Ohio State Buckeyes: Starting offensive line coming into focus?

“I think we’re still 17 days away from the game,” he said Tuesday, “so you get through a scrimmage Saturday, it’s starting to shake itself out.”

Frye went into the offseason with one of the most important and possibly most complicated tasks of any OSU coach.

While head coach Ryan Day and quarterbacks coach Corey Dennis have to find a new starter, they only have two choices.

Defensive coordinator Jim Knowles has been under the microscope all offseason after his unit crashed at the end of 2022, but he has a lot of veterans to turn to along with the generally accepted principle that everyone should be more comfortable in the second year in his scheme.

Frye lost three NFL Draft picks, including All-American left tackle Paris Johnson Jr., and he had a dearth of veterans obviously ready to step.

After experimenting with multiple players at all three spots all spring, he went to the transfer portal and pulled out one new player then a few days into camp apparently flipped just about everything that was going on at each tackle spot.

So now what?

“Guys are rising, and that’s what you do,” Frye said. “Guys just separate. All positions, both sides of the ball, we’re competing all over. And so we’re getting closer. I’m feeling confident with some guys getting looks against those real guys.”

Those “real guys” are the Ohio State defensive line, including talented juniors J.T. Tuimoloau, Jack Sawyer, Mike Hall Jr., Ty Hamilton and Tyleik Williams.

That group is expected to take a big jump this fall, but what about Frye’s?

“So now they just got to stack good days on top of good days, and that’s when guys kind of pull apart and separate themselves.”

He has redshirt freshman Carson Hinzman and senior transfer Victor Cutler Jr. competing at center, as they were in the spring, but the tackle picture seems to have changed drastically since April.

Josh Simmons, a transfer from San Diego State where he was the starting right tackle, is competing with Tegra Tshabola, a redshirt freshman from Lakota West High School, on the left side while the battle on the right includes fourth-year junior Josh Fryar and true freshman Luke Montgomery, who enrolled last winter.

Fryar was the team’s sixth offensive lineman last season and started a game at right tackle, but he went through spring on the left side. Tshabola was a reserve guard last season who worked at right tackle in the spring, so those two have flipped.

Getting a lineup set sooner than later might be important, but getting it right takes precedence.

“You’re trying to play the shell game to find your five best, and we’re really still in the middle of that,” Frye said. “You’re hoping guys can kind of settle up and finalize that, and we’ll get to that soon.”

Simmons and Fryar both said changing sides takes some adjustment but described the task as eminently doable.

“With the coaching staff and resources here, I know I’ll be able to do it,” Simmons said.

Left tackle is often considered a more prestigious position, but that notion is becoming outdated.

Both are just about equally as important these days with the proliferation of pass rushers on most teams as opposed to the past when a defense’s premier sack man would line up at right end and the left end would be a heavier player more attuned to stopping the run.

Now everyone wants to get after the quarterback.

“I think Coach Frye intertwining guys and seeing what the best five brings, I think he and I and all of us have pretty good sense of who it is,” Fryar said.