From the Associated Press, August 19, 2005:

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Penn State linebacker Dan Connor was suspended indefinitely Friday by coach Joe Paterno after he and two other players were cited by police for allegedly placing harassing phone calls.

Connor and two backups, receiver Jim Kanuch and safety Nolan McCready, were issued summary offenses earlier this week in connection with the calls, which “escalated to the point of harassment” over the course of several months, the school said in a statement.

The school said the person who received the phone calls requested to remain anonymous.

All three players had been placed on probation Thursday.

“Based upon a clearer understanding of the facts, coach Joe Paterno has placed sophomore Dan Connor on indefinite suspension for his participation in recent harassment calls,” the statement said Friday.

Like everybody else, I have to wonder why the hell all these kids have been going off the deep end. It is hard for me to rationalize the clustering of all the nefarious incidents of late. One theory is that weak leadership sets the seeds for mutiny. Another theory is that lack of focus leads to boredom, which is sometimes sublimated in negative ways.

Paterno is definitely losing his grip. Team cohesiveness and internal leadership are lacking. It must be hard for the coaching staff to sell the standard message of maintaining focus: “Keep your eye on the prize.” There can be no sense of keeping their eye on the prize when the prize for this team is some shitty, Made in China trophy awarded by some shitty bowl deep in the heart of Texas, at best.

Connor probably won’t be missed much for the first three games, but if his suspension extends into the Big Ten schedule, I will have to revise my annual wins projection downward by at least a game.

The Nittany Turkey deplores socially unacceptable misbehavior by kids who should be team leaders. However, if they themselves are subjected to poor leadership—exacerbated by the stigma of a once dominant football program that has sunk to the second tier—they are not completely to blame. As we used to say in the Bahamas, “De fish stink from de head!”

Well, folks, let’s kick off this season as we did last season, with a pseudo-statistical look at the season ahead, using the Sports Illustrated pre-season rankings as a basis. “Poppycock!” you say? Think again! The Great Gobbler is proud to reiterate that last year’s prediction hit the nail right on the head. We said four wins and it was four wins. You can’t beat that with a stick!

Well, now, this year, we have a little different situation, but in no way am I going to get into wishful thinking. Sure, I would like to see the Lions do well. I am as frustrated as the rest of you. However, there’s a long row to hoe on the way back to national prominence.

Let’s look a bit at the SI rankings. Last year, they started Penn State at #50. This year, they’ve put the Nittany Lions at #30. You can dispute the rankings and split hairs ad nauseam, but the SI ranking is good enough for this exercise. I’ll be looking at individual games later. For now, let’s take a look at the rankings of the teams on our schedule.
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