Tom, your thoughts?

[Catch1lion]

You buy a gt3 I’ll kiss the ring but til then YAWN (new, from a p car dealer)

What’s the over ? Prolly 50-100k. MSRP or bust . Got to have some rules .

 

[laKavosiey-st lion]

Say you’re worth 50 mil like most retired physicians, you crying bought 50k CMOM BRO

 

[laKavosiey-st lion]

 

[4theglory54]

I met CJF several times in the first several years he was coach. At that point, he would recognize me, and we shared a few jokes. I even gave him grief for being, like @LionJim, a Neshaminy alum. However, between Covid-19 and other things in life, my trips to PSU have been pretty limited in recent years. I saw CJF from afar (the stands, across the street, etc.) during those trips, but I can't even recall the last time we actually chatted. I do have a lot of friends and sources that would pass things along to me about CJF, but I don't think I could, at this time, say that I know him personally. I'd probably have given a different answer if you asked during the first few years he was at PSU.

As for his next steps, I have no idea. My guess is that he's pretty shocked by the turn of events. And while he's famous for having plans for any contingency, I'm not sure how much he planned for this possibility.

Turning to the bigger picture, I am not a fan of colleges making a change in the middle of a season. It may be old school, but I think you play with what you entered the season with, and then re-assess at the end of each season. From an educational perspective (which colleges still are, regardless of how much NIL $$ are out there), there is something to be offered showing the athletes that you complete that which you sign up for (a season). I will also admit that the last three games were a real kick to the gut. The Oregon game could have gone either way, and may well have gone PSU's way if they had changed tactics earlier in the game. That loss, while frustrating, wasn't that big of a deal, in terms of the playoffs, as PSU still had a legitimate path to the playoffs. The UCLA game was a shocker, though in many ways PSU ran into a perfect storm, with the UCLA coaching changes meaning PSU was preparing for a team whose tendencies and even game plans meant little for the actual game. The UCLA loss made the playoffs a stretch, but still not an impossibility. I think most fans expected PSU to bounce back against NW. When they instead struggled, especially in the 2nd half, and lost the game in the way that they did, I wasn't surprised by the way that many fans reacted. i still didn't expect PSU to make a coaching change, but today they surprised me, and did just that.


10 months ago I was debating going to Miami for the semifinal game. With many key players from that team returning, I don't think anybody projected the turn to where we are today. I feel bad for CJF and his family, as I liked them as people, and felt that CJF did a great job representing PSU, and maintaining many of the standards, both on and off the field, that PSU alums and fans take pride in. I'm somewhat cautious, by nature, in making big changes, and in that context I do worry that this action will hurt PSU with the 2026 and 2027 recruiting classes, which to a large extent determines how PSU will do a few years down the road.

Where Pat Kraft and the administration will go from here is a mystery to me. Only time will tell if the coaching change also changes the trajectory of this season, though with Allar's injury would have made that a challenge even if no coaching change was made. As for who will replace CJF, I have no idea. We can only hope that PSU's administrators make a wise choice, and that alums and fans will have reason to continue to be proud of PSU's tradition, as well as its success -- assuming the next coach guides the team to success. PSU is one of the elite programs in the country. It doesn't have the most NIL $$, and State College isn't for everyone. But PSU should, with perhaps only a small hiccup, be able to be fighting for national titles for years to come, provided a good hire is made. The commitment is there from the administration, which makes a huge difference.

Thanks for that, Tom.

This season of watching PSU football has exemplified the change that collegiate football continues to undergo. The sense of loyaly to and identity with the current athletes taking the field has deminished. The team is no longer an assemblage of students who came to PSU as freshman and matured through the program to achieve either success or disappointment on the merits of their own development and performance. Win or lose, they were PSU men that we could identify with and embrace. NIL and the portal, and associate fan expectations, has changed that forever.

In the past, you could look accross the NCAA landscape and assess which teams had which athletes returning, and make a half educated guess where your team matched up. This season, using past such assessments, PSU was returning a solid core from a playoff team, and they were "ranked" accordingly. But the landscape for comparisons was no longer predictable and teams like UCLA bring in a talented QB from accross the country and bam, they are not the team they were expected to be. Extrapolate that out across the NCAA landscape and one thing is clear, each year going forward will be unique in of itself. If you think you know the respective strengths and weanesses of the other teams for the next season, think again.

