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Onkotz played in this system, he would be just :ne," Ham said. "He would intercept as many passes as he did when we played against our conventional o;enses. He would be able to adapt." Yet there are many physical di;erences between the linebackers of the early Pa- terno era and their 21st century succes- sors. Ham is 6-foot-1 and his weight ranged from 212 pounds at Penn State to 225 pounds with the Steelers. Onkotz was listed at 6-1, 210 pounds in college. Here are the same measurements for several of Penn State's 2019 linebackers, according to the team's most recent roster: Cam Brown, 6-5, 226; Ellis Brooks, 6-1, 237; Jesse Luketa, 6-3, 236; Jan Johnson, 6-2, 234; Brandon Smith, 6-4, 228; Lance Dixon, 6-1 , 201. "These kids coming in now are more aware and much more prepared from high school than when I did," Ham said. "But there is nothing like experience in a game. All the practice you have in the spring and all the drills you go through in the presea- son and in the fall are :ne in getting you prepared. But there's nothing like being out there and experiencing the speed of the game when you're on the :eld. "[James] Franklin is recruiting high- quality three-, four-, :ve-star recruits all the time, and if you're good enough, you're going to be playing, and not in mop-up roles. You're going to be playing in the :rst quarter and when they go through a rotation. You have to rotate all your players to keep them fresh in the fourth quarter. Like if you're Jan Johnson in the middle, you've got to feel that traf- :c, you've got to feel the speed of the game and those o;ensive linemen coming at you. The only way you learn that is truly on-the-job training. That's why Micah Parsons continued to get better and better as the year went on, because he was getting a lot of playing time. He also was seeing Koa Farmer, who started ahead of him, and kind of mirroring the things he was doing out on the :eld. Practicing is invaluable, but you need to have all the time you play in games to un- derstand how you play that position." Farmer is the only starting linebacker from the Citrus Bowl team who will not re- turn in 2019. He's o; to try and make it in the NFL. Johnson and Brown will be com- peting with a younger corps of linebackers that includes two other reserves, Brooks and Luketa, and two incoming freshmen, four-star recruits Smith and Dixon. "I'm bullish on this linebacking crew going into next year," Ham said. "This group should be getting even better, starting with Parsons with all the experi- ence he's had this year, and a guy like Jesse Luketa, who's a talented kid and was on special teams and didn't get much playing time. You've got Ellis Brooks, who made some plays in the Citrus Bowl be- cause he had played some throughout the course of the year, and you saw guys just develop and mature. I saw :lm of Smith in high school, and he is as talented a line- backer as you're going to see." The young linebackers still have to prove themselves. Ham points to several Nittany Lions stars from the past who should serve as role models, guys who he says would also have been standouts against the kind of o;enses that are prevalent in college football in 2019. "Some linebackers were good against the run but a liability in the passing game, but guys like Denny Onkotz, Paul Posluszny, Sean Lee, NaVorro Bowman and Michael Mauti were all athletic, and you kept them on the :eld in passing situations because they were assets." Ham said. "Those guys understood you can't just be half a line- backer. Just because you make a tough hit at the line of scrimmage and a good tackle, that's just one half of being a good line- backer. You have to be a plus in the passing game, whether it's zone or man-to-man coverage. And all those guys I mentioned were so good at that because they worked at it, they worked at their cra=, and they continued to get better in the pros as well. LaVar Arrington and Brandon Short were like that, too. Arrington is probably the most gi=ed athlete. "I'm sure I've missed a bunch of others as well, just complete linebackers who could play the run and the pass equally well. And very smart players as well. They just understood what the o;enses were trying to do against them. A=er a series, you get into a feel for the game, you un- derstand how they're trying to attack you and then you make your adjustments, like how to disguise coverages. You can't make adjustments in the third or fourth quarter. You have to do it very, very quickly. That's when you become a com- plete linebacker." There is an instinctive play that Bow- man made during his redshirt sophomore season of 2008 that epitomizes what Ham means when he talks about the need to adjust quickly. The play was against Temple at Beaver Stadium in the fourth game of the season. Bowman had been a reserve outside linebacker the year be- fore, playing behind All-American Dan A T T H E 2 0 1 9 N I T T A N Y L I O N S ON THE AIR Ham has been calling Penn State football games for the past 19 years, working along- side play-by- play announcer Steve Jones (right). Photo by Steve Manuel

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