Lost Cell Phones, Previews, Ugliness and Political Hockey

The fight/contract phase of Penn State blogging appears to be on the low end of the cycle, which is nice, but there is an update to Timmons' situation:

Timmons however was charged for conduct after the alleged [HUB Fight], when he was swearing loudly and overturning furniture while looking for his cell phone, according to court documents. Timmons also refused to leave when told to do so by Penn State police, court documents state.

Centre County Judge Thomas King Kistler placed Timmons on ARD for 12 months, essentially probation, and ordered him to serve one day of community service. If Timmons completes the program and is not arrested again, the charges will be dismissed and his record cleared of the arrest.

Kid's and their loud swearing...

...

Rivals has come out with a Big Ten roundup (if you've read a story about Penn State in the last three months you can skip the first several sentences):

Penn State

OVERVIEW: There was so much controversy surrounding the team this spring that
football almost was an afterthought. Coach Joe Paterno did not get a new
contract; several players were suspended, and one was dismissed from the team;
and linebacker Sean Lee, an All-American candidate, suffered a knee injury that
will force him to miss the season. But there was some good news. Taking
advantage of the absence of suspended tight end Andrew Quarless, redshirt
freshman Andrew Szczerba distinguished himself with strong performances in
scrimmages and the Blue-White game. In addition, Stefan Wisniewski had a strong
spring and could challenge Mike Lucian for the starting job at right guard.

LINGERING QUESTION: How will the Nittany Lions cope with the loss of Lee, their
top defensive player? Penn State has good depth at linebacker, but replacing his
production and leadership won't be easy.

Szczerba was fun to watch in the BW Game, and given Quarless' apparent laziness, he's doing a very good job of taken advantage of the situation.

As for the "Lingering Question", replacing Lee at linebacker is a lot more like "impossible" than "won't be easy"...as in he will not be replaced. Regardless, the defense is sill in good shape. The difference, of course, is that they will no longer be able to win ball games like they were forced to in the Morelli Era. The bigger question: who will play quarterback? And, more importantly: how good will they be? They need to be able to take advantage of the same receivers that Robinson used during 2005, only said recievers are now seniors instead of freshman. That story is going to make or break the season, the defense will be ok...not great, but even without Lee they are talented enough to hold up their end of the bargain.

...

Here is some good news: we don't to play in the Metrodome this year (I know, not really news, but always good to hear). In an effort to brighten up a home field that looks like an ill-lit basement, the Gophers will be wearing new uniforms:

Yup, still ugly.

...

The Governor, who several years ago pushed for the Superbowl to be moved to Beaver Stadium if the Steelers and Eagles were matched up, isn't done fighting for a professional sports matchup in State College:

Gov. Rendell would like to see an annual outdoor game between the Flyers and Penguins played at Beaver Stadium in State College.

Rendell told Comcast SportsNet yesterday that it would be a great way to preserve the rivalry that exists between the two franchises, which both entered the league in 1967. He also pitched it as a game that would disperse some of the proceeds to the United Way in both cities.

Having the governor carry the banner could remove a lot of obstacles, especially with his enthusiasm. Rendell noted that it would be a great event for people who normally don't get to see a game and predicted that an annual game would fill the stadium.

Why Charlie Weis Makes It Easy To Not Like Him

I'd say hate, but he manages to redeem himself by not being an ass at the occasional hospital (I'm trying to link to a story but all I can find is malpractice claims).

Weis, in an effort to explain why he just finished one of the worst seasons in Notre Dame history, came up with this:

I could get hoodlums and thugs and win tomorrow. I won't do it that way.

There are so many things wrong with this I don't know where to begin. He is being attacked as a racist (H/T Wiz), but I don't understand why no one is calling him a liar.

He is blaming a 3-9 record, and the first loss to Navy is like 200 years, on recruiting. Yet, according to Rivals, he's finished in the top 10 in recruiting for three years now. This includes landing some of the most highly touted Emus in the nation every single year.


Besides that, name one single highly ranked player ND had to pass on because of character issues? Terrelle Pryor isn't exactly a saint and Notre Dame was all over him in the beginning.

Notre Dame has offered letters to the 2,3,4,5,6,8 and 10 ranked players on this Top 100 for 2009 (1 and 7, at least, appeared to only be looking regionally, it's not a 'thug' issue). That's just in the Top 10, I didn't look beyond that but I suspect the trend continues.

