Here's @Charley_Walters dropping a casual PJ Fleck —> Virginia bombshell on a quiet Sunday morning. #Gophers pic.twitter.com/JH9ft5aiy7— Minnesota Sports Fan (@realmnsportsfan) June 27, 2021
RUMOR: If Successful in 2021, PJ Fleck Will Leave Minnesota for ACC Payday
Today's biggest charge was early "buzz" surrounding PJ Fleck and a move to the ACC, should his 2021 campaign with the Gophers end a successful one. According to Walters, Virginia Tech is ready to offer $6 million/year to the current Minnesota head coach, a number that could potentially make him top-10 among his national peers. Fleck's salary at the U of M is $4.6 million/year, good for #24 in the nation (according to USA Today).
Probably not the best sign for the upcoming year that it's not even July and we are already being floated out as potential landing spot for coaches after the season ends.
Comments
This sounds like something Fleck's agent floated to use as leverage for contract negotiations. We know Whit wouldn't let any leaks happen from the VT athletic department side.
Didn't he already get a raise last year?
Yea, this report tells me that Fleck won't be the coach of VT next year. Besides, why would Whit replace a coach in year 1? /s
So if Fleck wins 7 games we don't care anymore? Nice journalism.
If Dana Holgorsen gets 10 wins at Houston, a P5 will poach him!
Ah how the rumor mill lives.
Edit: Since P5s love to poach from Houston and y'all almost got Herman if y'all poach Holgy I'll just pray that VT can afford the buyout.
Hate this shit. We've got a good team this year and a tough schedule where we can prove ourselves. And a lot of recruiting momentum. Fuck all the outside noise
We in fact do not know if we have a good team this year considering we haven't played yet.
You are correct we can prove ourselves.
Bingo! Way too early to suggest we have a good team. We have way too many question marks to know one way or the other. We might have a good team. We also might not have a good team.
I agree VT has a chance to prove itself to some extent. I also think it's a bit over the line to claim our schedule is "tough" though. UNC, WVU, ND and Miami are our toughest games. Outside of those four our schedule is pretty soft, consisting of a couple FCS lightweights and the bottom half of the ACC. Not exactly a gauntlet.
Pitt should be solid with having a QB returning for his 8th starting season
According to ESPN's power index Pitt is in the bottom third...
But its Pitt...
And it's ESPN...
fair point. But show me a respected source saying Pitt is in the top 3rd of the ACC. Now I'm not saying ESPN's list is gospel by any stretch of the imagination but VTs schedule in 2021 consists of UNC, WVU, ND, Miami, UVA and literally the bottom 5 teams on ESPN's ACC power index. Oh, and two pretty poor FCS teams. Thanks to UNC, WVU and ND it's not going to be the softest schedule we've ever had but to call it tough is a bit much IMO. If our schedule is "tough" then you would have to say that at least 60 of the 72 P5 teams also have a tough schedule which kind of waters down the value of "tough"
Yea, I was talking to a friend this weekend about this... to get to 8+ wins, we need multiple people to (a) improve drastically and (b) stay healthy. We have a 'known quality' at very few spots on the team.
We also have a 200 lb QB that will be asked to carry the ball seventeen times per game, if last year's average repeats itself.
I've heard this every offseason for the last few yet here we are.
I stopped believing the lies about 2 years ago...my expectations for 2021 are real low. Lowest they've ever been, actually. Is it possible that we'll have a good team? Yeah, sure! Do I think it's likely? No. But games aren't won and lost on paper. I'd be happy for the team to go out there and prove me wrong.
I think the vast majority of the fanbase would agree with you. I think you don't have to look any further than the blowback that the athletic department took by not firing Fuente last year, and the fallout from the disastrous press conference where the message "they (the fans) don't give enough for that opinion to matter" was actually said to see it firsthand.
