I’ll get to more on the increasingly insane latest bit of expansiopocolypse and what it means for Pitt in a bit. This is just a short thing that’s been gnawing at me.

One of my dad’s favorite cliches that he reaches for when trying to decide on a big economic thing  — buying a new car, moving, changing jobs, replacing large appliances, etc. — is: “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.” My father, as you can imagine, is very financially conservative.

That phrase, though, keeps echoing in my head as expansiopocolypse continues. Albeit in a flipped on its head to be: “Better the devil you don’t, than the devil you know.” Everyone is completely willing willing to risk the devil they don’t know for the money. And because they feel that they know the devil they know just that well.

Beyond the money there is no football school in the Big East that wouldn’t run screaming to another conference, because they know that Providence-based leadership just that well by now. They know how incompetent, late to react, and how little they actually care about football — and thus the conference doesn’t provide any help, support or growth for the football schools. If the Big East was able to get $20 million/year for football schools I would still want Pitt out of that conference.

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Scout.com has come out with their updated recruit star rankings as they do a few times each recruiting cycle and our five committed recruits have all been awarded three stars.  That is a jump for Shakir Soto, Aaron Reese and Jaymar Parrish from having two stars or being unranked.  Parrish has also been designated as the #3 FB in the nation.  Orndoff and Samuelson already had three stars next to their name.  Congrats to them all.

As a result of the update Scout also released their updated team recruiting rankings.  As of today PITT is positioned at #38 overall and tied for #28 in average number of stars. For comparison we were #40 for the 2012 recruiting year, #47 for 2011 and had a great year for 2010 under Wannstedt at #17 (overall).

That’s not too bad considering it is early days and especially considering the crap our football program has gone through over the last 18 months.  It was a mess and we are dragging ourselves out of it one day at a time.

All of which leads us to this article about Paul Chryst’s recruiting approach written by Chris Peak of Panther-Lair.com.  It is interesting in that he reiterates the fact that Paul Chryst has been doing pretty much what he’d said he do in recruiting when he was hired – let the University and the football program sell itself as much as possible.

Chryst and his staff have been very un-forceful in recruiting thus far. More than a few recruits have commented on how “laid-back” the coaches are; that term has been used quite often by the recruits themselves. When Cincinnati offensive line recruit Alex Gall visited Pitt this spring, the interaction with Chryst stuck out for that very reason:

“Coach Chryst told me he wants me to make the best decision for me. He was really laid-back about it. There are a few schools that are like that, but he really didn’t want to push me to make a decision. It was pretty unique how laid-back he was.”

Similarly, when four-star Belle Vernon offensive tackle Dorian Johnson was on campus last week, he had the same impression:

“I liked the fact that we just chilled. There was no pressure and they really didn’t talk about football at all. We just talked about my personal life. That’s different because usually coaches try to talk up the program and talk about football and all of that, and they really didn’t do that at all.”

Peak goes on to say that will be effective up to a point but sooner or later the hard sell has to come into effect.  Chris Dokish over at Panther’s Prey addressed this in part earlier in March with this article (last paragraphs).

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Tied up today. So all I can do is clear some old tabs with some things to read.

Athlon ranked the best running backs in the Big East from 1-10. Pitt has 1 and 10.

1. Ray Graham, Pittsburgh (SR)
Rushing Stats: 164 att., 958 yards, 9 TDs
Receiving Stats: 30 rec., 200 yards, 0 TD

Graham was well on his way to a 1,000-yard season, but a torn ACL in Pittsburgh’s eighth game ended his 2011 campaign. Through the first eight games, Graham posted 958 yards, including 201 in the opener against Buffalo and 226 in a 44-17 victory over South Florida. His production was even more impressive considering the struggles of the passing attack and an offensive line that never seemed to jell. Graham did not practice this spring, but is expected to return in time for the season opener. The Panthers won’t rush the senior back into action, but as long as he returns at full strength, Graham should be the Big East’s leading rusher at the end of 2012.

…

10. Isaac Bennett, Pittsburgh (SO)
Rushing Stats: 58 att., 237 yards, 2 TDs
Receiving Stats: 14 rec., 88 yards, 1 TD

With Ray Graham coming off a torn ACL, it’s a good thing Pittsburgh has some depth at running back. Bennett became the Panthers’ go-to option in the backfield after Graham’s injury last year, rushing for 237 yards and two scores over the final five games. He posted back-to-back efforts of 69 yards against Louisville and West Virginia and rushed for 51 yards in the 33-20 win over Syracuse. Bennett will face competition for the No. 2 role in the backfield when highly-touted freshman Rushel Shell arrives in the fall.

