As a quick followup to our “Where would Boyd be drafted?” contest two of us picked the Bengals (or Bungles in TX Panther’s case).

I weighed in at 9:28 am on the morning of Round One, before the draft started, with this:

OK – I’m thinking the Bengals take Boyd with their second round pick. I also think Holtz gets in on a surprise 6th or 7th pick tomorrow.  Pitts is left looking around like he never did on the field of play.

Comment by Reed 04.28.16 @ 9:29 am

Then the next day, before Round Two started, Texas Panther posted this:

He will become a Bungel

Comment by TX Panther 04.29.16 @ 7:32 pm

I win!!! I win!!!  Told you I was smart…

I also told you I love Mike Wysocki of The Pittsburgh City Paper and I just figured out why… he writes a lot like I do with tongue-in-cheek views mixed in with irreverence and some plain talking.  He also tends not to sugar coat things.

Since the last big interesting Pitt football issues just happened with Boyd being drafted we are looking a football desert over the next few months so I’m trying to find stuff that is interesting to readers yet pertains to us as Pitt fans also.

Wysocki just did an article on April 27th about on of the most highly coveted HS football players and his school Pine-Richland.  Well, this is mostly about the school but so what.

 Some 16-year-olds are awkward, immature and just hoping to get through high school. Others, like Phil Jurkovec, of Pine-Richland High School, are fielding full-ride collegiate offers from Pitt, Penn State, Ohio State (sorry THE Ohio State), Notre Dame, Michigan State, UCLA, Wisconsin, West Virginia and Temple.

OK, so it won’t be Temple. But most other kids aren’t like Jurkovec. Right now the Gibsonia teen is in 10^th grade, but in 2018, he will be on the national stage. 

He is the most highly sought football recruit in Western Pennsylvania since Jeannette’s Terrell Pryor (who went to, and was later kicked out of, THE Ohio State University for swapping autographs for Just imagine that many people being interested in you. At 16, I had only two offers. One was a job mowing the neighbor’s lawn for 10 dollars in beer money.

I’ve been reading sports articles all my life and have paid very close attention to other sportswriters since I started writing on here year ago and I have to say that this guy Wysocki is one of the best in the business.  He puts out about an article a week and I’m going to link them no matter which sport he is talking about.

Why do I think he’s so funny… watch for yourself…

For you Butler County guys here is one on that area and its contribution to the sports world.  My new favorite line of all time?  “It’s like a staycation in a time machine.” Fantastic!

The Jeep was developed by the Bantam Company in the early 1940s. John Roebling invented “wire rope” that he used to help construct the Smithfield Street Bridge, in Downtown Pittsburgh, and his more famous bridge in Brooklyn. Evans City was the genesis for our zombie obsession, as George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead was famously shot there. It’s also contributed to hair metal. The composer of “Unskinny Bop” and “Talk Dirty to Me,” Bret Michaels, is a Butler county native. Butler has even produced a secretary of defense; William J. Perry ran that cabinet position under Bill Clinton.

The breadth of athletic contributions is impressive as well. Pro wrestling technically isn’t a real sport, but here in Pittsburgh it is. What would Andre the Giant have been without his rival, the late Big John Studd? That’s right, Studd came from Butler. It’s not necessarily a football factory like surrounding counties, but having Paul Posluszny is a nice feather in the cap. The Poz, as well as former Notre Dame golden boy and Pittsburgh Steeler Terry Hanratty, are native sons. So is former NFL coach of the year and College Football Hall of Famer Jim Haslett.

Back to Boyd; here is a piece about Boyd’s plans for the Cincinnati offense:

“(We draft picks) coming in are basically the missing pieces to this organization,” he said. “A lot of core guys have been playing here for a long time. They’ve been going to the playoffs, but haven’t excelled to the next step, like the Super Bowl.

“So, I feel like they drafted the right guys.”

Huh, OK.  Guess that has been the reason for no Super Bowl since Mr. Arrogance himself, Maryland’s Boomer Eiasion, played QB for them.

Jerry DiPaola talks more about Boyd’s journey to the Bengals and about how some teams wanted J. P. Holtz to play fullback in the NFL:

As we now know some other Pitt players went as undrafted Free Agents – J. P. Holtz to the Cleveland Browns; LB Nick Grigsby to the LA Rams and  Lafayette “Dreadlocks” Pitts to the Miami Dolphins.

Penn State had five players drafted which makes sense since four were defensive players… and PSU had a very good defense last season where they were 8th in passing defense with 173.5 ypg; 14th in Total Defense with 345 ypg and 26th in Scoring Defense giving up 21.8 ppg.

In a bit more sobering news PSU’s ex-Favorite Son Jerry Sandusky will be back in court:

Judge John Cleland will hear arguments from prosecutors and Sandusky’s attorneys as the 72-year-old state prison inmate seeks a hearing in which he can present evidence that supports his claim that he was wrongly convicted.

Sandusky’s lawyers want to put on the stand people involved in investigating and prosecuting the case, Sandusky’s trial defense team and others.  Sandusky wants his charges thrown out or to be granted a new trial.

Oh, of course! It is everyone else’s fault.  Sandusky fits right in with the guards at Auschwitz who claimed they were just acting under orders.

Maybe this new judge will go for chemical castration so that there is no confusion by the other inmates as to which gender role Ol’ Jerry will play during  the Friday Night Games Hour at his new home.  the PA State Greene Correctional Institution.

Here the reason Tom MacVitte got that late recruiting season phone call from LSU’s Les Miles:

1. LSU Tigers

2016 options: Brandon Harris (Jr.), Danny Etling (Jr.)

The Tigers bring back more than 90 percent of their starters from a year ago. LSU also added a defensive coordinator, Dave Aranda, who has coaches abuzz after what he did at Wisconsin.

Really, quarterback is the only legitimate question mark on the entire team.

Harris has completed 54 percent of 322 career attempts; he was 37th in yards per attempt and 41st in QBR in 2015. That isn’t nearly the ceiling anyone anticipated for Harris, the No. 2 dual-threat prospect in the 2014 class and someone whose arm talent received high marks.

Harris remains optimistic of a late bloom, and the staff continues to express support. But Etling, the Purdue transfer, presents a viable option, and this race will heat up in August.

 To bring this to a close on a Pitt Note here is part of the pre-draft Pro-Day workouts that lead to those guys above being woo’ed by the NFL.