The Nittany Turkey

Primarily about Penn State football, this is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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Archives for November 2008

Roses and Lollipops

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The Penn State Nittany Lions (11-1, 7-1 Big Ten) walked off the field Saturday with much more than the god-forsaken Land Grant Trophy. Having decimated the Michigan State Spartans (9-3, 6-2) by a score of 49-18, the Lions were awarded the Big Ten Conference Championship trophy and a whole shitload of roses. The win was Penn State’s 800th, a milestone only six collegiate programs have surpassed.

Penn State played out its game plan perfectly. Everyone knew that stopping Javon Ringer would be of paramount importance, and the boys handled that task unfailingly, holding him to 42 yards on 17 carries, thus forcing Brian Hoyer to throw the football. Hoyer wound up completing 25 of 40 attempts for 206 yards and two interceptions. His average completion was only 5.2 yards. The PSU pass defense did its job.

Daryll Clark has returned from la-la land. He showed no signs of the hesitancy, inaccuracy, and air-headedness that had been plaguing him for the past few games. He played the game of his life before the 109,000+ frozen fans, and brought home the roses, going 16-26 for 341 yards and four touchdowns and no interceptions. How’s that for a career day?

In all, Penn State’s prolific offense racked up 557 yards, 419 of those through the air. That’s more passing production than ever heretofore was recorded for a Penn State game.  Paterno pulled out all the stops, loosened up the reins, and whatever the hell other metaphors you want to plug in here.

The Nittany Lions took care of business, allaying all our pre-game fears. We worried that they would not stop Ringer. They stopped Ringer. We worried that selling out to stop Ringer would put them in jeopardy of not stopping the pass. They defended the pass well. We worried that Clark would continue his post-concussion ineptness. Clark responded with a career day.

Mitch Albom of the Detroit Free Press, the king of the sports metaphor, summed it up as follows:

And Saturday, Penn State, the Big Ten King, ran a clinic. It was embarrassing how easily the Lions stuffed Javon Ringer, MSU’s biggest star. And Paterno’s offensive linemen created such a perfect pocket around their quarterbacks, it could have been sewn by an Italian tailor.

This Turkey has to wonder what kind of coaching strategy Mark Dantonio was employing in the closing minutes of the game. With the game well out of reach and the clock winding down, going for two points, calling back-to-back timeouts, performing onside kicks—what the hell did he have in mind? Perhaps he thought Joe was running up the score, but, hell, the clean jerseys were in there long before then and, yeah, Devlin was passing, but Moo U’s defense isn’t worth a shit. So, I suppose the strategy was to retaliate with snottiness.

Before, during, and after the game, Joe Paterno did his best to reassure his fans and recruits that he would be back next year, in spite of facing imminent hip replacement surgery. Internet rumors had been flying around all week alluding to the notion that this would be Joe’s last game at Beaver Stadium. It well might, if an asteroid destroys Beaver Stadium next week. PSU President Graham Spanier and athletic director Tim Curley joined Paterno in the locker room after the game. Supposedly, details of Paterno’s future will be hammered out over the next couple of weeks with those two.

I don’t want to start any new rumors here, not that anybody listens to me or anything. However, I wonder whether Joe will return next year with a reduced role. After all, he has indicated that he would be on the sidelines, but he didn’t say he would be there as head coach. He expressed teary-eyed gratitude to all his supporters at the Friday pep rally, while not actually saying farewell. He continues to stress the importance of being able to tell high school recruits that he’ll be there for them. As Joe ages and is hampered by increasingly more of the physical manifestations of aging, the need for a transition plan becomes more urgent. Adding it all up, this Turkey believes this could indeed be Joe’s last season as head coach, but I think he’ll continue his association with the program. The following post-game quote further hints at that:

I’ll sit down some time … and say, “Hey, what do you think of this, what do you think of that, what are we going to do” and that kind of thing.

So when I talk to a high school kid, I can be honest with them. Right now, I have no plans to leave. We’ll see what happens.