As we are all very familiar, by now, Bennett was the star of the offense in the spring. Not to mention the only healthy running back with a start under his belt from last season. He also wants to be encouraging to the much-maligned offensive line.

This spring he has seemed like a natural, especially with the scheme change and the way Chryst is emphasizing the run. That did not go unnoticed in the running backs room. Bennett also has noticed a change in the mind-set of his offensive linemen as well.

“I’ve seen them have a greater passion this year,” Bennett said. “I just see the looks in their eyes when they line up for the huddle. Everybody is getting up there properly, they have a new motivation. That is the vibe I’m getting from them.”

Okay, then.

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Now that Paul Chryst has made the decision as to who is nominal starting QB is going to be in this season and I say nominal only because we still have Voytik coming in, lets look at one major thing that needs to happen for Sunseri to be able to play better football this year than last.

 
Bottom line: Sunseri has to take three less sacks per game for PITT to be successful this season.

 
On the face of that remark it looks pretty ridiculous; “three less sacks per game”, hell most teams didn’t give up three sacks per game. The bold truth is that we gave up five (4.92) per game and 64 total sacks, which turns my stomach just to type that.

 
But I think we’ll be better in that area this season for sure. Graham’s “One, two, three, Go!” passing offense had our OL trying to aggressively attack the DL they were going to block in pass protection and it didn’t work out.

 
Look, in 2010 Sunseri was sacked 23 times total for less than two per game. Guys, that is 43 less sacks on the year. It almost literally can be any worse this year.

 
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Something amazing has happened in the last week. Whether it is part of a fundamental change in college athletics, or a response driven by self-interest I am stunned and thrilled. No, I’m not talking about the playoff plans for college football. I’m talking about the discussion of the revised ACC contract.

Since the new contract has been announced last week, it has been subject to debate, argument and especially the frustrations of Florida State fans with the ACC. There was the typical denial from the FSU athletic department that really didn’t say anything. What followed was where it got interesting. FSU fan anger exploded, and the chairman of the FSU Board of Trustees spouted off without really knowing the facts to further fan the flames..

The usual way these things are done are through anonymous sources explaining details of the contract to provide more context. You would have the backtracking and damage control by and for the name person spouting off. And at first that happened — see the part about explaining that all the conference media contracts are backloaded.

Yet that did little to quell things. In fact, it seemed that nothing was making a difference. Cue the change in tactics to direct dealings.

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Does this actually surprise anyone?  Really?

ESPN has a short interview with Paul Chryst today where he states that Tino Sunseri will be the starting QB for the Panthers going into the 2012 season.

We here at the Blather have been trying to get you guys to prepare yourselves for this announcement for sometime.  It wasn’t a hard call for Chryst to make.

It also makes sense as much as we may not want it to. Here is a rather telling point and one that some fans just have refused to believe:

He clearly was the best this spring that we had. You’re aware of the history but it doesn’t really matter for us.

Then here is this zinger.

“He’s got room to grow. If he chooses to grow, and I know it’s easier for us to say last year or two years before that doesn’t matter. It matters in the sense that you should learn from all of it, positive or negative. But it doesn’t matter going forward. 

Look, let’s be brutally honest here and stop bullshitting around. It really doesn’t matter going forward because he is all Chryst has.  He has no choice but to play Sunseri because of incompetence after him. However that “If he chooses to grow” comment leaves one wondering.  What if he doesn’t choose to grow?  Riddle me that Batman.

We just have no decent QB on the roster but Tino Sunseri and he’s suspect as hell. If anyone harbors any hope for any of the other four QBs, lets add Gonzalez just for more psychic pain, just let go of it now while you still have some sanity left…

“Chryst said nobody grabbed the backup quarterback job. As for what he anticipates for Chad Voytik once the four-star prospect arrives this summer, Chryst said, “First he’s got to get here. Then we’ve got to see how he picks up things. I anticipate him getting work. Legitimately getting work and then we’ll see.”

Got that?  No – Body – Grabbed – the – Backup – Job.  Not third year QB Mark Myers, not Shorty Anderson and not Smoke Gonzales.  “It is a ship of fools we have here on the Southside docks, step right up and take the cruise.”

