From the desk of Jim Snyder
We had to temporarily suspend the posting privileges of a few posters this week. It pains us to do this. One of our goals is to grow the Panther Nation. We don’t enjoy sitting with only a few longtime friends at bowl games. We want to increase the number in attendance and meet few new Pitt fans. We hope a few of these posters will come back but they will need to agree on some rules of the road. We simply are not crazy about posters who insist on posting obscenities, racist attacks, attacking other posters or attacking the Pantherlair or Rivals.com. We think all of these things are simply bad for our business. If you want to retain your posting privileges you simply need to post responsibly. All of us have posted things we should not including myself. If Pitt fans want out of the penalty box agreeing to a few simple rules is the quickest way out.
No one person can monitor the boards 24/7. It is impossible and quite frankly a waste of our time. We need time to interview players and coaches. We have several monitors. Each is empowered to delete posts or send individuals to the penalty box for a timeout. At the end of the day you have to trust the judgment of each of them. Chances are if the posts are offensive to them it is also offending others who come to the site.
This week the Pitt coaching staff had running back Anthony Elzy and his [/B]parents[/B] in from Warren, Ohio. A few weeks ago we told you that Pitt would only take one running back this year. In fact that is what they told the prospects they were recruiting. Quite frankly we looked at the video of Anthony Elzy and Kevin Collier from Churchville-Chili High School in the Rochester area and liked them both. The Pitt staff must have gone back to the video too because a “birdie” now tells us they now might be willing to take them both (if they can get them) and both players have be advised. Who knows maybe the spilt vote on the Pantherlair influenced them? You can never have too many good athletes that can run.
Offensive lineman Daniel Wenger (6’ 4” 280) from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida was in Pittsburgh this past week. We hear he had a very good visit. His father attended Pitt and there are unsubstantiated rumors that he ejected a few Pantherlair regulars from a favorite Oakland watering hole when he was a doorman. See Harry’s article later today for more details.
Through much of this recruiting season quarterback Thaddeus Lewis of Hileah, Florida has been quick to tell reporters that he would not attend summer camps or make visits this summer. He wanted to wait until after his senior season. The Pitt coaches, however, were able to convince him to come north and he was in Pittsburgh late last week (see Chris Peak’s article). We are not sure what is going on here but our best guess is that one of the Big Three in Florida is still recruiting him but has not offered. He may be buying time and is often cautious with his responses. He may need time to see where he stands with the local schools. There is still a lot of time between now a Labor Day when QB Dexter Davidson makes his visit. Lewis apparently got to meet about 15 Pitt players from Florida while he was in Pittsburgh.
Thaddeus Lewis looks more like a playmaker to us although I wish he were an inch or two taller. Dexter Davidson looks big and strong but throws off his back foot too often. The Orlando Sentinel has Thaddeus Lewis as the No. 3 quarterback prospect in Florida. They have Dexter Davidson as the No. 4 quarterback prospect in the state. It should be fun to watch this one play itself out.
To paraphrase singer John Fogerty we did not ”hear this one the grapevine” but we expect Pitt to take 3-4 players from the state of Florida. The Pitt staff led by Charlie Partridge has many good inroads into Florida the past few years. All-American candidates Greg Lee and H.B. Blades were both brought north. In addition Dave Wannstedt has great name recognition in Florida. Pitt is likely to take three or four from Florida just to show the pipeline is still open. It will help them in future years.
The Pitt football staff attended a golf outing at the Field Club this past week hosted by a couple Pitt alums. They all gathered for a dinner with their wives that evening. Reports are the Pitt staff is very confident they will finish strong on the recruiting front by getting commits from a number of their targets before we get to February (and maybe sooner).
The Pitt coaching staff now has 12 verbal commitments plus they must account for gray-shirt Kevin Hughes. Just how many will they take? For a while we were hearing 17 as a total but our “birdies” now saying more. It appears the Pitt staff like their chances with a number of players they are chasing. This is always a moving target but our best estimate now is approximately 20 in total.
Rivals.com is schedule to release the 3-star players next week. Tentative date is August 4th.
We had a number of question regarding football tickets. Here is what we were told. Season ticket sales are running ahead of last year but they are still hoping for a big push in August. They will start mailing season tickets the second week of August.
They will probably sell additional club tickets to those that already have club seats for the Notre Dame game. This probably will not happen until late August. The current thinking is they will not be a part of a mini-package. In other words some additional Notre Dame Club Level seats maybe offered to current club level members in late August. You would be able to purchase one ticket for each Club Level seat you now purchase.
