I really miss Fran Duffy and Scott “Our Very Own” Hartkorn.
Those were the video guys from back in the day with Al Golden.
Not only would they file a report a day, they’d send me the link and I would post it on TFF immediately.

Duffy and OVO brought the fans close to the team by interviewing a different group of players every day. The personalities of the  players showed through the screen, with guys like Adrian Robinson and Morkeith Brown doing dances and Morkeith coming up with his own Temple cheer. I hope the current video guys are allowed enough rope to do the same thing with the players as the summer progresses. In the video below, you see Morkeith Brown leading the guys in the ahhh-HAAA cheer. To me, that’s what Temple football is all about. No, not the cheer itself but the fun of playing the game and the swagger, the confidence,  that Temple brought to the stadium every Saturday.  AS much as I missed the winning,  I missed that swagger and fun last year.  Connor Reilly said something the other day that indicated to me the fun is back. “The whole atmosphere is changed around here,” Reilly said.

For a couple of years, Fran Duffy and his crew gave fans an insight into Temple football in their daily “Owl Outlook” features.

Duffy, who Al Golden called “the best in the business” at the team’s football banquet, is now producer with the Philadelphia Eagles television network. You’ll see some of his work Friday night on TV against the New England Patriots. OVO was Duffy’s right-hand man at TU.

Still, you’ve got to take what you can get and what you can get these days is an interview with Matt Rhule. Love the way Matt talks to the press. He’s honest and straightforward and doesn’t try to hide or sugarcoat anything.
Got a report from a few of the ex-players who said Connor Reilly has the “it” factor. I like the “it” factor. You know it when you see it. Adam DiMichele had it. Chester Stewart and Vaughn Charlton didn’t have it. Chris Coyer had “it” when Scot Loeffler was the OC. He didn’t have it when Ryan Day took over. I think Juice and P.J. have “it” as well.
The it factor can win a lot of games for you.
Also like that Rhule is saying the younger players are the story of the defensive secondary. After that secondary was torched last year (not really ALL their fault, there was no pass rush), it’s time for younger blood, although I think Anthony Robey is an NFL-caliber DB.
Rhule said today was the first day heat was a factor. Looking at the long-range forecast, doesn’t look like heat will be much of a factor going past the next day or so.
Unlike last year at this time, when Steve Addazio was complaining about the quality of the wide receivers, it looks like that group is a strength of this team.
See what happens when you commit to throwing the ball?

Throwback Thursday (skip the preliminaries and jump ahead to the 3:30 time stamp … this is what Temple football is all about):

Temple football after working out on the Art Museum (Rocky) steps recently.

Today, Temple football is back (officially).
Anyone who takes the train into the city on a regular basis as I do knows that Temple football has never left.
You could see the guys holding some sort of unofficial practices in the snow, rain and sleet all winter,  the cool spring  mornings and the heat of a mid-summer afternoon.

That’s the life of a major college football player these days.
For all of that work, you get only 12 Saturday afternoons _ 13 if you are lucky _ to show the fruits of all that lifting and studying and drills.
One of Saturdays is the last one of this month.
If football was a school play, this play skips the auditorium and goes straight to Broadway, where it will be scrutinized by all of the major critics in the media.
Now the practices are more structured and with a sense of purpose.
Rocky vs. Rudy.

Rudy Ruettiger (45) played for Dan Devine, who once applied to be head coach at Temple.

Temple vs. Notre Dame in about 26 days, give or take a few hours.

That’s almost four weeks to get ready for a top-level BCS team.

For all of the excitement about Notre Dame, though, there is a more important goal ahead than winning that first game.
For the past few weeks or so, the poll question on this website has been:
Would you rather …

a) lose to Notre Dame and go 11-1

b) beat Notre Dame and go 6-6

c) go 6-6 only if two wins are over ND and Rutgers

While C is my second choice, there is a right answer to that question and it’s No. 1.

Temple football should strive for excellence but Notre Dame recruits in a different stratosphere than the Owls.  (Notre Dame also recruited in a different stratosphere than UConn, USF and Navy and lost to all those schools in recent years. Temple beat all of those schools in the same time frame.)  That said, I don’t see a game among the final 11 (with the possible exception of Louisville) that can’t be won. Rutgers lost almost its entire team and Tommy Tuberville ran off just about the entire Cincinnati recruiting class after he signed to be head coach. The most important thing is winning as many of those final 11 as possible. I’m greedy, though. I’ll take all 12, but seven is the minimum this team should get. Anything above that is gravy and there’s nothing better than gravy around Thanksgiving.
Rocky vs. Rudy is a tremendously compelling matchup, but Rocky vs. the rest of the American Athletic Conference is far more important in the grand scheme of things.