If we hadn't just gone through a year of all large gatherings banned globally with now pent up demand for people to just go to a sporting event, I strongly suspect we'd struggle to fill Lane to 75% capacity on a consistent basis this upcoming season.
have you seen our home schedule? I think there's a good chance we'll fill Lane for the UNC game. Possibly ND as well (though, if we lost to UNC it'll probably be more green and gold than we'd like to see). Otherwise, I think there's still a decent chance that Lane will be less than 75% for the rest of the season, even after the pent up frustrations of pandemic crowd bans. Especially if we lose to UNC (and, FTR, I think we will). Lets not forget that everything is more expensive now too.
UNC - Likely sell out
MTSU - if we beat UNC, this might get above 90%. If we lose to UNC I could see this being <75%
RU - same
ND - Likely sell out (hopefully, beating UNC will mean more maroon and less green)
Pitt - if we're 2-3 at this point we probably struggle to fill Lane
'Cuse - 3-3 or even 4-2 and this probably doesn't get above 75%. Maybe if we're 5-1 or 6-0 it'll fill up. Maybe.
Duke - I can't imagine this selling out either unless we have fewer than 2 losses which I think is unlikely at this point
Put it this way, if it hadn't been for COVID and the pent up demand, I think we'd be looking at a UNC takeover of Lane for that first game. I also think ND fans absolutely will take over Lane, and thank goodness we aren't playing Clemson at home this year or we'd probably be looking at a takeover the likes that we used to pull at Wallace Wade.
Agreed
If it hadn't been for COVID and we didn't have to make layoffs/paycuts in the athletic dept and we still had a .500 season, we'd have a new coach.
Yeah, I guess we'll see in December
You don't fire a coach after Year 0
When is the last time any other school "took-over Lane"?
When was the last time VT entered a season having been ineligible for a bowl game the previous year?
When was the last time fans weren't allowed to go to games for an entire season?
Irrelevant.
Never. I made it to a game last year.
93, my freshman year.
Technically we were eligible (all teams were). We elected not to go to a bowl.
But...the streak died either way.
Pretending UNC has enough fans for that is absurd. Ohio State had a good crowd for a visiting team. Before that it was probably Nebraska that brought the most visiting fans. Even then it wouldn't qualify as a takeover.
UNC has a huge fanbase, though right now it is mainly about basketball. But if they are consistently a Top 10 to Top 15 team, you'll see them out in full force in short order. You're fooling yourself if you don't think they have the potential to completely dominate the bandwagon of this entire region if they get rolling.
They can't even fill their own stadium. Wake me when they can start drawing fans to their own games.
The comment you're replying to stated that UNC doesn't have the fans to takeover Lane Stadium on 9/3/21, not in the future if they remain a consistent top 10/15 team. They certainly do have the bandwagon fans across the nation and will be obnoxious if ESPN continues to hype them.
However... as of right now I would say not a concern. I've been on UNCs campus for more than a half dozen games. Its lame. The only tailgating is at fraternity houses, and there are no butts in seats.
The closest I can recall is Nebraska back in 2009. Their fans travel better than any.
LSU had enough fans downtown the night before that BPD broke out the riot gear. I can't remember if they had more fans in total than Nebraska though.
They were super surprised at us going to Lincoln the year before. I still feel sorry for the one lady on the Chicago to Lincoln flight that wasn't wearing marroon and orange cause we were super annoying cheering the entire flight.
Lotta Clemson fans in Lane in 2017. I wouldn't call it a 'takeover' but there were a lot.
Also, we have an amazing tradition/entrance, so that does tend to attract a lot of opposing fans. A lot of people want to come see Enter Sandman.
Yeah I met up with a lot of people I knew from Clemson at that 2017 game. Multiple Clemson fans I didn't know in my section as well. They also traveled well for the 2011 game.
I like it my dude. Hope springs eternal!
