"If you go back and look at Pitt when Kent first took over they had a bunch of articles about how much better he was then their previous strength coach Dave Kennedy (at NU now) and then a few years later Kent gets fired."
highy unlikely. Dave Kennedy is viewed as one of the best in the industry. he has turned down numerous NFL offers, the ones that I can think of are the chiefs, redskins and he turned down gruden when he was a raider and then callahan when he was a raider. When he was at Pitt he had players from the stealers ask him to help him with their workout programs. As far as Kent goes, he may be good, but he aint that good.
Panthers shaping up under new strength coach
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
By Paul Zeise, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Linebacker H.B. Blades looks like a new man -- and it appears as if there is a lot less of him.
The same can be said for defensive ends Thomas Smith and Azzie Beagnyam and offensive tackle Rob Petitti.
In fact, many of the members of the Pitt Panthers look a lot different than they did last year, which is the first clue that the hiring of strength and conditioning coach Mike Kent in February was one of the best moves Pitt coach Walt Harris has made.
The second clue comes when you listen to the rest of the coaching staff beam about the job Kent has done with their players.
"You look Azzie's shoulders and his upper body and you can see how much he has developed," said defensive ends coach Charlie Partridge. "And Azzie is now one of the strongest guys on our team. He still weighs about what he did last year, but he isfar more trimmer and he is actually quicker. Same thing with Thomas, who has gained weight, but good weight, and he still has maintained his quickness.
"You can't say enough about the job that Mike Kent and his staff has done for our team. We definitely are a stronger team and I think it will make a huge difference come game day."
Bill Bleil, who coaches tight ends and tackles, echoed those sentiments, as did some of the players.
"I've been impressed with what coach Kent has done in a short period of time," Bleil said. "I really have. It has been impressive to see how quickly some of these guys have grown and gotten stronger. And he is just getting started. He's been outstanding."
Tackle Rob Petitti added: "There is no doubt we are stronger and in better shape. Just look at the O-line -- we're bigger but we're still slim. That's enabled us to be more physical. Myself personally, I've never been this strong or in this good of shape. I think coach Kent has really been the difference."
Kent, who is a native of Youngstown, Ohio, came to Pitt after serving as the strength and conditioning coach at Louisville for the past four seasons. He replaced former strength coach Dave Kennedy, who left to take the same job at Nebraska.
Upon his arrival, Kent instituted his system and it was an instant hit with players and coaches.
His points of emphasis were lowering body fat, increasing strength in the shoulders and hands as well as the flexibility in the player's hips. He also is a firm believer that every drill must be relevant to football or football-specific, so wind sprints, for instance, are 20 yards instead of, say, 40.
"I think there is more than one way to skin the cat, so I can't say what I am doing is better than what they did here before," Kent said. "But we have a system we believe in and we were excited to get the opportunity to come here and work with this program. You rarely run 40 yards at a time in a game, but it is a game of multiple quick bursts, and that's the way we design our program.
"No matter what the system, however, it is worthless unless you have commitment and ownership from the players, and that's been the best part of this whole thing -- the players have embraced me and my assistant and really bought into what we have to do."
Kent's arrival breathed life into an area the Panthers were severely lacking. Last season, the team did not appear to be very strong -- they were pushed around and manhandled almost every time they took the field -- and many of the players appeared to be out of shape or a step slower than their opponent.Blades was a great example of that. He was a bit pudgy and not at his maximum capacity as a player. In six months working with Kent, his body has slimmed down, yet he has gained about 5 pounds. The difference is, he has dropped his body fat nearly 3 percent. Same thing can be said of Petitti, whose body fat has dropped 5 percent.
Kent said the fact the results have been visible, tangible and have happened rather quickly has made it that much easier for him to sell his program.
"When you see guys next to you having so much success, you have to get excited about it," Kent said. "That's neat when you see guys pushing each other, but it is an easy sell if you can point to a guy like Azzie or H.B. and say, 'See what it did for them?' The whole key is the players must be serious and committed, and these guys have been. You can go into a weight room and lift every day and not get stronger, but most of these guys haven't taken the easy road.