Optimistic hope should certainly continue . But "Expectations" of future season outcomes and successes should be restrained. Gone are the days of building/developing team success strictly from within. Each coming season will be unique in response to portal moves. The colligiate game that we loved is no longer the same. Worse or better? time will tell.

 

[LionJim]

On what?

#SubjectLinesMatter, ffs.

Fixed, ffs.

 

[OUIrPSU]

Let’s nip this in the bud before you start obsessing like moogy. “Moms” is a nickname that is all and it’s just between us, and now moogy

And everyone on the AKB

 

[Tgar]

Sorry, there is no such thing as a perfect girl from Philly. All Philly girls have some psycho in them.

The psycho girls from Philly have last names, the perfect ones do not……

edit, this has been a really fun Monday morning read. Tgar is going to have to endeavor to drop in more often. The other board is a bit too serious.

 

[manatree]

Turning to the bigger picture, I am not a fan of colleges making a change in the middle of a season. It may be old school, but I think you play with what you entered the season with, and then re-assess at the end of each season. From an educational perspective (which colleges still are, regardless of how much NIL $$ are out there), there is something to be offered showing the athletes that you complete that which you sign up for (a season).

I’m 100% in agreement with you on this.

 

[Bwifan]

I’m 100% in agreement with you on this.

I agree as well but I can also see if Adidas was pushing this, it's big business now with a lot of money on the line. If PSU were to lose out this program would almost be in shambles, losing recruits and firing its coaches. Just as Adidas was coming in to put their name on the jerseys. They didn't want a dumpster fire with their logo. I am sure there is tons of marketing planned to launch the PSU uniform with Adidas logo costing a lot of money. I get that as well. Times are a changing and college football is not what it used to be.

 

[LionJim]

I agree as well but I can also see if Adidas was pushing this, it's big business now with a lot of money on the line. If PSU were to lose out this program would almost be in shambles, losing recruits and firing its coaches. Just as Adidas was coming in to put their name on the jerseys. They didn't want a dumpster fire with their logo. I am sure there is tons of marketing planned to launch the PSU uniform with Adidas logo costing a lot of money. I get that as well. Times are a changing and college football is not what it used to be.

Huh. Interesting take.

 

[uh-Clem]

It is an excellent read. There are few things in it that some historians dispute, but he captured the Swamp Fox rather well, I thought, and did a nice job detailing his actions, both successful and not.

I was shocked when reading Oller's book to find that Leslie Nielsen play Francis Marion in Disney's series.

 

[uh-Clem]

@Tom McAndrew , where did you learn to dislike Neshaminy?

I learned it at a young age as a Pennsbury Falcon.

As a fellow Falcon, I was pleased as a freshman learning that Pennsbury stole Hail to the Lion and made it Hail to the Falcons. Made learning the song simple. Later my life was enhanced when I married a Neshaminy girl whose older brother was a linebacker on their 1964 team.

 

[Moogy]

That’s super gay that movie lol. 2 weeks were off to a wedding in Mexico (yo, they are DUDES)

Drunk laka is the master of the obvious. And oblivious. All at once. So is sober laka.

You should create a blog entitled "Imaginary Travels with a High School Janitor."

 

[Moogy]

Let’s nip this in the bud before you start obsessing like moogy. “Moms” is a nickname that is all and it’s just between us, and now moogy

Everyone KNOWS it's a nickname, product-of-a-Tylenol-bottle-a-day-while-in-utero laka.

The point is, it's creepy as eff. Your mom is the woman who carried you in her womb for 9'ish months and then cared for you over a lifetime, as you were her son - she taught you how to eat, how to poop on a potty ... she wiped your nose when you were sick, etc. So attaching a name reflective of that to the woman you're banging in the middle of a mosh pit, and on imaginary travels, and in the back of all your imaginary cars, and on your landlocked boat ... that's creepy. Why not just call her "daughters," since she's a daughter of someone?