Best news, the weekly Q&A with the Post-Gazette’s Pitt beat reporter, Paul Zeise, is back.
Q: Will you be brave and predict Pitt’s record and ranking for this season?
ZEISE: Hmmm, Ok I’ll bite. I think I’ve said before in the spring the season will come down to how the Panthers fare in four games — Notre Dame, Nebraska, Louisville and WVU. If they split those four, which personally I think might be asking a lot, they can finish 9-2. I’m guessing 8-3 is probably a little more realistic. I know there is a lot of enthusiasm for this new coaching staff and there should be – it is clearly an upgrade and will pay big dividends in the future.
But this team has some flaws in places that make it very difficult to run the table in college football. The defensive line is very unproven and frankly, there isn’t much depth particularly at tackle. Thomas Smith is out for now and if this is a lingering type injury, there is a huge hole that needs to be filled and I’m not sure the personnel is in place to fill it.
The offensive line is going to be the best it has been since that line had Bryan Anderson, Chad Reed and Rob Petitti (2002), but it is very, very thin as well. Any key injury could be a disaster, particularly to either of the starting tackles.
Those two potential trouble spots are not a surprise because the one of the main criticisms of the former coach was his inability to recruit big guys on both sides of the ball. Coach Wannstedt will change that and start bringing in linemen, but he ‘s still basically playing with the former coaches players.
The same can’t be said about wide receiver, which was supposed to be the specialty of the former coach. It is very troubling that all of those young, and talented, receivers are still very inconsistent and not yet reliable. There just isn’t many of these guys ready to step in and really contribute and that’s a surprise. This is an area that could become a real trouble spot if Greg Lee or Joe DelSardo gets hurt and miss any length of time.
These three areas, I believe, will ultimately cause some issues for the Panthers and will translate into at least two and likely three, losses.
He has thoughts on the running back position, the back-up QB, and the WR position. This is always one you should click to read in full.
Graessle and Cummings get featured on a piece on the special teams.
But both said they had areas to work on in the offseason and quickly listed them when asked about their workouts.
“There were a lot of little things that went wrong,” Cummings said. “I had three or four kicks blocked against South Florida and another against Utah. I know both got out of hand, winning big at South Florida and losing to Utah. No matter how it happened, it still affected my numbers.
“I was 17-for-22 (77.3 percent) going into South Florida, so ending up 18-for-27 (66.7) is disappointing after missing only five kicks. So, I dropped significantly from 80 percent down to 66. That breaks my heart, but I hope to get 25 attempts again this year, and I’ll try to make all of them.”
Cummings made a long kick of 47 yards, but he missed six kicks from longer than 40 with an 0-for-2 performance from more than 50 yards. He appears to have enough leg to make long field goals and could get more chances this year. Graessle has an even stronger leg and will kick off again this season. He averaged 43.3 yards per punt with a long from 79 yards, five touchbacks, six fair catches, 17 inside the 20 and five blocks.
“I worked on increasing my get-off (catch to punt) this year, and we’re aiming for 2.1 seconds,” Graessle said. “I was probably in the low 2.2s, but that little bit of time difference is really big when you’re a punter.
“So, I just wanted to improve in that area, as well as my direction and my hang time. My goal is to average 45 with a net of 45 (yards per punt) and with a lot of fair catches. So, there’s a lot for me to improve.”
Graessle improving his time to get off the punt is important. Last year way too many were blocked, and while bad protection was part of it he didn’t help with how long he took to get it away.
An interesting story from the AP on Tyler Palko’s continuing relationship with Stanford Coach Walt Harris.
When Pitt quarterback Tyler Palko sees the 650 area code pop up on his cell phone’s caller ID display, he knows immediately who is on the other end.
It’s Walt Harris, calling from Stanford University to check on his protege and friend, to discuss football and, specifically, playing quarterback. A year ago, Palko ran Harris’ West Coast offense at Pitt; now, the two maintain a West Coast-East Coast relationship.
Palko, who enjoyed the best sophomore season statistically of any quarterback in Pitt history, hopes it’s a coach-player relationship that will continue even though the coach no longer is his coach.
“We’re very close, and we got closer as we had more success because the trust factor was there,” Palko said. “I talk to him once or twice a month and we stay in touch. He’ll always be a good friend of mine because of how close we were, and I wish him the best.”
Harris’ advice can and counsel can only help Palko, and by extension Pitt.
Finally, I noticed that “Recruiting expert” Tom Lemming is providing content to CSTV.com. Today he rates the Tight Ends. He has Pitt commits Justin Hargrove and Nate Byham as #7 and #2. Lemming, though, is not paying much attention to actual recruiting it seems.
Byham has yet to divulge even a short list, but Penn State (his childhood team), Iowa (the first school to offer him), Michigan, Pittsburgh, West Virginia, Ohio State, USC and Michigan State are believed to be among the frontrunners.
That’s more than a week after Byham committed to Pitt. Hope CSTV.com isn’t paying too much for the services.