One of our subscribers had asked about Louisville tickets. The only way to get tickets through Pitt for all away games is to be a member of the Panther Club or to be a season ticket holder. If you qualify and want tickets contact the Pitt ticket office.
To use a term that has becoming a favorite of radio producers today, we are “efforting” to get John Majors on Rivals Radio. Now that Dave Wannstedt is the head coach he has welcomed Coach Majors back into the fold to a larger degree. Dave Wannstedt played for Coach Majors and was a young assistant under John. Coach Majors is also spending more time around the football program these days. We hope we are able to make arrangements. We will see. It is not a done deal yet.
Pitt released their non-conference basketball schedule this week and we kind of like it. The loss of Chevy Troutman, Mark McCarroll and Chris Taft will have Coach Dixon in a little bit of a rebuilding made this year. Auburn, Wisconsin and South Carolina will help get the Panthers ready for Big East play. Auburn is now coached by Carlisle native Jeff Lebo. He is still a little undermanned right now but you better be ready to play anytime you play one of Coach Lebo’s teams. In two or three years they will be a SEC powerhouse.
The addition of DePaul, Marquette, Cincinnati and Louisville to the conference makes conference schedule a bear. It is true Pitt does not play Villanova, who will be the favorite in the Big East, but they don’t get to play South Florida and they are as close as it gets to a sure “W”.
Some have questioned if having Carl Krauser return was a good thing. They argue that they want to take their lumps now so the young players will have some experience the following year.
Carl Krauser is not your fastest point guard nor is he a leaper. Carl had the misfortune to be born with average legs, which is not a good quality for basketball player competing at a high level. Carl has physical limitations, which requires him to take unorthodox shots just to get them off. Despite limited leaping ability he is a very good rebounder for a guard. What Carl does bring to the table is that he is fearless. He will not back down from anyone. He is a great competitor. His desire to compete can be a huge role model for these five incoming new players. In addition he is a fun player to watch play.
The 27-game schedule is tough enough in a rebuilding year. Rivals Radio runs a promo in which they quoted Illinois basketball coach Bruce Weber. He was in the middle of a long winning streak as was asked if a few losses might be good for his team. Coach Weber barked out, “We don’t need anyone teaching us how to lose. Let’s just keep on winning.”
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
We had to temporarily suspend the posting privileges of a few posters this week. It pains us to do this. One of our goals is to grow the Panther Nation. We don’t enjoy sitting with only a few longtime friends at bowl games. We want to increase the number in attendance and meet few new Pitt fans. We hope a few of these posters will come back but they will need to agree on some rules of the road. We simply are not crazy about posters who insist on posting obscenities, racist attacks, attacking other posters or attacking the Pantherlair or Rivals.com. We think all of these things are simply bad for our business. If you want to retain your posting privileges you simply need to post responsibly. All of us have posted things we should not including myself. If Pitt fans want out of the penalty box agreeing to a few simple rules is the quickest way out.
No one person can monitor the boards 24/7. It is impossible and quite frankly a waste of our time. We need time to interview players and coaches. We have several monitors. Each is empowered to delete posts or send individuals to the penalty box for a timeout. At the end of the day you have to trust the judgment of each of them. Chances are if the posts are offensive to them it is also offending others who come to the site.
This week the Pitt coaching staff had running back Anthony Elzy and his [/B]parents[/B] in from Warren, Ohio. A few weeks ago we told you that Pitt would only take one running back this year. In fact that is what they told the prospects they were recruiting. Quite frankly we looked at the video of Anthony Elzy and Kevin Collier from Churchville-Chili High School in the Rochester area and liked them both. The Pitt staff must have gone back to the video too because a “birdie” now tells us they now might be willing to take them both (if they can get them) and both players have be advised. Who knows maybe the spilt vote on the Pantherlair influenced them? You can never have too many good athletes that can run.
Offensive lineman Daniel Wenger (6’ 4” 280) from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida was in Pittsburgh this past week. We hear he had a very good visit. His father attended Pitt and there are unsubstantiated rumors that he ejected a few Pantherlair regulars from a favorite Oakland watering hole when he was a doorman. See Harry’s article later today for more details.
Through much of this recruiting season quarterback Thaddeus Lewis of Hileah, Florida has been quick to tell reporters that he would not attend summer camps or make visits this summer. He wanted to wait until after his senior season. The Pitt coaches, however, were able to convince him to come north and he was in Pittsburgh late last week (see Chris Peak’s article). We are not sure what is going on here but our best guess is that one of the Big Three in Florida is still recruiting him but has not offered. He may be buying time and is often cautious with his responses. He may need time to see where he stands with the local schools. There is still a lot of time between now a Labor Day when QB Dexter Davidson makes his visit. Lewis apparently got to meet about 15 Pitt players from Florida while he was in Pittsburgh.
