wow that site is an absolute mess. So much stupid fighting about DW vs TG. What a bunch of lame buffoons. I think I'll stay away from that board for a while.

(09-26-2011 12:14 AM)Joey_Niklas Wrote:  wow that site is an absolute mess. So much stupid fighting about DW vs TG. What a bunch of lame buffoons. I think I'll stay away from that board for a while.

I'm not really surprised after what happened with the way DW was fired, the debacle that was Haywood, and the hiring of Graham. Also, with the amount of posters who hate Peterson.....

I remember when Walt was fired many fans thought all Pitt needed was another coach to plug in and Pitt would be great right away. DW came in promising BE titles, competiting for National Championships, etc.

Same thing here. Graham came in promising high octane, BE championships, etc. If Pitt would have beaten Iowa and ND and started 4-0, even with ugly performances, that would have gone along way to convince the masses but alas it didn't happen.

I don't expect much this year. I hope for a 7-5 season with a bowl game and hopefully a W. This team absoluletely needs a bowl game for the extra practices.

Next year is when Graham and Company need to 'put up or shut up', in my opinion.

Yea I agree with every thing you said. I think the "High Octane" approach was more into getting asses in the seats more than on field production. I kind've figured we was going to have a start similar to this. I still think Graham should run a hybrid spread/power set until he gets his players in place.

That site is the worst. There is way too much infighting amongst the fans. Rivals is better but I still like the Pitt contingent on this board the best. I haven't seen a post by a Pitt fan yet that attacked other Pitt fans, etc. I realize this is due to the size on here, most likely, however, I compliment you all on your quality.

I don't think Pantherlair is really much better man. I enjoy the subscription side of things on each though. It always amazed me how people love the same team somehow antagonize eachother the way they do.

Hi Niklas....,i am agree with you..you are right,this site is an absolute mess.And so much stupid fighting about DW vs TG....

I don't think most of the people on those sites love the team. I think they just like to troll. I feel like Panther Digest goes unmoderated. I don't know what you would have to do to get banned because I have seen so many people using seriously personal attacks against others and yet they continue to post.

Panther Digest has too many people that personally know each other, which tends to morph into group think among 2 or 3 "camps". You have the "SP is legion" group that want nothing more than to see the AD fired. You also have the "DW was screwed over" group that believes that TG is bad because DW was given the shaft. I still post over there and try to be objective, but I admit that I tend to be a pollyanna when it comes to Pitt. I'm realistic, but I believe that Pitt as an institution is bigger than any coach or AD at the school. Therefore, my belief is that there is no single coach or AD that will magically make Pitt tank into the doldrums or will take it to the stratosphere. I think most of that heavy work needs to be done by the academic side of the school. Basically, as long as Pitt is willing to spend money on athletics, the better Nordy can position Pitt in academics and research, the easier it is for the coaches and AD to sell Pitt to the public. On top of that, Pitt is located in a solid recruiting area - not top notch - but far from anemic. Therefore, Pitt has natural advantages already built in that generally out guns WVU on almost any recruit that both schools go after.

This is what makes Pitt truly a great addition to a new conference, because conference expansion is much much more about institutional fit and the many other positive attributes about a university, along with markets, than on field performance for the last 3 - 5 years. No one would have wanted Colorado if you merely judged their on field performance. However, Colorado is much greater than recent success or the lack thereof. That is why Colorado is in the PAC and Boise wasn't even on the PAC's radar.

There's more to life than football. There's more to the institution than football. Some people get it - some people don't.

(10-12-2011 12:29 PM)ndlutz Wrote:  There's more to life than football. There's more to the institution than football. Some people get it - some people don't.

That's why WVU fans on Scout are so crazy. They think it is all about FB results. They think conferences expand without taking the long term view into account. If WVU football becomes mediocre or sucks, the other schools would look at WVU and wonder why are they even in the BCS? Their academics are very much like CUSA, or Sun Belt schools. That is not attractive to peer institutions.

Although I see your point, let's not throw stones. They're in a tough position which I (we) don't envy. In all reasonableness we know what these decisions boil down to and it's really not on field performance. In that category they're certainly attractive.

As much as I've grown tired of the idiocy of their fan base, I understand their position on realignment. We're extremely fortunate to be in the position we are. Because of their uncertainty, their level of misfortune is also extremely high. To this I am sympathetic.

(10-13-2011 12:02 AM)ndlutz Wrote:  Although I see your point, let's not throw stones. They're in a tough position which I (we) don't envy. In all reasonableness we know what these decisions boil down to and it's really not on field performance. In that category they're certainly attractive.

As much as I've grown tired of the idiocy of their fan base, I understand their position on realignment. We're extremely fortunate to be in the position we are. Because of their uncertainty, their level of misfortune is also extremely high. To this I am sympathetic.

I would feel a lot more sorry for them if their fans wouldn't act like $hitheads. But WVU put themselves in a bad situation when it came to their school mission and vision. Most people on the expansion board and on the WVU scout/rivals boards don't realize that academics are important. What if Pitt had the same academics as WVU today? Couple that with our recent football "success" and we don't look nearly as attractive. Pittsburgh as a market may have had enough TV sets to still be attractive to the Big12, but we certainly wouldn't have been invited to the ACC (or have been on the B1G radar last year). When you throw on top of that the poor reputation WVU has for a game day experience for an opposing fan, and it just adds more negatives that they need to work through.

The state of WV needs to realize that at least one school in that state should be set apart and designated as their research/academic center of excellence. Let those students that don't have the grades or SAT scores go to Marshall or the community colleges. They're killing WVU with their asinine decision making. On top of that, the corruption in the political sphere has set up a system to fleece underqualified students by "stealing" roughly $10K - $20K from freshmen that flame out because they should have never been allowed in in the first place. Their drop out rate is embarrassing, and it's exploitation of the unqualified students who feel "forced" to pursue a 4 year degree.

I understand your point but the population you deal with on a football message board are football fans. They didn't all even necessarily go to WVU and so their interest in the academic side of the school is probably not what drives them in their contact with other message board posters.

I don't know much about the academic situation at WVU besides it's been corrupt in the past (the free MBA) and it's not ranked well overall. Part of this isn't really their fault, either, because the population that they draw their students from aren't known as being the best and the brightest. When you're the state university of West Virginia you know you're not going to be drawing a lot of people from elsewhere and the students who go to WVU probably aren't getting into Pitt. Still, it is right for the state to have a university to educate the people there. Unfortunately, the quality may always be doomed to suffer.