We have survived the long, monthly off-season podcast schedule we’ve set for ourselves and now we have to (get to) return to our weekly schedule starting with this show. And we’ve got a lot of ground to cover!

Our opening topic is the conclusion of the NCAA investigation into Michigan’s sign-stealing scandal, which ended with Jim Harbaugh becoming the all-time cheatingest coach in college football history, a big fine for Michigan, and absolutely no bowl ban for the school’s Failure to Monitor charge, no vacated wins, and no real teeth to prevent any school from doing it again as long as it’s willing to pay the monetary price and maybe sacrifice a staffer and a coach (who in this case had already left).

On the OSU football news front, 10 Buckeyes shed their black helmet stripes between the start of camp and our recording this episode. Notable names include Devin Sanchez, CJ Donaldson, Riley Pettijohn, Phillip Daniels, Beau Atkinson, Bo Jackson, and Nick McLarty. The 2025 captains are now known, and they are Sonny Styles, Caleb Downs, Austin Siereveld, and Brandon Inniss. Styles will also wear the Block O jersey in 2025.

We also touched on some news items about former Buckeyes in the NFL and two things that shouldn’t exist — preseason polls and the preseason player of the year — and how they relate to Ohio State.

Ross Bjork outlined his plan to get fans to cheer louder. We discuss many of them, and we’re not convinced they’ll do the trick. At wine-and-cheese-crowd ticket prices, it’s difficult to get six-pack-before-the-game fans in the seats to make said noise. Making the games affordable is much more important than courting ridicule with pregame Victory Bell ringing or getting everyone to wear the same color a couple times a year. But hey, that’s just us.

Finally, we dove into how we see the Big Ten shaping up with our annual predictions. We did it a little differently this year, giving you our predictions from 18-1 in groups. We were very close in most respects, but we were pretty far apart on Michigan. At the end of the regular season, it’ll be fun to check back to see how close we came to having the correct finishing order.

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0:21 - The NCAA has spoken loudly and clearly about how much it’ll cost to cheat to win a national championship, and beyond the pricetag, there are no real consequences. Also: there has been a lot of OSU news since our last show.

31:26 - Ross Bjork wants Ohio Stadium to rock, but his ideas seem a bit weird and don’t seem like they’ll do the trick.

45:26 - Our annual preseason Big Ten predictions, in which we don’t differentiate much in our opinions except when it comes to That Team Up North.