WWTMD?

What would the mustache do?  

We've taken a bit of a break from the site since Scotty Reynolds pulled a Sid Bream on Pitt and broke our hearts at the last minute.  We're just now starting to think about opening the shades and letting some sun-light in on the disaster our life has become since.  Well, here's something to brighten our days before the eventual gloom of the football season tears us back down:  Wanny has discovered twitter.  (HT: mondesis house).

Football season begins in 4.5 short months, and I for one am not really looking forward to it.  We'll be coming off a historic basketball season for the University and jump right into a mediocre at best football season.  Players have been jumping ship left and right and left again.  Our all-american linebacker graduated and the quarterback situation looks...well...not much improved from last year.  What worries us the most, however, is the ground game.  With two relatively un-proven backs handling the ball for the Panthers this year, Pitt will surely sorely miss a game-breaking runner to steal a game or two.  Keep in mind that Pitt, without McCoy, loses to Notre Dame and WVU last year.   Even with a pretty easy schedule next year (YSU, NC State, Navy, less intimidating Big East schedule) who here thinks Pitt makes another run at a BCS game?  Thought so.  

We'll be breaking down the roster and depth chart over the next two weeks.  Stay tuned.

Natyazhko to Arizona

Kyryl Natyazhko is going to UA.

Thoughts:

Meh. He would have been a nice addition but wouldn't have been ready to step in and fill Blair's void right away. Pitt has plenty of young big men to groom for the future.

Recruiting Update

More good information from Chris Dokish. This time he touches upon 6’8 high school phenom Adreian Payne who is currently ranked as the 4th best center prospect for 2010 by scout. Dokish states that Payne is more of a power forward and does not want to go to a college with a lot of competition at the position. This might not bode so well for Pitt as they have a lot of young big men on the roster who project at the 4. ESPN has Payne as the 28th best prospect for 2010.

Speaking of ESPN, they released their final top 100 for the 09 prospects. Dante Taylor is at 16, Patterson dropped to 94, and Talib Zanna fell out of the rankings. Not concerned here. Based on everything I’ve read both Patterson and Zanna will be complete animals in a couple of years. Both of their hearts pump pure awesome according to the Pitt medical staff.

One last interesting thing: here are the rankings for the top 150 Juco prospects. Will Coleman is ranked 2nd. Jarrid Famous, who assistant coach Tom Herrion had watched play a couple months back, is ranked 11th. Haven't heard anything on Famous since then which makes me think the Pitt staff doesn't have much interest.

Blair Heads to the NBA

It’s official. Dejaun Blair is going pro.

I posted a Mock Draft on a Prodigy message board when I was about 14. I had Erick Dampier going third. If I wanted to see Dejuan stay at Pitt his junior year I should have posted another one that had him slipping to the 2nd round because apparently he might have read it.

Blair mentioned several times that he is guaranteed to be a first-round pick. That isn't true, but a self-described "internet freak,'' Blair noted that every website he's seen has him being selected in the first round, "as high as eighth and as low as 19th.'' But all in the first round.

Ahh yes, the internet mock drafts, where a cesspool of virgins from every quadrant of Mother Earth make their predictions on when so and so will be drafted. These sparkling individuals represent the utopia of sports career advice and it’s a shame our society undervalues them. Zing.

Not saying he won’t go in the first round but hopefully he put more stock in the guidance from the other more established sources. Regardless, good luck to Dejuan in the league. At worst he is a Leon Powe/Big Baby Davis type of body off the bench.

Thoughts:

No surprises here. I don’t really see Dejuan’s draft status getting any higher. He needs to improve his offense away from the basket but Dixon probably wouldn't want him playing outside the paint while at Pitt. It’s not like he can’t get better in the NBA while making millions either.

The Panthers now have a huge gaping hole in their frontcourt but they should be able to adjust. Villanova and Marquette were very successful this past year with smaller lineups so while we will see a drop off I still see Pitt in the NCAA tourney. In addition, prior to Blair declaring Pitt only had one open scholarship for 2010 that had already been filled by Isaiah Epps. Keeping it open for another recruit makes some sense if they can’t land Kyryl Natyazhko or Will Coleman. I don’t see Kyryl coming to a team that will have three freshmen bigs in its incoming class along with another redshirt freshman in Dwight Miller. We’ll see what happens.

Grab That Man a Sandwich

Jamie Dixon has been named the Naismith College Basketball Coach of the Year. If you see him at your local watering hole grab the man a delicious sandwich and a pint of fine ale. He is a hard worker and it’s important that he eats right. Dixon also won the award for coolest hairdo. West Virginia coach Bob Huggins won in a landslide for best shirt/tie combinations.

Other Things to Discuss:

Talib Zanna and Dante Taylor made the Washington Post’s All-Met first team. Taylor was player of the year. This is obviously awesome because of the great talent that comes out of DC. Pitt recruiting is an ever evolving animal. The future is bright my friends as the metamorphisis is still incomplete.

Another read on Kyryl Natyazhko. Doesn’t really give any insight on to where he is going. Just says he is trying to plan a visit to Arizona now that Sean Miller is coaching there. His top three are Pitt, Zona, and Arizona State.

Check out an early preseason top 25. Notice that Pitt is absent.

Blair to Declare?

According to DraftExpress Dejuan Blair will announce his intentions to enter the NBA draft tomorrow. He will wait on hiring an agent for the immediate future but it appears he is gone.

This comes on the same day that Andy Katz reported of a chance Blair might stay. We'll see what happens.

USC Rumors Squelched

Rumors flying all over the place of late.

Tim Floyd, coach of USC, was offered the Arizona job. The Trojans were then going to lure Jamie Dixon to Southern California with their temptations of quasi legalized marijuana and big breasted women.

Jamie has said repeatedly he doesn’t want to coach against Howland and the move to USC would have the two coaches facing each other and fighting for the same recruits. On top of that, Pitt is a much better basketball program in a more competitive conference. I called a severe case of shenanigans on the whole thing which was confirmed when Floyd turned down the Arizona job.

Other Things:

Another nice article on Dante Taylor in the Tribune.