Joe Klecko (left) hugging Wesley Walker. Read my story on Joe on Rantsports.com by clicking on this photo.

As much as I love watching the Pro Football Hall of Fame Induction Ceremonies (tonight, 7 p.m., ESPN), the last 20 or so years I’ve had to shake my head when I hear all of these speeches.
I mean, Warren Sapp is a great player and all and deserves to be in the Hall of Fame but does anyone who saw both Sapp and Joe Klecko in their primes REALLY think Sapp is a better player?
I didn’t think so.

Joe Klecko deserves to get into the Hall of Fame, as the great New York Times’ columnist Dave Anderson argues in this well-written piece.
Sapp wasn’t as a strong an interior presence as Klecko, never occupied as many blockers as Klecko and, unlike Klecko, was too fat and slow to get to the quarterback on a regular basis. But what can be said about the Sapp/Klecko comparison can also be said about the Dan Hampton/Klecko comparison or a number of other linemen who are already in with Klecko out.

Klecko led the league in sacks with 20 1/2 in 1981 and Sapp never led the league in sacks. Sapp’s season-high in sacks was 16 1/2 in 2000 and had only three other double-digit sack years.
Yet Sapp will get up there, make his speech and sit down and I will think that should have been Joe.
Again.
I hope that Temple people and Jets people can combine forces and push the Hall to get Joe Klecko in, if not next year, then the year after.
I do know when Al Golden got up and spoke for coach Wayne Hardin that made a little bit of a difference and I would hope that Matt Rhule does what he can to add his voice to the call for Klecko into the Hall, as do the New York Jets’ players, coaches and fans.

My only beef with Joe is a very minor one. When his son, Dan, played at Temple, he used to tailgate with us all of the time. At one game at Rutgers, I turned to Joe and said, “Now, Joe, just because Dan’s career here comes to an end, that doesn’t mean you have to stop tailgating with us.”

Joe turned to me, looked me in the eye and said: “Mike, I’ll still come back and tailgate with you guys, I promise you that.”

Joe’s never been back, but that should not disqualify him from the Hall of Fame.

The Joe Klecko Hall of Fame Facebook Page

Please read my AAC story on Rantsports.com here.

Sadly, and I hope this level of interest doesn’t translate into Temple football attendance this fall, BUT we haven’t had a TFF donation since July 9 and every click on this story sends about 25 cents TFF’s way. With this new site and the increased start-up costs, we could use the additional revenue. Thanks again.

Matt Rhule takes the podium tomorrow at noon.

Nothing says the start of college football season like Media Day.
(Actually, nothing says the start of college football season as the opening kickoff of football season but, for now, Media Day will have to suffice.)

Temple head coach Matt Rhule will be the last coach to take the podium at noon tomorrow in Newport, R.I..

Rutgers’ coach Kyle Flood will be the first coach to speak.

In this case, hopefully the first will be last and the last will be first.

There are a number of options for Temple fans to participate via twitter and on the internet.

One of the greatest position changes ever made at Temple: Matt Brown from slot receiver to RB. Khalif Herbin would give the Owls some high-end Matty Brown-type depth at RB.

About a year and a month ago at this time, I suggested one trick play for head coach Steve Addazio: Double reverse with Jalen Fitzpatrick getting the ball on the second handoff and then throwing it all the way across the field to Chris Coyer.

Got to love former Owl great Raheem Brock, still representing at the restaurant he owns, Brocks Wings, 1600 North Broad. You can get this schedule at Brock’s Wings and attached are discount cards.

Addazio, who would not know a trick play if it bit him on the butt, finally used the play in the season’s eighth game against Louisville. It went for 12 yards and a first down.

The thought behind that was simple: Fitzpatrick was a former Big 33 quarterback out of Harrisburg High. Coyer an athlete good enough to be named MVP for both the football and basketball teams at Oakton (Va.). Fitzpatrick knows how to throw a ball and Coyer knows how to catch one. We might know that. I’m not sure if teams playing Temple pay a whole lot of attention to that kind of detail.

I don’t know if that was the first trick play Daz ever used at Temple, but it certainly was the only one of 2012 and, thankfully, his last. I do know Matt Rhule uses trick plays. His call for a Joey Jones pass off a reverse resulted in a touchdown in a 42-25 win at Army in 2010 was pure genius. That was the tightest spiral thrown all season. So I don’t think I’ll ever have to suggest a trick play for Matt. He’s good at that.

Rhule gets a big thumbs-up for his well-thought-out position changes, too, in my humble opinion. While Addazio was perfectly comfortable using a four-star talent to hold a clipboard all last year, Rhule won’t allow that to happen.

