110 Days. That was how long the Floss made you wait. For this I apologize. But as usual the Floss will make "false" promises. If the Pitt Panthers win this week, I will update the blog everyday until their season ends. A loss, the Floss will do his best.
So for your reading pleasure, the Floss' 33.333333% season grades:
QUARTERMAN: Bill Stull was Wanny's guy from day one, don't you think he would have been a little bit better? He has a candy arm, can't throw a deep ball in bounds, and he doesn't have any running ability. All that being said, I don't know if anyone of our quarterbacks could be better right now. The Floss was in the very small Pat Bostick camp all off season, and I wanted him to get a shot again. In college football, future is important. Stull has one more year, and he will be the starter barring injury, which will only hurt this team. He won't have a big offseason, he will just continue his mediocrity. Bill Stull will never have that "it" factor to get your team a win. Tyler Palko had "it", think Notre Dame, it was his "fuckin" team. Will Bill Stull ever grasp the whole team? No.
GRADES: Stull--C, Cross--A
RUNNIN BACK Y'ALL: Shady McCoy was a Heisman candidate before the season started, but he quickly lost all hope after the loss to Bowling Green. Shady has been decent this year, but he didn't really change much for the better in the offseason. He still has his big runs, but I expected more. LaRod is my offensive captain and MVP right now. Dude is ballin' out of control.
GRADES: Shady--B, LaRod--A+
FULLBACK: Pitt really does have weapons here, sorry no one knows about them. Redge has dropped some passes, but I can't warrant a grade.
GRADES: N/A, Thanks Uncle Dave
TIIIIIIIIIIGHHHHHHT ENDS: Another position where we have the ballers, but we don't know how to use them. I am currently looking up the statistics of the tight ends on this team. The Floss is going to be very pissed at the results. Yep, pretty pissed. Currently Nate Byham is on pace for a startlingly low 24 grabs. So math majors, 2 catches a game, for a kid that is a leader on the field, works hard, doesn't quit, etc. UN-ACCEPTABLE. Dorin Dickerson, the former savior, is on pace for 18 catches. This is all due to Uncle Dave and Cav's hate to throw the ball over the middle of the field.
GRADES: A-minus to both, they do it when they get the chances.
WIDE RECIEVERS: One of the best positions for the Panthers going into the season has been a huge flop. However, the main reason is coaching. Oderick Turner is a CANCER for this team. He is like the ulcer on collective dippers' lips. He sucks. Drops more than he catches and in his 3 years playing, he may have made one great play. Kinder bounced back nicely from injury, but he doesn't look like the same guy who scored that 80 yard TD against Cincinatti 2 years ago. Ced Mcgee has been pretty money, which is why we call him Ced Money. TJ has continued to make plays. His only knack is that he loves getting in the dogghouse, or the Wannhouse. Jonathan Baldwin was the 2nd most heralded recruit of the Wanny era only behind Shady(and it was damn close). Yet he has been on the field very few. Pray that he gets on the field against the Bulls.
O-LINE: Actually the line has been decent. If they were this good last year, Patty B would still be the starter. All I know is that Joe Thomas gets better every week, thank god. Malecki has been solid. Houser has been an upgrade over Vangas. CJ is CJ. Pinky is good. They are formidable. Hard for the Floss to evaluate the line, although they did help us get nearly 250 bills on the ground against D-1AA Syra-lose.
GRADES: C+, could be a lot worse
D-LINE: The strength of the D, preseason was the interior, but they have just been okay sans Mick Williams. However, due to a mysterious(possibly Buddy Morris) factor, they are always fresh at the end of the game. Wanny does a solid job rotating 5 guys there. Just a solid middle. The ends are getting better week by week. All I have to say about the ends is this: Pre-game Thursday night, people will be talking Selvie, post-game it will be Romeus and Sheard. Dudes are beasts and T-Tuck has been better than expected.
GRADES: B+
BACKERS: Tough position to evaluate due to 2 starters being out. Scott McKillop has won BE defensive player of the week twice, we know dat dude. Greg Williams probably will be a 4 year starter. He was awesome against Iowa. Austin Ransom flys to the ball and probably shouldn't be out there on Thursday. He has played solid. Say it a million times, Fields at LB against spread teams.
