Tag Archives: Temple football

08.06.15
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Not Much to Choose Between Player A and Player B

Owls began practice today for the big showdown 9/5/15.

Owls began practice today for the big showdown 9/5/15.

One of the tricks of the trade David Murphy uses to compare players the Philadelphia Phillies might be after is to compare statistics of two guys and then unmask them at the end.

It is a useful exercise not only for baseball but for college football. One of the remarkable things about the first week of play this fall is that there are two quarterbacks with almost identical stats and almost exactly the same freshmen and sophomore years who will be playing that week.

One is talked about as being a first-round NFL pick in the 2016 Draft; one is not even in the discussion. A close look at both players indicates that there is nothing to separate them.

Player A

  Games Comp. Atm. Pct. Yards TDs INTs Rating Year
2013 9 152 250 60.8 2,084 20 8 150.8 Fresh.
2014 12 203 381 53.3 2,317 13 15 107.8 Soph.
                   

By now, you might have figured out one quarterback is Christian Hackenberg and the other is P.J. Walker, but, except for the number of games involved, it is hard to tell.

In many respects, Walker—Player A—was the more productive quarterback as a freshman than Hackenberg was. He had just as many touchdown passes in three less games and two less interceptions. Hackenberg had more yards, but that could easily be explained by his three extra games. Walker’s QB rating was considerably better, 150.8 to 134.8.

Player B

  Games Comp. Atm. Pct. Yards TDs INTs Rating Year
2013 12 231 392 58.9 2,955 20 10 134.8 Fresh.
2014 13 270 484 55.8 2,977 12 15 109.4 Soph.
                   

The next year, was similar with Hackenberg getting only the slightest of nods, a QB rating of 109.4 to P.J.’s 107.8. Still, in one less game, P.J. had one more touchdown pass than Hackenberg.

Both will admit they had down seasons, but the numbers suggest that there is not much to choose.

To borrow a new NCAA basketball phrase, there is something called the eye test. Because of his ability to escape the rush, I think P.J. is the better college quarterback. Hackenberg is taller and might be the prototype quarterback, but I think P.J. will come out on top 9/5/15.

08.04.15
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Dropping a Bomb on Penn State

In honor of Robby Anderson becoming eligible, we can only think of one song appropriate to the occasion.

Technically, it will not be until around 6:30 p.m. on the night of Sept. 5 before Temple fans learn whether their long Commonwealth nightmare is over. Substantively, though, they learned the result yesterday when Robby Anderson was declared eligible.

That's a 44-inch vertical, great hands, escapability an 4.5 speed.

Temple tested a smaller nuclear device last week when it learned Pitt transfer Adonis Jennings was declared eligible. Monday’s news about Anderson was one of those megaton Hydrogen-type jawns and the Nittany Lions have no idea of what is about to hit them..

We will not paraphrase former U.S. President Gerald Ford by calling the failure to beat Penn State a long national nightmare but, since 1941, it certainly has been a Commonwealth (of Pennsylvania) nightmare. We should all wake from that slumber in one month and one day, thanks to the special talents of one Mr. Anderson.

Temple tested a smaller nuclear device last week when it learned Pitt transfer Adonis Jennings was declared eligible. Monday’s news about Anderson was one of those megaton Hydrogen-type jawns and the Nittany Lions have no idea of what is about to hit them.

After carefully observing both Anderson in 2013 and the Penn State secondary last season, I have come to the conclusion—sad for them, good for the Owls—that the Nittany Lions cannot stop Anderson or even hope to contain him. Anything Jennings can add to this mix is just a bonus. Anderson should help open a Temple offense that was closed tighter than one of those Kansas silos.

Anderson’s eligibility is huge because is a proven big-play receiver, not only in the AAC, but from a national standpoint. His 18.7-yards-per-catch average was second in all of college football in the 2013 season. His three touchdown receptions in a 41-21 win at Memphis was an exclamation point in a five-game season that saw him catch nine touchdown passes from true freshman quarterback P.J. Walker.

