Hello, my six readers! Welcome to another year of uninformed commentary by yours truly, The Nittany Turkey. This year, I am particularly clueless and exasperated by the restructuring of the Big Ten, along with NIL bullshit, and the general descent of college football into the pit of professional sports.
As I wait out the peripheral effects of Hurricane Debby, I have a few thoughts to share. Mainly, I just want you to know that I am still alive and kicking.
Have I followed the machinations with the Nittany Lions? Only peripherally. As you might have gleaned by seeing posts in other areas of this blog, I have been dealing with health issues, but that is no excuse for the notable decline in my passion for college football. When the season starts, will I feel that old fever? No one knows.
While I do not have much to say about how this team will navigate the turbid waters of the newly redefined Big Ten, I invite your comments and conjectures. At the end of last season, I was hearing predictions for a 7-5 regular season in 2024. Have any minds changed on that? How about the expanded playoffs finally giving Penn State a shot? Will it happen, or will the enhanced competition leave our Nittany Lions languish in their usual Kohler Toilet Bowl post-season mediocrity? No one knows for sure, but we all have an opinion, don’t we?
What are the indications, good or bad, about Andy Kotelnicki and Tom Allen? Will James Franklin allow those vaunted hires to do their jobs unfettered? Opinions wanted here!
Interesting Schedule
My first observation is a happy one. Of the three non-conference games, only two are MAC teams and only one is an absolute pussy. That would be Kent. The third non-conference game is the season opener at WVU, who finished in the middle of the pack in the Big 12 last year. Playing in Morgantown in the first outing of the year is particularly tough. It is my hope that the Lions will be ready to hit the ground running.
The bye week coming early in the season between Bowling Green and Kent is not particularly beneficial. There will be few bumps and bruises to heal at that juncture. However, a second open date occurs on October 19, between USC and Wisconsin.
The Big Ten opener with Illinois should ease the Lions into the meat of the schedule, with UCLA coming to Big Beave the following week. Absent a hiccup in Morgantown, I expect Penn State to face the Bruins, the weakest of the Pac-12 emigres, with a 4-0 record.
That is when the going gets rough and I won’t predict anything, but I’m sure our Sanguinarians will think the Boys will be 5-0 going into the game with the stronger SoCal opponent, USC. From that point in the season, the potential certainly exists for losing three or four out of five games. The big embarrassment will be the White-Out game against Washington.
The good thing for PSU is that now Harbaughless Michigan, as well as Iowa, Oregon, and Moo U are not on the Penn State football schedule this year.
So Where is This Thing Going?
So much uncharted territory. So much contempt for what college football has become. Can this Turkey salvage his long-term love for the game? I do find myself caring about the Nittany Lions and wondering whether they will disappoint us again. Will Beau Pribula get playing time? Will Drew Allar suck? Does Penn State have any receivers that are worth a shit? Will the offensive line continue to suck? We’ll soon find out.
In the meanwhile, what’s your take on the season ahead?
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John K says
Welcome to the world of the living TNT! This could be an exciting season for many reasons, good and bad. Starting at the top, Franklin is Franklin and there is no changing him. He will not outcoach a good coach, and in my mind, he ranks in the bottom half of the new Big Ten. He will beat the teams he is supposed to beat, lose to those he is supposed to lose to and struggle with anyone with a pulse. I was initially in the 7-5 crowd, but, as we have seen due to the worst trends in college football, our schedule got much easier since December. Having two new coordinators, both of whom run radically different systems/philosophies is the biggest cause for concern.
I firmly believe we have upgraded both coaches. Diaz was always over-rated as evidenced by the number of times his defenses show up on bad end of the record book at every stop. Tom Allen is better, but, the front seven will have to play football, not run as fast as they can to the ball and not worry about anything else. That is a cultural change that won’t come easy. These players will have to play with discipline for the first time.
On offense, we have a new guy who I really like but has never had a pro-style QB. Like Yurcich, he is overly reliant on the wide zone running game. This time from a spread man blocking scheme vs. a spread gap. Same story, another cultural change as we go from passive to aggressive blocking while asking four of five linemen to do something they are generally too large and heavy footed to do. The receivers still stink and he has to scheme around a non-mobile QB for the first time ever.
