The year of 2023 didn’t end the way anyone with a scarlet and gray wardrobe wanted. Ohio State lost its third-straight game to Michigan which kept the Buckeyes out of the Big Ten Championship game for the same length of time. In 2021 and 2023, it also kept OSU out of the College Football Playoff.
However, one thing that has become apparent is that the current crop of veteran junior players on the team feel like they might have some unfinished business. We are hearing and seeing more and more examples and hints at a significant crop of those players looking to come back in 2024.
One of those players appear to be OSU defensive end, Jack Sawyer. He didn’t have eye-popping numbers in 2023, but he was highly active and productive with his hand in the ground as a more natural edge rusher than what he was being asked to do before standing up in the “jack” position.
To be fair, he’s not quite lived up to that five-star hype he had when he committed to the Buckeyes, but the talent and hunger is still there. So much so that Sawyer told the media on Tuesday that he’s leaning on coming back for his senior season and will also be playing in the Cotton Bowl on Friday night.
When asked about 2024 and whether he’ll be playing against Akron in the season opener, Sawyer let everyone know what he was thinking.
“I don’t know, we’ll see,” Sawyer said. “More than likely — yeah. Probably.”
Jack Sawyer said he is “more than likely” to return to Ohio State for his senior season, the latest sign upcoming NFL draft decisions could tilt in their favor: https://t.co/tB8qv5eZQg
— Joey Kaufman (@joeyrkaufman) December 27, 2023
Usually guys that have NFL decisions to make are pretty coy and unassuming about the questions lobbed at them, so it was a bit surprising to hear Sawyer go a little further than the boiler plate responses we’ve become accustomed too.
He’s not the only guy that we’ll be yearning to hear from from the highly ranked 2021 recruiting class after either Missouri or Ohio State are presented with a trophy, but it’s beginning to sound more and more like Sawyer and some of his classmates from the No. 2 ranked class from that cycle might be running it back one more time.
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