Walker, who started the same number of games at quarterback, finished with 20 touchdown passes and only eight interceptions. Without Anderson, who flunked out of school in January of 2014, Walker looked to be out of his comfort zone a year ago and suffered a sophomore slump in which he only had 12 touchdown passes and 14 interceptions. The news about Anderson came four days after Temple learned that the NCAA granted Pitt transfer Adonis Jennings, a four-star wide receiver recruit, a hardship waiver to become immediately eligible.

To be sure, there were signs this was coming over the last few weeks or so. A wide receiver transfer from Hawaii, Keith Kirkwood, who wore No. 19 last year, changed his number from 19 to 89 last week and Anderson attended a couple of team charity functions wearing his familiar No. 19.

As it turned out, those were clues to a mystery that was solved on Monday and will be the talk of AAC Media Day. More importantly, although there is still a lot of work to do over the next month, the confidence level of Temple fans going into a Penn State game has never been higher.

08.02.15
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Temple Having a NFL Head Coach Cannot Be Minimized

Bruce Arians' players showing former teammate Todd Bowles some love.

Bruce Arians’ players showing former teammate Todd Bowles some love.

When the Bruce Arians’ crew made the trip to Florham Park over the weekend for the first full day of New York Jets’ training camp, the contingent of ex-Temple players were treated like the champions they were.

The fact that Temple has a head coach in the NFL, Todd Bowles, cannot be minimized. Hopefully, Matt Rhule can use it as a recruiting tool. He already has the support of Arians’ players, guys like Sheldon Morris, Kevin Jones, Joe Greenwood and Paul Palmer and hopefully that kind of networking will work in Temple’s favor over the next few years.

camppasses

No, Arians’ players did not win the Big East—there wasn’t even a Big East back then—but they helped put Temple on the national football map by having two winning seasons in three years against two schedules that were ranked No. 10 in the country.

Think about that for a moment. Back then, Temple played a schedule equal or superior to the current powers the SEC, PAC-10,and Big 10 and more than held its own. It did so practicing on a rock-strewn field (now the Student Pavilion) when Geasey Field was taken over by the lacrosse or field hockey teams of the day. The weight room was located next to a bowling alley in the basement of McGonigle Hall.

When Arians was asked if beating the Super Bowl winning Seattle Seahawks was the biggest win of his career–he was the last team to beat them before they won the 2014 Super Bowl–he stopped the press conference by saying no. “My biggest win was when I was at Temple, beating Pitt for the first time in 39 years,” Arians said.

Through it all, they beat Pitt three out of five years, beat West Virginia, blew out a Virginia Tech team that won 10 games and a Toledo team that was 9-2-1. They had a Heisman Trophy runner-up in Palmer, who should have been a Heisman Trophy winner. They went down to East Carolina and shut out the Pirates, 17-0. Even in those days, places like Pitt, West Virginia and Virginia Tech had multi-million dollar dedicated practice facilities but Temple did more with less.

It had to.

Arians built his teams around a great running game with a great blocking fullback and hopefully Rhule can take something from that formula, which has been the way Temple has played football for a long time. Arians had an eye for good quarterbacks, like Lee Saltz, Tim Riordan and Matty Baker.

The guys who played for him have always been “tight as a fist” and it was good to see them enjoying and supporting their former teammate the other day.

07.27.15
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Good Sign: Robby Anderson Sighting

Robby Anderson is on the far right, wearing his familiar No. 19.

Robby Anderson is on the far right, wearing his familiar No. 19.

Anyone who went to the Elmwood Park Zoo yesterday got a good sighting of a beast Penn State should fear the most and we’re not talking about a charging Rhino or an Alligator here.

Look who P.J.'s right-hand man is ....

Look who P.J.’s right-hand man is ….

