Stock Up, Stock Down (10.5.26)

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STOCK UP

Jeremiah Smith

In a college football world where it doesn’t feel like any one team is head and shoulders above everyone else, that doesn’t necessarily seem to be the case when it comes to the individual players because what Jeremiah Smith is doing right now is ridiculous. He is fresh off a dominant performance against Iowa, hauling in 11 receptions for 206 yards and 2 touchdowns.

Through five games, he has 44 receptions for 823 yards and 9 touchdowns. Those numbers alone would be borderline first-team All-B1G worthy, and yet, he has at least (health provided) seven more games to go. Through a 12-game season, Smith is on track for 106 receptions for 1,982 yards and 22 touchdowns. Which leads me to ask, what the absolute hell, man? He is simply playing a different sport than everyone else out there.

It’ll be interesting to see how this Heisman race goes. Still a ton of the season left so other contenders will pop up, but Smith is +280 while Miami QB Darian Mensah is +480. Mensah had a solid night against Clemson — 18-of-27 for 227 yards, 1 passing TD, 27 rushing yards, and 1 rushing TD — but he’ll need more prolific performances to keep up with Smith who is doing absurd things every week.

Longterm for Jeremiah Smith, I’m curious to see how his NFL career turns out. I won’t lie, I always thought the hype was a *bit* overblown with him. I saw him more like a DK Metcalf or AJ Green than a Julio Jones or Andre Johnson. Someone who was a great wide receiver, but not one that would be in the GOAT convos. It appears I might be wrong on that.

Affordable Tickets To The White Out

There was some talk after the Wisconsin game about how ticket prices (and to be fair, hotel prices) were affecting Beaver Stadium’s attendance. There were notable bare pockets in the stadium against the Badgers, which you wouldn’t think would be the case for Homecoming Weekend with a 5 p.m. kick against a solid name while Penn State was 3-0 and ranked. Well, I have good news for anyone who is usually priced out of the White Out. As of this writing, the get-in price is $103 (according to TicketData.com) compared to where it was about two weeks ago: $340!

The 14-day change is a 71% decrease. The 7-day change is a 67% decrease. The 3-day change is a 48% decrease. Doesn’t take Nostradamus to figure out that thing is going to keep dropping.

STOCK DOWN

The Media Having Patience For Head Coaches

I don’t know if you have checked the general vibe around the Penn State program, but people are piling on Matt Campbell. As it turns out, this lack of patience doesn’t seem confined to just Penn State, but a good portion of college football as a whole.

Tosh Lupoi is in year 1 at Cal, his alma mater. Cal is 68-84 since Jeff Tedford’s last season in 2012. They’ve won more than 7 games twice, going 8-5 in 2015 and 2019. The 8th win was courtesy a bowl game both years, meaning their high mark regular season was 7-5 for 14 seasons. This is a true rebuild for a program that is not a historical power in any sense. They’ve ended the year ranked in the AP Poll five times since 1976.

With all that context, here was the reaction to Cal losing to a solid Mountain West UNLV squad to fall to 2-3 (1-1 in the ACC) 5 games into Tosh’s tenure:

Then there’s Brian Hartline, someone Penn State fans will remember for being sort of involved in the head coaching search last season. He ended up taking over at USF, a good job in the AAC. Willie Taggart (Oregon) and Alex Golesh (Auburn) parlayed the job into much better gigs, so there’s certainly an expectation that you can win at USF.

And four weeks into the year, Hartline was winning. The Bulls were 4-0 with wins over FIU, Army, Delaware State, and Bowling Green. Not the toughest schedule by any means, but a first-year head coach going undefeated in the non-con is always a welcomed sight. That is — until this last game.

USF lost to Temple at home 17-13. Ah, the humanity! Unacceptable!

If fans want to overreact to wins and losses, that’s fine. That is fandom. And honestly, if the media (and I will include BSD in this, even though we certainly claim to be fans, not journalists or an unbiased party) wants to jump all over Penn State or Michigan or whoever at the first sign of struggle, so be it. For the best programs, that’s part of the gig. But it feels like we maybe are losing the plot when we are deeming or insinuating a coaching failure at programs like Cal and South Florida because one is 2-3 and the other lost one game. I realize the portal has changed the way programs are able to rebuild and it has spread up the process, but I think we can show a little more patience for someone like Tosh Lupoi for not turning Cal into a juggernaut in year 1.

Hype For The Penn State/Michigan Game

Speaking of Penn State and Michigan, oh boy is that going to be a fun one in the Big House. There was the 2020 game where Penn State was 0-4 and Michigan was 2-3, but obviously there’s some different vibes with the whole “empty stadium” thing. You have to go back to 2014 for the last Penn State/Michigan game in the Big House where neither team was ranked.

Truly a gross game. The Nittany Lions opened up with points on their first three drives: field goal, field goal, touchdown (aided by a Michigan turnover). It was 13-7 with 11:58 left in the second. From there, this is what the Penn State offense did:

Punt
Turnover on downs
Punt
Turnover on downs
Interception
Punt
Punt
Punt
Safety

End. Of. Game. Michigan 18, Penn State 13.

Unfortunately, I remember it well: I was there. Ann Arbor is an awesome college town, and the Michigan fans were actually incredibly nice. Did not get one “Sandusky” comment the entire trip. But honestly, I think that was because they were struggling just as much as Penn State was at the time. That was the end of the Brady Hoke era and they were 3-3 going into that game. Fan bases aren’t usually ones to talk that good-good when they are doo-doo. The way things are going for Michigan and Penn State, I’m expecting another ~pleasant~ atmosphere around and in the Big House.

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