I called for this pass to be thrown against Rutgers back in the summer of 2012. Unfortunately, wasn’t used until Nov. 4.

I had three position changes outlined for coach Matt Rhule in a post dated March 20, 2013 and titled “Matt Rhule Bobblehead Day” and one of them was switching Alex Jackson from tight end to defensive end.

Matt didn’t go for it in the spring (practice began two days after that post), but, thankfully, he did not wait until the eighth game of the season to switch Alex Jackson from tight end to defensive end. Jackson was switched to defensive end last week and I think this is a trade that will benefit both clubs (offense and defense).

I’ve always said the two biggest keys to winning in college football (other than ball security, of course) are protecting your quarterback and putting the other quarterback on his ass. I have a feeling that  having the combination of the speedy 6-4, 280-pound Jackson in there at one bookend with Sean Daniels at the other will give the Owls a much better pass rush. Jackson was a DE in high school and showed a lot of ability to rush the passer at Dunnellon (Fla.) He only played high school football one season after earning a reputation as one of Florida’s best basketball small forwards. At Temple, he was switched to TE and had trouble catching the ball in big spots the past two seasons particularly.

I think the offensive line is shaping up real well and it looks like new tight end Romond DeLoatch will be a reliable pass-catcher.

The other position change I’d like to see at some point is Khalif Herbin to running back.  With Kevin Newsome leaving the program (he doesn’t want to play football anymore), I think that move is now needed more than ever. High-end depth at tailback is going to be a problem without Herbin filling a “Matty Brown-type” role. Fullback is a real good spot for the Owls. If they use Wyatt Benson (the best blocking fullback in Temple history) on defense, they still have Kenny Harper (another good blocker) and  Coyer who can also play the position. High-end depth at tailback means a battle between guys like Jamie Gilmore, Zaire Williams and (hopefully) Herbin. Out of those  guys, hopefully one or two “home-run hitters” will emerge.

Still, I see a lot of good pass-receiving options and Herbin is the kind of talent who I’d like to see touch the ball more than the 5-7 times a typical slot receiver touches it during the course of any game.

Matt Brown was in a similar position to Herbin at the start of his freshman season and Al Golden saw the light and switched him before the 2009 opener with Villanova. To me, Herbin and Matt Brown are the same player except that Herbin is slightly bigger and slightly faster. Brown and the Owls benefited from the extra touches and there’s still plenty of time for the Owls to determine Herbin’s eventual spot.

Pete White shows good pass protection technique giving Danny O’Brien time to pass.

While the current 2014 Temple recruiting class is highly rated, it includes a lot of three-star players but no marquee four- or five-star.

That all changed over the weekend when Temple head coach Matt Rhule announced to people attending the “Down the Shore” event at Wildwood, N.J. that highly touted offensive lineman Pete White was coming to Temple. Since White is a fifth-year senior who graduated from Maryland in May, he will not have to sit out. He’s the “Montel Harris” of offensive linemen. (Paul Layton is the Montel Harris of punters, graduating from Albany before coming to Temple to replace Brandon McManus’ role.)

Cool off with some ice cream at the Reading Terminal Market tomorrow

In 30-plus years of following Temple football, I can only remember one other four-star recruit snagged by the Owls and that was New Jersey Player of the Year Kevin Harvey (Paulsboro), a quarterback whose dynamic ball skills were wasted when then head coach Bobby Wallace switched him over to cornerback.

Other schools recruiting White out of St. John’s (D.C.): Florida, Miami, Oregon and Virginia Tech. Those schools make very few recruiting mistakes.

Temple will only have White for one year but if this guy lives up to his potential, he could be a nice addition to an already strong offensive line for the Owls. Remember, this line includes impressive sophomore-to-be Kyle Friend and 2009 starting center Sean Boyle. Cody Booth, who switched from tight end to tackle, also had a great spring blocking for the Owls and probably will be a starting tackle along with Boyle.

White started six games for Maryland in 2011 and one of them was not against Temple. The Owls won that game, 38-7, and their defensive line, led by the Steelers’ Adrian Robinson, had a field day, registering three sacks. White started the first two games at guard in 2011 and was injured in the 33-27 loss to West Virginia in the Terps’ second game. Interestingly enough, the Terps beat Miami (Fla.), 32-24, two weeks before losing, 38-7, vs. Temple, causing maybe even Al Golden to thank God he did not have to play Temple in the 2011 season.

White missed the Temple game due to an injury and, with him in the lineup against Miami and West Virginia, Maryland was the only team in the country to not allow a sack in the first two games.

Then Temple came to town.