We’re talking about Temple wide receiver Robby Anderson (and, yes, it is now officially Robby; more on that later). That has got to a be a good sign because Temple Summer Session II classes end on Friday and grades are released on Aug. 3. Temple head coach Matt Rhule said Anderson’s eligibility is tied to those Summer II grades. (His Summer I grades were more than acceptable.) This is not a case like Bernard Pierce in 2009, when the NCAA Clearinghouse waited until the week before the Villanova game to approve Pierce’s participation as a true freshman. In Pierce’s case, the NCAA was concerned about the Glen Mills’ course load, which was later approved. Pierce had 44 yards on six carries in his first college game. Had this issue been cleared up before then, he probably would have started and went for 100 plus.

robster

There is that best helmet in college football again with the buckle allowing the ‘][‘ to be clearly shown.

Penn State cannot cover him and I doubt it can even hope to contain him.

 

In Anderson’s case, his community college courses done in Florida were enough for him to be re-admitted to Temple and now his eligibility is tied to how he does here.

For Rhule to even allow Anderson to participate in a team function has to be a sign that the coach is satisfied with Anderson’s academic progress.

(Now to the spelling of Robby’s first name: Since he is now spelling it Robby, instead of Robbie, on his twitter account, that’s how we will spell it here henceforth and Temple Football Forever. Or at least until he changes his twitter account back to Robbie.)

Why is Anderson’s eligibility so important? Temple did not have a single game-changing offensive player Penn State could fear a year ago. Anderson is just such a player and his very presence in the Penn State game makes quarterback P.J. Walker a game-changing player and it makes running back Jahad Thomas a game-changing player and possibly SEC-talent-level tight end Colin Thompson a game-changing player. Heck, he makes Romond Deloatch more dangerous in the red zone. In my mind, Temple beats Penn State with him and it would be very difficult to win this game without him. Penn State cannot cover him I doubt it can even hope to contain him.

So, while Sept. 5 is the most important date in Temple football history, Aug. 3d is shaping up to be pretty darn important, too. Robby Anderson being at the Zoo made July 26th a good day for Temple football, just how good will be determined soon.

07.15.15
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What Matt Rhule’s Jetpack Has to Do With Stadium Failure

Matt Rhule's Jetpack has been on Go Fund Me for half a month now without a single penny raised.

Matt Rhule’s Jetpack has been on Go Fund Me for half a month now without a single penny raised.

Nothing major gets done at Temple University without it being approved at a Board of Trustees Meeting.

That was true for the Apollo of Temple, now known as the Liacouras Center, and also true for the $50 million basketball practice facility and the $17 million football training facility. To assume that a $300 million stadium is going to get done behind the scenes with all that as a backdrop is a fallacy.

With this Jetpack, Matt will no longer have to take the SEPTA 24 bus to practice.

With this Jetpack, Matt will no longer have to take the SEPTA 24 bus to practice.

Temple people are notoriously protective of what is inside their wallets–perhaps as a Pavlovian Response from spending four years near the edges of the Green Zone (17th Street on the West and 10th Street on the East)–and the strong rumor is that the BOT will not allow discussion of a stadium until $25 million is raised by stadium backers

So another meeting of the BOT having come and gone without a stadium announcement—or even a discussion of a stadium—speaks volumes. Meetings were held in December, March, May and now July without mention of a stadium.

The next question has to be why. For that, all you have to do is look at the funding for Matt Rhule’s Jetpack. As a joke, a poster named “Victory Engineer”  set up a “Go Fund Me” for a Matt Rhule Jetpack on July 3 and posted it on Owlsdaily.com. It has been seen by nearly 2,000 viewers and raised a grand total of zero dollars.

You would think someone, even as a joke, would have given five bucks in two weeks but, so far, nothing.

What does this have to do with a stadium?

Temple people are notoriously protective of what is inside their wallets–perhaps as a Pavlovian Response from spending four years near the edges of the Green Zone (17th Street on the West and 10th Street on the East)–and the strong rumor is that the BOT will not allow discussion of a stadium until $25 million is raised by stadium backers. So far, that figure has fallen far short—about $24 million short—and, at this rate, a stadium will not be discussed until the October meeting.

October, 2068.

It’s time to extend the Lincoln Financial Field lease now and worry about a stadium later.