GRADES: B
SECONDARY: Aaron Berry has been a good player for this team now for two years. He is a solid B grade so far. Much like Tony Tucker, Jovani Chappel has been a very pleasant surprise this year. Safeties have been shaky at best. First it was the Dom Decicco fiasco in the first two games, now he is the man. Elijah Fields looked to be the answer until he goes and gets pissed on against 'Cuse. Basically they both have shown flashes, and will be good. Eric Thatcher is still 5'9 and 175 pounds. He doesn't tackle particularly well and doesn't really make big plays. Thatch is also as intimidating as Clay Aiken .
GRADES: B--Corners, C-minus--Safeties
COACHING: My favorite thing about the coaching staff, is well...nothing. Okay maybe the D-Line rotations. On offense, I hate how vanilla we are. I hate how they refuse to play Jonathan Baldwin, although this is rapidly changing. I hate how they continue to play Oderick Turner, who either doesn't try or just blows. I hate how we are the only team in college football who doesn't get creative. I hate how our most successful offensive formation last year, the Wildcat, has been X-ed out of the offense. Things I like, they run the ball a lot. I actually believe in running the ball. Clock management isn't as important in college as the pros, but with our kind of offense it is. I just wish they would use Redge, Hyno, Collier, and Shariff Harris. None of them can redshirt, so give them a few chances to shine. On defense, I hate how we stay in the base defense unless it is a clear cut nickel or dime situation. Mix up the fronts, play some more corners, I don't know, just changing it up will help. Pitt has just lucked out three weeks in a row on defense because they played pro style offenses instead of playing spread teams that can spread out a 4-3. Obviously the 4-3 hurt us against Bowling Green, where their spread attack dinked and dunked all the way down the field. Remaining on the schedule, Pitt plays 2 true spread teams(WVU, USF), 3 Pro Styles(Rutgers, ND, and Cinci), 1 good tweener offense(Uconn), 1 average tweener offense(The L), and whatever Navy runs. So basically unless we adjust to teams, our defense really only matches up fine with 3 of the 8 remaining teams. This coaching staff has actually earned some credibility the past three weeks, but in true Wanny fashion, I expect a heavy dose of Fuck Up.
GRADES: C-MINUS--WANNY, C-MINUS--CAV, C--BENNETT
UN-BEAT-A-BULLS
South Florida is undefeated and the clear cut favorite to win the Big East(watch out for Uconn though), but this Pitt team is ready. They laid a BIG BIG egg in week one against Bowling Green, but since have bounced back. The wins weren't all that pretty, but when Wannstedt only had 13 wins vs. D1 opponents in 3 years, a win is a win. Plus we have hit some milestones this year. Wanny won his first off a bye week. We beat a Big 11 team for the first time in Wanny's tenure. We came back from 8 points down in the fourth quarter at Syracuse and won by 10. The Floss actually likes our chances this week. I wish I knew how healthy George Selvie was because if he is less than 70%(still probably better than Joey T and probably Pinky), Pitt should run at him the whole first half. Our offense will not be able to keep up(understatement of the year). What we do have is a good running game. Do you remember West Virginia, when we just kept the ball out of their hands most of the game? Exactly what we need to do again. This could be a Wanny type game to win because his pro mentality is the right idea. Come out, run the ball, win the field position game, and score when the opportunities are there. In a perfect World, Pitt will control the ball something like 18-12(minutes) in the first half and be tied or within 7. A lead would actually be bad for the Panthers to have in this game. Seriously. A lead just leads(pun not intended) to extra conservative on both sides of the ball. Like I said, more runs on offense aren't a bad thing as long as we get a few yards a pop. 3rd and longs murder any team, but I don't want Billy getting blitzed too much. But the D can't just sit back and let them take what they want from 20 to 20. That is the main problem with our D, we don't come out aggressive til we are pinned back by our goal line. Like I said, Pitt cannot jump out to a big lead. I would rather deal with their overrated crowd than watch our D sit back. So 3 keys to the game:
1. Score when the opportunities are there (7's not 3's)
2. Be aggressive on D
3. Run the football
RANT OF THE DAY
I was at the Steeler game the other night and the fans booed Ben Roethlisberger. You don't boo Ben. You don't boo Ben. You don't boo Ben. He won the Steelers' their only Super Bowl in the last nearly 30 years. He had 35 touchdowns last year, won the division, and should have won the playoff game. Steeler fans love the backup, but really Lord Byron. We aren't in the MAC here. Remember Kent Graham, Jim Miller, Mike Tomczak, Queerdell, Tommy Gun. Booing Ben Roethlisberger is like booing your mother after one bad dinner. She's brought you this far and your going to get that upset over one turkey casserole gone wrong. Grow the fuck up.
