Big Football Weekend Ahead

I am looking forward to a couple of big football games this weekend:

• First, the so-called "Sanctions Bowl" between Penn State and Ohio State on Saturday.  We all know the story behind why THIS GAME is the biggest one of the season for both teams (well, maybe the Michigan game is bigger for OSU), so why rehash them.  Clearly, the job that Bill O'Brien and the Players Who Stayed at PSU in forging a 5-2 record is one of the more interesting ones in college football this season.  
• Also on Saturday, undefeated Notre Dame faces its biggest test of the season, Oklahoma in Norman, OK.  This will be the acid test for the Irish, to be sure.
• Finally, there is the Steelers and the Redskins on Sunday, and at 1:00 to boot!  First of all, the Steelers will be wearing those ridiculous throwbacks this week:

• For this week only, it will be the Steelers, and not the Pirates, who will be the laughingstocks of their League.
• More importantly, the Redskins will be bringing the most talked about and, arguably, the most exciting player in the NFL to town: Robert Griffin III, or RG III.  I listen to podcasts of Tony Kornheiser's Washington DC radio show, and as you can imagine, I hear an awful lot about RG III in the process.  I can't wait to see him, and, more to the point, how the Steelers deal with him.  Much has been made of the porous Redskins defense, and we know that the Steelers defense hasn't been so hot either when it comes to holding onto leads (until the met the Bengals, of course).  This has the earmarks of a 41-38 barn burner.  Should be fun!
• Pitt beat Buffalo in what was a pretty crummy game, but in watching it, did anyone take note of the Buffalo sidelines?  The two back-up QB's, wearing red baseball caps, were continually motioning to the QB on the field, constantly waving their arms in multiple and oft-times opposite directions.  Could that have possibly meant ANYTHING to the QB out there on the field?

And in non-football news....

• Did you catch the story about Lance Armstrong in last week's Sports Illustrated?  If not, you should take a gander at it.  Turns out that golden boy Lance was not only a drug cheat, but a bully as well, who let his teammates know in no uncertain terms that THEY had better juice up right along with him.
• Of course, cycling may just be the dirtiest sport out there, PED-wise.  Not sure why we should care about it.
• As for Game One of the World Series last night with Justin Verlander giving up five runs and getting knocked out after four innings.....I sure didn't see that coming.  Makes it pretty imperative for Detroit to take Game Two tonight, I should think.

Book Review: "Game Over" by Bill Moushey and Bob Dvorchak

I just finished reading this very excellent book by former Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reporters Bill Moushey and Bob Dvorchak.  This was the first of what will no doubt be many, many books to be written about the Jerry Sandusky scandal at Penn State its aftermath.  Moushey and Dvorchak began work on this book almost as soon as Sandusky was arrested, and it was published in the Spring of this year, before the trial that convicted Sandusky, before the Freeh Report, and before the NCAA and Big Ten sanctions were handed down.  As a result of that timing, if you read this book now, as I did, you may not find anything that has not already been made public knowledge as a result of those very public on-the-record events, but that is the value in reading this book now, I think. 

The research and the reporting done by Moushey and Dvorchak on such a short deadline is astounding.  When the book was published, it was assailed by many of the Penn State loyalists, and its chief critics were, not surprisingly, the Paterno Family, none of whom, it should be noted, were willing to be interviewed for the book, despite requests from the authors.  At the time, the authors merely stated that they stood by their reporting as documented in the book.  Both the trial and conviction of Sandusky and the findings in the Freeh report validate everything that Moushey and Dvorchak had written,  Nothing in "Game Over" has been proven to be false or inaccurate.

I had the pleasure of meeting Bob Dvorchak recently, and it was fascinating hearing him talk about the writing of the book.  A paperback edition is scheduled to be released soon, and while Bob didn't mention it, I imagine that there will be an "Afterword" to that edition.  I will be most anxious to read that as well.

I will leave you with a quote from Bob Dvorchak that I though most interesting, and I hope that he will not mind me quoting him.  We asked about the position that Franco Harris (who also declined several requests to be interviewed for the book) has taken as Joe Paterno's most vigorous public defender.  One of us said that, well, I guess everyone is entitled to their own opinion.  Yes, Dvorchak said, you are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own set of facts.

I thought it an interesting statement that can be applied in all walks of life.

"What in the Wide, Wide World of Sports is Going On....?"

The title of this post is dedicated to my breakfast companions of yesterday morning.


Some sporting thoughts on a Sunday morning.....

