Ohio State Football: Ryan Day gets another extension

The Ohio State football team has been recruiting at a high level under Ryan Day. The Buckeyes have had some really good prospects come into the program since Day took over. Day also led the Buckeyes to the National Championship Game in 2020.

Day had already signed an extension through 2026, but Gene Smith decided to give him another one. Day signed a two-year extension through 2028. The extension gives him total compensation of $9.5 million a year once it kicks in, which is almost a $2 million raise.

The timing of this extension is…interesting. Day is coming off a season in which he led the Ohio State football team to a two-loss season and lost to TTUN for the first time since 2011. That doesn’t exactly scream “extend me!”, but that’s what’s happened.

Smith decided to extend both the football and the basketball coach despite both coming off disappointing seasons. I’m not saying Day doesn’t deserve it, but they didn’t have to do this right away. He could have waited and seen what Day did in the next couple of years before making a decision on his future.

Day has shown great leadership of the program and has made the program feel more like a family, which is really great. Players clearly like him and love playing for him. I think Day is a really good coach and will be better this year than he was last year.

My problem with the extension is that Smith just could have waited. He didn’t have to give him more years on his contract coming off his worst season as a head coach. The timing is just weird, which is my main issue with it.

Only time will tell if this ends up being a good move or not. I think it will be in the long run.