02.19.15
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Thoughts on the 2015 Schedule

fifteensked

There is an accepted process in the business world of annual evaluations based on the creed of “up or out.” That usually applies to everyone but the job performances of meteorologists and Temple football head coaches over the last 30 or so years.

The 2015 football schedule was released this morning and the first thought those in charge at Temple has to be start running football like the multi-million dollar business it is. Six and six after 2-10 was up and now anything less than seven should be out.

There is no one on that schedule Temple cannot beat, there are a couple of teams on that schedule that Temple probably will not beat and the rest of the schedule largely consists of teams Temple can and should beat. Another positive is the fact that there is only one bye on the schedule. Three byes were way too much last season.

I think the talent is in place to win at least eight games but, given what I’ve seen from my seat in the stands the last two years, seven should be acceptable. Six wins again definitely is not.

There are going to be a couple of times teams Temple should beat win and, hopefully, at least that many times the other way around.

There is a Dec. 5 AAC championship game and the goal should be no less than to make that game in Philadelphia and win it.

02.13.15
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Patrick Anderson Could Be Second Coming

The book closed on the first chapter of The Anderson Story at Temple two weeks ago when Robbie accepted a scholarship to Florida Tech, hopefully not to major in nuclear physics. That’s when all Temple fans finally gave in to any ill-advised hope that Robbie, an academic casualty, would return.

Patrick Anderson scores on a halfback touchdown pass (remember those?) against Beaver Falls.

Patrick Anderson scores on a halfback touchdown pass (remember those?) against Beaver Falls.

A new chapter started this week when Patrick Anderson (no relation) signed at Temple. Let’s hope this book is a lot thicker than the first one.

Robbie was like a Halley’s Comet, giving Owls’ fans a brief glimpse of what a big-time receiver can be. In five games, Anderson caught nine touchdown passes from P.J. Walker, who obviously formed a cosmic connection with Robbie. Against Memphis, Anderson caught three touchdown passes from Walker—three more touchdown passes than Owl receivers were able to get the next season against the same team in a 16-13 loss.

That was the most disappointing thing with the departure of the first Anderson. The Owls knew he was leaving and recruited five receivers in last year’s class and none of them were good enough to make it onto the field for any length of time.

The reviews are yet to be written for Patrick Anderson, but the first draft of his work looks good. Consider the production for the final high school years of each player. My only concern is does Patrick have the 40-speed of Robbie? At 225 pounds, that would be tough to match but, if he does, watch out:

The Two Anderson’s in Their Best High School Years:

Name Wt/Ht Receptions Yards TDs
Patrick 6-4, 225 21 481 9
Robbie 6-3, 180 39 497 6
02.07.15
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Solving the Jet Pack Mystery

"Yeah, but what about the Jet Pack quote?"

“Yeah, but what about the Jet Pack quote?”

Groundhog Day was on Monday, but it has been the last four days for me.

Wednesday wake up, turn on Comcast Sports Net, watch Neil Hartman report live from the Penn State signing day. Thursday, wake up, turn on CSN Philly and watch Neil Hartman report a recap of Penn State signing day. Friday, wake up and watch Neil Hartman interview the Penn State fax guy from Penn State signing day. Saturday, wake up and watch Neil Hartman report about James Franklin recruiting 2016 guys.

decommit

Tomorrow, I fully expect another Neil Hartman report on how Penn State fans reacted to the recruiting day. Overkill, thy name is covering Penn State football  in a town 250 miles away that already has a FBS college football team. Temple really needs to take them down.

Meanwhile, there is no coverage at all of the burning mystery of the day: What the heck was Matt Rhule referring to in his “jet pack” tweet? If it was about a recruit—as was widely rumored—it could not have been about T.J. Simmons because the time lines do not match up. Here was the original tweet, followed by Adam DiMichele’s “game-changer” tweet:

It could not have been about Simmons because three days later he was still committed to UCLA:

Also in the same day:

https://twitter.com/tjsimmons4/status/558095179308351488

Simmons did not change his mind until the NEXT day:

Unless Speedy told Rhule something on Jan. 18 he didn’t tell UCLA fans until four days later, the Jetpack tweet makes no sense. If it was supposed to be about a recruit, other than Speedy, no jetpack-worthy recruits were signed between Jan. 18 and now.

So, until Neil Hartman has a four-day story on the anatomy of Matt Rhule’s jetpack tweet, we can only assume Rhule knows something about a stadium none of us do.