So what we have left is a long shot miracle that may or may not be happenning in training camp with Chad Voytik.  But here’s a bit of advice.  Don’t back the wrong horse…

“Coming around the clubhouse turn!  It’s “Tino Time” with the big lead and… hold on!  Here comes the Tennessee stud closing fast!!!   It’s a horse race again folks, anything can happen….!”

… in our dreams.

Another aspect of this is that Chryst wants to get the offense personnel set as soon as possible and start instituting his playbook that first week of training camp.  He needs a starting QB to do that.  The fact that he said Voytik will get a legit look is nice but he’ll go into training camp with Sunseri and stick with him IMO.

But Chryst feels that he can coach Sunseri well enough to succeed in his offense and that may be the case.  We’ll see.  I tend to think Sunseri will not be the same QB we had last season and that he’ll be better due to his new comfort zone. I do not think we’ll look at Sunseri at any time this and think that he’s turned the corner or that his troubles are behind him though.

No, every snap will be an adventure again this season.  Perhaps that 70%/30%  run/pass split doesn’t sound to bad right about now, huh?

I hope you are not surprised by this predictable outcome. New PSU Head Coach Bill O’Brien generated plenty of pixels of media coverage and cheers from the Penn State base at saying he wants to restart the tradition and play Pitt annually. As I wrote a little over a week ago, I didn’t see it likely to occur. And that was even without taking into account the Pac-12-Big 10 deal to have annual games between the conferences that will be home-and-away. Effectively giving every Big 10 a quality non-con game every year to to with 8 conference games.

That leaves only 3 non-con games left. And we know from past Paterno deflections, Penn State needs to have 2 guarantee home games every year. Soooo… Gentlemen. Start. Your. Hedging.

Penn State has four non-conference games, and O’Brien says he’d like to play a neutral site game (The Meadowlands and Washington, D.C., are possibilities) to begin the season against a traditional or new rival (such as Alabama or Notre Dame). Moreover, in 2017, the Big Ten and Pac-12 are expected to begin an annual non-conference game between the conferences, further crowding the schedule.

That leaves two non-conference games remaining, and both of those must be moneymakers for the health of the program. In other words, they must be guarantee games against teams that can’t expect a return game.

“We’ll see what happens,” O’Brien said Monday. “I’d like to find a way to make it all work out.”

O’Brien has spoken at length since arriving at Penn State about the desire to play Pitt annually, but admitted Monday it may not happen because of logistics.

O’Brien is overpromising on the schedule, because PSU fans are tired of a non-con schedule that might have one good team every other year at home and at least two patsies. That’s not changing too radically.

The teams may play periodically, but it won’t be on an annual basis. Now if the basketball teams want to start back up with things that would be a good start.

A little further down the food chain of college athletics, there is plenty of conference realignment happenings that I’ve ignored. With Temple re-joining the Big East, but this time as a full member, the A-10 had a need. They called Butler up from the Horizon League and VCU from the CAA.

Meanwhile C-USA is seeing UCF, SMU, Houston and Memphis coming to the Big East so they need anyone new blood. They pulled Charlotte and their soon-to-be-minted-in-2013 football program from the A-10, and are trying to get Old Dominion from the CAA. ODU, though, is taking a page from Mizzou and may not decide until the end of June.

That leaves an opening in the Horizon and maybe two spots in the CAA.  So, who is under consideration for membership in both conferences? How about Robert Morris?

The Horizon would seem like more of a natural fit with geography. It has Cleveland State, Youngstown St., Detroit and Wright St. within 5 hour bus trips. The problem is that RMU plays football, and the Horizon has no home for football. That’s where the CAA comes into play.

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Not good. Not good at all Carl Krauser.

One of the leading scorers in University of Pittsburgh basketball history is facing multiple charges for attempting to run from a police drunken-driving checkpoint in Beaver Falls.

Carl Isaac Krauser, 30, of 1744 Watson Ave., New York City, was charged by Beaver Falls police with escape, carrying a loaded weapon, possession of a small amount of marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, public drunkenness and driving with a suspended license.

Playing at Pitt from 2002 through 2006, Krauser was the first player in program history to finish his career with 1,000 points, 500 assists and 500 rebounds.

Krauser was detained by police manning a drunken-driving checkpoint at 10:15 p.m. Friday on Seventh Avenue in Beaver Falls, according to the report.

