Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1015973
P E N N S T A T E F O O T B A L L >> ames Franklin is usually pretty tight-lipped when it comes to in- juries, but apparently that policy only applies to his players. When it comes to his own injuries… well… let's just say he has a tendency to over-share. Take Franklin's halftime interview at the Fiesta Bowl last year, in which he re- vealed to a national TV audience that his biggest concern heading into the locker room, aside from Penn State's two first- half turnovers, was that his ribs were killing him after he had been punched in the gut by Trace McSorley during a touchdown celebration on the sideline. Or, better yet, take his opening state- ment at the Nittany Lions' football media day earlier this month. While discussing a variety of off-field activities that players and coaches had been enjoying, the fifth-year head coach mentioned a recent a visit to a paintball range. Setting the scene, he explained that he had lifted up his gun to signal that he had been hit, eliminating him from the game. Paintball players who have been eliminated are supposed to be off-limits, but instead of holding their fire as he got out of their way, Franklin's team showered him with paint pellets. The volley of close-range shots left the coach with an assortment of welts and bruises all over his body. How do we know this? We know it because at media day, he stood up from the desk at the front of a packed Beaver Stadium media room and first lifted his shirt, then hiked up his pants, revealing an assortment welts and bruises all over his body, in- cluding a nasty contusion about the di- ameter of a baseball on the back of his left thigh. That one drew an audible gasp from the assembled reporters. "Most of those shots came when I wasn't supposed to be getting hit, run- ning across the field, the whole way across the field," Franklin said. "Great idea on the front end. Not really good in terms of the execution of it." There are a number of takeaways from Franklin's recent run of bad luck on the injury front, one of which is that when the coaching staff looks to line up future team-building exercises, it should prob- ably just stick to bowling. At the very least, Franklin would be wise to avoid doing any trust falls at the Nittany Lions' next retreat. It really does seem at times as though his team is trying to put him in the hospital. A more significant takeaway, however, may be that Penn State's football pro- gram has truly taken on Franklin's bois- terous personality. Its roster is made up entirely of players who were signed by Franklin (although a handful of fifth- year seniors were recruited by Bill O'Brien), and those players have em- braced his work-hard-play-hard men- tality. That wasn't necessarily a given when Franklin arrived in 2014. His predeces- sor, O'Brien, had taken a more busi- nesslike approach, a reflection, no doubt, of his many years in the NFL. O'Brien's most noteworthy recruit, Christian Hackenberg, shared that res- olute demeanor, and their approach worked well for the one season in which they were together, as the Nittany Lions managed to win seven games in 2013 de- spite the debilitating effects of the NCAA sanctions. When Franklin stepped in following O'Brien's return to the NFL, he brought a different personality to the team. If his predecessor was all business, Franklin was business casual. He did all the things you would expect a maniacally competitive Power Five head coach to do, showing up at the office before day- CHEMISTRY LESSON J As he prepares for his fifth season as head coach, James Franklin is reaping the benefits of a football culture that encourages players to have fun without losing sight of the program's ultimate goals