The Week That Was: Antone Exum

Everyone has those moments when they see something on Twitter, but it's so terrible that they hang in a highly tense balance between not believing it and not wanting to believe it.

One of the best examples of this individual sway of emotions was a story told to me by my friend Kevin. On the night former Oklahoma City Thunder shooting guard James Harden was traded, Kevin—a die-hard OKC fan—was at a bar in downtown Blacksburg. After he saw it on Twitter he immediately bought a stronger drink simply out of disbelief. Then after seeing the story break on the bottom crawl of ESPN, he set that (barely touched) drink down and immediately walked home to sit in silence.

He just couldn't handle being around people.

That is exactly how I felt when I saw the news that Antone Exum tore his ACL. I just sat on a couch and stared at my computer screen, hoping it was some sort of hoax or poorly sourced report. It just couldn't be. The guy that had adopted the previously vacant "vocal team leader" role just blew out his knee playing pick up hoops? It simply sucked too much to be true.

Is there any player not named Te'o that has gone through a larger roller coaster than Exum? Over the first four weeks of the season no one was more scrutinized and criticized than him. Critiques of his play ranged from mild displeasure to absolute vitriol, all coming to a head after an absolutely BRUTAL game against Cincinnati (2 face masks, 2 pass interferences).

This lead to Bud Foster's now infamous rant leading to our favorite coach saying that Exum "played his nuts off." What did Antone do with that vote of confidence? Oh you know, just (arguably) become Tech's best defensive player. He played incredibly well against for the rest of the season, just look at his accolades (according to HokieSports):

• Second Team All-ACC
• Coaches All-ACC Second Team
• SI.com Honerable Mention ALL-AMERICAN
• SI.com All-Bowl Team
• Russell Athletic Bowl MVP

If that's not giving the finger to the haters, I don't know what is.

One more thing on this: are we ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN that this was not caused by Nick Saban? Obviously this sounds insane, but didn't this cross everyone's mind in some way or another (or just mine)?

Let's break it down. Exum basically Tweets, "Saban's preparing right now, so I will too". Less than a week later, the Prince of Darkness sends one of his sleeper agents to play pick-up with Exum, basically breaking his right knee.

Don't tell me that scenario is COMPLETELY out of the realm of possibility...if anything there will be more fuel for the #BeatBama fire.

In another big happening in the Hokie football scene last week, the offensive staff was introduced via press conference. First of all, if you haven't watched the entire presser, do it. IT WAS AWESOME. Here are my quick thoughts:

Good old Frankinator started the conference by thanking former coaches, and then pulled out a few pages...yes PAGES... of notebook paper that had the sole purpose of listing all of the coaches he consulted before making these hires. This list was longer than the list of artists on We Are The World. Moving on.

There was then a very awkward exchange in which he made every coach stand to show that the staff was, "not just getting younger, but taller." This kind of felt like when an extended family member tells you how big you've gotten even though you're 25.

Jeff Grimes is terrifyingly intense. There were a lot of intense phrases thrown around such as "spearhead of the offense" and "point of attack". Here's a follow-up interview Coach Grimes did with Bill Roth, more patient INTENSITY.

Aaron Moorehead, however, is my favorite of the three. Just look at his eyes. The man doesn't look at you, he looks through you to his next objective. This group of receivers is in for an extremely...active...round of spring practice. Godspeed fellas.

The Hokie Hoops team began the week on an uplifting and positive two-game winning streak. They now host 14th ranked Miami after losing their last two.

Positives: Erick Green scored 60 points on over 50% shooting in the two games.
Negatives: Everything else.

UVA was in the news twice this week. First off, they announced a home and home series with Oregon...LOLOLOL. They tried to start a #BeatOregon campaign, but only there was less belief in that than there were fans at their spring game.

Yesterday it was reported, then confirmed by Virginia, that offensive coordinator Bill Lazor is leaving Charlottesville to become the quarterbacks coach for the Philadelphia Eagles. Upon hearing the news, Michael Vick and Nick Foles joined the Rocco-Simms Foundation For Rotated Quarterbacks.

Seriously though, why did Chip Kelly hire Lazor? Does his wife make good snacks for the coaches meetings? Does Kelly know he can just tell him to shut up at any time, while actually coaching the offense?

The why in Kelly's case remains to be seen, but it will ultimately leave the Wahoos with two new coordinators for the upcoming season. Upon hearing this Tom O'Brien immediately looked at Philip Simms, cringed, and slowly walked to the clipboard.

Finally, a federal court just ruled that collegiate football and basketball players can pursue a cut of the revenue from the NCAA's television contract. Somewhere in a garage, Peter Warrick is just shaking his head thinking about all the clothes he could have bought.

Until next time, have an awesome week y'all.