Later Saturday evening, Oregon State beat Arizona to remain in the Rose Bowl mix. Many PSU fans seem to be repelled by the potential of a rematch with the Beavers, but this Turkey doesn’t share that opinion. Methinks it would be interesting to see if PSU could throttle them again the second time around. The Beavers are well coached and they have improved dramatically over the season. Let’s not get into the mode that Tennessee fans were in for the 1993 Citrus Bowl. All around the Citrus Bowl before the game, they could be heard bitching that Penn State was an unworthy opponent. After PSU had taken them apart 31-13, they were pretty damn quiet.

It would be cool to play USC again, but isn’t it enough just to be playing in “The Grandaddy of Them All?”

Also, please stop your whining about Penn State not being in the SSMNC game. Shitcan your neuroses and just enjoy the hell out of a good time in Pasadena. What the hell is this obsession with the so-called national championship, anyway? Even with a playoff, you’d never really know decisively who was the best of the best. We’ve repeatedly seen that on any given Saturday, the best can beat the rest and the rest can beat the best. Was Nebraska really better than Penn State in 1994? I don’t know. In Lincoln they’d say so. In State College they’d say no. WTF! It still comes down to boosterism and braggin’ rights. So, who cares? These are the type of people who would have been pissed off at Michael Phelps for bringing home one fewer gold medal than he was theoretically capable of winning.

No matter which opponent it is, everything is coming up roses for the Nittany Lions. They have the Land Grant Trophy, the Big Ten Championship (well, half of it, anyway), and a date in Pasadena. I’d say they did pretty damn well.

Land Grant Trophy Rumblings

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Although this ridiculous trophy should be buried behind some hapless farmer’s outhouse, it surely has inspired a lot of prose through the brief years of its existence. Here are some quotes and links for you.

Glasses of Joe proposes some more reasonable replacements for what Drozz refers to as “Office Furniture”:

This season, the game actually means something, but we all know it’s an anomaly. For the most part, unless the above is happening or LJ is breaking 2000 yards for the season, the game is meh. Let’s make this game worth something. I propose the following trophies/obligations the game should carry with it.

[Visit Glasses of Joe for the list of suggestions.]

— Glasses of Joe, November 19, 2008

And from mlive.com:

But no, the trophy also is adorned with snapshots of tailgate parties, artifacts from all-time great panty raids, part of a burned couch, an empty gin bottle, a vial of water from the Red Cedar River, an outdated pair of Joe Paterno’s prescription glasses and a pig hoof — don’t ask.

It used to have a lampshade, but Kerry Collins borrowed it for a frat party he went to once and it hasn’t been seen since.

It’s topped by the same exact chrome-plated plastic football player that’s on the trophy I got at my eighth-grade football banquet at Ninth Street Hall in Grand Rapids in 1967. You would think someone would have accidentally on purpose picked that off on a locker door years ago.

— mlive.com, November 15, 2007

From a senior lineman:

From what I can remember, it’s heavy. I haven’t seen the Land Grant Trophy recently. I know it’s around. I don’t know.

— Rich Ornberger

Some bloggers annually have a field day with it:

Every year, we go through the same old thing with this trophy. I guess we’ll just have to take solace knowing that Penn State and Michigan State fight for the most well-known “ugly” trophy every year.

No, it doesn’t make me feel better, either.

— Zombie Nation, November 17, 2008

Some go to great lengths to spoof it, spending hours with Photoshop in their desire to eradicate the thing:

This piece of trash should be buried in Grant’s Tomb. The mere possession of it would almost make one play worse, for fear of retaining possession for another year.

But, in their defense, as indefensible this slaughter against the senses is, the 50-Yard Lion has discovered that the Land Grant Trophy was really styled after a more obscure, but equally vomit-inducing, trophy . . . THE LOU GRANT TROPHY.

Pictured here. Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.

