OZone
4/19
Football
Pittman Number One at Tailback Despite Injury
By John Porentas
Antonio Pittman is definitely the leader in the race for the tailback position at Ohio State next fall, but Pittman is also spending a fair amount of time glancing in the rear-view mirror. He may be leading the race, but there is a group of talented challengers in behind him that would love to pass him up.
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Pittman had a breakout season in 2005, rushing for over 1,300 yards in his sophomore season.
"His sophomore year rushing the second-best in the history of Ohio State University, and the guy before won a Heisman," said OSU running backs coach Dick Tressel of why Pittman will be the number one guy next fall despite sitting out most of spring drills with a pulled hamstring, an injury he sustained while running a 40 yard dash this winter.
"I hope we're smart enough to not let a hamstring cloud the memory. He's a pretty good player, and he's done enough in practice that we won't forget," Tressel said explaining why Pittman will be number one despite his inactivity this spring.
Pittman's hamstring has kept him out of contact drills this spring, but as he has recovered from the injury, he has stepped up his participation level in practices.
"At the beginning of the spring I was just doing cardio a lot, staying in shape. Now I'm practicing no-contact as of last week," Pittman said.
Despite his limited practice time this spring, Tressel says Pittman will not be behind this fall.
"Pitt is far enough along that this little bit of spring practice that he hasn't had is not going to stop him from being as good as he can be," said Tressel.
Pittman's freshman season was not even close to his sophomore year. He was undersized and had not yet adjusted to the complexities and vagaries of the college game. He spent the time between his freshman and sophomore seasons in the weight room getting bigger and stronger and in the film room where he really got an understanding of what it takes to be a big time college ball carrier. He liked the result of that strategy so much that he's taking the same approach this season.
"Going into my sophomore year I watched a lot of film, became more patient, really got into the flow of things. Going into this year it will be more focus, watch a lot more film, get a lot stronger, and do better than I did my sophomore year," Pittman said.
"I want to play at 205 to 207 this year. Last year I played at about 197," he added.
Tressel does not have Pittman penciled in as number one guy next fall. Actually, he has it written in ink.
"He's our number one. In the fall, when we put the depth chart out there, Pitt will be at the top," Tressel said.
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Tressel thinks that there is still a lot of upside for Pittman.
"I feel that Antonio Pittman feels like he has just scratched the surface, and I'm excited about that.
"I think he can look back and watch himself on tape and visualize some opportunities that are maybe above and beyond what he did last year.
"It was a great season, but we started slow with it, and that's on the coaching staff, because it wasn't an established situation for him, but he certainly grabbed the opportunities and he knows that there are still opportunities for him to get better and he's excited about that."
Pittman says he is healing well and could possibly take snaps in the spring game this saturday, but Tressel indicated that he would question the wisdom of that.
"If there was a game tomorrow I'd play," said Pittman describing the current status of his injury.
"It feels great right now. Hopefully I can get a series or two in the spring game. We'll see," he said.
Tressel, however, was not quite on that same page.
"We'll put that on the table tomorrow morning as we get ready for our draft, whether we're going to allow him to be drafted," he said referring to the draft for the spring game to be held today.
"The thing is that the number of reps that he would be allowed to have in the spring game with minimal preparation, is that worth the chance that he would put extra stress on that hamstring. If push comes to shove, we'll (the coaching staff) decide, because he would go play."
Tressel said that coming out of spring, he will have one main request of Pittman.
"There's one little thing between he and I, and I think it's real simple, but I think for Pitt its going to be an in absolutely great shape and physically be able to put himself in a situation that in his mind, he's going to be able to do everything that's demanded of a great Big Ten tailback.
