Poll: Are the Buckeyes the Los Angeles Dodgers of college football?

Anyone who has ever been in the same room as me knows there is one team I hate more than all the others. I know what you’re thinking—surely it must be the Michigan Wolverines.

My friends, I’m sorry to disappoint, but That Team Up North takes the second spot on my most-hated list because, with my whole chest, I cannot stand the Los Angeles Dodgers.

I think a lot of baseball fans probably have similar feelings about the New York Yankees. Part of it is that both teams have been historically good programs, and it can be hard to root for a predictable team. Part of it is the arrogance that comes with being historically good (and the rudeness that happens whenever something doesn’t go your way).

As a result of the disdain I feel for the Dodgers organization, coupled with the general eye roll that accompanies mention of the Yankees in most locales, I was grumbling about the upcoming World Series over the weekend. We could have had a Subway Series. We could have had a Guardians-Mets World Series between two teams overdue for a win. But no, we’ve somehow ended up with a championship series between the two most predictable teams in baseball.

I’m already bored, and they don’t throw the first pitch until Friday.

So imagine my surprise when I was doing my anti-Dodgers venting, and my (so-called) friend gave me one of the dirtiest reads ever:

“The way you feel about this World Series is how the rest of the country feels when Ohio State plays Alabama in a high-stakes game. The Buckeyes are the Dodgers of college football.”

Excuse me?

Some history: While the Dodgers had a bit of a dry spell (I won’t go so far as to call it a drought) in the ‘90s and early aughts, since relocating from Brooklyn to the City of Angels, they have played in 12 World Series and won half of them. Certainly, in recent memory, they’re always a contender, even in years they don’t make it all the way. You can never count them out of the running.

Similarly, the Buckeyes seem to always be in contention for the National Championship in a way that allegedly is getting old to non-Buckeye fans. Though there have been years where they’ve missed the CFB Playoffs (including last year), other than 2020, the last time the Buckeyes failed to qualify for a New Year’s Six Bowl was in 2012 when they were banned from playing altogether because of Tattoogate.

It’s also been a second since either team won a title (excluding the Dodgers’ 2020 World Series win because all of 2020 felt like a fever dream for everyone), but you wouldn’t think it based on how passionate these fans can be.

It’s hard to imagine a playoff pool that doesn’t include Ohio State at all — especially now that there are 12 teams. I mean, we lost our last game and still largely control our own destiny, so I can see how we feel like the boring option to fans of other strong-but-often-just-out-of-contention teams.

Now, I’m probably too biased to make this call accurately, but I would like to think that’s where we diverge from the Dodgers fan base. In my experience, Dodgers fans only show up when their team is good (by their standards, which are high because they’re not used to adversity). Yet I was in college in 2012, a no-stakes year for the Buckeyes because of the aforementioned Bowl ban, and still, every game was full of fans proudly wearing their Scarlet and Gray. You can’t exactly accuse us of being fair-weather fans, even though the weather is rarely less-than-fair.

I’d also like to think the Shoe is a fun place for away teams to play their games. There is a difference between heckling in good fun and downright rudeness and disrespect.

To be honest, I expected rudeness in Ann Arbor because of the rivalry, but even there, I was met with jokes that were all in good fun. A little lighthearted trash talk between fans is part of what makes sports fun, so long as you know where the line is, and I’d like to think Buckeye fans know the line. I’m not naive enough to think there aren’t a few bad apples who have done stupid things to ruin other fans’ days, but for the most part, I’d like to think we want people to come to the Shoe!

The only time in my life I’ve ever felt unwelcome at a sporting event was a Dodgers game—and I have attended The Game in Ann Arbor before.

Still, I’m curious to hear from other fans—do you think my friend had a point? Are we really the Dodgers of college football? And if so, does having an expanded playoff pool change that or open the door for even more predictability and eye-rolling when we inevitably make the cut year after year?