— 50-Yard Lion, November 19, 2008

Others try to fathom the genesis of the monstrosity:

[Mike, over at BSD, presented a hilarious fly-on-the-wall conversation among several PSU and MSU functionaries, which he summed up as follows.]

You think I’m making this up? Take a look at this piece of crap. You practically need a forklift to get it in and out of the stadium. I can buy that miniature Nittany Lion at the Student Book Store for $19.95. I suspect I can buy Sparty at the Michigan State bookstore for a similar price. What’s with the pictures of the buildings? Are those post cards? And don’t even get me started on the bowling trophy someone bought at Walmart and nailed to the top. This thing is pathetic and easily the WORST college football trophy if not the worst trophy in all of sports.

— Black Shoes Diary, November 16, 2006

Finally, one of my favorite descriptive quotes comes from Chico Harlan of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

Every year, Penn State or Michigan State — whichever team wins the contest, or perhaps whichever team has spare closet space in its football complex — earns possession of an asymmetrical stanchion called the Land-Grant Trophy, an eyesore award that basically looks like an oversized Rubik’s Cube after five minutes in the mouth of a rottweiler.

— Chico Harlan, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 16, 2005

The Land Grant Trophy…and Much More

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The #8 Nittany Lions (10-1, 6-1 Big Ten) take on the #15 Michigan State Spartans (9-2, 6-1 Big Ten) for the vaunted Land Grant Trophy. However, for a change, this game means a whole helluva lot more, as a piece of the Big Ten championship and a trip to the Rose Bowl are at stake. If Penn State wins, a Rose Bowl bid is all but assured.

You all know by now that since joining the Big Ten, Penn State has never lost to Sparty in seven tries at Beaver Stadium. Aren’t such statistics wonderful, albeit meaningless? I could say that I haven’t missed the toilet once while taking a leak at 7:00 AM but what predictive value does that have about future target practice? There are lots of other variables at play, urologically speaking, so we won’t dwell on this singular, sterile, metaphorical statistic (unless you want to). Hell, this Turkey attended the last Beaver Stadium game where Moo U. beat Penn State, on September 25, 1965. The score was 23-0 and Bubba Smith, now 63, terrorized the Nittany Lion backfield for much of the game. What does that have to do with 2008? Nothing, but neither do those seven Penn State wins since 1990.

Point made? This particular “considered in a vacuum intangible” is pure bullshit.

Land Grant Trophy
Land Grant Trophy

Another manufactured “intangible” is both teams’ presumed blood thirst for possession of the Land Grant Trophy (pictured at left). I mean, look at that ugly mutha. Whoever heard of a trophy with bric-a-brac shelves? Do you think either university actually enjoys having that piece of shit in its trophy case without a sheet draped over it? Hell, if I were playing and my team were to win that scatographically hideous mélange of a mute testament to design by committee, I’d run the other way when it came time to carry the massive, mahogany mounted, misconceived monstrosity across the field. Yea, verily. I hate that junk.

Someone ought to blow it up as a Halloween prank one of these years and be done with it. So much for that “intangible,” but I digress. Sorry, I got carried away; it’s an annual, apoplectic phenomenon.

The compositions of both teams and their performances this year are the only reliable indicators of the outcome of this game, and still there are too many urological variables to assure us of a particular outcome either way. The biggest such variable—and the one least possible to predict—is the human factor. The weather has a bearing on the outcome, too, although this game, being the ill-conceived rivalry game the conference geniuses contrived, is perennially played as the final game of the season in late November, when the weather is always crappy in Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Michigan.

So, given that the emphasis of the Michigan State attack is on its supremely talented running back, Javon Ringer, ranked #3 nationally, and obviously, Penn State’s defensive emphasis will be on stopping him, it is instructive to break down the performance of the big D against Big Ten running backs this season. Here they are.

