HATER’S GUIDE: THEEEEEEEEEEE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

Look, I’m not here to convince you that Indiana is going to beat Ohio State on Saturday. As great as this would be, it hasn’t happened in 28 years, and in case you haven’t heard it from one of Ohio’s millions of former residents, this Buckeye team is pretty dang good.

So instead, we have to turn to our natural instinct in this situation.

HATER’S GUIDE BACK.

Let’s start with you, Mr. or Mrs. Ohio State Superfan. You are truly unique and one-of-a-kind, aren’t you? Seriously though, y’all are everywhere - if you go to Antarctica and yell out “O-H!” the odds are really good that someone else will respond with an “I-O!”

It’s never hard to find an Ohio State fan, because most of them haven’t stepped foot in Ohio for many years. But even though OSU fans have infiltrated the rest of the universe because of their desire to get out of Ohio (despite defending the state when anyone dares to question its greatness), they all have found their way back together through The Internet. And Ohio State fans love to get mad online, even when their team is probably the best one in the country.

Now, there’s a quick distinction I want to make between Michigan fans and OSU fans. Michigan fans like to fancy themselves as the college football brainiacs, who will #wellactually you to death every time you happen to incorrectly tweet something that happened, whether it was about Michigan or even about your own team.

Ohio State fans, on the other hand, would like you to remember Ohio State’s greatness AT ALL TIMES. Here is an innocuous tweet from Pro Football Focus about the IU offensive line:

And here is one of the replies:

I mean look at that - despite the original tweet not having any relation to OSU, this brave tweeter would like to remind you that Ohio State is very good. And to top it off, he also tags the name of three OSU D-lineman as well as their position coach, just so the reader will know who the Hoosiers will be up against. Thank you, concerned citizen of the Ohio State football fanclub - I really wasn’t worried about Ohio State but you know what? NOW I AM.

And hey, check this one out. In the postgame venting thread on The Only Colors last weekend, the bummed-out Michigan State fans had a visitor!

Folks, the real winner of the Old Brass Spittoon? That’s right - the BUCKEYES BABY!!!!, according to that fellow. We should just bring the pot with us this weekend and leave it there for OSU to enjoy, as they are clearly the ones who deserve it the most.

Speaking of Michigan State, do you remember that time when Ohio State lost at home to a quarterback who couldn’t beat Indiana last weekend? Yeah, that owned. Well after it happened, Buckeyes fans were so upset that they didn’t make the College Football Playoff that they penned a now-deleted Open Letter to the CFP Committee. As you can see by the replies, it went over very well.

And does it surprise you that OSU fans are well-skilled at tweeting at recruits? Yeah, I didn’t think so.

But if Ohio State fans on the internet are bad, don’t forget about what happens when they all converge in the same place - particularly at a football game. Fans will all be wearing some shirt from some warm-weather bowl game, such as the 2009 Fiesta Bowl. Then, while the game is going on, they will explain to whoever is around them how much better their Buckeyes are than the opponents, and go so far as to loudly call out what the opponent will do on their next play, and keep doing so even if they’re wrong 95% of the time. Look, if I’m voluntarily going to an OSU game, I’d prefer to watch your team kick butt without you wrongly explaining to me why it’s happening.

As you can see, Ohio State fans are fun and rational people. Just like their coaches! Woody Hayes is a legend in Columbus. He won five national titles and after a long successful career in Columbus it ended very peacefully when-

Oh. Nevermind. Yep, that’s your legendary beloved coach punching a student-athlete right there. Great molder of men right there, huh? If Woody Hayes were alive today he’d be standing next to Bob Knight (an OSU alum of course) at a Trump rally.

After two coaches who were roundly disliked in Columbus because they only won about 80% of their games, Jim Tressel took over in 2001. Two years later, he “won” a national title thanks to a flag in the end zone that was thrown roughly 30 seconds after the play actually ended. Tressel played conservative, defense-minded football that produced several 13-9 final scores. Throughout his time as coach, Ohio State fans defended this method as the right way to win games. Tressel exemplified such great morality and behavior during his entire tenure that it led him to his current job as president of Youngstown State.

After Tressel was forced out, did a 7-6 season in 2011 humble Buckeyes fans at all? Of course not, because it was the worst-kept secret in college football that Urban Meyer would be coming to Columbus the next season. Meyer employs an up-tempo spread offense that often has a dual-threat QB. Now that Meyer is in charge, Ohio State fans have come to defend his method as the right way to win games. Once he started coaching, we had to wait 25 games for OSU to lose again. Oh but when they did, sad pizza was consumed. LOTS of sad pizza.

With all the football talk, it may surprise you that OSU has other sports as well. Like basketball! Know who I still can’t stand? This guy:

Aaron Craft played the game the “right way,” according to many OSU fans and Indianapolis radio hosts, and he always had plenty of puff pieces written about what a good guy he was. Nah. We all know better. Even Aaron Craft probably didn’t believe the BS that he peddled for four obnoxious seasons. He couldn’t shoot, thought he could defend, and was a thorn in the side of those IU teams right when Victor Oladipo was coming into his own.

In conclusion, OSU fans are obnoxious online and offline, Woody Hayes punched a kid, Hang On Sloopy is overrated and makes no sense, and Aaron Craft is the most hated Big Ten player of the past 25 years.

They might win by 40 on Saturday, but at least one Hoosier will be happy: