Your honest expectations for this season?
- Thread starter Nitt1300
- Start date
2017 will be a letdown. Losses to Ohiya, Iowa and another team we shouldn't lose to. A key player will get injured.
I predicted 12 wins just to offset Cosmos's dreary post.
10-11 is realistic. 12 would be remarkable.
10-11 is realistic. 12 would be remarkable.
I see Bad Luck Sheprock has chimed in. He's the guy with the perpetual rain cloud over his head. Wowsie wowsie woo woo.
The running game still means something in today's college game. Psu has a top 3 rb; maybe the best in the whole country. Gesicki is a gronk like matchup problem. Those are two rare pieces. The defense seems to lack a real gem, but one might emerge as the season goes on. This team losses games to inferior opponents if it beats itself: turnovers, dumb penalties, and overconfidence. It looses to teams that have experienced USC type talent on the road. Big ten doesn't have many of those teams. I would expect 10 or more wins.
Drunk posting again?? What are you drowning your sorrows in alcohol over this time??
Regular season: 1 loss to OSU in a close game. OSU will fall to UM (2 losses) this year, however, who we will beat by two scores. OSU wins the tie-break but this time our resume is strong enough for two B10 teams to make the playoffs. We beat USC in a shooting match then best Clemson in a primarily defensive struggle. Boom. National Champs.
I expect 10 wins.
The offense should be the best we've had since 1994. No excuses, especially if Mahon & Nelson come back healthy.
The defense worries me. LB was already a weakness and now we've lost Bell. Cabinda is a very good MLB but Bowen and Farmer are going to really have to step up. Brown is still young and lanky. Will Cooper be ready to provide depth? We must also replace both DEs. The backups have experience but we'll have to see how they do. Losing Golden to graduation isn't a big deal but losing Reid is huge. He was also a very good punt returner.
The offense should be the best we've had since 1994. No excuses, especially if Mahon & Nelson come back healthy.
The defense worries me. LB was already a weakness and now we've lost Bell. Cabinda is a very good MLB but Bowen and Farmer are going to really have to step up. Brown is still young and lanky. Will Cooper be ready to provide depth? We must also replace both DEs. The backups have experience but we'll have to see how they do. Losing Golden to graduation isn't a big deal but losing Reid is huge. He was also a very good punt returner.
We get hosed by visually impaired Big 10 officials in Columbus. We win every other game. Delaney states that after some deep contemplation only the Big 10 champion should get into the college football playoff. Playoff committee member and Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith agrees. Penn State once again on the outside looking in this bullsheet conference.
I believe the D will be much better than people expect. I think the interior line will be really good and the pass rush off the edge improved over last year. I see potential for stardom with Bowen and Farmer. Oddly enough, my biggest concern is the secondary because of the Reid loss. Overall, a much better overall D than last years team
The funny thing is ... 2017 was supposed to be the first year post-sanctions we were supposed to be really good. Franklin just moved the timeline up a year because of Moorhead lol. I think we'll go 10-2 at worst ... though I don't see where the 2nd loss is at this time. We'll lose unfortunately to OSU. They'll be a Top 3 team with a bye week the week before ours and have a home game. People are worried about Iowa .... except Iowa doesn't match up well with us. Kirk Ferentz owned Joe. He doesn't own O'Brien or Franklin. I think we'll beat Pitt by 30+ and beat Michigan by 10+. At Northwestern or home vs Nebraska are probably my top 2 candidates for a second loss at this time. But i'll take 11-1 and a chance for the CFP all day.
Will probably be favored in all but one (at least before the season starts). Ohio State will be tough, Michigan will be young, but they have talent, Michigan State won't be as bad as they were last year, Northwestern will be pretty decent, Nebraska is breaking in a new QB, but he'll have about a whole season under his belt by the time they show up.
Honestly, I can see anywhere among 9, 10, 11, 12 wins.
Honestly, I can see anywhere among 9, 10, 11, 12 wins.
And Sandy will chime in and say OSU should be in, but then later tweet she meant PSU should be in over someone else.
PSU and the $uckeyes are the clear favorites. Both teams play 5 b1g road games (and only 4 b1g home games). Static probabilities today would likely project both at 10-2. In season probabilities are not static though -- they are impacted by how the team looks and plays from week-to-week on both sides of the ball, especially in regards to how they play on the road early in the season.
In that regard, if PSU starts the season 4-0 and continues to show marked improvement as Coach Franklin's recruits continue to come on board (this year will be the first year where nearly 100% of the "playing depth chart" are Franklin recruits), PSU will go 11-1 or 12-0.
Given what Franklin has accomplished in 3 seasons with far less depth and talent than on this year's "playing depth chart", including beating the $uckeyes on the field of play in 2 of the 3 years - not bad for a guy who supposedly "can't coach" according to the biased jabbering Jabronis, I wouldn't bet against PSU looking extremely solid and dominating out of the gate next year.
IOW, "the progression" continues and next year's PSU team is going to be the best team of the Franklin era so far in terms of talent, consistency, depth and play on both sides of the ball. PSU rolls into the last weekend of October 7-0 and finishes the season either 11-1 or 12-0....beyond that, 2018 PSU is going to be even better than 2017 imho.
In that regard, if PSU starts the season 4-0 and continues to show marked improvement as Coach Franklin's recruits continue to come on board (this year will be the first year where nearly 100% of the "playing depth chart" are Franklin recruits), PSU will go 11-1 or 12-0.
Given what Franklin has accomplished in 3 seasons with far less depth and talent than on this year's "playing depth chart", including beating the $uckeyes on the field of play in 2 of the 3 years - not bad for a guy who supposedly "can't coach" according to the biased jabbering Jabronis, I wouldn't bet against PSU looking extremely solid and dominating out of the gate next year.
IOW, "the progression" continues and next year's PSU team is going to be the best team of the Franklin era so far in terms of talent, consistency, depth and play on both sides of the ball. PSU rolls into the last weekend of October 7-0 and finishes the season either 11-1 or 12-0....beyond that, 2018 PSU is going to be even better than 2017 imho.
New faces on the defense will surprise a d our defense plays lights out. Our offense will help the defense with a crushing time consuming running game as Moorehead changes the scheme to use a better OL and the best RB in football.
- I definitely agree that the DTs should be good. Cothren, Cothran, Givens, Windsor, & Chavis were decent last year and come back with more experience.
- DEs are an unknown. Brown has experience but only mixed success thus far. Same with Buchholz. Miller got raves in practice but not much experience. Simmons needs to grow. I think it's premature to say this area will be improved after losing 2 all conference performers. We can hope.
- Bowen has shown flashes. We'll see. Farmer hasn't done much thus far. Brown should b a RS freshman this year. I think he has a way to go. Look at the Rose Bowl defense after Bell went out. I hope you're right about Bowen & Farmer becoming stars.
- M. Allen's return at S is big. He should be a leader out there. Scott, Monroe, & Apke should provide depth. I don't see a big drop off from last year.
- Haley & Campbell should be decent at CB but Reid was exceptional. That's a big loss.
- DT improved
- DE slight drop off
- LB slight drop off
- S similar
- CB slight drop off
FYI PSU's all conference players on defense last year:
- Nobody on 1st team
- Sickels on 2nd team - left early
- Schwan on 3rd team - gone
- Cabinda & Allen on 3rd team - both return
- Bell & Reid honorable mention - 1 gone and 1 injured (Cothren returns)
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I worry more about NW than Iowa.
Iowa lost a really good QB, and even with Vandeberg back, they still have one of the worst WR groups in the conference. Ferentz used to out JoePa, JoePa, because his teams were better along the trenches and played mistake free football. It's been a completely different rivalry since the JoePa era ended (2-0, w/ 26pt avg victory margin)
NW returns probably the 3rd best QB/RB combo in the conference, and a ton of other starters. Beating NW is one of the last monkies on CJF's back.