  • Illinois: #71 Daniel Dufrene, 14 carries, 96 yds, 0 TD, long carry 30
  • Purdue: #29 Kory Sheets, 18, 59, 1, 19
  • Wisconsin: #38 P.J. Hill, 15, 58, 0, 15
  • Michigan: Brandon Minor, 23, 117, 2, 36
  • OSU: Beanie Wells, 22, 55, 0, 8
  • Iowa: #2 Shonn Greene, 28, 117, 2, 14
  • Indiana: Marcus Thigpen, 8, 72, 1, 57

The only non-conference opponent worth mentioning is Oregon State, so let’s add them to the mix.

  • Oregon State: #9 Jacquizz Rodgers, 22, 99, 2, 13

In games in which their top running back was able to gain 96 yards or more, opponents scored an average of 19.7 points. In other games listed above, opponents scored an average of 6.5 points. Accordingly, with the Penn State offense sputtering, the task of shutting down Ringer is of paramount importance.

It is late in the season and an already depleted defensive line is banged up. The linebacker(s) need help. I mean, there really is only one guy I’d call a real linebacker, that being Navorro Bowman. Reports from practice have revealed that Mark Rubin is being drilled as effectively a fourth linebacker in hopes of beefing up the linebacking corps in its all-important quest to keep Ringer under control.

However, if Penn State wants to play eight in the box, Moo U. can beat them with the pass, so selling out to impede Ringer is not a key in itself. The defense has to be competent against the pass, too. Lead Moo-Cow and senior quarterback Brian Hoyer has been improving from game to game. This season thus far, he has completed 137 of 279 passes with 9 TDs and 6 interceptions. He’s been sacked 14 times. Certainly, applying pressure to Hoyer on passing downs is essential. In any case, I would not recommend the BBDB defense, better known here as the matador defense, that was employed against Iowa in the fourth quarter of that game. The soft zone sucks and you’ve heard it here over and over again. Nevertheless, the defense will have to contend with both run and pass situations. For those of you who think Moo U’s offense is one-dimensional, their average yardage per game is 147.82 rushing and 207.36 passing, ranking #64 and #65, respectively. Michigan State actually ranks #9 in rushing in the conference. One has to suppose that a strong reason for that has been the obsession with stopping Ringer. So, let’s see if that strategy is successful.

Here’s how Ringer has played. I’ll show opponents with national rushing defense rank, number of yards, and total MSU points in Big Ten and selected non-conference games.

  • #39 California, 81, 31 (loss)
  • #57 Notre Dame, 201, 23 (win)
  • #92 Indiana, 198, 42 (win)
  • #18 Iowa, 91, 16 (win)
  • #44 Northwestern, 124, 37 (win)
  • #26 Ohio State, 67, 7 (loss)
  • #45 Michigan, 194, 35 (win)
  • #32 Wisconsin, 54, 25 (win)
  • #96 Purdue, 121, 21 (win)

In the above games where Ringer has run for over 100 yards, Moo U. scored an average of 31.6 points; when he was held under 100, they scored an average of 19.7 points. The rush defenses that were able to hold him under 100 yards were ranked nationally between 18 and 39. Penn State ranks #10.

Penn State’s pass efficiency defense ranks #2 nationally. This misleading statistic partially relates to the conservative overall nature of the Big Ten Conference. The only pass-happy team the Nittany Lions have faced was Purdue. The pass defense has not been tested against a competent pass-oriented offense. However, Michigan State does not rank with the cream of the crop there. If PSU does not get too obsessed with Ringer, they can minimize the Moo U. damage.

The Nittany Lions will have to score enough points to win this one. The habit of not playing well in the first half must abate; as well, turnovers must cease. Clark’s two fumbles last week were particularly disconcerting. So, two significant keys will be playing four quarters and taking care of the ball.

Royster, as well, will be a key. The running game, derailed of late, has to get back on track. There have been some significant breakdowns in the interior offensive line that resulted in there being scant few holes to exploit for Royster, who ranks #22 in the nation and #3 in the conference behind Greene and Ringer. Fortunately, the Moo U. rushing defense is ranked #73. Royster should have his way with them.

