Ohio State announced its captains for the 2025 season last weekend; earning the honor for the defending national champions are linebacker Sonny Styles, safety Caleb Downs, offensive lineman Austin Siereveld, and wide receiver Brandon Inniss. Over the last two seasons, four has been the magic number for head coach Ryan Day when it comes to team captains. The number has come down from what we saw towards the end of Urban Meyer’s tenure, heading into Day’s first few seasons in charge of the Buckeyes.
2017 was a bonkers season for captains for Ohio State, as Meyer decided that nine players were worthy of the honor. From 2018 to 2022, the number of team captains fluctuated between six and seven before bottoming out at three captains in 2023. Last season saw two captains from the offensive side of the football and two from the defensive side, consistent with what the Buckeyes are doing with their captains this season.
Today, we want to know who would be your choice to be a captain this season if Ohio State were to add a fifth captain. If there was any year where the Buckeyes would need someone else to step up, it would be this season. Not only is Ohio State the defending national champion, but they also lost a ton of experience on both sides of the football. The choices Day made when it comes to this year’s captains are great. We just want to know who you would add to this year’s group to help the Buckeyes try to win back-to-back national titles.
Today’s question: Which Ohio State player would you add as a team captain this season?
We’d love to hear your choices. Either respond to us on Twitter at @Landgrant33 or leave your choice in the comments.
Brett’s answer: C.J. Hicks
Despite not yet living up to the lofty expectations that were set for Hicks coming out of high school, I would love to see the Dayton native added as team captain for this season. There’s nothing that says a player has to have a certain number of starts to be named a team captain. Siereveld has only started six games, while Inniss has appeared in 24 career games without yet being credited with a start during his career.
With everything that Hicks has been through so far in his career, he would be a great player to help lead the next crop of Buckeyes through the season. From being a highly touted recruit to struggling to meet those expectations, followed by a position change towards the end of his career. It would have been easy for Hicks to hit the transfer portal and close out his college career at a school where he might not have to work as hard to get playing time. Instead, Hicks stuck it out and kept fighting for his place at Ohio State.
For all the work Hicks has done during his career in Columbus so far, while not receiving much playing time, I could definitely see a situation where he could be looked at as someone to help guide this year’s team. It feels like everything Hicks has done, especially recently, has been with the team’s best interests in mind. Currently, there is a tremendous group of linebackers on the roster who deserve playing time, so he is trying to find other ways to help this year’s team. With both Jack Sawyer and J.T. Tuimoloau having graduated, the defensive line could use some depth, which has led to Hicks being used as more of an edge rusher.
Some of my thinking when it comes to another captain for this season is that it would give each level of the defense a captain. Caleb Downs is the leader of the secondary, Sonny Styles is the leader of the linebackers, and Hicks could be the leader of the defensive line. Maybe my reasoning is a little murky since Hicks is a relatively new defensive lineman, but with pretty much every starter from last year on the defensive line having to be replaced, Hicks stood out to me because of how long he has been a Buckeye.
There are some people who might label Hicks as a “bust” because of the expectations some had for him coming out of high school. No matter how this season goes for Hicks, he’ll always be a national champion. Adding team captain to his Buckeye career would have been the icing on the cake for Hicks.
Matt’s Answer: Julian Sayin
This is a weird one for me, because when you look across Ohio State’s roster, there just aren’t that many guys who immediately pop out as leaders. And what’s frustrating for this exercise is that when looking at the obvious four captains, if I were going to select two guys to join them, it would be linebacker Arvelle Reese and wide receiver Carnell Tate.
But, both of their position groups are already represented, so from a captain construction point of view, that feels unnecessary. I also considered guys like Kenyatta Jackson Jr., Davison Igbinosun, and even Bennett Christian, but none of them felt quite right. So, if I’m going to pick someone, I’m going to turn to the most important position on the team, the quarterback.
While Julian Sayin has not yet played a meaningful snap in his collegiate career and has only thrown 12 passes (completing just five of them), he steps into the leadership role of all leadership roles, so whether he is technically a captain or not, he is captain, so they might as well make it official.
From the moment the clock struck 00:00 in the national championship game, most onlookers assumed that Sayin would become Ohio State’s starting quarterback, but it didn’t come easy. Following the departures of Devin Brown and Air Noland, the competition between Sayin and Lincoln Kienholz was intense. Clearly, Sayin earned the respect and trust of his coaches during that quarterback battle, so I assume he did so with his teammates as well.
We don’t really know what type of QB Sayin is going to be, but if this Buckeye squad is going to get anywhere near its potential, it is going to need its quarterback to be a leader. So, perhaps, my selection of Sayin was more aspirational than it was deserving, but in a season where OSU could play as many as 17 games, there is time for the true-sophomore starting quarterback to grow into all of the responsibilities on and off the field that his position requires, and what better way than to be around the four best leaders on the team?
Hell, I might even go as far as to say that the starting quarterback should be a captain by default every season moving forward. The position is just too important not to have his voice heard in those meetings between the captains and the coaches.
