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Art Briles Found Himself a Brit

This image came up when I searched for "Helsinki." It's almost exactly what I expected.   (Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Bongarts/Getty Images)
This image came up when I searched for "Helsinki." It's almost exactly what I expected. (Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Bongarts/Getty Images)
Bongarts/Getty Images

In a pair of tweets tonight, David Smoak of ESPN 1660 in Waco announced that Baylor accepted the transfer of an offensive lineman from the mother country. Jason Osei will join Baylor this week and have immediate eligibility to play this season. I get that we're still basking in the afterglow of London 2012 and everything, but this is the first time I've ever heard they even play football (American football, obviously) across the pond. How much eligibility Osei will have at Baylor is not yet known, but according to Smoak, Osei is 25 years old. The last relatively advanced transfer from a foreign land worked out pretty well. I should also note that Briles' previous foray into the world of European football players was drafted in the second round and plays for the Patriots. We're having fun here, right?

Poking around a bit for information, I discovered a few things of interest about Jason Osei. First, in what has to be an incredible coincidence, there appears to be an unrelated Jason Osei already at Baylor. Is Osei a much more popular surname than I was led to believe? Second, unless there is yet another Jason Osei playing football in Europe, Osei spent last season with the Hamburg Blue Devils. Before this moment, I did not know Hamburg had a football team at all. There's a picture of Osei at that link. Before that, he was a London Olympian (third row from the bottom, third from the left). The year before THAT, he played in the Finnish Maple League (what?) for the Helsinki Wolverines (is this some kind of joke?) and made the best highlight film since Yoenis Cespedes. I think I'll put that one below the jump.

Before you look at it, tell me if you think this is his LinkedIn page. It's a guy from London whose picture kinda looks like the one from above that says he likes "American football" and "mixed martial arts." How many can there be?


The intro to the video lists him at 6-4, 278, extremely helpful information considering it's difficult to tell how big anyone else is on the field. That was three years ago. Assuming that he's grown since then, it's at least feasible that he could be big enough to play OG or OT. His skillset is obviously the big unknown; we just won't know much about him until we get more information or a more recent video. I'll sleuth around a bit.