Digdug, There’s plenty of room for a stadium in Panther Hollow! But……….it’s not worth spending a 150 million on. My solution, embrace Hienz Field and win! When you win consistantly the students and fans will follow and the atmosphere will improve. If this offence does what it’s capable of, the game experience will be electric.

Comments and a correction on the above blogs as follows: 1. Unless I am mistaken offensive lineman Sacco of Don Bosco Prep in N.J departed the Panthers prior of Fall Camp. Too bad, he was a good one. 1. Dustin Garrison of Pearland. Texas who ran for 292 yds. yesterday against Bowling Green,was a highscool teammate of the promising frosh QB of Pitt who wears#10. Their team won the 5 Star championship in the Lone Star state last season. Oh yes, Mr. Garrison now plays for that Morgantown school whose name escapes me. 3. Anyone who thinks the Rutgers grid staff (which is comprized of several former Pitt coaches, is NOT ENERGIZED about the Pitt game Sat. is highly mistaken. The Panthers better be prepared because the Scarlet Knoghts will be!! Rev. George from Columbus

Boomer,

Regarding the negativity of Sunseri’s play on here. There is a place for criticism as long as it’s constructive and reasonable. But when it is written with a large dose of cynicism and sarcasm all that does is show a glimpse of the writer’s character.

But Chas doesn’t do that and very few posters on here do. What you have to understand is that we PITT fans have watched Sunseri through 18 games so far and we are seeing the exact same mistakes he made in his very first game. While he’s doing a bit better this season it is still apparent that he has faults that aren’t physical, that is not attributed to his physical abilities, and that is maddening.

It is one thing if he just didn’t have the arm strength to throw deep – but that isn’t the case. Its that his timing and accuracy is so poor on those plays. Its the same with his holding the ball too long. He’s always gotten sacked, or had to scramble, too much due to his inability to quickly recognize where to go with the ball.

One good game does not a season make. If he continues to improve from this point on you’ll read less criticism on here but until that happens, if that happens, it is entirely correct to discuss his limitations in context of the team’s success.

BTW – he didn’t really beat out the other QBs for the spot. The fix was in before any true competition was allowed to take place.

^^^ Correction: Lets say Sunseri was AWARDED the starter’s job before any competition was allowed to take place. Saying the “fix was in” might be too prejudicial.

who wears No. 20? He is a DB who didn’t start but played a handful of plays vs ND and uSF. This number is not listed on the roster in Pitt’s web site.

I think 20 is Brandon Ifill

Need to came back to positive stuff. I was watching the Steeler game and just saw a nice 2nd comback thwarted. It’s tough for any quarterback to do much with no protection.

On to the Rutgers game. Let’s go Pitt!

“Lets say Sunseri was AWARDED the starter’s job before any competition was allowed to take place.”

And you know this how? Do you happen to Todd Graham’s priest or something?

gc, think you’re right. Ifill listed as #20 on roster in Panther Digest .. redhsirt frosh, shows some promise

Yeah, it’s Brandon Ifill, he was a pretty solid 3* coming out of high school. He should mature into a good player for us. I think Wanny wanted him as a defensive down lineman though, possibly a DE? He’s been converted back to DB. Maybe not…

I checked my notes from the confessional. Tino WAS awarded the QB job before any competition was allowed to take place. the rest is privileged.

Thanks for the clarification, Father. I wouldn’t want to know any more than that.

Pitt can try to make the best of its hopefully temporary residence in Heinz Field. It should enjoy very much success there. However, all the top major college football programs have on campus stadiums. I could never imagine Notre Dame, Alabama, LSU, Texas, Florida or you name it being a tenant in a pro stadium. Pitt must have an on campus stadium. It may take some time and it will take some money but it is a must to get us to the top level.

i luv pitt and have been called an eternal optimist about the players on the team…booing in that stadium drives me nuts..i know its your ‘right as a paying customer.’ but its my right to call you an a-hole for doing it.

as far as tino being given the starting qb job…thats the song everyone sang about wanny…let me tell you, putting tino in really did a lot of good for wanny. don’t be naive…big time college coaches don’t play favorites because they drink a certain kids dad after work…if you don’t put the best kid out there, you’re going to be looking for work.

