Aaron Smith from Gateway High chose Pitt over Maryland.

Been a while. This one’s hosted by the HeismanPundit.

What criteria do you use to determine if a team and its players are good?

Past performance, while not necessarily indicative of future performance is still the leading factor. This goes for teams, coaches and players. That is always a starting point. It has to be. There is no way anyone with anything approaching a life and normalcy could possibly be able to look at each team without taking the past into account. This means taking into account the coaching staff’s history — developing players, finding talent, gameday coaching and in-game adjustments.

As for players, only a fool or a liar doesn’t admit to taking some note of how they were ranked by various recruiting services as at least a starting point/shortcut. I want Pitt to land Darrin Walls. Why? I haven’t seen him play. I’ve not bothered to watch any video. I have, however, heard from voices with credibility that he is an absolute talent, though. I have some measure of trust in what I’ve heard — again, looking to past performance on someone to base the opinion.

From there I go by what I see on the field when the time comes. I look for the fundamentals and natural ability. Natural ability is easy to spot and is good initially. It’s what comes afterwards that determines just how good. Does he know the system and the plays? Does he make the same mistake continually? Does he adjust accordingly? Does he make improvements from game to game?

To shift to basketball, Pitt had 2 players in the front court this past season who couldn’t be more different — Chevy Troutman and Chris Taft. Both good players, but different. Taft showed no adjustments, or growth. He relied on pure natural ability to take him where he wanted — but no further. Troutman continually improved and adjusted. He tweaked what he was doing as a game went on, and continually looked for new ways to accomplish his goals on defense or offense.

If you could choose one coach to build an offensive system for your school, who would it be? Conversely, who would you choose to devise the defense? Why?

I know, Urban Meyer on offense and Pete Carroll on defense is the easy call. I’m not taking that way, though. Just for fun, I’m going with actual coordinators.

For the Offense, how about Chris Petersen. This is his 5th season as offensive coordinator at Boise State. How or why he hasn’t taken over OC duties at a bigger school is a mystery to me. Maybe it’s because of the blue turf, but he has just made an offensive machine there. Before that he was the WR coach at Oregon under Mike Belotti. Judging from what hasn’t been seen from Joey Harrington in the pros, maybe his WRs and their WR coach need a little more credit.

On Defense, I’ll take Bo Pelini now the d-coordinator at LSU. He’s been a hot assistant for a few years now. I like his aggressive defenses, and the way he makes in-game adjustments (the USC game notwithstanding). I actually think being d-coordinator at 3 schools in 3 years (Nebraska, Oklahoma now LSU) has hurt his head coaching prospects — makes him look so blatantly like he is just eyeing the next job. Second choice, Tom Bradley, Penn State D-coordinator. Coming from a Pitt guy, that should tell you all you need to know about him.

Describe your typical college football Saturday.

Oh, boy. If Pitt is at home, and it is a noon start, that means things started the night before. Preload the car with the chairs and whatever else I’m bringing and showering the night before. Then it means rolling out of bed around 5 or 6, smacking my foot or stepping on some toy my kid left as a landmine for me as I stumble to the bathroom — all curses quietly muttered. Get dressed and get in the car to begin the drive from Cleveland and hope to stay conscious until I hit about mile marker 193 on the Ohio turnpike where there’s a rest stop for a triple shot of espresso at a Starbucks kiosk.

Get to the designated meeting spot of the tailgating group — Pat’s house on the South Side — make sure we have everything, wait for the rest of the crew to show (and likely grab some more espresso) and convoy over to the parking lot around 10 am. Start drinking and grilling while listening to the radio pregame.

Attend the game.

Afterwards, it’s more tailgating for a couple hours while watching the roads back-up. We are usually one of the last groups to leave the parking lot.

Eventually drive home.