No one has the national exposure and money to recruit like Notre Dame. They have their own TV deal. And you want to blame your shitty record on the fact that you can't "go after thugs", because it would be so easy to win with them?

And to bring this back up: you lost to Navy. Do you think Navy can go after thugs?

Stop making excuses and deal with the fact that you probably should have been fired by now.

Oh, and um....

Reacting To: What A Rivalry Is All About

I didn't have time to get into it yesterday, but I'm realizing this morning that I might have lead some people to believe that I agree with everything that guy said. I don't. First let's look at one of the most disturbing quotes I've read in a long time:

"My decision to go to Penn State was brutal.

My Penn State teammate Nick Haden and I laugh. We were cheering for Pitt half the time on the sidelines during our first Pitt-Penn State game."

What the fuck? You were cheering for Pitt?!? It's one thing to cheer against your own school, but against your own team?

This is a credibility killer for me. He then goes on to say he "has a love for both places", but seeing as he now coaches at Pitt, I'm not buying it. He has one love, Penn State sounded a lot more like a good looking affair to me than a mutual wife (you know, if fandom was polygamy).

He then goes into a THON-like "it's for the kids" speech which seems a little sappy, but I understand where he's coming from. It does, in fact, hurt the national exposure of PA football and, as a result, makes it harder to keep kids in state. Maybe more kids go to Pitt than would have otherwise, but a hell of a lot more top prospects would go to Penn State as well. In Ohio and Michigan there is a pride factor that comes into play when a recruit is making a decision. There is a local team. Penn State is losing some of that feeling. Staying local is more a geographical concept than one of identity.

Now there are practical issues with the rivalry, ones that make the upside for Penn State look rather dull. For the record I'm torn. We don't have much to gain, but Pitt does. We don't need to do them any favors. At the same time, how many OOC games have we played that would have been more fun than Pitt? Nebraska, maybe, but definitely not Oregon State, Boston College and Syracuse. Even the Notre Dame series was a major disappointment.

I guess I'm just saying I could use a rival.

What A Rivalry Is All About

Interesting read about what the PSU-Pitt game really meant, the teaser:

[Editor's note: The University of Pittsburgh was once Penn State's biggest rival in all varsity sports. That is no longer true--not since Penn State joined the Big Ten in the early 1990s. At one time the competition in football was bitter and intense, with an annual game played at the end of the season that was as fervent and as any other in college football. Greg Gattuso played for Penn State and now coaches at Pitt. Here, in his own words, is his unique perspective on the rivalry.]

...and the story.

Profiles In Plagiar-Agism: John Cooper

Profiles In Plagiar-Agism is an offseason series being run to examine the history of exit plans. We will be analyzing some of the greatest football coaches of all time and determining any parallels between their final days and those that are facing Joe Paterno.

Editor's note: I know, I know...John F-in Cooper? Not really Plagiar-Ageworthy, but in light of his puzzling introduction into the College Football Hall of Fame this week, I thought he might make a decent case study.

(Previous episodes: Paul William "Bear" Bryant, Lou Holtz)

John Cooper

Coaching Years: 1977-1984 Tulsa, 1985-1987 Arizona State, 1988-2000 Ohio State.

Mythical National Championships: None.

Conference Championships: Three, all shared.

Backstory: After growing up in Tennessee, Cooper earned his keep as an assistant at Iowa State, Oregon State, UCLA, Kansas, and Kentucky. He was later handed the keys to the Tulsa program where he managed a 57-31 record.

He was given the job at Arizona State and earned a Rose Bowl bid in just his second year. However, as a sign of things to come, in three seasons he never beat in-state rival Arizona.

Regardless, Ohio State came calling and Cooper took the job in 1988. His progress there was slow but steady, leading to his first (Shared) Big Ten Championship in 1993. As mentioned earlier, he would share a total of three conference championships, and as most of you know, could rarely beat Michigan. He was fired in 2000 almost exclusively because of his 2-10-1 record against the Wolverines. The most painful appears to be the 1996 game, in which an undefeated Ohio State team, ranked #2 and playing at home, took a 9-0 lead into the locker and lost 13-9. Michigan was 8-4 that season and cost Ohio State an MNC.