As officers checked his license, Krauser stepped from his car and began to run, police said. He was located by police moments later in the Save-A-Lot parking lot, 400 Ninth Ave.

As he was being placed in a patrol car, a plastic bag containing marijuana fell from Krauser’s pant leg, police said. A second bag was found in a pants pocket.

As they prepared to tow Krauser’s car, police said they found a loaded gun under the front passenger seat.

A breath test showed Krauser’s blood-alcohol level was 0.067 percent, according to police.

That is a fail on just so many levels. One bad decision after another.

FSU’s President Eric Barron issues a statement on conference alignment. Specifically on the whole issue of the ACC or Big 12 for Florida State.

“I want to assure you that any decision made about FSU athletics will be reasoned and thoughtful and based on athletics, finances and academics. Allow me to provide you with some of the issues we are facing:

In support of a move are four basic factors argued by many alumni:

1. The ACC is more basketball than it is football, and many of our alumni view us as more football oriented than the ACC

2. The ACC is too North Carolina centric and the contract advantages basketball and hence advantages the North Carolina schools

3. The Big 12 has some big football schools that match up with FSU

4. The Big 12 contract (which actually isn’t signed yet) is rumored to be $2.9M more per year than the ACC contract. We need this money to be competitive.

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Did you know that the late signing period for basketball ends this Wednesday? Does it really matter? Only insofar as the Letter of Intent is concerned. The reality is a kid could still commit after the signing period ends. He just wouldn’t be signing a LOI. Only scholarship papers.

The practical side is that it means the kid wouldn’t be on most campuses for the summer session, and paperwork could be a bit more rushed. Leading to questions later if the NCAA gets information late.

Savon Goodman, increasingly has appeared to be heading to prep school for a year. Specifically to Brewster Academy in New Hampshire. That’s probably good for Pitt, since there really isn’t room this year.

That didn’t stop Goodman from finally taking an official visit to Pitt this past weekend.

Uncommitted 2012 wing Savon Goodman took an official visit to Pittsburgh this past weekend, his high school coach, Rob Moore,confirmed to SNY.tv.

Goodman was not immediately available for comment but Moore said the visit went well.

Take that for whatever you want it to mean.

In actual committed players, here’s an interview with Chris Jones. Steven Adams is just trying to enjoy being a student a little longer.

I’m now of the opinion that conference realignment in college sports is much the same as summer TV programming. It’s generally not as good as the regular season, but at least it’s something to watch.

Apparently I made the mistake of listening to my wife and taking Sunday as a computer/twitter/internet-free day. Not checking for updates. Not looking to see if anything new happened. So I missed the Chairman of the Florida State Board of Trustees (Sorry, I have to do this) going off the reservation. Ranting about the ACC’s new deal, going with the conspiracy theory of North Carolina/basketball favoritism, expressing how interested Florida State is (or should be) in the Big 12. And generally, acting like he came from the message boards rather than as a steward for the entire school.

The biggest problem was that he was horribly clueless about so much of the reality.

[Andy] Haggard played up the long held idea that the league office is in the back pocket of the basketball programs of Duke and North Carolina, while floating the concept that there is some pile of cash possible if the Seminoles could only package some of their lower-profile football games, maybe even like Texas does with the Longhorn Network.

“It’s mind-boggling and shocking,” Haggard told Warchant.com. “How can the ACC give up third-tier rights for football but keep them for basketball? … It continues the perception that the ACC favors the North Carolina schools.”

The truth is the money delivered by selling off the first- and second-tier rights was shocking enough. Also true: neither of his assertions may be accurate. The ACC later said Haggard was incorrect and third-tier basketball rights are not maintained by schools. And no one has any idea what FSU could get from some of its weaker football games.

Sources say the ACC has not distributed the contract with ESPN to member schools. It rarely, if ever, does. Many in the league are wondering how much Haggard himself came up with the third-tier conspiracy, what he thinks is in the deal or why he believes it even matters so much.

It seems like a ploy to drum up fan support for a bold switch. Nothing rallies boosters like the idea of Coach K bullying someone into action, even if it isn’t true.

What’s also sad, is that this piece by Wetzel has its own whopper of an inaccuracy.