02.05.15
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Finally, a Temple Fan Playing for the Owls

Every once in a while, someone says something that makes you feel like they understand exactly what another person feels and that someone yesterday was Kareem Ali Jr.

Ali said something so profound that I had to stare at the words while holding my Philadelphia Daily News: “I’m tired of seeing Temple lose. I’ve been to almost every home game since my eighth grade or seventh grade year. I know their pain. I’m tired of seeing that.”

So, for every Temple fan who wanted to go down on the field and break up that Hail Mary against Fordham or Buffalo and run a more direct route to sacking Blake Bortles, Kareem Ali Jr. is playing for us. I hope his play will be contagious and the rest of the Owls who are not from here are tired of losing, too. Many of us have the want-to for doing all of those things, Ali has the how-to.

Already, he has become my favorite Temple Owl, following in the footsteps of guys like Kenny Harper, Donny Klein, Paul Palmer and Bernard Pierce.

Temple Recruiting Last Three Years 

Year National Rank Rivals National Rank Scout Conference Rank Scout
2015 75 93 7
2014 59 74 4
2013 85 87 8

Klein might be an odd name for some, but not for me. The Temple center immediately became my favorite player when Temple played at Rutgers after getting kicked out of the Big East. The Owls trailed, 14-3, at halftime and Klein went on a profanity-filled rant: “I’ve never lost to f-ing Rutgers and I’m not about to lose to f-ing Rutgers now” pounding his helmet on the floor. Those were not empty words as Klein’s borderline fanatical blocking opened up huge holes for Tanardo Sharps in the rain and mud and Sharps gained 215 yards on 43 carries as the Owls won, 20-17. That’s the kind of fire, emotion, intensity and desire I’d like the see the Owls play with all of the time.

Those are the kinds of players Temple cannot get enough of and I have the feeling they got at least one more of those kinds of leaders yesterday.

Here are the rest:

Ryquell Armstead RB, Fr. 5-11, 205, Millville, N.J.

Jeremiah Atoki DB, Fr. 6-2, 190, Vineland, N.J.

Josiah Bronson DL, Fr. 6-5, 265, Covington, Wash.

Chapelle Cook LB, Fr. 6-1,214, Lakewood, N.J.

Jovahn Fair OL, Fr. 6-3, 283, Akron, Oh.

Jager Gardner RB, Fr. 6-2, 205, Black Mountain, N.C.

Daishaun Grimes LB, Fr. 6-2, 190, St. Cloud, Fla.

Benson Israel OL, Fr. 6-1, 316, Spring Valley, N.Y.

DeAndre Kelly DL, Fr. 6-3, 238, Hyattsville, Md.

Dana Levine DL, Fr. 6-4, 213, Hallandale Beach, Fla.

Roy Pugh TE, Fr. 6-4,196, South Orange, N.J. .

Jake Robinson TE, Fr. 6-3, 208, Haddonfield, N.J.

T.J. Simmons RB, Fr. 6-1, 195, Lakeland, Fla.

Cortrelle Simpson WR, Fr. 5-10, 175 Indian Head, Md.

Greg Webb DL, R-So. 6-1, 312, Sicklerville, N.J.

Taiyir Wilson LB, Fr. 6-2, 210, Collegeville, Pa.

Dawayne Young DL, Fr. 6-3, 280, Philadelphia, Pa.

MID YEAR TRANSFERS

Kareem Ali, Jr. DB, Fr. 5-11, 175, Sicklerville, N.J.

Logan Marchi QB, Fr. 6-1, 170, Bristol, Conn.

William Updegrove LB, Fr. 6-2, 230, Berwick, Pa

02.03.15
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The Temple Spin Zone

Click here to get into the Temple Spin Zone. It is a lot like the old Twilight Zone, with a little less reality.

Click here to get into the Temple Spin Zone. It is a lot like the old Twilight Zone, with a little less reality. Not surprisingly, the show opens with Sean Padden’s microphone turned off. If you can lip read, it’s a great show.

Fox News has its Bill O’Reilly No-Spin Zone and Temple football will have its spin zone on Wednesday morning at 7 a.m. on National Signing Day.

It is considered a major no-no in the journalism business to call a subject you regularly cover by his first name. Par for the course or the MRAs at Owlscoop.com, though.

It is considered a major no-no in the journalism business to call a subject you regularly cover by his first name. Par for the course for the MRAs at Owlscoop.com, though.