For non-home games, it means getting a game on around noon after I’ve done the dad thing by playing with my daughter all morning (so I can dump her off on the wife for the afternoon). Around noon start watching football and begin cursing the fact that because I live in Ohio they think I actually want to watch Northwestern vs. Illinois. Don’t even get me started with the realization that I am going to be stuck with Ohio St. v. San Diego State on September 17 at the same time Pitt plays Nebraska — looks like I’m springing for ESPN Gameplan that day.

Alcoholic beverages are involved in all of this. Sometimes food.

Now you know.

Is this thing on?

Sorry, just testing the audioblogging feature, which may or may not — depending on levels of sobriety — be utilized during games or tailgating situations. The audio runs via quicktime.

Speculative, but still a little worrisome.

For the third day in a row, tailback Rashad Jennings did not dress for practice. He is being “rested” — which is coachspeak for Jennings is nursing some undisclosed injury. Jennings, who walked off the practice field with no outward signs of injury, was not permitted to speak with reporters.

Could just be some tender ribs. At least it doesn’t appear to be an injury in the legs. Or it could actually be nothing. It just means one more thing to watch at practice today — if someone could. Practice this afternoon is a closed session.

Coach Wannstedt said he won’t name the starting tailback, though, until after Monday or Tuesday because he wants to see how Jennings looks back in practice.

Two different types of puff pieces today — game and personal.

H.B. Blades gets the game puff piece. A piece that talks about his play, how good a player and leader on the field he is and such. For Blades, it also means talking about his move from strongside (SAM) linebacker to middle linebacker. Something he is actually quite happy about despite national recognition following an outstanding season last year.

Blades said his football intelligence comes naturally, but he has had to work at developing a good football sense because he knows he isn’t as blessed athletically as many players.

“Some guys, [understanding the game] comes natural and with me it comes natural as well because of my genes,” he said. “At the same time, I used to go to football meetings all the time with my dad and my uncles and I got to see things at a college and professional level. That helps me now because I learned how to read things. It is not only the ones who go out and run fast or make hard hits who make the plays.

“If you go out and make three hard hits and that’s it, what have you done? You have to play smart, you have to be consistent and be smart. If you are smart, it makes you that much faster, and even if your opponent is faster than you, you can still beat him because you are going to get to where he is going before he does.”

Blades said he was happy for the opportunity to play as a freshman and sophomore, but he always believed he was better suited play middle linebacker than outside linebacker.

“I am a very physical player. Everybody knows that and I love to get after it,” he said. “This year it is going to be more downhill for me and I’ll be able to play a lot more fast and being physical, and that will be good for me because this is what I am better suited for.”

Blades was also one of the very first players to openly support Coach Wannstedt’s hire — because of his uncle and father’s experiences from Miami. The article also points out that swapping Session and Blades to SAM and middle respectively will allow Session to go for the big hit and use his speed — which he prefers — while Blades, who is more technically sound, can focus on stuffing the run and tackling.

The personal puff piece is for John Pelusi, his sister Jamie and of course their father. Both are at Pitt. Jamie is a scholarship, star goalkeeper — yes, soccer. John Pelusi was the starting Center on the ’76 Pitt team and also is on Pitt’s Board of Trustees. Last year, Pelusi being slow to commit to Pitt was an indication of Coach Walt Harris’ lame duck status. Now he and his sister are carrying on the grand Pelusi name at Pitt.

In some other player news, Joe Flacco is still not in any college. He hasn’t appeared at Delaware.

The AP preview story on Pitt I noted in passing earlier in the week, keeps getting picked up in larger online outlets.

Finally, a sportswriter decides to list the top starting college QBs in the country from 1 to 119. It is based on his guess of “how each of these guys will produce in his offense” not talent. He also lists the back-up for some reason.

7. Pittsburgh = Tyler Palko, Bill Stull = Palko flourished last season, but will Dave Wannstedt curtail him?

If he’s ranked at #7, I’m guessing the guy doesn’t think the coaching staff will curtail him.