Beanie's favorite meal.

It's been well-documented already, but the amount of holding by Ohio State's offensive line was beyond comical.  Aaron Maybin was held practically all night, and the interior linemen didn't fare much better.  We're talking blatant stuff here -- grabbing fistfuls of jerseys and whipping defensive linemen to the ground.  It was happening in the very plain view of multiple officials, and guess what?  Not one holding flag against Ohio State all night.  Sometimes, it truly does feel like 11 vs. 18 on the field in this conference.

Need an unbiased opinion?  Allow me to quote Mr. Orson Swindle, during Ohio State's final drive:

And then there's this picture.

Anyway.

Defensive Line:  A  

Okay, one last example as long as we're on the subject.  On Pryor's first scramble, no less than three Penn State defensive linemen (Odrick, Okoli, and Evans) were clearly held.  The good news? If holding is such a widespread problem throughout a game, at least defensive line is raising hell.  The PSU defensive line was in the right place virtually all night.  Beanie Wells ate spoonful after heaping spoonful of stuffing.  Pryor made a few plays with his feet but didn't change the game in any meaningful way.  Maybin and Odrick were the stars of this unit.

Linebackers:  A-

Josh Hull and Tyrell Sales got the starts, and both played rather well.  Hull was getting a little more downhill than in previous efforts, and was more than eager to take on Beanie Wells. Still, he keeps getting stoned on blitzes.  The defense may as well play with ten players instead of forcing Hull to awkwardly dance with a random offensive lineman.

Sales made two especially great plays.  The first was sniffing out a screen pass to Robiskie and making a great open field tackle.  The second was throwing Beanie Wells to the ground after Mark Rubin knocked the ball away from Terrelle Pryor.  Oh, and then he poked the ball toward his teammates. 

Navorro Bowman, as always, was everywhere.  In the backfield taking down Wells, deflecting passes.  Truly awesome.  Now, imagine him and Sean Lee on the field together next year.

Secondary:  A-

They all played pretty well, but let's face it.  This is about Mark Rubin, who was tough from the very beginning.  He fought off a block on the first screen pass and stuck his nose between Beanie's numbers.  Then made the next tackle.  After a while, you expected Mark Rubin to always be the last guy in the dogpile to be peeled off Beanie Wells. Rubin was occasionally lost in pass coverage, but against such a run-heavy, one-dimensional offense, he was outstanding.

Coaching: A+

Stop Beanie Wells and let the chips fall where they may.   Not the most complicated gameplan you'll ever see, but it didn't have to be exotic.  Just effective.

Oh, and waaaaaaaah, holding!

Almost forgot, didn't you?  You're wasting time in Blogfrica (Blogbabwe?  Blogistan*?).  It's a Wednesday.  It's football season**.  That means it's time for the 8,395 Penn State blogs to put their pasty heads together for Blue & White Roundtable. 

Continue reading this post »

You can tell we're getting closer to the season when the fluff articles start coming out telling you all about players X, Y, and Z who have overcome insurmountable obstacles to get where they are today. They are interesting to read, but don't offer much fodder for blog discussions other than lumping them into a Nitt Picks.

Our first article comes from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review who had a discussion with Sean Lee about his rehab.

Continue reading this post »

Between Fresno and Notre Dame?  Really?

I'll save everyone the obvious rant here and try to get to the reason I find this so disturbing.  This is a screen shot from Mark Schlabach's updated summer rankings.  Blurbs are obviously required, but you'll be disappointed if you think they give any insight into his rating system.

The issue here, I think, is that this apparently thoughtless set of rankings is posted on the most visible platform in sports.  To say "oh it's just a summer ranking" is partially correct, but when these guys decide to sit down and spit out their own Preseason Top 25's, how do you think they do their research?  See where I'm going here?