No one can say how the Owls’ coaching staff will spin it, but pretty much everyone agrees that there will be a spin involved. There can be no other conclusion based on the way the Owls handled their other recruiting classes. The theme of past signing days I attended was Al Golden saying we were No. 1 in the MAC by all objective analysis and Temple’s goal is to be No. 1 in everything, recruiting, workouts, gameday, etc. Instead, this will be one of the lowest-ranked recruiting classes in recent years, with Temple ranked No. 102 in the country by one of the two major recruiting websites. Sixth in the AAC by one, eighth–behind Mensa-level Navy–by another.

It came down to the wire.

It came down to the wire.

I do not know how to spin that, but I guess that Temple will bring up all of the examples of two-star guys who came to 10th and Diamond and made it to the NFL. For every one of those guys, though, Al Golden was able to get a guy heavily recruited by a BCS team like Boston College (Kee-Ayre Griffin) or Pitt (Adrian Robinson) who really made a contribution at Temple.

Bernard Pierce, who I called “The Franchise” for his three years here, was a two-star who Golden was able to stash away at a reform school (Glen Mills). This is the way you build winning teams: Get five guys who the big boys want, stash a couple of guys away, and then do a tremendous job watching the film.

That’s what Golden did.

The spin tomorrow will probably be “we watched the film, trust us.”  That’s OK, too, if Temple is able to land T.J. Simmons of Lakeland (Fla.) and Adrienne Talan, a linebacker who is between Nebraska and Temple. I would love to get the Canadian defensive end, Mathieu Betts, who is between Temple and Purdue. If Rhule is able to pull off those three, the spin becomes easier to swallow. Love the legacy recruit, Kareem Ali. Jr., and the kid he was able to bring with him, Greg Webb. I believe both of those guys could earn starting jobs next season. That would upgrade the talent level of a team which already returns 20 starters and set the minimum bar for Rhule wins at eight. A healthy Simmons following a fullback, say Rob Dvoracek, could do some serious damage against Penn State. Simmons following last year’s offensive line without a lead blocker like Dvoracek would not nearly be as effective. Remember, Pierce, Matty Brown and Montel Harris followed great  blocking fullbacks  through the hole and enabled Temple to set up an effective passing  game.  Don’t try to tell that to Rhule, though, who thinks his “process”  of no running game, no pass protection and no wide receiver separation can prevail against any opponent. There’s a lot of spin in that gameday coaching process, too.

This is not a Golden class, though. At best, it is a Silver one, maybe a Bronze. I’d rather have the top-rated class the AAC, like Golden had in the MAC for three-straight years. If Simmons is 100 percent—and that’s a big if—he could be better than Bernard Pierce. Having his announcement rescheduled for 7 a.m. is a big positive for Temple, which does not currently have a franchise running back on the roster.

Keep your fingers crossed and set the alarm for 6:55.

01.31.15
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Temple Finally Joins the Big Time

It’s never too late for Young Jeezy to put in a good word for Temple.

Usually, the only thing on TV in the middle of the afternoon on a mid-week day is a soap opera.

That and work is why I do not watch television on a week day afternoon. One soap opera on Wednesday, though, is must-see TV and that’s when Temple football finally hits the big-time on ESPNU. Every year, ESPNU reserves about a dozen spots for players who wait until signing day to make their announcements on live television. ESPNU’s only requirement is that the player must not have made his intentions known prior to the live announcement and he must be at least a four-star recruit as named by one of the two major recruiting websites, Rivals or Scout.

Usually, it is involves a guy who is about to pick between, say, a Florida or an Auburn. He looks at one hat, lifts it up, puts it down, and then finally puts the hat on of the school he where he chooses to spend the next four years playing football and getting an education. Since ESPNU started this charade a few years ago, I wanted Temple to be part of the show.

Now I have my wish.  That’s where Temple, Marshall and T.J. Simmons come into play.

Julu Smith’s signing day last year.

This will perhaps be the last time either school will have this opportunity because I believe the Power 5 schools will be paying players by the next show and, unless Temple can  find a route to the Power 5 capital, we won’t see this kind of drama again.

I hope I’m wrong, but I do not see this ending well for Temple because Simmons’ primary Marshall recruiter is Sean Cronin and Cronin is not the biggest Matt Rhule fan. I can see a lot of “negative recruiting” involved with Cronin’s knowledge of Temple and Rhule and, if negativity did  not work in getting someone’s vote, we would never see a negative political campaign ad (and that’s all we see).

Either way, tune in between 3:30 and 4 on ESPNU. For the first–and maybe last–time, it’s must-see afternoon TV.

Related:

http://www.herald-dispatch.com/sports/x984739541/Simmons-visiting-MU-this-weekend