As far as Matt Rhule’s Jetpack, that has a much better chance of happening on Sept. 6 should the result of the Penn State game turn out to be in the Owls’ favor.

Related:

Get coach Rhule His Jetpack

06.26.15
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Temple Putting the Cart Before the Horse With Rhule Extension

This had to be the reaction of a lot of Temple fans reading the news of Matt Rhule's contract extension this morning.

This had to be the reaction of a lot of Temple fans reading the news of Matt Rhule’s contract extension this morning.

The way it works in the business world is that a promotion or contract extension usually goes to the guy or gal who has proven to be an asset to the company with a history of proven results.

Anything else is called putting the cart before the horse. That’s why it’s extremely puzzling that the university would give a contract extension to a guy who has coached two years and has yet to produce a winning season or even secure one of the 76 bowl bids that go to the 126 FBS teams.

Temple could afford to wait for two important reasons. First, we do not know if this fine young man possesses the game day decision-making acumen that leads to winning football games. You do not give promotions and contract extensions to people for just being nice guys. If that were the case, a lot of guys pushing carts in super market lots would be CEOs of Shop Rite and Acme. Second, a contract extension buys Temple no security.

Unless the buyout is $8 million or more—and there is no reason to believe it is—any Power 5 team can break Temple’s contract with Rhule without a sweat.

Temple could afford to wait. The uni’s highly paid publicity staff tried to put lipstick on this pig with a slickly-worded press release yesterday but, if they were really honest, this is what they would have penned:

PHILADELPHIA (6/25/15) – Temple University announced today that it has extended the contract of head coach Matt Rhule for four years, which might or might not keep him as leader of the team through the 2021.

Rhule was hired to become the Owls’ 26th head coach on December 17, 2012, succeeding Steve Addazio and inheriting a team that went 4-7 in 2012. Despite returning 16 starters from a four-win team, Rhule turned that into a two-win team, which included arguably the three worst losses in Temple history—to an FCS team, Fordham, the worst FBS team in 25 years, Idaho, and to an 0-9 UConn team. Fordham would later get blown out by Lafayette.

That did not engender a whole lot of confidence for Owl fans for the 2014 season but the Owls finished the season with a 6-6 record, still not good enough to secure one of the 76 bowl berths that go to the 126 FBS teams.  Despite a four-win improvement in one year, Rhule had the Owls in the bottom third of FBS teams. The Owls often called a puzzling parade of time outs in the opening portion of each half which left  them without valuable timeouts at the end of each game.

In 2014, thanks to a Hurricane-like storm that took the sails out of an ECU Pirate ship that shot a full volley of 70 points into North Carolina, Rhule led the Owls to their first win over a ranked opponent since 1988. Still, Temple suffered a puzzling loss to a Navy team that got hammered by Western Kentucky for the second-straight year. The Owls were able to muster only two field goals against a Cincinnati team that gave 448 yards per game (102d nationally) and ranked 66th in the nation in scoring defense (27 ppg). That was a game the Owls had to win and a game in which the offense suffered a 60-minute malaise. 

The Owls’ offense was ineffective, largely because the coaching staff gave sophomore quarterback P.J. Walker empty backfields on numerous third-down situations, making him a sitting duck for blitzing linebackers. Not surprisingly, the Owls finished last in the FBS in third-down efficiency (23.8 percent) and last in the AAC in rushing. Running the football historically been a Temple strongpoint with players like Paul Palmer, Brian Slade, Harold Harmon, Zach Dixon, Stacy Mack, Jason McKie, Bernard Pierce, Matty Brown and Montel Harris following the blocks of lead fullbacks through the hole (Shelley Poole, Nelson Herrera, Henry Hynoski, Mark Bright, Wyatt Benson and Kenny Harper).

With the addition of a fullback as an additional blocker at the point of attack to jump-start the running game (and give P.J. some needed pocket protection) and the recent reacquistion of wide receiver Robbie Anderson, the BOT is confident Matt can fix last year’s problems on offense and decided to jump the gun and give him a contract extension.