ADVERTISEMENT

The Curse......poll

VeroBeachPanther

VeroBeachPanther

Scholarship
Jun 27, 2001
248
79
28
Hilton Head Island, SC
Injury and suspension threads talk about curse. When do you think PITT Fooball became cursed?

Once we find the origin we can exercise the demons. Or at least put a face on it

For me, it may go way back to 48-14. Pitt was up 14-0 (maybe we angered the football gods for celebrating to much too soon) Pitt punt returner (I think it was Tim Lewis) called for a phantom "fair catch" but proceeded to take it to the house so was also tagged for "delay of game". Next thing you know PedSt receivers "catching" balls out of the end zone, Dan-o struck with color blindness and coaching carousel hits second gear. Fast forward 35 years we haven't overcome.

My second choice would be Jackie Sherril leaving to A & M for big $$$$ after season when he had a stacked team coming back. At the time I was naive about the power of money.
 
Actually it all started on Friday, November 27, 1981 downtown at Froggie's at about 10:30pm. Someone asked the dumb question,
"Are We Recruiting Well Enough?" Then someone else said " Should Pitt return to the block letters or at least Navy and old Gold colors" Later without provocation someone said "Playing Penn State at Three Rivers Stadium really has been cool, why are we playing in Pitt Stadium tomorrow, no parking and the place is a dump"...at this point the clock struck midnight.....
 
  • Like
Reactions: pittdan77 and WiseAndGlorious
It is pretty simple. There are simply too many sports options for Pittsburgh people, and not enough loyal supportive Pitt people.

IMO Pitt should expand their campus into another part of Pittsburgh. There is strength in numbers.
 
pittmeister said:
I believe all this curse talk is silly. However, I will say this, the momentum of the Pitt football program came to a screeching halt when Bozik took over. You can recover from bad losses but bad hires can set you back for years.
Click to expand...

I don't. You can't explain how ridiculous stuff that has happened against us. No program has really had to endure such bad luck and circumstances at this level for 35 years.
 
  • Like
Reactions: sherepower
Swervin27 said:
we need to all meet up outside of Heinz, get all weird on beer and liquor and do some sort of choreographed spirit dance. Kill some of those geese that hang out there and offer them up to the football gods as a gifr and paint our faces with the blood, pound out some beers and dance it up. maybe bring a radio so we got some music.. I think this could help rid the program of this 30 year old curse.

what do you think fellas, anyone want to meet me in the north shore, get drunk, kill geese and wipe animal blood on our faces and dance around, all for the betterment of pitt football? i'll bring pizza
Click to expand...
What kind of pizza?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Swervin27
DiehardPanther said:
Pitt thought they were too good for Jackie Sherrill, Walt Harris and Jamie Dixon. A lot of the issues are self inflicted.
Click to expand...
Jamie left for his dream job. said as much. he tried to get yet another undeserved raise/extension with playing the rumor game and well, you go to the well once too often, you come up dry.

You guys think walt and wanny left the cupboards bare, Dixon not only left the cupboards empty, he burnt the whole damn house down and left his trash on the neighbor's lawn before he left..
 
Pitt doesn't need the NCAA for santions. They've been sanctioning their self for decades. From the sounds of other posters going back to jock southerland when Pitt administration was jealous fb was too powerful and castrated the program back then.

Did it again in early/mid 80s.
 
  • Like
Reactions: vegasgreed and sherepower
Swervin27 said:
Jamie left for his dream job. said as much. he tried to get yet another undeserved raise/extension with playing the rumor game and well, you go to the well once too often, you come up dry.

You guys think walt and wanny left the cupboards bare, Dixon not only left the cupboards empty, he burnt the whole damn house down and left his trash on the neighbor's lawn before he left..
Click to expand...
Pitt should have given Dixon more $ for assistants, and allowed him to continue manipulating the RPI with his scheduling. Instead - we are going to have 3 straight losing seasons under Stallings, and then have to pay a buyout. In the end we will have spent the same amount of $ and have a far inferior product.
 
