First, it was his furry friend and then it was his player rankings. ESPN’s College GameDay analyst Kirk Herbstreit knows how to be in the (negative) limelight. Ryan Day’s Ohio State Buckeyes have been looming with pride after crushing the Iowa Hawkeyes 35-7 on October 5. But poor Buckeyes! What are they going to do with the scores if it took Herbstreit just one ranking to snub all the Ohio players from his list But again making charts doesn’t come easy. Herbstreit is now bearing the blows as Buckeyes fans strip off the analyst. 

Time for Herbstreit to let CFB fans know about his preferences when it comes to players. Walking into Week 6, the College GameDay analyst sat with a pen and paper to chart out his list of favorites, the top performers.  On October 7, Herbstreit dropped a total of 8 names of players and titled it “MY TOP PERFORMING PLAYERS OF WEEK 6.” And it was enough to leave Day’s squad and Ohio State fans with ruffled feathers. 

Why wouldn’t it? Neither of the eight players belonged to the Buckeyes. To Herbstreit, Diego Pavia from Vanderbilt is eligible for the top spot, followed by Conner Weigman from Texas A&M, Boise State Running Back Ashton Jeanty, and Xavier Restrepo from Miami. The analyst dedicated the fifth spot to James Williams from Nebraska, and the sixth to Minnesota Golden Gophers safety Koi Perich. The Ole Miss defensive line grabbed the seventh spot and ended it with Richie Munoz from Weber State Wildcats at the eighth.   

And BOOM! Herbstreit can’t be forgiven anymore by the Buckeyes fandom. How could they? Day’s phenoms like WR Emeka Egbuka, and RB Quinshon Judkins among others are ranked among the top 30 prospects as per Bleacher Report’s NFL Draft prospect rankings. And here the ESPN analyst went away without giving them the due respect. With this, Herbstreit got bucked up by the Buckeyes fans.

Buckeyes fans defend their stars by calling out Kirk Herbstreit

Fan rage is something that the sportscaster is already aware of. A few days back Kirk Herbstreit got thrashed online for his dog Ben who interrupted during a live broadcast from the ESPN channel. Now Day’s fans try to give him a lesson for the light take. When the CFB world is going gaga over Ohio State WR for receiving the Big 10 honors after crushing Iowa, a fan was surprised not to find the elite talent on Herbstreit’s list, “Emeka Egbuka, THE Ohio State!”

“What about Emeka?” another concerned fan threw a question for the analyst for living out on Day’s player who gifted a hat trick against Iowa. Not just Egbuka, the freshman WR Jeremiah Smith who made a one-handed touchdown against Iowa did not find a place either. This made a fan frustrated and he came up with a sharp retort for Herbstreit, “Ever heard of Jeremiah Smith? Should look him up, smh.”

“Dudes allergic to picking anyone from Ohio state,” another fan tagged it as sheer ignorance on the analyst’s part. A Buckeyes loyalist couldn’t help but laugh confidently stating that Egbuka deserves the spot over Restrepo, “Emeka over Miami dude lol.” As long as Day’s squad is putting up points, Buckeye fans are all ears for stats, not chatter.  

Other than the player rankings and the reaction, if you would like to explore more about concepts like the NIL and NFL, you can check on the latest episode of the Think Tank podcast.