But so what, right?  Even if the AP preseason ranking is way off, won't it straighten itself out?  The truth is this: not necessarily.  Starting behind in the polls is not that much different than starting behind in a race: you can't win unless the other guys slow down.  An undefeated Penn State team in 2005 would have been shut out of the BCS National Championship game, and misguided preseason polls are one of the main reasons that the Auburn Tigers were short changed in 2004 (they started at #17, USC and Oklahoma debuted at #1 and #2).

While I'm not implying that our boy Schlabach gets to declare the BCS finalist in June, I am saying that the least he could do is put some thought into his work.  It's especially embarrassing for Penn State when you look at the ridiculousness of the sandwich they are put in.  Here are the two teams in all of D1a that Schlabach thinks fall in line next to PSU:

23. Fresno State - Mark says:

With 16 starters back from a team that finished 9-4 in 2007, Fresno State is a popular choice to unseat Boise State and Hawaii in the WAC and contend for a spot in a BCS bowl game.

Even if every starter was returning, a 9-4 record in the WAC doesn't exactly imply they are all of the sudden BCS bound in 2008.  Speaking of starters, according to your own website, Fresno is only returning 15 starters, not 16...which makes me wonder why in the world you wouldn't use your own "experts" as a resource.  Penn State also returns 16 starters and finished with a 9-4 record in the Big Ten, so naturally they fall behind the Bulldogs.

24. Penn State - To paraphrase, they can't be very good because Paterno is old.

25. Notre Dame - Mark Says:

NBC thought enough of their future to renew its TV contract another five years.

This is simply amazing: They are ranked in his Top 25 because of the extension of a TV contract.  It's not very often that I am blown away by the failed logic of the good people at the WWL (I've been conditioned), so congratulations Mark, you are a step ahead of your peers. 

I'm left thinking about the other teams that deserve this spot; all the other schools that would be sitting at 25 if only they were named Notre Dame.  Teams including, but not limit to: Georgia Tech, Michigan, Michigan State, Purdue, Boston College, Navy and Air Force.  All of these teams manged to win more than three games, but apparently don't appear on TV enough to be ranked.  Tough luck guys.

I'm not here to say Penn State should be placed higher, or even that Notre Dame doesn't belong, my point is that it's scary how much say reports have in the process and equally troubling how little they appear to care.  Or maybe it's something else, I don't know.  Regardless of why this happens, here are a couple of things I find totally unacceptable in the poll system:

• That voters justify a high ranking for a team because "they have a soft schedule", as in they will be ranked high because they won't lose much.  What the hell is the point of the polls then?  Why don't we just use overall W-L if you are going to judge your rankings on pure record.  The whole point is to be able to see past the schedule, to take the difficulty of the path into consideration.
• When voters refuse to let a clearly better team jump a higher ranked team simply because both continue to win.  Preseason polls are totally unreliable and based entirely speculation, yet most writers refuse to reevaluate their original opinions based on what they actually see on the field.
• That coaches get to vote.  No one has more invested in the BCS rankings than these guys and it's crazy that they are expected to not only follow all 120 D1a teams, but also objectively rate themselves and their opponents on a weekly basis.

 With all the talk about reformatting the BCS games, I think I might be more troubled by the underlying ranking system.  We can add another round of games, or even expand to an eight team playoff, but if we are going to change the format I think the selection process needs to be reevaluated as well.

I probably spent more time on this than Steele did, but I suppose that's what blogging is all about.  I'll review the first teamers in depth, summarize the rest of the PSU representation, and give some final thoughts below:

Big Ten 1st Team:

DE Maurice Evans - Frank Cooney has Evans as the third best DE in the nation, so, ya, he's kind of a big deal.  He was also named to both the Bronko Nagurski Trophy and Rotary Lombardi Award watch list. The nice thing about DE's is they tend to bring a fairly consistent game week in and week out. Production is another issue, but this has a lot to do with the ability of an offense to scheme around select players. Either way, he is going to be making plays or making it easier for others to do the same.  There is also no question he belongs on the 1st team.