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Back in 2009 we PITT fans eagerly awaited Penn Hill’s linebacker Dan Mason’s field debut as a Panther and it wasn’t too long before we were able to see the extent of how he could play. Mason, a four star recruit who was on everyone’s All-Everything lists, verballed early to PITT and impressed the staff enough that he was in the two-deep at Middle Linebacker coming out of the summer training camp.

He did well that year,  assuming the starting role after Adam Gunn went down with an injury. In his first start he had 11 tackles and two sacks against Navy which earned him the Big East Defensive Player of the Week. Pretty damn good start to a career, eh? Mason ended up with three starts in 2009 including the bowl game where he made a game saving interception at the goal line to preserve a win against North Carolina.

In 2010 he was the uncontested starter at Middle Linebacker and played in three games before his dramatic and very serious knee injury, sustained when he was tackling a Miami player after a pass reception. That is a gruesome injury and he found out afterward that it was much more than a common MCL/ACL injury as he had thought. Reflecting back on how it happened Mason said this:

“I think about it ’cause I was so stupid just,” Mason says with a smile. “I love getting contact so as he was going down I wanted to give him an extra shot, and I guess I blinked or something and he went lower than I thought he was gonna go. He took out my knee.”

 Mason initially didn’t know the damage that had been done. He thought he had torn his ACL. If only. “I rolled over and I looked down and saw my knee poking out. I was like ‘Oh man. I saw some of my teammates running the other way grossed out and everything. [The bone] wasn’t poking out of my skin, but you could see the form of the bone poking out. It didn’t break the skin.”

Ugh.  It was bad then and the news would get worse. Not only was his knee almost literally destroyed in being dislocated along with shredded ligaments but he also had serious nerve damage which resulted in “Foot Drop”, which sounds harmless enough but is a condition in which the person can’t flex the ankle into an upward position which leads to the foot staying at a downward angle and dragging along the floor.  Try waking with that let alone attempting to play ball again.

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Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by this.

The University of Pittsburgh filed a lawsuit Friday in Allegheny County Court in an effort to leave the Big East after the 2012-13 academic year, one season earlier than required by the conference.

Pitt also asked for unspecified monetary damages, according to a 34-page court filing.

Pitt maintains the Big East relinquished its required 27-month waiting period for departing members by not holding West Virginia and TCU to the standard when they announced last year they were leaving the conference, the lawsuit states.

Apparently Pitt had begun negotiations with now-deposed Big East Commish John Marinatto about Pitt getting out after the 2012-13 season — as was widely expected. The problem was, talks had abruptly ended a few weeks ago. Something that shouldn’t be a surprise in light of Marinatto’s firing since according to the reports of Marinatto’s demise, the firing “had been building for weeks.”As such, it should be no surprise that the Big East powers started cutting off Marinatto’s authority.

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Well, FSU’s AD finally had enough of the chatter and reporters calling and asking for comments.

In an interview with the Orlando Sentinel, FSU athletics director Randy Spetman said his programs were “committed to the ACC” and that any conversations about the school switching conferences is pure nonsense.”We’re in the ACC. We’re committed to the ACC,” Spetman said. “That’s where our president and the board of trustees has committed to, so we’re great partners in the ACC.”

For the past seven days, what started as quiet chatter on message boards and blog sites quickly turned into a matter of serious conversation among those following college football.

Florida State, the speculation said, was contemplating a move out of the ACC and was planning to go to the Big 12.

Spetman flatly refuted such accusations.

“I’m not out negotiating,” he said.

…

Spetman also told the Orlando Sentinel on Friday that any reports about him or any of his fellow FSU officials out talking to Big 12 officials are patently false.

“They’ve said I’ve been in Texas all this week,” Spetman said. “My wife was wondering how I was getting back and forth every day.”

According to Austin American-Statesman columnist Kirk Bohls, Spetman may be telling the truth.

In a tweet from Thursday, Bohls said that Texas and Texas Tech officials were surprised about the rumors involving FSU and similar rumors involving the Seminoles’ ACC partner, Clemson.

“‘First I’ve heard of it,’ one high-up says,” Bohls tweeted.

When pressed about why reports are existing with respect to his school and Big 12, Spetman added: “I don’t know why people have written that.

“I don’t know how they can say that — and I don’t mean to pick on the media — but how can the media person come out and say that there was a Florida State person in a meeting that wasn’t true? How can they get away with that? To my knowledge, nobody from our organization was there. So I don’t know how they can get away with saying that.”

Will this help end the rumors? I doubt it.

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