Ohio State Football: Chase Young will be NFL’s best Buckeye DE

Chase Young is the most recent in a trend of elite pass rushers that have come from Ohio State football. He’ll also be the best of the bunch.

It’s almost become a tradition to have an elite defensive end from Ohio State in the NFL Draft. In 2016, it was Joey Bosa that went third overall to the (then) San Diego Chargers. In 2019, his younger brother Nick went second overall to the San Francisco 49ers.

This year, it was Chase Young.

Going second overall to the Washington Redskins, Young was the best player in this draft. In three years at Ohio State, he racked up 30.5 sacks, 40.5 tackles for loss, 9 forced fumbles (7 alone in 2019), and 68 solo tackles.

In 2019, he was the Big Ten defensive player of the year, won the Bronko Nagurski and Chuck Bednarik Awards, and was a consensus All-American. He’s already the favorite to win the NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Award as well.

That’s not what sets him apart from his fellow Buckeye pass rushers, though. Instead, it’s his freak athleticism.

When it comes to pass rushing skill and technique, it’s splitting hairs to compare Young and the Bosa brothers. They all possess a diverse set of pass rush moves in their arsenal, they all hand-fight with the best of them, and they all have high motors.

Their games are similar, but Chase Young is just, to put it plainly, a freak. As Joel Klatt, who’s called countless Buckeye games on Fox in recent years, said about him, Young is a “better version” of Nick Bosa. That’s high praise.

ESPN’s Todd McShay feels the same way, calling Young an “even better prospect”.

Why is he a better prospect? For Klatt, it comes down to length. He said, “Bosa is explosive but he’s shorter. Chase has better length. He’s a little better versus the run because of that length. He is the type of guy that I think can be an all pro multiple times in his career”.

The scary thing about Young is, according to him, he’s not done growing.

Young is already one of the scariest athletes we’ve ever seen, and at 21, he’s probably onto something. It’s not unrealistic to suggest Young still has some growing to do.

Comparing three of the best pass rushing prospects we’ve ever seen is not an easy task, but when you do so with these three former Buckeyes, it’s clear that no one’s ceiling is higher than Young’s.