Thaddeus Lewis looks more like a playmaker to us although I wish he were an inch or two taller. Dexter Davidson looks big and strong but throws off his back foot too often. The Orlando Sentinel has Thaddeus Lewis as the No. 3 quarterback prospect in Florida. They have Dexter Davidson as the No. 4 quarterback prospect in the state. It should be fun to watch this one play itself out.
To paraphrase singer John Fogerty we did not ”hear this one the grapevine” but we expect Pitt to take 3-4 players from the state of Florida. The Pitt staff led by Charlie Partridge has many good inroads into Florida the past few years. All-American candidates Greg Lee and H.B. Blades were both brought north. In addition Dave Wannstedt has great name recognition in Florida. Pitt is likely to take three or four from Florida just to show the pipeline is still open. It will help them in future years.
The Pitt football staff attended a golf outing at the Field Club this past week hosted by a couple Pitt alums. They all gathered for a dinner with their wives that evening. Reports are the Pitt staff is very confident they will finish strong on the recruiting front by getting commits from a number of their targets before we get to February (and maybe sooner).
The Pitt coaching staff now has 12 verbal commitments plus they must account for gray-shirt Kevin Hughes. Just how many will they take? For a while we were hearing 17 as a total but our “birdies” now saying more. It appears the Pitt staff like their chances with a number of players they are chasing. This is always a moving target but our best estimate now is approximately 20 in total.
Rivals.com is schedule to release the 3-star players next week. Tentative date is August 4th.
We had a number of question regarding football tickets. Here is what we were told. Season ticket sales are running ahead of last year but they are still hoping for a big push in August. They will start mailing season tickets the second week of August.
They will probably sell additional club tickets to those that already have club seats for the Notre Dame game. This probably will not happen until late August. The current thinking is they will not be a part of a mini-package. In other words some additional Notre Dame Club Level seats maybe offered to current club level members in late August. You would be able to purchase one ticket for each Club Level seat you now purchase.
One of our subscribers had asked about Louisville tickets. The only way to get tickets through Pitt for all away games is to be a member of the Panther Club or to be a season ticket holder. If you qualify and want tickets contact the Pitt ticket office.
To use a term that has becoming a favorite of radio producers today, we are “efforting” to get John Majors on Rivals Radio. Now that Dave Wannstedt is the head coach he has welcomed Coach Majors back into the fold to a larger degree. Dave Wannstedt played for Coach Majors and was a young assistant under John. Coach Majors is also spending more time around the football program these days. We hope we are able to make arrangements. We will see. It is not a done deal yet.
Pitt released their non-conference basketball schedule this week and we kind of like it. The loss of Chevy Troutman, Mark McCarroll and Chris Taft will have Coach Dixon in a little bit of a rebuilding made this year. Auburn, Wisconsin and South Carolina will help get the Panthers ready for Big East play. Auburn is now coached by Carlisle native Jeff Lebo. He is still a little undermanned right now but you better be ready to play anytime you play one of Coach Lebo’s teams. In two or three years they will be a SEC powerhouse.
The addition of DePaul, Marquette, Cincinnati and Louisville to the conference makes conference schedule a bear. It is true Pitt does not play Villanova, who will be the favorite in the Big East, but they don’t get to play South Florida and they are as close as it gets to a sure “W”.
Some have questioned if having Carl Krauser return was a good thing. They argue that they want to take their lumps now so the young players will have some experience the following year.
Carl Krauser is not your fastest point guard nor is he a leaper. Carl had the misfortune to be born with average legs, which is not a good quality for basketball player competing at a high level. Carl has physical limitations, which requires him to take unorthodox shots just to get them off. Despite limited leaping ability he is a very good rebounder for a guard. What Carl does bring to the table is that he is fearless. He will not back down from anyone. He is a great competitor. His desire to compete can be a huge role model for these five incoming new players. In addition he is a fun player to watch play.
The 27-game schedule is tough enough in a rebuilding year. Rivals Radio runs a promo in which they quoted Illinois basketball coach Bruce Weber. He was in the middle of a long winning streak as was asked if a few losses might be good for his team. Coach Weber barked out, “We don’t need anyone teaching us how to lose. Let’s just keep on winning.”
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
