Mason Heintschel

Call me a spoil sport. Call me a contrarian stick-in-the-mud. It is just fact that oftentimes when a football team, college or pro, makes a change at quarterback to a guy who the opposing coach has no book on, has never seen film of, because it doesn't exist, they get astonished. Bill O'Brien is a helluva coach, but he had no way of knowing what Mason Heintschel's tendencies were. Mason is a true freshman, 18 years old! Now, tackle football is not USMLE. I don't know how the endocrine system works but I damn well know how a quarterback works. O'Brien knows what a QB does, fresh-faced or not. But we "Panther" fans all thought Eli Holstein was the second-coming last season, remember? 7-0! Yeah, Gooo Pitt! In the second half of the season we lost seven straight. Part of that, of course, was that our early season was padded with the usual cupcakes, that when we got to conference play and higher quality opponents Eli didn't look like a savior. But part of that also is that opposing coaches had a book on Holstein. My Big Brother told me, I forget which way but Holstein couldn't go left or right, he always went one direction. Coaches watch enough film of that, they're going to notice! I haven't had a TV in over 20 years, ergo, I didn't see today's game, but the next opposing coach is going to have film on Mason. Maybe this 18-year old 3-star from Oregon Ohio is the next Dan Marino, I don't know, and that's the point: no Pitt fan does. Nobody can.