The pass will be problematical, as Michigan State ranks #12 in pass efficiency defense. Clark hasn’t been throwing very accurately, so this Turkey’s guess is that pass plays, such as there are, will be mostly of the short, safe variety. Whether Clark has worked through his confidence issues and whether he has fully recovered from the concussion he suffered in the Ohio State game—both physically and mentally—is anyone’s guess. Clark certainly has shown signs of impaired decision making, along with his pass accuracy problems. Whether these issues are due to a late-season slump or the concussion are immaterial. Dantonio will no doubt want to test Clark’s ability to handle pressure. Still, Clark is the man, and I doubt that you’ll be seeing Devlin unless the game is well out of reach, one way or the other.

OK, I’ll present a few so-called intangibles for the hell of it, because I like you and I know you can’t live without them.

The Spartans have been relaxing with a bye week. Dantonio made it a vacation week for the players, prohibiting them from accessing the athletic facility during the off week. Sparty will be rested, healed, and ready. Presumably, their attitude will be good because they’ve seen a few movies last week, and they weren’t game films. So that’s an intangible in Moo U’s favor.

Whether the Nittany Lions are equally ready is problematical. Much is at stake in this game, but even more was at stake in Iowa, where the boys faltered miserably. However, this is where the Lions have a great, big intangible advantage: the home crowd. It’s the last game of the year, the Big Ten championship is on the line, it’s Senior Day, and the boys want to see “2008” added to the other championship years inscribed in the ring around the Beaver Stadium luxury boxes. If that doesn’t get a noisy, raucous crowd out, what the hell will?

Indeed, the kickoff is at 3:30 PM, not noon, so the hangovers will have had time to abate and new buzzes will have had enough time to kick in. There are no excuses for a lack of proper ambiance for this game.

The weather will be cold and breezy. We’ve seen some hands issues from the Iowa game forward, not coincidentally all cold weather games. It is this Turkey’s hope that we’ll see fewer dropped passes this week than we have been seeing the past couple of weeks. The weather, however, is an intangible that should affect both teams equally, unless someone hogs all the space heaters while the other guys forget to bring any, as was the case with the Iowa game.

One last intangible. Much has been made of the rumor that this will be Joe Paterno’s final game at Beaver Stadium. He has pooh-poohed that rumor, stonewalling it as usual, but he does admit that he needs a hip replacement and it most likely will happen soon after the Michigan State game. At the press conference today, Paterno stated that he wanted to coach the bowl game on the sidelines, not from the booth. Based on my own rehab track record, that certainly would be possible, as Joe is probably in better shape at 81 than I was at 54. Meanwhile, Joe’s wife, Sue, has been inviting family and friends from all over the country to attend this game. Lots of people are adding two and two, in this Turkey’s opinion, coming up with five. Nevertheless, with a strong, malodorous whiff of a possible Paterno retirement in the air, we have another strongly motivating intangible for the boys.

And so, boys and girls, that brings us to the feature you’ve been waiting for all season, the final Official Turkey Poop Prediction of the 2008 Penn State season! Last week, thanks to the offense forgetting to play the first half, Penn State did not cover the spread. This Turkey predicted a 47-10 outcome; it was actually 34-7. Not unlike my assessment of the crowd, if a game with such significant overtones does not arouse the footballistic passions of the Nittany Lions, they might as well all just visit the apartment of Evans, Koroma, and Quarless and pass a joint around. This is it. This is the season. It’s 48 minutes of basketball. Oops, I mean it’s 60 minutes of football, baby! Las Vegas has established Penn State as a two-touchdown favorite with no over/under at present, although one book opened at 48. That combination would suggest a final score of 31-17. With Ringer on the loose and Clark on the mend, but still a “maybe”, this Turkey thinks the spread is in jeopardy this week. But shit, I’ve been wrong all season. I hope it’s a Penn State blowout, but the OTPP is Penn State 27, Michigan State 24.

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