However, the 2016 season took a machine gun to a lot of those monkies, so we shouldn't be overly pessimistic about that game.
Iowa lost a really good QB, and even with Vandeberg back, they still have one of the worst WR groups in the conference. Ferentz used to out JoePa, JoePa, because his teams were better along the trenches and played mistake free football. It's been a completely different rivalry since the JoePa era ended (2-0, w/ 26pt avg victory margin)
NW returns probably the 3rd best QB/RB combo in the conference, and a ton of other starters. Beating NW is one of the last monkies on CJF's back.
However, the 2016 season took a machine gun to a lot of those monkies, so we shouldn't be overly pessimistic about that game.
Regarding the bottom portion of your post....
You could have done the same analysis regarding PSU coming into the 2016 season and it would have suggested that PSU was likely headed for a sub-.500 season - especially on offense where PSU was returning a very mediocre unit, actually statistically awful, and was losing their starting QB to the draft! But PSU's Offense showed massive improvement in 2016 relative to 2015 averaging 433 ypg "Total Offense" and 38 ppg "Scoring Offense" in 2016 versus 348 ypg and 23 ppg in Total and Scoring Offense respectively in 2015! (and went 10-2 during the regular season vs 7-5 in 2015....and won the B1G East Division with an 8-1 record.....and won the B1G Championship Game posting an overall record of 9-1 in B1G games....etc.). IOW, the diametric opposite of what your analysis would have projected.
Here's the thing that your shallow-analysis does not capture at all... PSU's position-by-position Depth Chart is easily the best of the Franklin era - without question much, much stronger in terms of talent and depth than the 2016 "Playing Depth Chart" coming into the season. Given that Franklin was able to go 9-1 in the B1G and 11-2 through the B1G CCG with a weaker 2016 "Playing Depth Chart" almost across the board, especially in regards to talent 2 and 3 deep, what does that tell you about how the 2017 team will play relative to the 2016 team, when you factor in that much of the talent that has continued to be added to the "Playing Depth Chart" "on the margin" we have barely seen or haven't even seen yet at all?
I think we win them all 
Mostly because of the OL. We now should be able to play ball control when needed. The USC game was lost because we could not run the clock out and had to throw. In addition we will no longer have to wait for the second half to score points. In many games we should have substantial leads by the end of the 3rd quarter ;-)
I just hope Franklin can get a "signature" win !!!!
Mostly because of the OL. We now should be able to play ball control when needed. The USC game was lost because we could not run the clock out and had to throw. In addition we will no longer have to wait for the second half to score points. In many games we should have substantial leads by the end of the 3rd quarter ;-)I just hope Franklin can get a "signature" win !!!!
This is pretty much my feeling with one difference and one addition ... I think Golden will be a bigger loss than many think, especially earlier in the season before the secondary has time to gel ... you forgot to mention Brandon Smith in the LB talk as I feel he is highly under-rated being a walk-on. With Cabinda and Smith the strength is in the middle while the OLBs (as you put it) really have to step up.
I don't think it's a shallow analysis but your point is well taken even though I think it's a bit exaggerated. I predicted 9-3 or 8-4 depending on how the Pitt game turned out. I was definitely surprised by the 10-2 record but in no way did I expect a sub .500 season.
So what changed that allowed the team to overachieve last year? By far and away the answer is McSorley. I think most expected OL improvement and we got it except for a temporary setback when Mahon & Nelson went down. On defense I thought that we would be good at LB with Cabinda, Bell, and Wartman. My concerns at LB were about the future since Bell and Wartman were seniors. We learned early about or lack of depth when those two got injured early. It couldn't have been much uglier than it was at Michigan.
So do we have a new player coming in that will impact the defense the same way McSorley impacted the offense? Maybe but I don't see it. The best chance might be Miller at DE.
You act like I'm slamming the team but that couldn't be further from the truth. I think PSU has an excellent team. I also realize that we play OSU in Columbus and they have 4/5* players at every position. I realize that we play Michigan, OSU, & MSU back to back to back and we also play Nebraska. I don't think 10-2 is a bad prediction.