The posters on here, primarily "Recruits" and his buddies from Panther Rants were relentless is their personal attacks on Walt Harris ( affectionately known as Wlat by his admirers. ). You should all be ashamed of yourselves.
 
tetonpanther said:
The posters on here, primarily "Recruits" and his buddies from Panther Rants were relentless is their personal attacks on Walt Harris ( affectionately known as Wlat by his admirers. ). You should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Click to expand...
Harris had Palko and something like 17 starters coming back from the Fiesta Bowl team. Then we had Flacco ready to take the reigns. Geez.....Pitt fans and their administration are dumb.
 
tetonpanther said:
The posters on here, primarily "Recruits" and his buddies from Panther Rants were relentless is their personal attacks on Walt Harris ( affectionately known as Wlat by his admirers. ). You should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Click to expand...
Recruits... attacked Walt? @recruitsreadtheseboards what do you say for yourself? Walt saved this program bro, had the best WR (most reception yards per game) like 7 out of 8 years in the big east, over such programs like Miami.

Dude, come clean for your past sins, admit them in an open manner, acknowledge you were wrong, ask for forgiveness and i'll see what I can do here with calling off the dogs. Damn man, I used to think you were cool too.
 
Harris was only 57 years old, and would have retired at Pitt if the administration had provided more support to him and his staff. Instead Pitt tried to play hard ball, and that is when Walt's agent came out with his remarks. Harris was 25-13 his last 3 years at Pitt, and coached the only BCS game we have played in. Pitt was in position to continue winning 8 or more games for that foreseeable future.
 
Swervin27 said:
Jamie left for his dream job. said as much. he tried to get yet another undeserved raise/extension with playing the rumor game and well, you go to the well once too often, you come up dry.

You guys think walt and wanny left the cupboards bare, Dixon not only left the cupboards empty, he burnt the whole damn house down and left his trash on the neighbor's lawn before he left..
Click to expand...
Well we certainly showed Jamie!
 
It's kinda similar to Jerry Seinfeld's rant at the car rental counter. They're good at taking the reservation, it's FILLING the reservation where they have problems. With Pitt, we find it easy to remove coaches, it's the REPLACING them where we have our problems.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DiehardPanther
The University of Calfornia, Berkeley football stadium is built atop an earthquake fault.

Pitt Football has teetered precariously over a figurative fault line for much of its history. Every time the Panthers reach solid footing, the Cathedral wonks undermine the program. The damage of Ed Bozik's reign of error cannot be underestimated. Bozik was Pearl Harbor, Chernobyl, the Biblical Plagues of Egypt, crab grass and younameit all rolled into one suntanned-academic-in-a-blazer parcel.
 
  • Like
Reactions: sherepower, The Central Scrutinizer and Swervin27
I guess some of you guys believe in the "Kennedy Curse"? More hogwash. Most of that was self inflicted as well: overdoses, playing football on skis, driving drunk and passenger dies, flying a cargo of explosives in WWII, flying a plane at night but unable to read the instruments, resulting in three people being killed... etc
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: DiehardPanther and The Central Scrutinizer
DiehardPanther said:
LOL - The geniuses in charge of Pitt athletics somehow think it is better to hire mediocre coaches and then pay their buyouts to hire a new coach rather than retain a good coach once we get him.
Click to expand...
Ironically we finally switched that up with Jamie. Paid HIM. But went cheap and moralistic on the assistants and recruiting and discipline. That's bad for any program but particularly in Dixon's case because his weakness was in one on one recruiting, his personality seemed lacking as a finisher, so he needed strong (aka sleazy) assistants and freedom to operate from the typical Pitt admin tyranny. But as they upped his contract they seemed to squeeze him in all those other areas. Predictably (or it should have been predictable anyway), Dixon couldn't even beat Fordham for recruits near the end (and the struggles continue now with Stallings, though i think the main issue there is mostly that he's a jackass). Alarmingly it appears similar is happening with Duz now too.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DiehardPanther
tetonpanther said:
The posters on here, primarily "Recruits" and his buddies from Panther Rants were relentless is their personal attacks on Walt Harris ( affectionately known as Wlat by his admirers. ). You should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Click to expand...
Walt burned out... couldn't recruit linemen to save his life and had DCs and offensive line coaches who were worthless.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Central Scrutinizer
Swervin27 said:
Recruits... attacked Walt? @recruitsreadtheseboards what do you say for yourself? Walt saved this program bro, had the best WR (most reception yards per game) like 7 out of 8 years in the big east, over such programs like Miami.

