Ohio State Football: Backup quarterback could be a surprise

As the Ohio State football team prepares for its 2020 season, the backup quarterback could be someone nobody is thinking of.

This has been a whirlwind of an offseason for the Ohio State football team and head coach Ryan Day. As the team prepares for summer camp, an unlikely quarterback is ready to emerge as the No. 2 in case Justin Fields goes down.

Senior transfer quarterback Gunnar Hoak is in prime position to take the job. With no real offseason for highly ranked incoming freshmen CJ Stroud and Jack Miller to learn, develop and earn the second team role, Hoak is in the best position to have the job.

With this being Hoak’s second season in the program and a decent amount of college football playing experience both last season at Ohio State and in years past at Kentucky, Hoak is ready to take the back-up job to Fields.

Here is what Ryan Day recently said about the situation, via Lettermen Row:

"“I think for the situation that we have, it’s unbelievable because you have Justin and you have Gunnar,” Ohio State coach Ryan Day said. “But other than that, there’s nobody in the program other than some of the other walk-ons who are still developing, and we hope [Stroud and Miller] become candidates to win a backup job or whatever."

That sounds like a coach who is ready to lean upon Hoak’s experience and knowledge of the system for next season if needed to be called upon, much like how Chris Chugunov was in that role last season.

Now, this does not mean that we shouldn’t see the young quarterbacks play in mop-up duty of games. They need the experience for the 2021 season, this just means that if Fields goes down in a close game, look for No. 12 to be the guy running into the huddle.

Let’s just hope it does not get to that point. But if it does, Hoak will have to be ready.