I should have mentioned B. Smith. He doesn't have great athleticism but he's strong and he plays smart. He'll provide important backup to Cabinda. I actually wonder if Franklin would consider having Cabinda & Smith on the field at the same time in certain situations.
I agree that Golden is a big loss. That's why it was important for Allen to return.
First of all, PSU ended up 9-1 and 11-2 through the full b1g season - the B1G CCG is part of the "B1G Season", not the "Bowl Season". Your notion that an analysis of PSU's 2016 Roster based on what was coming back from 2015 - on either side of the ball - would have led anyone to predict that PSU would improve their 2015 record, let alone go 9-1 in B1G Play in 2016 and win both the B1G East Division and Conference Championship via CCG, is laughable (PSU was 4-4 in B1G Conference Play in 2015 and 7-6 overall versus 9-1 in B1G Play and 11-2 overall in 2016!).
You seem to have missed the very obvious point in your typically "self-serving" argument style....an analysis similar to what you just did for 2017 relative 2016 done before last season relative to the 2015 Roster would not have pointed ANYONE to project that PSU would even eclipse its 4-4 B1G and 7-6 Overall 2015 records, let alone eclipse those 2015 records to the tune of going 9-1 in B1G Play and 11-2 Overall. Your laughably gratuitous commentary that you saw and projected this massive improvement coming despite PSU losing their best players to the draft or graduation on both sides of the ball (the ACTUAL analysis you just did to project 2017 versus 2016) is just that....laughable and gratuitous.
I cant imagine we win less than 10 games and wouldnt count out winning more. I think our defense will be deeper and quicker. Reid is a big loss, but still a lot of kids that can play. Wade came in the knick of time.
The offense should be explosive, with a much better, consistent running game. I love Traces game, but honestly our receivers made a lot of plays on 50 - 50 balls and I dont know if that will continue. I guess im hoping for a little more precision in the passing game and a more dominating run game and the rest will take care of itself.
The kicking game and special teams will be a big positive.
The offense should be explosive, with a much better, consistent running game. I love Traces game, but honestly our receivers made a lot of plays on 50 - 50 balls and I dont know if that will continue. I guess im hoping for a little more precision in the passing game and a more dominating run game and the rest will take care of itself.
The kicking game and special teams will be a big positive.
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BTW, in the form of a follow-up to this nonsensical debate as to all the "insight" this analysis gave you regarding the 2016 Season relative to what PSU was losing from the 2015 team that pointed you to PSU being substantially better in 2016... Could you tell me how many players PSU lost to the 2016 NFL Draft, how many to the 2016 NFL Draft or FA and finally how many 2015 starters to Graduation, expired eligibility, NFL Draft/FA?
Just curious, because anyone who claims that the 2017 team is losing "more" production off the Depth Chart relative to the 2016 team as compared to what the 2016 team lost relative to the 2015 team is smoking some pretty good stuff....
You can cast it any way that makes you feel good.
Bottom line is I predicted 8 or 9 wins last year depending on how the Pitt game turned out. I was critical of those who predicted 5 or 6 wins because I expected LBs to be good (not knowing there would be injuries) and I expected the OL to be improved (with Mahon & Nelson being juniors and the addition of Bates). I said there was no excuse for Franklin not improving over his previous 7-5 record. I certainly didn't predict a conference championship but NO WAY did I predict 7-6.
This year I predict 10-2 and you seem to think that's overly negative. So be it. I hope you're correct.
Quite amusing, you're the party who claims what tremendous insight this analysis of departing loses gives you from year-to-year, but you laughably blithely ignore that PSU lost infinitely more on both sides of the ball to the draft/FA, to graduation, etc... from 2015 to 2016 than they will this year relative to 2016 and yet the big record in 2016 improved to 9-1 from 4-4 in 2015...and the overall 2016 pre-bowl record improved to 11-2 from 7-5 in 2015? Sounds like the ACTUAL "analysis" you are marketing as being highly relevant in 2017 (despite Franklin's "Playing Depth Chart" continuing to improve dramatically relative to 2016) was completely IRRELEVANT in projecting 2016 based on 2015 Starters Lost...IOW, the very definition of a "shallow analysis"! The reality is that PSU's "Playing Depth Chart" for 2017 is ACTUALLY far BETTER than the 2016 "Playing Depth Chart" and there are highly-rated, talented Franklin recruits joining the 2017 "Playing Depth Chart" that we haven't even seen yet!