with regards to todd ‘high octane’ graham…he put so many chips on the table before this season that there is no way he was going to put anyone out there that he didn’t feel was the best for the job. i think that graham would like nothing more than to have any other option than tino. he plays more freshmen than i’ve ever seen at pitt and the fact that he’s given trey any snaps at all is a joke…trey looks like an 8th grader playing varsity ball. it looks like the actual football is too big for him and that his helmets going to tip him over. he may be the future…but right now there is nothing even close to a better option than tino even on his worst day. so to piss & moan & boo when you’re at the stadium doesn’t do anything but make the whole pitt fan base look like we belong in philly.

as far as doing it on this website and in the media…hey that’s fun…and its fun to argue about it. and our qb situation could be worse…just look at that hell-on-earth garbage can of a town in state college.

I agree with boomer. Graham wouldn’t be playing Tino if he thought he had a better option. We got a taste of what his offense can produce. 44 points and over 500 yards is not bad. He can’t throw the deep ball but if he can get the ball out of his hands quickly to complete short and medium passes and run a little he will open things up for RG.

It would be nice to have a better option than tino…but i like having a kid thats got guts running the show. it would be nice to see him succeed.

i can’t wait for the Chad Voytik to get here tho. i cant remember the last time we got a QB this highly rated coming out of high school. getting the kid from fox chapel…voytik and possibly shell….that almost makes this year a success reagrdless of the record. im out of my mind excited about the future of this program

HTP and great turnaround game showing we got some guys who care — especially Ray Graham. D looked pretty impressive to me and that’s my biggest take away from it. We all knew Graham was talented and Tino had to play smarter. But keep in mind, USF gave up over 500 yards of offense to ND in their win and basically got bullied by them as well — and as we saw, ND ‘ain’t all that’. Great game but need to see more downfield passing — 15-20 yards enough with a deep one every so often — so Graham doesn’t have to shake three guys for a four yard gain…he must go through shoes like crazy.

Boomer we have a 4 star QB sitting on the bench who is 6’4″ 230LBs. I realize he is a Pro Style QB but if you check Rivals Viytik, 6’0″ is also classified as a pro-style QB. Myers was rated as the 4th strongest arm in the country and 1st team ohio quarterback. There is no reason to believe simply because your 6’4″ 230 that you can not run the triple option (Tino is not very quick). Obviuosly TG has his reasons for not giving the kid a chance, perhaps he does not like his attitude. Flacco probably had the same attitude not getting a real chance.

if myers was good enough to play, he’d be playing. period. i dont care how big he is…he’s either so dumb that you can’t even risk letting him sniff the field, or he has no accuracy whatsoever, or some other major deficiency on the field. in major D1 football it’s never just because of an attitude….ie jon baldwin and the entire WVU Mountaineers. if you really are talented enought, you’re going to get your looks. i have nothing against the guy…my point is that there is no way they would let a guy sit on the bench if he was really the right guy for the job. in myers case he’s 3rd string behind a walk-on…come on DRW…what does that tell you? there’s a reason for it. and if he’s to go to delaware or ul-monroe or some other po-dunk school and light up JV defenses, don’t let the door hit you in your splinter-riddled arss

DRW – you get way too caught up in what scouting sites say. Voytik is not a ‘pro-style’ QB at all. The kid is a perfect fit for this offense, hence his being such a prime target by our HC, because Voytik can both pass and run like crazy.

I posted up Voytik’s running stats from his last game – 149 yards and four rushing TDs – yet you keep on with asserting he is a “pro-style” QB. He is not. Here’s a summary of his last game.

“Voytik, who has verbally committed to the University of Pittsburgh, had the breakout game he’d been waiting for this season. He scored on runs of 44, 2, 9 and 21 yards and rushed for 149 yards on 11 carries.”

Last season he rushed 79 times for 439 yards (5.8 ypc) and 7 TDs.

Now, go back and watch our games against ND and USF and concentrate on how Sunseri started using his run option. When you take out the sacks Sunseri was 6/39 for 6.5 ypc against ND and 9/39 for 4.3 ypc against USF.

Here is a direct quote from Todd Graham on what we need from the QB in this offense…

“Tino running the ball has been a part of our game plan this whole time. We weren’t able to execute the plan before Thursday. For some reason we didn’t have it taught yet but we are now getting it done. One of the key factors is to establish the quarterback as runner in our spread out game system. It is very important for Tino to be a threat and run the ball.”

