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.
