Reports filtered out on Thursday morning of a violent collision at the Pitt Football South Side facility: one between Special Teams Coordinator and Tight Ends coach Jacob Bronowski’s forehead and an offending trash can during a pre-practice hype speech.
Bronowski, a first-year member of the coaching staff who served as the blue team’s coach during Pitt’s spring game, discussed his love for the job and the passion he brings to the workplace—trash can attacks and all—following the Saturday scrimmage.
“I was getting the blue team hyped up on Thursday,” Bronowski said. “And that’s the thing you guys probably know about me if you’ve been around, I love being in that building every single day, I love coming in to work and the passion just pours out.”
Bronowski went on to describe how the event unfolded.
“I was just getting fired up, I gave a little quote about Sun Tzu—which more than three-fourths of our guys didn’t know who that was, which is crazy—gave ‘em that quote, was talking to them, just getting them fired up,” Bronowski said. “I looked over [at the trashcan] and I kinda just walked over and I picked it up and I just started smashing it against my head, you know, repeatedly.”
S*** Hits the Can
From there Bronowski’s story got hazy—whether because of the Viking-like stupor that came over him, or because of the effect of slamming a piece of metal into his head repeatedly—although he said he didn’t suffer any ill effects from the dust-up.
“I might’ve punted it,” Bronowski added. “I’m great… I’m good. Hard-headed.”
The pump-up speech had the desired effect on the Panthers’ locker room, and Bronowski said it helped him impart a lesson in the process.
“The guys went nuts. To me, it shows those guys, and I had a lot of them come up after, you can have a heck of a lot of fun when you work,” Bronowski said. “I don’t care what it is… you can whistle when you work no matter what. If that means banging a trash can on your head, which my wife probably doesn’t approve of, but if that’s what that means to get those guys excited, then so be it.”
Blue team quarterback Nate Yarnell—the presumptive starter for Pitt football entering 2024—corroborated Bronowski’s assessment of the players’ reaction.
“Just pure, I mean, just fire,” Yarnell said. “It was electric. It was awesome. I love Coach Bro, and he brings so much, all this new staff brings so much energy. We just have a lot of fun in there. When it’s time to work, we work, and when it’s time to have fun we really enjoy being around each other.”
Gus Frerotte would be proud.
🤣
In this era of concussions and CTE, banging your head repeatedly on a metal trash can sends a GREAT message.