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QB CJ Stroud (All B1G, 2022 B1G QB of the Year, All-American, NFL OROY, Houston Texans)

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FGMyN9sVUAIouki
 
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C.J. Stroud never envisioned he would play for Ohio State as a kid growing up.

In his younger years, Stroud dreamed of playing college basketball. Even once he decided to pursue a career in football – a decision he made after his eighth-grade football coach told him he had the potential to play in the NFL – the Rancho Cucamonga, California, native thought he’d be playing somewhere on the West Coast like USC, UCLA or another Pac-12 school.

Ultimately, the recruiting process led Stroud to Ohio State, where he’s now the third Buckeye quarterback in the last four years to be a finalist for the Heisman Trophy. And seeing the success Justin Fields and Dwayne Haskins had at Ohio State before him is a big reason why Stroud chose to become a Buckeye two years ago.

“It definitely played a part into it, just honestly seeing young Black quarterbacks go out there and play really well and having intelligence about the game,” Stroud told Eleven Warriors on Wednesday. “I used to go to camps and people would think I played receiver because I was just tall and Black … So just seeing how Ohio State not always has but a majority of the years has had African-American quarterbacks. And I’m really big on my culture. And that’s not a disrespect of any other culture. If you can play, you can play. It doesn’t matter. But I just saw how they treated us, so that really played a part into it.”

While Stroud didn’t anticipate becoming a Buckeye until Ohio State started recruiting him during his senior year of high school, he watched Ohio State games regularly on TV and was inspired by what he saw from Haskins in 2018 and Fields in 2019, when both of them were Heisman finalists. By becoming a Buckeye himself, Stroud believed he would have the potential to follow in their footsteps, though he’s tried to do it in his own way.

“You’ve seen Dwayne, you’ve seen him do what he’s doing when he was here. You’ve seen Justin, what he did when he was here. And then I got to witness it (with Fields) last year. So you definitely want to picture yourself in those shoes,” Stroud said Wednesday. “But I feel like just being a competitor, you have to go do it yourself. You can’t just ride their coattails. So that’s something I’d tried to do is pave my own way, just be myself, play my way. I don’t try to be like Justin or Dwayne. But still learn from those guys, learn from their successes and learn from their mistakes. So those are all things that I took into consideration to come here and then do what I’m doing now.”
 
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