I don’t list the reasons why I think Graham isn’t playing Myers as some sort of approval for him not doing it but as facts that are plain as day.

PITT has had 812 offensive snaps this season and Myers has taken one meaningful one. What in hell does that tell you? It says Graham feels pretty damn strongly that Myers wasn’t who he wanted back there at QB.

As I wrote before, when Ronald Jones was asked to play QB and throw a pass (for a TD) in the closing moments of the UCONN game before Myers even saw the field the handwriting was refreshed on the wall for Myers.

To say that Graham “has reasons” for doing what he’s doing does not mean that they are good reason, only that I understand them.

I don’t know if you are new here but I’ve been writing since even before the season started that I believed that Graham was going to play the 2011 season with an eye to the 2012 season no matter what. This is a key point with me. IMO that’s why he’s played 12 true freshman this season and that’s why he stuck with Sunseri, with breaks to Anderson and Jones, instead of Myers. He’s getting as much of his future resources ready to play in his systems as soon as possible. I truly believe that Graham does not think Myers will be on the roster next year.

But here may be the difference between you and I. I don’t necessarily want to tar and feather him for basing his decisions on that. Unlike some other PITT fans, I feel that this team would have tanked even if DW were still coaching because the talent level we lost was so great. Let’s not forget we had a 7-5 regular season team with guys like Baldwin, Lewis, Hynoski, Sheard, DeCicco, Berry etc… all solid starters and some stars. If we win at Syracuse we are exactly one game worse then last year.

Those who say Sunseri would have played better in that pro-style system have short memories also – he did the same thing he’s doing this year in having two good games and then sucking at every thing else. he ducked and covered last season also… and who kept him in almost every single snap? That would be DW.

This was the year, Graham’s first as coach, to get ready to do what PITT hired him to do in instituting his offense and win games. Therefore I think that Graham used that as the basis for his personnel decisions.

I don’t think Graham has been just mailing in this season either though. We were close in a lot of those games and he made personnel decisions to make that happen too. He just didn’t make the one you most wanted in playing Myers.

I was screaming for Graham to put in someone else – anyone else – after the second half got underway last Saturday. And personally, I think that playing Myers at some other points in the season would have given Graham a chance to see Myers under real pressure and, in turn, would have lessened Sunseri’s hat size.

Although it could also be that Graham just thinks Myers sucks at what he wants him to be as a QB.

BTW – I have had Media Credentials for these 2011 camps and season and had a chance to see the team in practices so that’s what I’ve based my opinion of Myers on, which isn’t a negative opinion either.

I don’t really disagree with most of your points. If you looked at my post, all I was saying is that when you teach a team a whole new system they cannot make up for the shortcomings at QB.

I therefore, don’t necessarily think that Sunseri would’ve been better in a pro set, but the team would’ve been able to compensate to a degree for his limited capabilities.

I will say that I would rather see this season be a washout and growth as you point to in 2012, than a decade in mediocrity.

DaveD

The O line was good enough to allow Graham to be the leading rusher in the nation for the first half of the season…yes, Graham got many of those yards because of his own brilliance, but you don’t lead the nation in rushing behind a bad O line.

Ask Jon Baldwin how many bad throws Tino made last year as he repeatedly ran past people only to watch Tino’s flutter bombs fall helplessly four yards behind him. Shame on both Wanny and Graham for inexplicably (sp?) hanging with Tino for sooooo long. No shame in giving a guy a shot, but good lord…

So Reed, I agree with you. TG is looking towards the 2012 season by eliminating competition for his prize recruit. Myers will leave and be successful. Tino will continue to stink, because he does and always has. For anyone that has played a team sport before I ask this. When your leader gets hit (sacked,)have you ever seen his teammates pick him up? Nope. That just wasn’t last week, that has been the case since week three. As a result of the above, this scenario increases pressure on new qb.

RB is the same situation but for a different reason and the plan was working extraordinarily well until the injury to our key RB. Had the injury not occurred, Ray G would have turned pro which would have opened the door for Rushel Shell to slip in and help immediately. However, the injury may have opened the door for 34 to take some carries away from Rushell in the short term, but I think that works out well for RS. Rushell is expecting twins soon and he will need to be committed to working out in order to provide for his family in the coming years. Concentrating on strength and speed improvement will help him achieve that goal of Sunday playing time. His body is not strong enough right now to play an entire season well. The earlier he can get to campus and onto the weights, the better for him.This scenario decreases the immediate pressure on Shell because RG and Bennett return. Shell still plays, but the pressure is not on him until he becomes a sophomore.

A huge bonus for Pitt going forward with recruits is how their defense played this year. With Rippy and several DL highly rated recruits out there, Pitt may get some consideration where perhaps they didn’t get as much as late as one month ago. The defense looks fun to play and is aggressive which should bode well in recruiting.

Shanahan is a great hands guy although he boxed a few Tino chucks this year. As previously stated, I think he was surprised to see a ball thrown on tempo and accurate during a game. Shanahan should really push for hback/te work immediately if he wants to sniff the NFL. Put on another 20 pounds and you have another prototype NFL TE.

Has Holley disappeared lately? Anyway, I see things differently than most of you on here. I don’t believe any Coach or employee gets a free pass for a year. Those are called excuses. TG’s first year was a failure. Period. No sugar coating. Year two will be an improvement unless he sticks with Tino. Tino must be told that he will not sniff the field next year and Pitt can arrange for a transfer to California or IUP. No hard feelings. This happens all the time in professional sports and real life work! For TG, this was a wasted year of development for many players. Now go out there and recruit some bigs, that are fast and have some football mentality. Forget the diminutive fast guys. We don’t play in the MAC.

And I’m not defending Sunseri’s play either. But if you look at what he has done, realistically, you’ll see that he also put a pretty large number of passes, between 15-25 yards right, into the hands of both Shanahan and Street… or could have if Street didn’t pull up like a 8th grader on a crossing route, and they didn’t finish the play.

Some of those were key plays that would have extended drives or in two cases been TDs when we needed them. Sunseri did just enough correct things to keep Graham believing that he’d be able to get wins.

I posted this on another board but I think it explains my thinking a bit. In a sense that’s too bad.

“See, this is where Graham screws himself. Sunseri has a habit of playing well in the first half of games.

Then when he starts faltering in the second half, which is almost every game we lose, it’s too late to put an untested QB in there because we still have a shot to win on one series.

The reality is that these games we have lost have been way too close for Graham to make that switch. Graham is obsessed with TOs and Sunseri protects the ball well. His INT ratio is very good so, IMO, Graham thinks that by putting Myers in he’s opening the prospect of turning the ball over.

It would have been a hell of a lot better had Sunseri stunk out the joint right off the bat in the beginning of the year so that Graham could have made a change before we got sucked into crunch time with Sunseri.

But that didn’t happen and Sunseri actually played some pretty good games to keep his job. But I’m not sure Graham would have gone with Myers back then anyway – he may well have gone with Anderson or moved Gonzalez back to QB.”

Huffdaddy – you are pretty optimistic about what Myers would have done had he played this season. More than I am.

TG did all he could do this year. Why does everyone act like the next QB in line, that is on the roster, is the answer? It is quite possible they all suck. Hell, there are NFL teams that don’t have good QBs.

News to me.

Chas, Reed or anybody who is really in the know, does this rumor hold up under investigation?

From what I’ve heard previous to the above posts is that Voytik is NOT graduating from HS until the spring and will be showing up at Pitt in the summer anticipating being only at preseason camp. Whats the accurate information??