The Nittany Turkey

The title for this post should have something to do with the Pitt Panthers, but I’ll temporarily digress from football felines to share some local ursine lunacy. The recent furor over an anthropomorphized, human habituated black bear and her two nine-month-old cubs (affectionately referred to as “the twins” by my illustrious neighbors) that roam around my ‘hood foraging for delectable garbage morsels convinces me that the humans are the ones who need to be relocated to the Ocala National Forest.

After an incident between Momma Bear and a woman trying to protect her yapping little mutt, many of my neighbors are protesting the Florida Wildlife Commission’s policy of trapping and euthanizing bears that endanger humans. These internet-reading, cabernet-sipping, social-media-empowered self-appointed experts think they know better than the FWC about how to deal with nuisance bears. They’ve been protesting and wreaking havoc on the FWC’s efforts.

To them, the bears are just giant, cuddly, mischievous raccoons who are sweet, people-loving critters who care as much about us as we care about them. They just looooooove watching their antics — including one schmuck who used to put food out for them. Bears are impatient. The guy was not halfway out his door when the bear kicked his ass. That was several years ago, and they still haven’t learned. People leave garbage, bird feeders, and food for feral cats (even Pitt Panthers) outside. The bears eat it all and come back for more. They will not be denied.

I’m bearly getting started here!

I’ll get to the Pitt game forthwith, but writing is therapeutic for me and I need to get this off my chest! So I’ll lay on a little more, already.

I have a solution: I’ll stay here with the bears and they can take their entitled, gentrified, knee-jerk asses somewhere where you can’t do any damage to yourself and the bears. “But they’re sooooooo cuuuuute and they were here first, you know. We’re treading on their territory. We should respect our fauna. The bears are why we live here! (But not the snakes, gators, and coyotes, of course).” Why, I oughta…

You just wait until one of their kids or their precious little doggie gets mauled. (According to these idiots, “our” bears are docile and would never harm anyone or anything). Yeah, right — now is foraging season for bears. Bears are omnivores. They’ll eat your bird of paradise plant, they’ll eat your garbage, and if they’re hungry enough, they’ll eat your little Yorkie. Or maybe YOU. With the old fable about the frog and the scorpion in mind, what we know is bears will be bears. Keep them in close proximity with humans — especially morons who feed them wittingly or unwittingly — and someone will get hurt.

End of Rant. Back to Pitt.

Oh, yeah. The #13 Nittany Lions (2-0, 0-0) host the Pitt Panthers (1-1, 0-1) in a nooner clash at the Big Beave (formerly known as St. Joe Memorial Stadium at Beaver, hosted by Accuweather.com). The Panthers are coming off a 20-10 victory over Mid-America Conference Ohio Bobcats. Meanwhile, you know that the Lions beat up on Buffalo 45-13 after a sluggish start.

Speaking of sluggish starts, this is a noon game, and historically, nooner performance has been slow as a black bear waking from hibernation. Fortunately, this is not a road game, or that would have been a double-whammy.

Just two ranked teams in the ACC

Were you aware that there are only two ACC teams in the Top 25? Bookends Clemson (#1) and Virginia (#25) are ranked. That’s it. And Pitt has already lost to one of them (Virginia). Fortunately for the Panthers, Clemson isn’t scheduled this year.

(In comparison, seven Big Ten teams are ranked in the Top 25).

But funny things happen in the ACC, so ya nevah know who’s going to emerge as an unexpected victor from one week to the next. Recall that in 2016, Clemson’s only loss was a 43-42 squeaker in Pittsburgh. And in 2017, Pitt stunned Miami. So, never count these guys out as gamers.

Is this a rivalry?

No. Not now. Not ever again. The Pitt rivalry days of our St. Joe past are remembered by us grey-hairs, but no one on the team now was alive back then. For them and for the coaching staff, it’s just another game. After this year, the argument will be moot for who the hell knows how many years until (if ever) the two teams play each other again.

Now, granted, some asshole fans use the pseudo-rivalry as an excuse to raise hell and berate the other side, but most of the time, these assholes don’t need an excuse. (Recalling the story of the frog and the scorpion, assholes will be assholes).

The Big Ten has cleverly arranged more pseudo-rivalries, thinking first that we should have a rivalry with Moo U., and then later changing their mind thinking we should have a combinatorially explosive rotating non-rivalry rivalry with Rutgers, Maryland, and the aforementioned Moo U. You’ve seen me rant about that bullshit before, so I’ll spare you.

That said, Shitt on Pitt!

See? I can be a Pitt-hating asshole, too. But I digress. Let’s look at The Pitt Experience of 2019.

What the Ff*ck?

Maurice Ffrench, that’s what. He be da guy to watch on the Pitt offense. The 5’11, 200 lb senior receiver has caught 16 passes for 192 yards and a touchdown this season, with a long one of 75 yards. He’s also a bang-up punt and kickoff returner. He doesn’t Ffumble much.

His wide receiver partner, junior Taysir Mack, is averaging 10 years per reception.

Wash Quarterback, Pat Dry, and Season

Kenny Pickett has been around for a few years now — his first start was that upset over Miami in 2017. The 6’2″, 225 lb junior is now a seasoned college quarterback who can hurt you with his arm (but not so much with his legs). This year, with two games under his belt (Virginia and Ohio), he has thrown for 506 yards, one touchdown and one interception with a completion rate of 60.3%.

Pickett has been sacked five times. Last year, he was sacked 33 times. I’m here to tell you that the O-Line suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks. This is an opportunity for the PSU pass rush to shine.

The Panthers lost their big runner from last year, Qadry Ollison, and they haven’t regained their ground game since then.

Defense

One stat tells a big story. The leading Pitt tacklers are defensive backs. Pitt lost two major contributors on the D-line to season-ending injuries, so I’m thinking this should be a field day for Sean Clifford. However, while this would seem to be an opportunity for the running back committee, they better pick it up after the crappy performance against pseudo-cupcake Buffalo last week. Despite their D-line injuries, Pitt ranks 23rd in rushing defense.

The question is whether James Franklin and the offensive brain trust will figure out this defense enough to exploit it without suffering Buffaloesque embarrassment in the first half. And the second half, too, for that matter!

Encouragingly, one area in which the Pitt defense has struggled is in defending third-down conversions, where they rank #69, allowing 36.7% This is an opportunity for Penn State to mitigate its abysmal third-down conversion rate of 17.6%, ranking 127th out of 130 teams. Holy dropped pass, Batman!

Da Wedda

Showers with a high of 74 is what AccuWeather tells me. Shouldn’t be much of an issue, should it?

Da Bottom Line

Well, you know, I have to tell you the bear (sic) truth. In my mind, until we see this game and Maryland after the bye week, we haven’t seen enough to pass intelligent judgement on PSU Football 2019. Nevertheless, I’m happy to put my foot in my mouth in this regularly incorrect section of the Turkey Report.

The spread has remained flat at 17 – 17.5 all week but the o/u has risen five to 53.5. This gets us to a break-even at about 36-18 in favor of Penn State. Turkey think that about right, kimosabe. Still not put big wampum where mouth is. Me say we get heap big first half bullshit where someone ask to change channel and put on old Lone Ranger because bored. In second half, after being down 17-7 at halftime, heap big PSU defense clamp down while offense get going with 27-point explosion. Penn State 34, Pitt 17. Hiho Silver! Away!

I’ll be back after the game with some bear (sic) facts about the game if as yet unnamed Tropical Cyclone Nine doesn’t inundate my ass.