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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Home Archives for 2009

Archives for 2009

It won’t be significant longer than yesterday!

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I wish to relegate yet another hackneyed sportswriter cliche to the literary garbage can to accompany “it is what it is” and “controls one’s own destiny” in that abominable collection of shoddily written detritus. Today’s trite construct is:

“If [such and such happens/doesn’t happen], it’s going to be a very long day.”

Writers of such trash need to go back to school —  not only to learn how to write, but also to close the scientific knowledge game caused by them sleeping through fifth grade science class. No matter what the Nittany Lions do today, unless the Mayans are correct, Saturday will be approximately as long as any other day. There are minute variations based on many esoteric astrophysical parameters, but how Penn State’s offense performs is not one of them.

Next on the list, two gems: “at the end of the day” and “the [insert famous athlete name here]s of the world”, not to mention using the present tense to describe future activities.

The Battle for THIS!!!

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Land Grant Trophy
Land Grant Trophy

Lots of people think that Penn State still is in the running for a BCS bowl this year. That might well be the case, but I cringe at the thought of crappy special teams play making the Nittany Lions a laughingstock in a big, highly visible BCS bowl.

I don’t think the coaching staff has any answers for the lousy play. In fact, the big guy himself was his old, testy self at the press conference, throwing out flippant responses to serious questions about the special teams’ incompetence.

Yes, indeed. Joe Paterno’s got me worried. ????? ??????? ?????? He says that he’s going to go out there and show them how he did it at Brown, where he still holds the record for most yards gained on punt returns in a single day. Perhaps the Nittany Lions would be better off with Joe returning punts at 83 years of age, bionic hip and all. ?????? ???? ??? When it gets down to Joe offering to do it himself, then you know there’s something to worry about. It might have been tongue-in-cheek and, yeah, he was talking about practice, not the actual game, but how bad is it when the old man himself offers to take over? Pretty bad.

So, here we are, facing the last game of the year with a dysfunctional special teams unit — still. Well, “still” is too bland a word in that context, as they’ve gone from bad to worse. This is a season of regression to the mean, not of raising the level of play. It seems pretty obvious that many of the special teams guys don’t want to be out there, and those who do aren’t getting support from the rest. When you can’t count on guys like Graham Zug, you know it needs to be nuked and rebuilt from the ground up.

I’m not suggesting a special teams coach. The NCAA only allows each school so many coaches. If I was as smart as all the message board geniuses, blogwonks, and lowly sportswriters who think a special teams coach is a pat solution that will transform this fucked up recon platoon into an elite company of fighting men, I’d be pontificating about it here. However, I’m obviously not that smart, as I have no solution to propose. I tend to agree with Paterno that personnel changes are necessary on the field, though, although this is sure as hell not the right time of year to be thinking about that. The special teams coach deal is TFE (that means “too easy”), much akin to changing the head coach if the team has a losing record. You can’t fire the team, so fire the coach. That’s the way fandom works these days. This Turkey is of the opinion that if you don’t have the personnel on the field, you can’t do the job. I’m sorry to say that this year’s personnel pool is largely mediocre, if not in talent, then in attitude. Accordingly, don’t expect any marked improvement between now and the end of that wonderful bowl game you are all hoping for. Moreover, you ain’t going to see what you perceive as a panacea — the vaunted special teams coach — anytime soon.

There. I got that off my chest. Now on to the Michigan State game. Moooooooooooooo U!

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More on the Season Ticket Morass

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In an article posted last night on PennLive.com, David Jones of the Patriot-News amplifies upon the earlier report regarding the Penn State administration’s intention to charge additional fees for season ticket holders and to relocate the student section at Beaver Stadium.

Jones takes no pro or con position on the fees themselves, letting conceptual validation stand up to the fundamental microeconomic principles of supply and demand. He posits that as long as demand exists for the product Penn State is putting out, alumni and fans will pay the freight. However, in the unrestrained manner to which we are accustomed from Jones, he proceeds to go off on the quality of the product, to wit:

“Where I have a real problem with Penn State is part of the product — the pansy scheduling that so transparently reeks of money-grubbing. As a fan of college football, I hate seeing the current trend, not just here but around the country, of power schools scheduling pancakes just in order to get a home game and an extra payout.

…

“Running a business to succeed is one thing. Marketing a product without value is another. And Penn State football this year had very little.”

Although to say that Penn State football this year had very little value might seem like a wee bit of over the top hyperbole, it’s not very far from the truth. Season ticket holders were treated to such finery as sure wins against ho-hum opponents Akron, Syracuse, Temple, and Eastern Illinois, in which the Nittany Lions underperformed, apparently thinking they could “mail it in”. Paying customers were further tormented by the inability of this year’s team to rise to the level of Iowa and Ohio State, and they were wrung out watching a half-assed effort against Indiana. Alas, the homecoming game with Minnesota, won by PSU 20-0, might have been the only truly entertaining game of the year, but because of the snowstorm, it was sparsely attended, the vast confines of Beaver Stadium appearing to be half empty. In summation, the home fans attending games at Beaver Stadium were treated to three halves of football: half-assed, half-gassed, and half-vast.

As I mentioned in my previous post on this subject, I know a long-time season ticket holder who has had enough of this crap and will definitely not be renewing his contract. I know that there are more like him who will raise hell, and many more who will silently pull out. Raising the price of a product while reducing its quality is an arrogant gesture that takes unfair advantage of the fierce loyalty we all feel for Dear Old State. David Jones hits the bullseye in that regard.

Read Jones’ article here.