Again, 2017 Depth Chart is actually BETTER than the 2016 Depth Chart, not the opposite as you claim. IOW, the "progression" continues and 2017 will be the best, most talented, most consistent PSU team we have seen in the James Franklin Era. Given that Franklin's PSU team went 9-1 in B1G Play and 11-2 Overall last year with a less talented team, especially in terms of Depth Chart 2 and 3 deep, I'm not sure why you keep characterizing your "prediction" as being super generous....actually I'm a bit confused why you are so fond of gratuitously rating your own silly opinions regarding PSU's potential or why you find these opinions based on provablly-absurd, silly, shallow analyses, rather than the overall talent and strength of the "Playing Depth Chart" from one year to another, to be so earth-shackingly important to reality. The old saying about opinions being like bung-holes - everybody's got one - applies....
Whete did I claim that the 2017 team is losing more production off the depth chart than the 2016 team? You're just making that up. I said the offense should be better at just about every position and we should also be improved at DT. I expect a slight decline at DE, LB, and CB (w/o Reid).
The washing machine goes back into "spin cycle" yet again.....go figure.
Here is what I said you have blithely ignored in my original post:
And you have clearly IGNORED the most critical element to what PSU's record will be in 2017 relative to the prior year - the OVERALL TALENT, QUALITY and STRENGTH of the 2- and 3-Deep Depth Chart from one year to the next - by instead focusing on individual losses in the starting line-up. Then you claim this same "analysis" prompted you to predict PSU would be "better" in 2016 than 2015 despite your absurd shallow analysis suggesting that PSU lost infinitely more in regards to the starting line-up from 2015 to 2016 due to graduation and the NFL than they will this year relative to last year??? Huh? What?
In regards to your absurd BS about PSU capable of possibly going 10-2.....blah, blah, blah. Ummmmm, yea! I guess 10-2 is possible when overall PSU RETURNS a far more talented and deep "Playing Depth Chart" relative to last year's team and the 2016 Team EXCEEDED your 10-2 prediction going 9-1 in the b1g and 11-2 overall through the complete B1G Season! Given that this year's team is even better than last year's team in terms of returning proven talent, overall talent and depth and new talent logic dictates that their ceiling is also higher and a 10-2 season is possible - sure - but so is a 13-0, 12-1, 11-2 pre-bowl record....IOW, 9-3 or 10-2 are on the bottom side of the possible records, not the high-side as you claim, based on how PSU's 2016 team did and the strength of that team relative to this year's team.
A better way to look at potential records this far in front of the season without the benefit of dynamic forecasting in-season based on actual on-field performance is via a probabilistic forecast of potential final records prior to the "FBS Bowl Season" imho. To that end, I would assign a 10% chance of PSU going 13-0 (this is just a very low probable outcome even for great teams - look at how many times Bama has been able to accomplish it despite dominating CFB for the past decade), I would assign an equal probability of 20% each to PSU going either 12-1, 11-1, 11-2 or 10-2. I would assign a 10% probability of PSU going 9-3 or worse. Doing the math on this probabilistic forecast, it would suggest a projected final record of 11 wins (12*0.10 + 11*0.20 + 11*0.20 + 10*0.20 + 9*0.10) and 1.5 losses.... IOW, that analysis suggests PSU has a very high probability of making it to the b1g CCG; however, so would the $ucknuts if you did a similar analysis of their likely final pre-bowl records (i.e., PSU or O$U are likely to go 13-0 or 12-1, while the other - the loser of the PSU-OSU game - has a strong possibility of going 11-1).
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