Apparently the usually optimistic Dave Wannstedt has his limits. That was a direct quote from Coach Wannstedt following what was a less than positive practice. While he wouldn’t single out the particular unit that upset him, it was evident to those who watched practice.
Wannstedt did his best impersonation of Steelers coach Bill Cowher on Monday, staring down his offensive line and then shouting at the unit in an on-field meeting.
Pitt’s offensive front struggled in the morning practice and closed the session with a dismal effort that included three straight sacks. And, quarterback Tyler Palko banged the thumb on his left hand – his throwing hand – on a helmet, but finished practice.
“We sure as heck didn’t make any progress today in a couple areas of our football team,” Wannstedt said. “It was pretty evident that certain areas of our team didn’t come out today and compete with the desire to win.
“And we’ve got to make sure that we don’t get ahead of ourselves, and we make sure that we cover first things first, which is to put the guys on the field that are willing to be accountable with the desire to win with every snap. And for whatever reason, we didn’t have enough of them today.”
No indication at this time that the thumb bang is serious.
Dorin Dickerson got positive reviews for his first full-contact practice he was able to participate. Darrelle Revis was held out for one more practice as a precaution but will be back tomorrow. Mike Phillips is still out with a sore ankle.
Kicker Conor Lee still looks like the kicker unless Freshman Dan Hutchins really comes on in the next week (or Lee’s hamstring really gets bad). David Abdul will not be coming back to play football.
On placekicker David Abdul:
David Abdul was not cleared medically. So unfortunately his football career at the University of Pittsburgh is over. He’ll be put on medical [scholarship]. He was a senior and going to finish up anyway. If there was a deserving senior, we could use the scholarship for a year, but nothing has been determined yet. We just got the news on David. Mark Estermyer is a guy that we’re talking about [giving a scholarship to]. He’s been doing a good job snapping for us the last couple of years and we’re looking at a couple of other guys too without giving you their names right now.
Good luck to David. He still has his whole life ahead of him, not to mention a young daughter.
T.J. Porter looks to be making the case that he will be the #3 WR behind Derek Kinder and Oderick Turner. Marcel Pestano has also been looking better in recent practices.
Better this than have the team split apart after a tough loss and disappointment (see: first three games 2005). I’ve thought for a long time that one of PITT’s continuing problems was overconfidence by the players (and individual agendas). I think that we need to build on whatever positives there were last season (and there were some – look, we won 5 games) and find the strengths of this team early on and build on that also. I just wish we didn’t start off with two tough teams in our first three games. It’ll be hard going if we can’t get it together by the MSU game. I see the opener as a game where we grind it out for some points, hope to hold UVA down in scoring and try to pull it out in the 4th quarter – although our special teams, mostly kicking, are suspect so far. DW’s working on generating more turnovers, he has recruited and evidently put speed into the lineup, and the lines seem improved so that will be what we need this year.