trey Sermon will count.
Four players from this class are still playing, a fifth would still be playing if not for a freak injury and oddly enough, the highest-rated recruit of the six-man class is the one who had the least successful NFL career. Just how things work out sometimes.
Ohio State gets back into the first-round column with a pair of players going in the top-31 picks with Ryan Shazier going No. 15 to Pittsburgh and Bradley Roby going No. 31 to Denver. Running back Carlos Hyde would come off the board in the second round while Jack Mewhort would come off two picks later at No. 59 to Indianapolis. Corey Linsley would have to wait until the 5th round to go to Green Bay and then Christian Bryant would go towards the end of the draft to the (then) St. Louis Rams, at No. 241 overall.
2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 |
Total Number of drafted players: 6
Average star rating of drafted players: 3.8
Highest rated player to be drafted: Christian Bryant
Lowest rated player to be drafted: Bradley Roby
Biggest surprise: How meaningful this class is to this day
Let’s get right to it and talk about Shazier, while he was not the highest rated recruit in the class, he certainly had an impactful career over four seasons with 41 games started, 299 tackles, seven sacks, seven picks and seven forced fumbles. He as a two-time Pro Bowler and then it all came to an abrupt end during a Monday Night game against Cincinnati when a tackle went horribly wrong and Shazier could not move his legs. There were concerns that Shazier would not walk again, but he proved that wrong as he took the stage at the NFL Draft a little more than four months later and walked with assistance and then would be able to jog just six months later. Shazier’s NFL career is over, but he has proven to be an inspiration to so many people, Steelers fans and non-Steelers fans alike.
Roby is on his second team after being drafted by the Broncos and being moved to the Houston Texans. Roby was the only three-star of the class to get drafted and now has an eight-year career to show for it and has played in 99 games with 301 tackles, 10 interceptions and three touchdowns.
Hyde started his career with San Francisco and played four teams there, rushing for 655 yards and 21 touchdowns. He has played for four other teams and has 15 touchdowns, including four for Seattle last season. With the career of an NFL running back getting shorter and shorter, Hyde is bucking the odds and continues to make an impact.
Offensive lineman, especially non-tackles, often seem to get overlooked and Linsley went in the 5th round but has made the most of it, having a strong career in Green Bay and now is on the move to the LA Chargers where he signed a five-year deal for 62.5-million, making him the highest paid center in the league.
Bryant was drafted late and never really found much success in the league, he has played for four NFL teams, but has not been able to find much time on active rosters with only five career tackles. He had two runs with Arizona along the way. He did have a deal with Birmingham of the Alliance of American Football but that league suspended operations, ending Bryant’s run with that league and team.
