Let’s have some speculating fun with a conspiracy theory.
I’ve been thinking about a reason that Graham may have had for instituting a “No Media” policy after the warm-ups of each practice. They kick everyone out 40 minutes or so after the practice begins so that nobody can see the actual plays and how well, or not, they are being executed by our players.
It may not be secrecy to not to allow opponents a chance to see what they are instituting on the offense. Hell, all they have to do is look at films of Graham’s Tulsa offenses and they know what we’ll be doing at this point in pre-season. It may be all about personnel issues and keeping any players who may be on the edge of transferring from jumping ship.
Think about it. Over the past years we fans, and everyone else including national sports media outlets, have been treated to what was a pretty darn detailed practice to practice running commentary in the Post Gazette, Tribune-Review, Scout.com and Rivals.com articles on how the kids were doing in action with the 1st, 2nd and 3rd string offenses. We knew if Bostick was throwing TDs or INTs, If Stull was comfortable under center, whether Sunseri was pushing Stull, and so on. Brian Bennett of the ESPN Big East blog spent two days at the PITT camp last year and wrote about almost specifically about the QB competition. Basically, we knew which kids were doing well and which kids were struggling.
That was OK because all the QBs on the roster were recruited to specifically play in the Pro-Set offense – typically as a drop back QB that Wannstedt wanted to field. The players could rest assured that even if they didn’t win the starting position they would be in-line and able to compete for it either through injuries (think 2007) or through attrition.
Now, those kids are still on the roster but the ground has shifted underneath them with the advent of Graham’s High Octane offense. Some of those QBs have to be really wondering how they fit into the present and future plans that Graham and Magee have for the position.
I think it is safe to say we have two distinct styles of play between our four QBs. Sunseri and Myers are more of the drop back types and that isn’t to say those two can’t succeed in a new system, just that it has been their bread & butter up until now. Gonzalez and Gray are, and have been through HS, dual-threat QBs and may feel way more at home with the High Octane. These two styles are the QB’s comfort zones so far in their football careers.
You can look at any combination of things and try to figure who the odd man out would be. But let’s say that Graham distinctly wants a dual threat QB for the High Octane offense so he picks Gonzalez as the starter and Gray as the second string. Might that now make Sunseri and Myers think hard about whether they fit in and what their best personal options are? They would be looking at not only having to adapt their style of play but then not even start after doing so?
Let’s say he picks Sunseri as the starter, does Myers then say I’m not waiting around for another two years to play in a system that doesn’t highlight my strengths? If he picks Sunseri does Sunseri then think ‘I’ve two more years to show my stuff in the best possible way for the NFL’, perhaps at another school better fitted for his strengths.
So, perhaps Graham doesn’t want any negativity to enter into this at all from the media side of things. Maybe he wants to make sure that each QB is focused on the task at hand and not reading any poor reviews in the media reporting of the practices. Sure he can say “pay no attention to the news reports” but that doesn’t cut it with players that age. This way he can hope to at least get through spring and into the summer training camp without defections. After all, the smoke signals from the Southside about this issue did say “when they see how things shake out after spring ball”.
Anyway and still speculating here, but if I was putting money down on who the two would be I’d bet Myers and Sunseri were the two who are thinking about transfer should they not win the starting job. Now, that said… it is also being reported, vaguely, that both those kids are doing well in the new offense so far so all this might just be an exercise in theory. As we all do, I hope this is just pre-season talk, but it is something to think about and discuss… especially since there is no actual practice details to talk about.
What will probably happen is that both those players, Sunseri and Myers, do well enough in this new offense to feel good about what is happening at PITT and decide to be a part of it. Let’s hope that the coaching staff isn’t too ridged about what they want in a QB and that they adapt certain aspects of the offense to fit personnel. I think they will. After all we did hear Graham says they may not “Be able to institute A-Z but more like A-M” for 2011.
But here’s something that would be kind of fascinating and ironic… Let’s say the rumors are true and two QBs do decide to leave when spring practice finishes. Just how fast do you think Todd Graham and Calvin Magee would be knocking on Pat Bostick’s door to get him to come back on the squad?
Again, if the past tells us anything it’s that you can get down to QB#3 real fast as PITT did in 2007 (or to QB#5 in Cincinnati’s case a few years ago) so a third string QB probably isn’t a bad thing to have on the roster, wouldn’t you think?
