I'm not going to beat a dead horse.
Posted: October 3rd, 2010, 12:18 am
Herbie covered it well, and I am sure Ham is posting tomorrow, so I'll let them do most of the talking. I will say this though. Ham called me right at the half and had an excellent point.
"The end of that half was a microcosm of Penn State football the past 5 years."
I would go beyond it and say 11. But a great point nonetheless.
There is a huge difference whent he head coach is wearing a headset and when he isn't. A lot of times, the players and coaches on the sideline are justifiably scattered around frantically talking to their kids or coaches. The guys upstairs dont need to do that. So if a guy upstairs sees the the playclock dwindling, and yells into the headset "10 seconds, 10 seconds" when the offense is still on the sideline... I mean... Just think about the time you lose in the transfer of information from upstairs to McQueary to Joe to the referee. That could be 4 seconds in itself. I think that anyone who has the opinion that the staff on the sideline should be watching the playclock in this situation is somewhat wrong.
The LT position at PSU is not good. That is a kid who is replacing Landolt, who was above average. This year's LT is below average, despite being there awhile. Each year we hear Joe talk about the youth. When does all this youth get older, is what I am asking. If we have been saying for 10 years "we have a young team", when do we have an experienced team?
The o-line has been criticized to death, but the G's are not as bad as the tackles. The tackles are coaches by Bill Kenney, who's head I have been calling for for probably 5 years. Kenney coaches TEs as well, and does a very good job w/ them. But he needs to be replaced, he should have been replaced years ago. It is incredibly embarrassing to watch these OTs year after year.
I understand that Barham was up against a kid who will be a first round pick. I know, trust me. But one of the first things they teach you in OT play, on pass protection, is to not let the man cross your face into the B gap, keeping your weight on the inside foot. This is true whether man to man or in slide or zone protection. You have to move your feet, you have to force that guy outside if he rushes, you cannot let a guy zip past you while you stand flat footed.
Here's the hilarity of that LT. Quinn Barham was offered a scholarship b/c he was on the same HS team, and is friends with, Greg Little. Little was a 4-star ATH who PSU coveted. He chose North Carolina. We took a chance on a kid who was not a great prospect (2-star, I believe) because we wanted his friend. This is the same thing that happened a few years ago when we offered (and attained) 2-star CB Mike Wallace from Good Counsel HS in Maryland. Wallace is bestfriends with 5-star LB Jelani Jenkins, who chose Florida over Penn State. That right there is 2 scholarships to 2 kids who should not be on that roster. In my opinion, Doug Klopacz (backup C) is another kid who should never have been offered. It is very true that OL recruiting is the toughest spot to gauge talent, but there are kids at PSU on scholarship who were not very good prospects. There's 2-3 others I dont even want to name b/c they are still underclassmen and I dont think its fair to throw them under the bus yet. This is all just my own opinion.
If Quinn Barham is our best option at starting LT, we are in a lot of trouble through all of the B10 schedule.
A guy in the Lions Den posted this and I think it sums it all pretty well:
...a program that consistently gets humiliated in big games on national tv
...a coach who exhibits again and again he no longer controls the staff or can master the game
...a staff where only 50% of the coaches recruit
...a team who is so predictable and easy to prepare against it makes games against the MAC seem close and games against the elite hopeless
...a weight program so inferior the vital offensive line gets tossed around like rag dolls...
...a coaching staff who has their team so scared in big games you can see it in analog...
...a head coach who doesn't have the guts to go for it on 4th and short w 4 minutes left and down by 2 touchdowns
...rarely are there games without a little silver lining...but we've had back to back games on national tv by the score of 24-3 that suggest otherwise...
And I will close with this, It is getting harder and harder for me to ride this out until Joe leaves. And I cant believe I am saying this, but Stefon Green is getting shafted.
"The end of that half was a microcosm of Penn State football the past 5 years."
I would go beyond it and say 11. But a great point nonetheless.
There is a huge difference whent he head coach is wearing a headset and when he isn't. A lot of times, the players and coaches on the sideline are justifiably scattered around frantically talking to their kids or coaches. The guys upstairs dont need to do that. So if a guy upstairs sees the the playclock dwindling, and yells into the headset "10 seconds, 10 seconds" when the offense is still on the sideline... I mean... Just think about the time you lose in the transfer of information from upstairs to McQueary to Joe to the referee. That could be 4 seconds in itself. I think that anyone who has the opinion that the staff on the sideline should be watching the playclock in this situation is somewhat wrong.
The LT position at PSU is not good. That is a kid who is replacing Landolt, who was above average. This year's LT is below average, despite being there awhile. Each year we hear Joe talk about the youth. When does all this youth get older, is what I am asking. If we have been saying for 10 years "we have a young team", when do we have an experienced team?
The o-line has been criticized to death, but the G's are not as bad as the tackles. The tackles are coaches by Bill Kenney, who's head I have been calling for for probably 5 years. Kenney coaches TEs as well, and does a very good job w/ them. But he needs to be replaced, he should have been replaced years ago. It is incredibly embarrassing to watch these OTs year after year.
I understand that Barham was up against a kid who will be a first round pick. I know, trust me. But one of the first things they teach you in OT play, on pass protection, is to not let the man cross your face into the B gap, keeping your weight on the inside foot. This is true whether man to man or in slide or zone protection. You have to move your feet, you have to force that guy outside if he rushes, you cannot let a guy zip past you while you stand flat footed.
Here's the hilarity of that LT. Quinn Barham was offered a scholarship b/c he was on the same HS team, and is friends with, Greg Little. Little was a 4-star ATH who PSU coveted. He chose North Carolina. We took a chance on a kid who was not a great prospect (2-star, I believe) because we wanted his friend. This is the same thing that happened a few years ago when we offered (and attained) 2-star CB Mike Wallace from Good Counsel HS in Maryland. Wallace is bestfriends with 5-star LB Jelani Jenkins, who chose Florida over Penn State. That right there is 2 scholarships to 2 kids who should not be on that roster. In my opinion, Doug Klopacz (backup C) is another kid who should never have been offered. It is very true that OL recruiting is the toughest spot to gauge talent, but there are kids at PSU on scholarship who were not very good prospects. There's 2-3 others I dont even want to name b/c they are still underclassmen and I dont think its fair to throw them under the bus yet. This is all just my own opinion.
If Quinn Barham is our best option at starting LT, we are in a lot of trouble through all of the B10 schedule.
A guy in the Lions Den posted this and I think it sums it all pretty well:
...a program that consistently gets humiliated in big games on national tv
...a coach who exhibits again and again he no longer controls the staff or can master the game
...a staff where only 50% of the coaches recruit
...a team who is so predictable and easy to prepare against it makes games against the MAC seem close and games against the elite hopeless
...a weight program so inferior the vital offensive line gets tossed around like rag dolls...
...a coaching staff who has their team so scared in big games you can see it in analog...
...a head coach who doesn't have the guts to go for it on 4th and short w 4 minutes left and down by 2 touchdowns
...rarely are there games without a little silver lining...but we've had back to back games on national tv by the score of 24-3 that suggest otherwise...
And I will close with this, It is getting harder and harder for me to ride this out until Joe leaves. And I cant believe I am saying this, but Stefon Green is getting shafted.