Terrelle Pryor Suspended, What's Next For the Ohio State Quarterback?

Brewing rumors turned into confirmed reports today when it was announced that five Ohio State football players, including star junior quarterback Terrelle Pryor, would be forced to sit out the first five games of the 2011 regular season.

Rumblings have been surfacing out of Columbus for the past few days connecting unnamed Buckeye players to a local tattoo parlor, which was recently raided by the IRS, claiming that the players had traded memorabilia in exchange for free tattoos.

Today we finally got clarification as to which players were involved.

QB Terrelle Pryor, RB Boom Herron, OT Mike Adams, WR DeVier Posey, and DE Soloman Thomas have all been found guilty in the court of NCAA Law, which as we know can be a bit of a sketchy court when it comes to justice, and now all five—as well as the entire Ohio State team—must deal with the consequences.

Thomas is the only member of the group who isn’t considered a high value player.

Herron, the team’s leading rusher, Posey, the team’s second leading wide receiver and Adams, a first team All Big Ten selection, are all valuable contributors to the offense. But clearly the one name that sticks out in this story is obviously Terrelle Pryor.

Pryor, who entered the Ohio State program with the tag of the nation’s top recruit back in 2008, is one of the most well-known and also one of the most scrutinized players in all of college football.

The junior quarterback has failed to take his team to the BCS title promise land in his three years playing at the Horseshoe and many around college football have labeled him as an underachiever given his lofty recruiting hype.

Those critics seem to forget that Pryor has led the Buckeyes to consecutive eleven win seasons and back to back BCS bowl games.

Still, one has to wonder what the suspension will do for a legacy, which Pryor expressed wanting to cement as one of the most illustrious in school history.

Pryor recently made the declaration that his intention was to return to Columbus for one last season in order to become an iconic figure in the school’s prestigious history. But now after this, it seems he’ll likely go down as one of the most infamous instead.

The question now becomes—where does Terrelle Pryor go from here?

We know one thing, thanks to pure, wacky NCAA justice, Pryor will have at least one more game in an Ohio State uniform.

Pryor and the four other suspended Buckeyes will conveniently have the opportunity to participate in the Sugar Bowl against Arkansas on January 4th.

You didn’t think Allstate was going to let anything happen to the ratings and attendance, did you?

What happens after that contest though is anybody’s guess right now.

Pryor chose Ohio State citing the fact that they were the best team to prepare him for the NFL.

The only problem is that he’s not fully prepared yet. He needed that one more season of development to reach that elite level many expected him to be at by this time. Right now, Pryor is a top ten caliber athlete with a third-round quarterback skill-set.

When you throw in these latest maturity concerns, it seems Pryor’s already questionable stock has taken a hit.

Now, it’s true that he could go to the combine, run a 4.4 40-yard dash at 6‘5 240 lbs, wow scouts in workouts and cause a few teams to fall for him. But right now, he’s made it an uphill battle.

Pryor came into the 2010 season as one of college football’s biggest enigmas as far as trying to project him for the NFL.

This only adds to the confusion.

Coupling personality concerns— immaturity and cockiness—with physical limitation concerns—lack of arm strength and inability to read defenses—is never the right mix for moving up draft boards.

Still, something inside me tells me that Pryor can succeed in the NFL.

Sure, it will take the right situation but the fact is, Pryor is a rare kind of prospect.

It’s almost silly to speculate until we have definitive word on what Terrelle’s true future intentions are, and if he does indeed declare for the draft we’ll have a solid four months to debate him as an NFL prospect.

The only thing that’s obvious right now is that if Pryor really wants to gain back some of his luster, a performance like the one we saw from him in last year’s Rose Bowl would certainly help. The stage is set to do battle with Arkansas and their own star Ryan Mallett, another highly touted junior quarterback with first-round aspirations.

Pryor’s earned the ire of Ohio State fans and the college football world once again, but that’s nothing new for him. He’s dealt with criticism and doubt his whole collegiate career.

It should be interesting to see what type of showing he can come up with in the Sugar Bowl on January 4th.

After that, things should get interesting.