This isn’t new from Graham, he has been saying this since the day he was hired – the whole offense is based around this premise. I know you refuse to acknowledge this but Myers in no way fits this description. He just doesn’t and never will. He wasn’t recruited for this type of offense and can’t be changed to fit it.

BTW- Sunseri is physically well quick enough for this offense to succeed, what has held him back was his reluctance to see his run option as a main part of his job out there. Based on his playing background running the ball meant bad things were happening and he did it only on scrambles. Now that the light bulb has turned on that it is good to pull the ball back and run we’ll see the offense really start to click.

Boomer – Myers isn’t on the outside looking in for any of those reasons you stated – he just isn’t the type of a QB Graham wants or needs in the triple-option offense. This view strengthens even further next year when PITT has three QBs on roster (Sunseri, Anderson & Voytik) who fit Graham’s ideals for a QB.

^^^ Correction. Boomer – you post is correct.

Boomer do you really believe Plakyo was the better QB than Flacco? This is just one obvious one. How about the Steeler running back Willie Parker who never cracked the starting line-up at N.C. Do you really think that in life that perception from one’s superior in any organization has any impact on promotions and terminations. That the best and the brightest always rise to the top? I think you would get an argument from anyone on that prpoposition. It seems that after one game, same as last year, everyone is ready to ready to annoint Tino after 2 years of marginal plays as the best QB at Pitt. Myer’s is not stupid, at least academically, having graduated from one of the best Catholic schools in Cleveland. If you were raised in the North you know the public H.S. are good but the Catolic schools are academically better. As for Reeds remark about relying too much on scouting reports your argument about Voytik’s comes entirely from the same source but you put in his running yardage – if you went back to Tino’s and Gonzalez’s you would find the same breakdowns about their ability to run with the ball since they were rated as “dual-quartebacks.” It is perception what we want to beleive, as a human with finitie knowledge I admittedly. The only real observation I have read was from one the bloggers, who conceivally amy have been biased, that had seen the 3 QB’s actually working out before the ND game and stated that watching the 3QB’s throw “considering arm strength and accuary, Myer’s looked like a man among boys.” This is not to say Myers does not have some unknown problem since he is never mentioned in the press or by TG except when I read in the PG that he is in TG doghouse because of his “attitude.” Based on his background I am suprised except he may not have dealt well with the fact that a non-scholarship player was asked to join the team and annointed the second team QB after 2months in camp. Being obvious that to those except that because he ran the offense in H.S. he should be on scholarship, in my opinion and all D1 coaches in TX. and the rest of the country Anderson is not a D1 player. So my point is when the game is put away like last week I would like to see Myer’s go in to see what he can do – when in TG langauage Pitts “keep the pedal down.”

DRW – here is the difference. You quote a poster who watched ONE pre-game warm up and think his is an accurate assessment. Yet when I tell you I watched Myers in multiple actual practice sessions where he tried to run this offense you discount what I say about him.

OK, that’s fine if you want to play it that way. I suggest then you watch the season play out and see how much playing time Myers gets in this offense. Unless there are major injuries to Sunseri and Anderson in will be a lot less than you want him to have.

Answer this: Why would Graham put in Myers ‘to see what he can do’ when it is obvious that Myers doesn’t fit his conception of what Graham wants at QB for this offense? Believe me he’s seen a ton of what Myers can and cannot do over both the spring and summer camps, that is why the staff currently has him at QB3.

I’ll venture this thought and it is pure speculation because we all hope it doesn’t happen… but if both Sunseri and Anderson go down with long term injuries I’ll say there is a real chance that Gonzalez gets moved back and starts at QB before Myers does. That’s how much I believe Graham doesn’t want to veer from this established triple-option offense.

Not to sound snotty but there is a reason Graham hasn’t mentioned Myers name once in connection with QB playing time since the season started… not once. Remember in the latter stages of summer camp when Graham said that Anderson and Myers were neck and neck for QB2? That is history now, Anderson won the back up spot going into the season and is a firm #2 especially now that Graham has seen how much better this offense clicks when the QB actually uses his option to run.

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