I saw in last nights game thread that people were thinking of coming up to DC to catch a game or two.  I live in Fairfax, VA and was wondering when you were planning on coming up.  I know they are in town next week (Apr 20-22) and July 3-5 for the Nats and June 12-14 for the O's.  I'm guessing July... It'd be nice to setup a lil TC cheering section there.

I was talking with one of my friends this weekend whom is from Monroeville and went to Gateway.  Seems that ever since Justin King left, Gateway has become a gateway to other schools.  Now I'm not 100 percent positive, but it seems that something might have happened with Justin and the coaches.  He mentioned that when their players this year signed with other schools that in a quiet manor Terry Smith hinted that there's a rift there. 

Just curious for other's takes, and or truth to the matter.  Considering their top two prospects when to tOSU...

In the wake of Ryan Clark's latest "questionable" big hit, has the art of the form tackle been lost?

It seems more and more safetys and linebackers are trying to go for the shoulder/crown of the helmet big blow a la Ryan Clark or Taylor Mays.  Where are the hits that Poz or Ray Lew make by squaring up a Wideout or a Running Back coming through the hole?

I tried to get into a conversation with a friend of mine about it and just kept rambling on about its legal, its part of the game, you're still bitter about Welker getting lit up (I am a Pats fan and thought that hit was utter BS), etc...  Yet more people I talk to that aren't a bias homer seem to think that either the NCAA or NFL needs to start cracking down on the use of the crown of the helmet as first line to hit a player.  We saw Taylor Mays get 15 for the helmet to helmet hit he put on Norwood, yet Ryan Clark does something similar and it's "Legal?"  I don't remember Norwook being a defenseless receiver, he was in the process of making a catch (which should have been reviewed and called a catch). 

Thoughts...

Now that 08 is over, time to take a look at 09.  We all know that the back 4 who at times have gotten a lot of flack for being in that Cover 3 we all know and love are all graduating. So here's my little preview as to what we have both coming in and in-house already.

On the Roster

Drew Astorino (5-10), Cedric Jeffries (6-2), D'Anton Lynn (6-1), Nick Sukay (6-1), Knowledge Timmons (5-10), AJ (6-1), if they make a switch any of the Mike's (Mauti, Yancich, Zordich all over 6-0)

On the way:

Gerald Hodges (6-3), Darrell Givens (6-1), and Derrick Thomas (6-0).

Much has been made about the height of our DB's and you can see that we shouldn't be well short on talent back there.

I was also thinking, the last time we had a fairly Big Secondary was 05 with Zemaitis, Phillips, Harrell and Lowery and back then I remember Scrap allowed Alan and Anwar to play man to man a fair amount.

Thoughts?

I've seen the replay over and over and my head still hurts from it.  I've read a lot of peoples comments saying this would be good clean fun back in the old days, everyone is whining because it was a Patriots WR, etc etc. 

We all know he will be getting a FedEx package from the league and rightfully so.  The ball was no where near Wes, let a lone he pulled up and Clark decided to leave his feet, launch himself into Wes and pretty much knock him out.  If the ball was close to Wes I could understand him trying to break it up, but the play was pretty much dead and there was no reason to jack up Wes.  This crap about its my job to tackle people that come across the middle... well for one he didn't have the ball so how are you making a tackle? 

Am I just off my meds or did everyone see the same late hit I saw?

So I went over to Eleven Warriors to read the recap.  Got to love some of the commenters on that blog. 

Here's one that irked me:  "alabama or texas will rape this psu team."

So we only put up 13 last night.  We didn't really open up the play book.  It was a knock down drag-it out game.  We did was we were supposed to.  Oh and by the way OSU only ran for 61 yards.  Thats right 61, beanie had 55 of those on 22 carries.

The game plan was make TP throw the football.  He did, we picked him, sacked him but didn't give up a touchdown.  Everyone knew this would be a defensive game, but to say that either of those teams would rape us? 

We play either of them it will be a good game, but give our D some credit they manhandled the OSU line all night long and forced TP to do things he didn't want to due.  We locked up that vaunted running attack and played the typical bend don't break.

Sorry for the rant, but people like this just grind my gears.

Here's an interesting outlook on the second half of the season CNNSI . Looks like most expect PSU to be in the title, but thanks to that Sweater Vest/ Big 10 stigma no one expects PSU to win.  Not surprising to me, but we have to be one of the most balanced teams in the nation on offense and defense. I know we haven't beaten the "Big Boys" but we did just crush Wisc @ their house and I remember being in the Beav when we beat Oregon State 45-14 whom then beat USC.

Just some food for thought.