Top five former Ohio State football players in the NFL

#1: Michael Thomas

The final and best former Ohio State football player in the NFL is Michael Thomas. He was the 47th overall pick in 2016 to the New Orleans Saints.

Thomas is another former Buckeye who suffered from a down season in 2020-2021. He posted career lows in touches, yards, yards per reception, and touchdowns.

This is very unlike Thomas who before this season did not have a year in which he had under 92 receptions and 1137 yards.

Although it was a slump of a season for Thomas, the year before was a record-setting season. In the 2019 season, Thomas posted 149 receptions for 1725 yards and 9 touchdowns.

This won him the 2019 Offensive Player of the Year award. Along with this, Thomas has been named to the Pro Bowl three times and an All-Pro twice.

There are two major reasons as to why Thomas had such a bad 2020 season and should be back to normal in 2021. The first is that he was fighting injuries the whole season. He only played in 7 games and started in 5.

Along with this, there was not much consistency or talent at the quarterback position. This season was Drew Brees’s final year in the NFL and he was one of the best to do it. However, father time caught up to him in 2020. He also was fighting through injuries himself. For some reason, when Brees was out, head coach Sean Payton decided to start Taysom Hill who is more of a combo player than a quarterback over Jameis Winston.

With Winston likely getting the starting job next season, Thomas will once again have a starting quarterback who can consistently get him the ball and put his name back into the conversation as best wide receiver in the league.