Bill Landis

But I also think that maybe there's a little more interchangeability between strong safety and star with McLean and little than probably there would have been with downs and styles last year.

I think so, yeah.

And I think he was a good safety blanket, I think, on the back end last year.

But at least I wonder, anyway, if the best version of him is not getting the play a little more downhill.

Yeah, I think whatever it was, there was like early, I think it was three runs that popped for Michigan that got out and Jalen McClain just like kind of ran all three to the sideline and they were long runs, but they weren't scores.

Right, like the chief sort of...

like, motivating factor, I think, for the defense as it pertains to, like, the back end last year was to make sure the teams weren't able to, like, isolate Caleb Downs and figure out what he was doing.

And Ohio State was really good with all the disguises and movement they did to make sure that that didn't happen.

And now I just... And that's, like, a core tenet of their safety play.

Like, they want that disguise.

That's not changing.

But now I think, like, the benefactor of that player-wise could be anybody, right?

rather than just sort of more often than not probably being Caleb Downs.

Yeah, I think you almost have to give it to him, right?

And it's not that being the deepest guy in the middle of the field is an unimportant job.

Watch a team score a couple 40-yard touchdowns, and then we'll figure out an important job.

But Jalen McLean is just the kind of guy that... Because when we're talking about... You move down closer to the line of scrimmage, you're going to be around the ball more.

You're going to have an opportunity to make more plays.

And he just seems like he is the guy who will maximize whichever position you put him in.

So why not put him a little down closer to the action?