With that said, I think 8-4 is a reasonable pick given how easy the schedule is. Learning two new systems and going on the road to play at WVU in the opener is not great. I am glad it is not a night game full of drunken Hill Billie’s and burning sofas. I think we lose due entire to the new coordinators. WVU was considerably better at the end of last year than early on when we did struggle with them more than most admit and are even better now. Chalk up several wins in a row against the sisters of the poor and they will travel to USC for another loss followed by another loss at Wisconsin and another against Ohio State. If they are healthy, they can right the ship and win out but there are speed bumps. UW’s new coach is way better than Franklin and has a lot more talent than people realize.
Overall – 8-4 which is good for 7th in the Big Ten in my book. 9 and 3 if we can steal a win on the road in the opener. I don’t see 10-2 in the card. 7 and 5is certainly possible but unlikely. We aren’t really in discussion for the playoffs at 10-2. Would need 11-1 and shear dominance against the rest of the slate given how week the schedule is as we would get passed over by several 10-2 teams.
The Nittany Turkey says
Welcome back, K John or John K, depending on which juxtaposition is your current preference. Another exciting season lies ahead and your insights are appreciated here in the Land of the Clueless.
Even given the playoff expansion, you don’t give the Lions a chance. I thought the expansion happened due to 1) mo money, and 2) whiners like PSU fans who think they are Rodney Dangerfield. Yea, verily, the Sanguinarians are all thinking getting a playoff shot this year is a slam-dunk. I’m more inclined to agree with you than with the Sanguinarians.
No Michigan, no Oregon, no Iowa on the schedule suggests that a 10-2 finish would be suspect, but I don’t see three-loss teams getting into the playoffs. If it came to a 10-2 Texas and a 10-2 Penn State for the last slot, guess who would be get playoff bragging rights.
All that bullshit having been said, I remain clueless about the new talent on the team. I don’t even know who we lost to the ridiculous transfer portal and, disgustingly, which commits we lost due to NIL issues.
I will be in PA watching the WVU game with my good friends who date back to my PSU days. Plenty of Franklin bashing anticipated there.
Here’s to an interesting season!
—TNT
K. John says
K John would still be my preference even though I apparently forgot how to type during the off-season. I personally don’t think this team is good enough. Two new coordinators, radically different systems from the previous two years. Reports of Allar running the option in camp, not just zone read. An OC that apparently is cross-training all linemen at multiple positions while trying to install an all new blocking scheme that may not fit the talent on hand. Another wide zone focused running game when the previous failed for entirely predicable reasons. Athletes (most of our defenders are athletes, not football players) that will have to play disciplined defense for the first time in their careers. Franklin’s horrible game day coaching decisions. What could go wrong?
The obvious aside, I think there is only one Big Ten team that can get in with two losses and that team is the defending champion because they will likely play the hardest schedule in the country, whereas we play one of the easier schedules in the Big Ten. I think we’ll see Notre Dame and two group of five teams taking 3 of 12 spots. That doesn’t leave a lot room for error. I would put us 5th in the potential playoff pool for the Big Ten behind Oregon, Ohio State, Iowa and Michigan. Then there will be Georgia, Alabama, Texas and Ole Miss from the SEC. Florida State and Clemson form the ACC and lastly, Utah and Oklahoma State from the Big XII. The pool of schools this year is going to be huge and there will be pressure to take two teams from the ACC or Bix XII and two group of five teams. That is before we get to our record. I think 8-4 or 9-3 is far more likely than 10-2 or the 11-1 that would really be needed.
The Nittany Turkey says
I’ll be curious to see whether your thoughts have changed after the opener at Morgantown. As for me, I am clueless — even more so after reading through the pre-season expert commentary.
Not scheduling Michigan will fly in the face of PSU’s chances to get into the playoff. We agree on that. However, chances of beating even a Harbaughless Michigan (which still benefits from His Michigan Man recruiting violations), would have been minuscule, even though the Sanguinarians would give us a 50-50 chance of winning. (After all, the power of the White Out would prevail, right Guido?).
After WVU, we’ll have a three-week break to reassess Penn State’s chances. Losing the opener to a halfway-decent bunch of Mountaineers would not be a good sign.
—TNT
K. John says
I won’t take much away from the WVU game. We clearly have better players, however, it will be the first game, on the road, with two new systems. That is a tough one, especially against a motivated WVU team who played us much closer than the slappies think last year. The same WVU team was a very different team by seasons end. They were much better. I not sure I would like our chances if we played them in late November to be honest. We got worse, they got better.