link to tinyurl.com

Not a Insider subscriber. What’s the skinny on this Katz story?

I for one like this move…I’m particularly interested in the attention being paid to the “mental” “toughness”. Our teams seem to lack a certain killer instinct. The hard hits were far and few between. In the last few years, I’ve seen few hits that made the crowd go “Oh!”…and one of them came when Palko ran over a BC would-be defender. Last year two hits stand out…Blades blast of the TE in the Lousiville (I think) game (fumble that wasn’t) and Shane Murray layed a good lick on someone in the So. Fla game. We need hits like that in every game…Like the ones Romon Walker dished out on a regular basis. If Morris can get these guys to play with intensity and a mean streak, he will prove invaluable. I think that there has been too much emphasis X’s and O’s, or how much a player can lift, or how fast they run, and not enough on the physical aspect of the game. Buddy ball can’t make things worse!

“Ramon”, of course.

SI is reporting Gray maybe too sick for the game Sat.

HbgFrank, big hits only happen if:

1) The player has the speed to get there, and…

2) The payer is in the correct scheme to close on the ball.

Both of those fall under X&Os strategy and strength/condition issues (and recruiting speed on the D side, Harris didn’t seem to care about that) where we have been lacking over the last two years. I’d prefer to see the players put in position to make a tackle at least, forget about the big hits (see Session’s play over his career – he seemed to be so enamored by the dramatic, half the time he was watching the ball carrier run past him).

Do agree about the mental toughness. However, I think it has to be directed inward rather than at the other team. The 2006 Panthers seemed to pretty much give up when down, and while there’s a school of thought that it was mostly the upperclassmen (re: Harris’ guys) it looked to go the whole way through the team. Also, the lack of killer instinct was DW’s dragging his NFL mindset into the college game – you know, where if you have a 7-10 point lead you run out the clock in the second half. Only problem was that the team had neither the personnel or the skill to sustain long, clock eating drives. I’m sure Palko was chomping at the bit in more than one game to keep scoring when his OC was calling for LaRod up the middle.

Now, they should have figured out halfway through the season that our D wasn’t good enough to hold teams in the 3rd & 4th quarters, so, to me its just plain poor coaching. Who knows really, but it was a real problem and one that bears watch early next year.

Here’s an interesting take on Pitt’s 2007 recruiting and future from Tom Lemming:

“Lemming said that Penn State’s and Pitt’s recruiting classes will finish in the top 20 nationally, while West Virginia should break into the top 30.”

and…

Lemming said Pitt’s recruiting classes will make the difference in Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt’s future, which, he added, looks promising.

“Pitt is headed far north with the talent it has,” he said. “You can’t tell the true values of a coach until he has a class the full four years. Wannstedt will start turning things around next two years. They weren’t as talented as WVU, Louisville or Rutgers this season.”

Certainly a different point of view from some other’s opinions, and I’m not sure which to believe, but as Chas says “I know which one I want to believe.”

Here the full article, and it has some good insights to what this nation media writer feels about WPIAL players.

link to pittsburghlive.com

Steve: In ref to your ‘Masochist’ comment. Unfortunately I’m still taking that class which is unfortunate and resultant in my reluctance to put the football season away just yet, especially when the HC reports: …“I think our goal here was to get the strength and conditioning staff in place…the areas we needed most improvement in are our strength and our toughness, both mentally and physically.”

…. “I think” is not decisive enough for me and I should think, most other Pitt fans too.

For those of you in the fitness field could you enlighten with regard to how “strength and conditioning” (err, weight-training and nutrition) corresponds/ translates to “mental toughness”?

Really, if DW was doing his job (without excuses) then it would be a hell of lot easier to ignore schmuck utterances and inane arguments to justify retaining Rhoades whilst firing Kent, Bray.

(Incidentally, I liked your theory, Harrison (comment posted under ‘why’ DC Rhoades remains a staple at Pitt).)

Reed,

I see your point, I didn’t say that X & O’s, speed and strength were not important, just that maybe the coaches need to spend more time making the players be more tough. I’m thinking about the transformation that a military recruit goes through in boot camp. They don’t just want to get the recruit to be physically strong, they want them to me mentally strong and tough as hell. IF this is the direction DW is moving towards with the new hires, then I see good things happening on the field as a result.

Yes, you’re correct, that type of transformation in spring and fall camp would go a long way. However, we’ve heard this song before with the ‘early morning running drills till you puke’ of last year. I’ve had the impression that PITT has had a habit of folding in adversity over the last decade or so. Maybe that’s just a projection, but I’d like to see us win a couple of come from behind late in the game wins to dispel that. DW’s changes could work though.

I do like the changes so far that DW has made, and hope he gets an energetic and aggressive hire for the secondary coach -who can also recruit. Maybe I’m the eternal optimist (at least compared to some on these Blogs) or maybe I just don’t get so emotionally invested as others, but I do think we’ll see better things in the next few years, and am excited about seeing some of the young DW kids get their chance to shine.