Ohio State Football: Buckeyes need a healthy Justin Fields in the CFP

The Ohio State football team defeated the Wisconsin Badgers  34-21 in the Big Ten Championship Game last night. Quarterback Justin Fields health will remain a concern heading into the playoffs.

Justin Fields health will be a main topic of concern for the Ohio State football team moving forward. He didn’t quite seem right in the Buckeyes come from behind victory last night in Indianapolis.

Especially in the first half, Fields was inaccurate on a lot of passes and seemed to be indecisive at times sitting in the pocket. Credit Wisconsin’s pass rush for some of that. With five sacks on the night, the Badger front seven was very effective in disturbing Fields’ ability to get the ball down the field.

But Justin Fields sprained MCL injury was bothering him last night. Even though Fields denied that being the cause of his performance in the first half. He attributed it to being “too calm” and “something was wrong mentally”, as reported by ESPN.

But I’m not buying it and neither is Urban Meyer, via 247 sports:

"“He’s been pressured all day, given up three sacks. But that’s only half the story,” former Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, now a college football analyst for FOX, said during the halftime show. “He’s running all over the place. He’s not setting his feet, and then when he does he’s launching the ball high. That means something’s off right now with Justin Fields. The guy that makes the offense go all year, Justin Fields, he’s not right.”"

Urban Meyer is not known for spewing nonsense out of his mouth. If he went out and said that on national television than I’m going to go ahead and believe it to be true.

The bottom line here is that Ohio State can get away with a lack luster half of football against the Wisconsin’s of the world. We all saw the second half onslaught that ensued. This team is way to talented to be kept down for an entire game. But one half or even one-quarter of bad football may very well be the difference in victory or defeat against the likes of Clemson or LSU.

Justin Fields deserves a ton of credit for his overall performance though. Gutting out his knee injury, he still finished 19-31, 299 yards and three touchdown passes. Pretty darn good numbers. Good enough in fact to be the Big Ten Championship game MVP.

But if the Buckeyes want to lift up that National Championship trophy in January then Justin Fields is going to need to heel up. Lucky enough for Ohio State, there’s plenty of time between now and the next game for that to occur.