SS Anthony Scirrotto -I'll be the first to admit that I have a tough time judging how well a SS is actually playing.  You typically see them on three different plays: (1) lining up and destroying a receiver when the QB throws a 'hospital pass' (have to give credit to my high school hockey coach for that one). For example:

Ahh, good times.  Moving on...(2) when the corner either blitzes or blows a coverage, leaving the safty to cover as a corner, or (3) chasing down a guy who has already caught the ball in stride headed down field. It's difficult to judge which one of these things is the player blowing his assignments and which is his ability to make up for others' shortcomings. I do know this: he hits people hard (see above), he runs a 4.56 forty (solid, not great), he led the Big Ten in interceptions (6), and finished second amongst all players in the conference with 14 passes defended. What I'm getting at is that he's pretty good at what he does, even if he does look short on the field for some reason.

LB Sean Lee - I couldn't resist bringing him up, and I'm still not fully over his injury, which doesn't sound right but you know what I'm saying.  Rehab is coming along, although as suspected it sounds a little discouraging.

The Rest of The Story

CB AJ Wallace (2nd Team), DT Phillip Taylor (4th Team) and LB Tyrell Sales (4th Team) also made the list.  Wallace is what guys like Paterno call a "football player".  He doesn't dominate at any one position but has shown the ability to play WR, CB and return kicks with a high level of success.  King was as quick as any player on the field, but Wallace might have a better football sense and that will help him become the lock down guy we need.  Taylor gets the nod here despite make more bad news than good.  While he is a solid player I think Ollie Ogbu should have been named here instead.  Sales recorded 50 tackles last season and by most accounts has shown improvement during the off-season.  With the injury to Lee, he is going to have to "step it up", as they say.

Special Teams 1st Team

P Jeremy Boone - No question here, and with Paterno's ultra-conservative road game plans, Boone might end up being a lot more important to PSU's success than most people realize.  While he struggled in the loss to MSU, he posted an impressive 51.4 yard per kick average in the bowl game and shows consistency..

KR AJ Wallace - See above...basically Wallace and Williams are one of the better 1-2 punches in the Big Ten.

Special Teams 2nd Team

PR Derrick Williams - More of this, please:

Special Teams 3rd Team

K Kevin Kelly - Here's the deal:

So basically, he's money inside 40 and, well, not money outside 40.  This is great if you are settling and want the three points, but it can be frustrating when you are trying to mount a drive at the end of a half or are facing a 4th and long on the opponent's 30 yard line.  Don't get me wrong, I'll take perfection from inside 40 all day long, I'm just saying there is room for improvement.

Other Defensive Notes...

-Ohio State has 10 of their 11 defensive starters on Steele's first three teams. 
-Illinois will never be able to replace J, he's an American Hero , but they appear to have another decent linebacker in Martez Wilson.
-Minnesota has just one player on the All Conference Team, 3rd Team LB Steve Davis.  Ok, that's the wrong Steve Davis, but there probably isn't that much to share about the football player anyway so enjoy the read on Snooker.

In this day and age the trend for most conferences is to backload the schedule of their better teams putting off their better games until late in the season. The thinking goes like this: let your powerhouse teams rack up impressive 8-0 or 8-1 records and then let them go at it. Any team with eight wins late in October is most likely ranked and attractive to television. Pit two highly ranked teams against one another and you get a lot of attention. Lots of attention means national television appearances which is good for the conference as well as the two programs involved. But this year the Nittany Lions should coast through their three games in November if all goes well. As Frank Bodani points out, our real test will be the month of October.

Then comes the most memorable October on record.

The Lions play back-to-back road games against Purdue and Wisconsin, which are backed up against homecoming vs. Michigan and a trip to Columbus, Ohio.

What a stretch.

By the time the bye week hits on Nov. 1, the Lions will be either in the national title hunt or will be regrouping once again.

I see a lot of Nittany Lion fans already putting on the blue tinted glasses. They are scoffing at the preseason polls that rank us in the 20's if at all. They hold up other polls as gospel when they predict us in the Top 10. People, have we learned nothing over the past two years?