• It is frustrating to see the Pirates just eaking out wins over the Astros, a team that they should be hammering into submission, this weekend, but, hey, they ARE winning those games, right?  Just a sign, I suppose, about how far the Pirates have come this season.
• Those Astros, by the way, are really a bad ball club.  As bad a team as I've seen since, oh, the 2010 Pirates.   I'm watching these games, and I am unfamiliar with just about every player on that team.  And is it a coincidence that Brad Mills makes you think of John Russell as he stands expressionless in the Houston dugout?
• For the record, I liked the trade for Wandy Rodriguez.  Nolan Ryan, he ain't, but he will be an improvement over Kevin Correia, I think, in the long run, despite the fact that Correia has won his last six decisions.
• It should also be noted that Rodriguez is under contract, and not an inexpensive one, for, I believe, two more seasons after this one, so kudos to Nutting/Coonelly/Huntington for pulling the trigger on this one.
• If Colton Cain wins 20 games for the Astros in 2017, this will still have been a good deal, if the Pirates get to the post-season this year, or even if they stay in the hunt deep into September.
• I also like that Starling Marte is now here in Pittsburgh, and how can you not after that spectacular debut?  True, he is hitless in his last two games, but I do believe he will be an improvement over what Pirates left fielders/lead off batters have given the team so far.
• Now the big question:  Does GM Neal swing a deal to bring a hitter, or "a bat" as is now the lingo, to PNC Park for the stretch?  I will not pay attention to anything Neal might say on the subject between now and Tuesday - he will never say anything significant on such a subject - but I anxiously await that July deadline.
• In case no one noticed, and it is definitely a secondary story line in Pittsburgh this summer - the Steelers opened training camp  this week.  The highlight for me was hearing my first Mike Tomlin soundbite of the season.  I LOVE hearing those, and I am not being sarcastic.
• Mike Wallace learned a hard lesson this week: When you get into a contract hassle with the Steelers, you will lose.  Every time.  You think these guys would know that by now.
• One thing that guys like Wallace and their agents absolutely, positively need to remember:  the Steelers released Franco Harris in a contract dispute back in 1983.  They do that to one of the pre-eminent figures in franchise history, then guys like Wallace will never have a chance.
• It amazes me to hear that there are some folks in Pitt fandom who think that the Panthers should now forget about ever playing Penn State, even to the point of canceling the two games scheduled for '16 and '17.  "Who needs THEM now?", they sniff.  This makes those elements at Pitt guilty of the same arrogance and hubris that they have accused (and not without some justification, it should be noted) Penn State and Joe Paterno of having had ever since the series ended.
• My friend Dan Bonk, a major Pitt fan and supporter, has taken the opposite tack:  AD Steve Pederson should be on the phone RIGHT NOW to whoever is in charge at Penn State these days negotiating a long term home-and-home deal with Penn State. 
• Penn State has always been able to find a way to schedule teams like Ohio University.  Pitt has always found a way to schedule teams like the University of Buffalo.  They can find a way to make this happen, and don't forget, the one person who always prevented  this series from continuing, is no longer on the scene.
• The NCAA and other college "spokesmen" have talked very loftily about how the College football culture needs to change after it was allowed to run amok at Penn State.  Yet there were reports this week, the ink on the consent decree not even dry, of rival schools' coaches on the PSU campus recruiting the Lions' current scholarship athletes.  Do you REALLY think that that culture is going to change?
• In spite of all that has fallen upon Penn State, I find myself really rooting for Bill O'Brien and those kids who will choose to stay at Penn State this coming season.
• I learned very quickly this week, that if you want to watch the Olympics and not know the results of a given event, stay off of Facebook, Twitter, or the entire Internet itself over the course of the next two weeks.

The NCAA Drops the Hammer

Because this is such an emotional issue, and because I have many friends, as well as family members, closely associated with Penn State, I have tried not to get into the fray too deeply over the Penn State/Freeh/Sandusky affair, but with the announcement of the sanctions by the NCAA and Big Ten today, well, I do have to say something.  I won't rehash everything - you all know what went down today - but will make a couple of random comments.

• I do not think that the sanctions were too severe.  Neither, apparently, does the Penn State President and Board of Trustees.  I think the NCAA got it right this time.
• The vacating of the 111 victories since 1998 was the real shot to the gut, and was obviously intended as a means to purge Joe Paterno from the record books.  It also addressed the issue of the "cult of personality" predominant in so many major college football and basketball programs.
• Sadly, I doubt that this will end such things on our university campuses (quick: who do you think of when you think of Duke University?).
• The fact that a staggering figure like $60 million represents only one year's revenue of the PSU football program boggles the mind.  It is a big reason why this whole cover-up took place.
• The NCAA is coming off today as the simon pure guardian of collegiate athletics.  Please.  They will soon be negotiating a television contract for the College Football Championship playoffs that will begin in two years that will involve amounts of money that are unimaginable.
• ESPN learned it's lesson, apparently.  They did not use Matt Millen as a commentator on their coverage of the NCAA announcement today.
• They did have Les Miles of LSU (of the SEC) on commenting on the evils of the culture of big money in college football.  That was so ludicrous that I couldn't even think of a snarky comment to make about it.
• I heard someone on the radio saying that if you are a fan of a college and are wondering which Penn State scholarship players you could get to come play for your school, you are a part of the problem.
• In the end, I do feel bad for Bill O'Brien and the current players.

Whither Penn State Football?

The debate rages as to whether or not Penn State University football should receive the "death penalty" from the NCAA. I am of two minds on the subject and can see both sides of the argument. However, I am fairly certain of one thing that would most certainly not be right and proper following all that has happened and been revealed about the last 13 years, at least, at Happy Valley, and that would be 110,000 people at Beaver Stadium in full white out regalia on the first Saturday in September screaming "We are....PENN STATE" as the Lions take the field against whatever cupcake Paterno had scheduled for the 2012 season opener. Whatever steps can be taken by either the PSU administration or the NCAA to avoid that particular scene should be taken immediately.