From there the whispers became rather loud calls for a replacement. While Cooper would recruit with the best of them, some said he either lacked coaching skills that were needed at the top level or maybe just didn't have the confidence to "win the big games". He was fired in 2000 after an 8-4 season, a loss in the Outback Bowl (Cooper was 3-7 8 in bowl games with Ohio State), and yet another defeat at the hands of "that team up north".

Current Legacy: When a fanbase gets sick of the "almost made it" seasons, a dramatic move usually comes back to bite them in the ass. This is where I make a Nebraska joke. At one point Cooper finished in the top two of the Big Ten seven years in a row, no MNCs, but he finished second in the nation twice. There are two roads to take at that point: either try to weather the storm and wait to get over the hump, or hire a guy who has never coached at the D1a level.

They did the latter, and as a result of Jim Tressel's success, Cooper is either the but of a joke or, if your a Michigan fan, the face of better times. I can't remember the last time I heard an Ohio State fan say something good about the guy. But we have to be a little bit fair here: if Ohio State's last 8 years had been more like that of any other Big Ten team, Cooper would likely still be highly respected. He's not, though, mostly because of three MNC Game appearances and several additional BCS bowls.

So What Did We Learn? Cooper coached at Ohio State for 13 years, and thus played his "biggest game of the year" thirteen times. Penn State has no active rival, but it is fair to say Ohio State and Michigan tend to be the bigger games.

Paterno's record against Ohio State the last thirteen years: 5-8. Not 2-10-1, but not great either.

Against Michigan: actually I don't fell like typing it out.

Bowl games: 5-2. Since joining the Big Ten that's 9-2.

So the pictures don't exactly fit right over each other, but there is a trend here. For two years now PSU hasn't had a win to hang their hat on (debatable comment, I'll admit that). A rivalry win gives you something to be proud of when your team ends up being mediocre. Paterno hasn't been able to bring that kind of thing home and it has become one of the biggest problems that his critics will bring up.

So how bad is it? That's really what I'm getting at. At what point would a normal coach be fired? Probably at this point. While 2005 was a great season, all it's really been doing, for me, is reinforcing how athletic and driven Michael Robinson was. The loss at Michigan this year was a direct result of coaching, and while I am of the opinion that Morelli was uncoachable (the way he would get batter and then totally revert is a big factor), a coach can either tailor a gameplan for a crappy qb or start developing one of the two other quarterbacks that are ready to play the position.*

What is interesting is that the lack of a rival is probably helping Paterno right now. Can you imagine if he lost 5 of 13 to Pitt (you have to do two things to imagine this: (1) try to remember what the Pitt game meant when it meant something, and (2) try to forget how bad Pitt has sucked the last decade+)? Even the biggest supporters of Paterno would start to hurt a little bit.




*Once again, this is coming off at Paterno bashing. Paterno get more room than guys like Cooper, and think he should. But I can't let that stop me from telling it like it is.

Butkus To Now Give Out Butkus

Extra, Extra!

"Dick is thrilled," Butkus lawyer Robert F. Helfing said.

Butkus' family will begin presenting the award in January 2009 in Chicago, where he grew up and played eight Pro Bowl seasons for the Bears.

"The point of this whole lawsuit was to use this award to raise charitable funds, and he feels he will be able to do that better in Chicago than down in Florida," Helfing said.

Club officials said the cost to defend the lawsuit was no longer justifiable and the money could be better used to serve youth.

And here comes the outcry from the SEC about more Big Ten bias.

+1-1=Current BCS

Working on a Profiles In Plagiar-Ageism, which is a task not easily done. In the meantime two quick topical points:

-There won't be a +1 anytime soon. I'm ok with this, mostly because it's not really going to solve anything. Yes teams #3 and #4 get in, but what happens when #4 wins? How many teams from each conference are allowed? Where are you going to play the games? In the South and West of course, where the power bowls currently are. That's bullshit for the rest of us.

-Old Man Media v Basement blogger has been a hot topic ever since the CostasNow episode on Tuesday night. I could talk all day about it but I'll save you the trouble. Blogs aren't newspapers. They aren't here to replace "news". They are the people taking back some of the power. For the rest of the story I'll defer to what I consider the best analysis of this whole thing.