ADVERTISEMENT

off season woes

A few thoughts:
I think the pac12 is officially now history (after the last spring sport - women's softball). Anyone know what wash st and ore st going to do? Can they stay afloat - all sports?
I see people pick on the NCAA. Wonder what their role is in the future?... College sports is changing so very fast.
When will we see HS kids hit the portal? or transfer for NIL (of sorts) to a school (probably private) that will pay out?
How will gambling be controlled or contained? Sooner or later it will be limited to 'not your sport', then what?
  • Like
Reactions: therod

Manny Diaz "I think some of the lessons learned at Penn State made me a better man and made me better coach for sure to be here now."

Manny Diaz in Duke intro press conference

The article is a few days old but it just popped up in my Apple Newsfeed today. There are some other interesting quotes like "It was very quick because I think James Franklin called me an hour after getting fired in Miami. I mean the body wasn't even cold at the funeral. " But in any case, despite what the doom and gloomers and the Paterno diehards say, we have a pretty damn good program right now. We are quite fortunate. And Manny just promoted the hell out of our program (and Franklin) by speaking so fondly of it. Perhaps one day if Franklin decides to move on we can get Manny back from Duke as a HC.

FB Recruiting The latest on 2025 DB target -- Kainoa Winston

FB Recruiting 2025 RB target visiting elsewhere today....

"Sex Noises" blare at post NBA game presser

This made me remember that I attended a big show where Dell was presenting their latest breakthrough in networked PC servers. There were at least 100 people in the room. Young dude shares his desktop on the big screen and just as he begins his presentation, a pop up appears with some porn. great demo of Microsoft's crappy Internet Explorer product and its lack of security. I. was told the guy was fired the next day.

Why won't the B1G and TV partners cater to the White Out?

KSN SEGMENT ON WHITE OUT

See Link. Segment from a State College radio show. Typical talking points except about 3 minutes in one of the guys raises the question as to why the B1G doesn't give the White Out the respect it deserves as a one-of-a-kind unique event and shoehorn it into a primetime late Sept-early Oct timeslot vs. a top-shelf opponent. From a conference-wide marketing and branding standpoint, it makes total sense -- essentially have the conference treat the White Out with the same reverence they treat the "always last week of the season" OSU-Mich game. Yes, from an aesthetic standing, the Whiteout is just as eye-catching against Illinois as it would be for Oregon/Mich/OSU, but if there are no stakes to the game itself then it's not gonna keep fringe TV viewers with no rooting/gambling interest from changing the channel. Just feels like the league gives the White Out second-class status for reasons that escape me.

FB Recruiting Updates / Tidbits from June 7th OV weekend

Below we will be tracking all of the social media updates and notable tidbits we learn from the first Official Visit weekend as kids will post all kinds of things from photos, videos, etc from their weekend trip.

WEEKEND OFFICIAL VISITOR LIST....
WR Phillip Bell (Mission Viejo - CA)
WR Jeff Exinor (McDonogh - MD)
WR Matthew Outten (Norcom - VA)
DE Jayden Woods (Mill Valley - KS)
DE Jarquez Carter (Newberry - FL)
CB Daryus Dixon (Mater Dei - CA)
S Josh Johnson (Ironton - OH)
S Kainoa Winston (Gonzaga - MD)
ATH Rashad Johnson (South Sumter - FL)
  • Like
Reactions: GregInPitt

Greatest Movie ever made? (The Wizard of Oz)

The meaning of the story is awesome and the use of color/sepia was incredible. So many layers. You can enjoy the movie as great pure entertainment. You can enjoy it for it's political subterfuge. Or, you can just enjoy the fact that a woman, following the yellow brick road (gold) to utopia (Oz) simply leads her back to the virtues of courage, heart, and intelligence while learning "Oz" was just a fantasy made up by a man. It all kind of relates back on this 80th anniversary or D-Day. it was filmed in 1939, the same year Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Goodbye Mr. Chips, and Gone with the Wind were released.

Login to view embedded media

Film Study - Kotelnicki's Pre-Snap Shifts & Motions

KOTELNICKI FILM STUDY

See Link. For all the stuff we and other sites have done, THIS is going to be the most noticeable difference in Penn State's offense this year -- not the whacky plays, triple option, sugar huddles, etc. Kansas ran more pre-snap shifts and motions than any team in the FBS in 2023, so we dove into all Kotelnicki does before the play starts. Yurcich motioned a good amount, but Kotelnicki is at another level as far as frequency and DEPTH (if that's the right word) when using pre-snap movement -- like, there are stages or layers to his shifts and motions.

Couple notes we couldn't fit in the video:
1. All the shifts and motion made Kansas one of the slowest teams in college football from a plays per minute standpoint. This will feel like a Ciarrocca/Moorhead offense as far as pace, compared to Yurcich's meep meep offense at Okla State..which honestly, I'm fine with. Felt like Yurcich's up-tempo no-huddle stuff was a flop for the most part here, especially when he got caught trying to hurry up with odd personnel groupings.
2. As our guy says, Year 1 is where you see the biggest statistical benefit when comparing plays with motion vs. plays where the offense aligns and doesn't move. As Big 12 DCs got more accustomed to all this pre-snap craziness, the statistical gap between motion-no motion shrunk in 2022 and 2023.
3. We touched on it one play, but Kotelnicki loves to disguise his personnel groupings by sticking players in odd alignments - WRs in the backfield - then shiftinginto, say, an empty set to create advantageous coverage matchups.
PS - Codutti is back in a month.

Yesterday's tornado experience

Unbelievable. I had a medical appointment in Washington today so my wife and I stayed at a hotel in Gaithersburg, Maryland, last night. We got back from dinner at 6:30...no hint of any weather issues...but an hour later all hell broke loose.

It suddenly got dark, buckets of rain mixed with hail, thunder, lightning, a wild wind...the whole nine yards...and then repeated blaring alerts on our phones of a Tornado Warning...seek shelter. Internet service went out at that point.

So we're on the top (6th) floor of the hotel and I'm gawking out the big window. When my wife suggested we go to the 1st floor, I'm like, hell no, it'd be romantic to die in one another's arms.

Of course I was joking. The seriousness of the situation just wasn't registering. My brain is going: a tornado??...in freakin' Gaithersburg??...no way. Tornadoes don't happen in Gaithersburg, Maryland. It's probably an overreaction.

Only 15 minutes later everything was over, and I went downstairs to check on our car. All the hotel employees were gathered together in the lobby, and there were, like, 20 people in the parking lot taking videos with their phones of a large black cloud disappearing toward the east.

I asked one of them, was it a tornado? And he's like, uh, yes, as though I were the only doofus in the building who hadn't gotten the word.

This morning, as media reports flowed in regarding the event -- see link below -- I told my wife that my performance the previous evening might qualify me for a Darwin Award. She said, no, you have to die for that. But she suggested that I might be in the running for Clueless Dumbass of the Month at least. The girl is such a smart-aleck.

All in all, a memorable evening. And the damage and injuries, including one fatality, were no joke:

FB Recruiting Future Casting a 2025 Defensive Back Target...

On the heels of his official visit to Happy Valley this weekend the staff here at Happy Valley Insider is Future Casting three-star defensive back Josh Johnson to the Nittany Lions. The Ohio native has also made an official visit to Louisville, and a commitment could happen sooner rather than later. Johnson is listed as a safety, but being recruited by Penn State to play cornerback.


Login to view embedded media
ADVERTISEMENT

Filter

ADVERTISEMENT