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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Up to 25 FSU Players Might Be Suspended

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You think JoePa has problems in his twilight years? All those off-field brouhahas this year made it appear as if the reputedly clean program at Penn State had been severely tarnished. Well, Bobby Bowden has bigger problems. The Orlando Sentinel reports that 25 so-called Florida State student athletes might be suspended and prohibited from playing in the December 31 Music City Bowl, where FSU plays Kentucky.

The academic improprieties were unearthed in an expanding investigation of cheating in other sports’ so-called student-athletes. Read the story here.

You know what the Turkey thinks about the student-athlete charade, so I won’t use this space for another harangue on that subject. I’ll just caution you to not ridicule FSU too much for this thing, because this seems to be the way big-time college football is going. So far, Penn State under JoePa has avoided this kind of thing, but for how much longer?

If the NCAA decides that these players were ineligible for this season’s games in which they participated, that august organization could indeed impose forfeits on FSU. The upshot? JoePa would instantly surpass Bowden in total wins.

Rodriguez is Michigan’s New Head Coach

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The University of Michigan’s sports machine announced today that current West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez had accepted its offer to be the head football coach of the Michigan Wolverines. As I do not play the charade by which some of my fellow bloggers abide, namely paraphrasing news and presenting it as original content, I’ll point you to ESPN.com for details.

And now, for the opinion part of this article. Rich Rodriguez is a good coach. That’s what this Turkey thinks. The Wolverines have made a good move. I think they’ll forget about Les Miles and Greg Schiano in a hurry. Whether Rodriguez’ coaching style will suit the Big Ten is moot. You cannot hire a head coach and then command him to “play Big Ten football.” If the CEO of your industry group leading corporate football enterprise cannot move the market, don’t hire the wimp. You want a guy who can shake things up, who can be on the leading edge of innovation. So, perhaps Rodriguez will be the catalyst necessary to initiate the transformation of the Big Ten from a primordial power football league into a sleek, modern, junior NFL. Change is good. Status quo is boring. Go Rick!

How will this move affect Penn State? Who knows. The Nittany Lions couldn’t beat Michigan with Carr at the helm and they certainly won’t be able to beat the Wolverines with Rodriguez running the show. Well, at least not until the PSU offense is updated and the oft mentioned coaching issues are resolved. The ripple effect created by Rodriguez’ hiring might be significant to Penn State, however, inasmuch as one current rumor has West Virginia University offering the head football coaching job vacated by Rodriguez to none other than Penn State’s own defensive coordinator, Tom Bradley, whose name crops up in the rumor mill quite frequently.

Something to Cheer About

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Just because Penn State wound up in a minor bowl this year, many fans are using the F-word (that’s “failure”) to describe the program. It’s nice to aspire to a BCS bowl every year and it’s even nicer when Penn State actually makes it to one. However, we have something else to cheer about and that’s Penn State’s academic success rate, which based on certain measures would have put the Nittany Lions in the mythical Academic BCS title game this year. Their opponents would have been Boston College. These are two excellent football programs with the distinction of being better than everyone else in the way their players perform academically. So says Lindsey Luebchow in the Patriot-News this morning:

Unless we are prepared to adopt a purely mercenary approach to college sports — and perhaps pay players rather than perpetuate the charade of the student-athlete — we should recognize that the future of most college football players depends on getting a college degree, not on securing an NFL contract.

We should care [that] only 32 percent of Texas football players leave campus after four or five years of playing football with a degree. And we should applaud the 72 percent of Penn State players who leave with a degree. Even more important though, we should care about ensuring that Penn State and all colleges and universities provide all of their students with the skills needed to get a good job. A college’s job is not simply to graduate students; it is to educate them.

Read this excellent piece here.

Let’s not forget what the university’s true mission is. Let’s not forget college football the way it was before television and corporate sponsorship. I’m fortunate (in a way) that I’m old enough to remember those things. I recognize that I’m an anachronism. However, I hope I don’t stand alone when I say that I would prefer to think of Penn State as a distinguished institution of higher learning first, and as a football team second.