Count me as cautiously optimistic about this season. I think we'll have a good team. And why shouldn't I? We return nine starters on offense and eight on defense. But you have to admit their are some questions about this team. And if we've learned anything in the past two years, it's that these questions don't always magically work themselves out.

We're going to be starting a new quarterback this year. While it's tempting to say nothing could be worse than what we had the last two years, that doesn't necessarily mean we'll get something great. Many people are convinced Daryll Clark is the next Michael Robinson after he rushed for 60 yards and a touchdown in the Alamo Bowl. But oddly the coaches didn't even let him attempt a pass in that game. And honestly can anyone remember him completing a pass? The stats say he has, but he hasn't had any meaningful playing time his entire career other than the 2006 Michigan game. He looked completely terrified of the Michigan defense in that game. Perhaps rightfully so as he was the second quarterback of the evening to be carried off the field blowing snot bubbles.

But as far as the offense as a whole I'm not too worried. We sport a veteran offensive line and two great running backs. That alone is enough to score a lot of points. The new quarterback, whether it be Clark or Devlin or even Cianciolo, will just be asked to keep it simple and don't make mistakes. And he'll even have a veteran corp of wide receivers to work with. The offense will be fine. It's the defense I'm worried about.

The defensive line is killer. Evans, Odrick, Koroma, and Gaines all have NFL potential. If the worst case scenario happens and Joe Paterno runs them over in a fit of road rage, we'll simply throw Lattimore, Baker, Taylor, and Maybin out there. If those guys decide to go "party walking" and stomp some guy in front of 50 witnesses on College Avenue we'll just go with Hayes, McEowen, Okoli, and Still and you know what? That wouldn't even bother me one bit. The defensive line will not be a problem with this defense. The linebackers and defensive backs? Meh...

The loss of Sean Lee is huge. Yeah we've recruited well in recent years, but Lee was the heart and soul of this defense. And now he's gone leaving a huge leadership void. I think our linebackers will be ok, but I would feel a lot better if our opening day lineup was Lee, Colasanti, and Bowman rather than Hull, Gbadyu, and Sales as it appears at this point.

In the secondary we obviously lose Justin King, which may or may not be a bad thing considering the way he got torched like a marshmallow at girlscout camp in the second half of the season. A.J. Wallace looks like he has the physical tools to be a good corner, but whether he has the discipline to stay under control remains to be seen. Also, I'm not convinced Mark Rubin is a great choice for safety. I think he'll be great in run support, but with our defensive line and linebackers I'm not sure we need him there. We need a great cover guy that can lock down the tight end or third wide receiver. I'm not sure he has the speed to do that.

And we can't completely ignore the schedule. It's damn tough. The out of conference schedule should be challenging, but manageable. Illinois is a team that always plays us tough. Zook always has a surprise for us. In 2006 he broke out the option for the first time against us. In 2007 he brought in backup quarterback Eddie McGee in the second half, and he promptly broke off a 60 yard run on us. Count that game as one that scares me.

The night game at Wisconsin is a bit frightening, but I have a good feeling about that game. Their power running game plays into our strength on defense. And we pretty well demoralized them at home last year. One or two lucky bounces in 2006 we would have beat them despite our horrible quarterback and offensive line play. I think we'll get that one.

Michigan has more questions than answers, so that's a game we should win at home. Count Ohio State as a loss. So it would sound like I'm talking myself into an 11-1 or 10-2 season. But there is always the Paterno factor. Joe is notorious for puckering up on the road and playing conservative. I have to think there will be one or two games we come out flat and grossly underachieve. Games at Purdue and at Iowa look like prime targets. Couple the fact that Indiana went to a bowl game last year and Dantonio is bringing Michigan State around and I think it's highly possible we drop two of those games.

I'm not prepared to make an official prediction until I study all of these teams in more depth. (I have to go out and get my copy of Phil Steele this week.) All I'm saying is let's not make asses out of ourselves like recent years. We have the potential to go 12-1, but it's also likely we could end up 9-4 for the third year in a row.