Dude, come clean for your past sins, admit them in an open manner, acknowledge you were wrong, ask for forgiveness and i'll see what I can do here with calling off the dogs. Damn man, I used to think you were cool too.
Click to expand...
Maybe he watched the game at Toledo or the swinging gate game or the USF game....or on and on....Walt was just ok...,he petered out like Dixon
 
DiehardPanther said:
Harris had Palko and something like 17 starters coming back from the Fiesta Bowl team. Then we had Flacco ready to take the reigns. Geez.....Pitt fans and their administration are dumb.
Click to expand...
Yea 17 starters back on a team which lost to Utah by 50.....whoopie!
 
Revenge Of The Noise said:
Ironically we finally switched that up with Jamie. Paid HIM. But went cheap and moralistic on the assistants and recruiting and discipline. That's bad for any program but particularly in Dixon's case because his weakness was in one on one recruiting, his personality seemed lacking as a finisher, so he needed strong (aka sleazy) assistants and freedom to operate from the typical Pitt admin tyranny. But as they upped his contract they seemed to squeeze him in all those other areas. Predictably (or it should have been predictable anyway), Dixon couldn't even beat Fordham for recruits near the end (and the struggles continue now with Stallings, though i think the main issue there is mostly that he's a jackass). Alarmingly it appears similar is happening with Duz now too.
Click to expand...

Jamie quit as soon as he found out that Pitt was going to the ACC. He just didn't have the guts to tell anyone so he could continue to receive the big paychecks.
 
That is funny. Not true but funny. Jamie could not longer get kids out of NY so the team kept getting worse and worse. All about the players!


RaleighPittFan said:
Jamie quit as soon as he found out that Pitt was going to the ACC. He just didn't have the guts to tell anyone so he could continue to receive the big paychecks.
Click to expand...
 
Delpanther said:
Walt burned out... couldn't recruit linemen to save his life and had DCs and offensive line coaches who were worthless.
Click to expand...
He had something like 17 starters returning from the Fiesta Bowl. Palko and the offense would have put points on the board and Flacco was waiting in the wings. Coyer and Rhoades were solid DC. Freeman was blah. It is tough to go out and get big time coaches when the admin is not giving the $.
 
Cathedral Lawn Frisbee said:
That is funny. Not true but funny. Jamie could not longer get kids out of NY so the team kept getting worse and worse. All about the players!
Click to expand...

I have to assume it is true because Jamie made no bones about the fact that he didn't like leaving The Big East. Especially for the ACC.

Regardless, TCU was never Jamie's dream job. Jamie took the best opportunity he had before he fell completely on his face at Pitt (in the ACC).
 
  • Like
Reactions: Cathedral Lawn Frisbee
DiehardPanther said:
He had something like 17 starters returning from the Fiesta Bowl. Palko and the offense would have put points on the board and Flacco was waiting in the wings. Coyer and Rhoades were solid DC. Freeman was blah. It is tough to go out and get big time coaches when the admin is not giving the $.
Click to expand...
Rhoads was a total bum..go watch the Toledo tapes and tapes of all games Pitt played against spread teams. The Fiesta bowl team left a lot to be desired...lots of very mediocre players.
 
Delpanther said:
Rhoads was a total bum..go watch the Toledo tapes and tapes of all games Pitt played against spread teams. The Fiesta bowl team left a lot to be desired...lots of very mediocre players.
Click to expand...

One game stands out from the rest of the spread games. Paul deserves a lot of credit for stopping WVU in the 13-9 game.

I won't argue one bit on your view of the rest.
 
RaleighPittFan said:
One game stands out from the rest of the spread games. Paul deserves a lot of credit for stopping WVU in the 13-9 game.

I won't argue one bit on your view of the rest.
Click to expand...
He lost more games than he ever won because of his strategy! I wouldn't give you a plug nickel for him.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

K

Capel deserves a ton of credit at the moment

Replies
45
Views
2K
Center Court at the Pete
jlazinger
jlazinger
1

Sunday March 24: The Sweet 16 is Set

Replies
8
Views
746
Center Court at the Pete
Big Marty1
B
1

Elite Eight Sunday: The Final Four is Set

Replies
8
Views
733
Center Court at the Pete
17-15
1
Chris Peak

Breakdown: Pitt holds off late N.C. State surge to finish the regular season with a win

Replies
0
Views
1K
Center Court at the Pete
Chris Peak
Chris Peak
DT_PITT

NC State Game @ the Pete & Other Dribbles ...

Replies
21
Views
2K
Basketball Board
DrPittfan163
D
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest posts

ADVERTISEMENT
Top Bottom
Back