Putting aside the fact that this seems really early to be talking about this, Fleck seems a little Buzz-y to me, in a lot of ways a self promoter but maybe that is what we would need, I do know that his quarter-zip/button down/tie combo would look great in hokie colors.
He wouldn't let WMU keep "row the boat"
well, that tells me we know one person who definitely WILL NOT be coaching VT next year...and that is Fleck.
ho boy...it could be a looong season
After the way last season went I just don't think its healthy to be talking about potential new coaches before the end of any season, let alone before the season even starts!
I really don't want to be engulfed in debates about who the next coach will be until December. It irritates me that VT is being mentioned already...it indicates to me that the VT coaching job is going to be a hot topic for the media throughout the season and that is just going to be annoying AF
I think the best course of action is for both programs to just flat out ignore this little rumor and hopefully it just dies and doesn't resurface again.
And for the love of all things holy, please beat UNC. Winning that game will do a lot to dispel these types of rumors.
Yep, this really isn't about Fleck, but more about that its not even July and we're already getting roped into the coaching carousel as potential destinations for people after this upcoming season. That's not a great sign that its already ramping up with 2 months before the season even starts.
As you said, gonna be a long year.
Why would we want Fleck at this point. 8 Wins at Minnesota and that means he would be a good option for VT? Uh What?
Especially for the amounts they are floating.
I'm hopeful we have a good season next year, but I wouldn't doubt it if there are already conversations with some coaches. Ones that may not have stopped since last season...
⬆️ So much this. I came to say pretty much the same thing. The WMU record was good but MN hasn't really been firing on all cylinders. His win percentage is .578 in the B1G
From sports-reference.com
Provided by CFB at Sports Reference: View Original TableGenerated 6/28/2021.
and if we want someone to elevate recruiting, i'm not sure Fleck is it. He definitely took Minn another level from mid 40s-low 50s to high 30s in terms of rough ballpark for class rankings, but I'd much rather have someone who can consistently keep us in the top-25 and make a push towards top-20.
I didn't really understand the hype around Fleck, but after you posted those numbers I really don't understand it. I'm a hard no on Fleck because based on W/L it would be more of the same. Fleck's winning percentage at Minnesota is .578 and Fuente's is .594 during his time at VT. I'm tired of what we have and don't want more of the same.
my guess is the attraction is his youth, his energy level, and his "row the boat" mantra that ESPN likes to dick ride.
He's coached at two schools, one of which is P5, and take each from sub .500 to NY6 bowl in 3 years. Fuente basically did the same thing in the opposite direction. How can you say they are the same? Do you not see the trend?
Here's the same Table for Fu - He's .594 in the ACC, Better than Fleck's .578 in the B1G. I'm not really excited about either of them, if we are looking to move beyond mediocre.
Provided by CFB at Sports Reference: View Original TableGenerated 6/28/2021.
Difference between Fleck and Fu is performance at the P5 level. Fleck went from 5 wins to 7 to 11. Fuente went from 10 wins to 9 to 6. Trends matter.
He might be trending up, but we need excitement to re-energize the players, fan base, and donor base. IMO Fleck is not the guy that is going to excite most people. Even though it's a small sample size, look at this thread for examples. I don't think Hokie Nation would be overly excited for Fleck.
Counterpoint, look at the trends. Started out terrible at WMU but improved steadily and had them in the Cotton Bowl. Mediocre at MN to start but then had them up to a real good team with a steady rise. Okay, last year was not good, but it was crazy. And with 2 solid upward trends with 2 teams, I think he gets the benefit of the doubt that someone who has been on a fairly steady downward trend like you know who does not get.
Don't know enough about Fleck to have a strong opinion either way, but focusing on just the overall record, which is pretty decent, is overlooking the way his teams have elevated over time.
In regards to VT success, I have been hearing for a year that covid was not an excuse for our poor record. So, why would it be for a new coach coming in? I am not arguing that Fuente is necessarily better than Fleck but I am advising caution on ignoring the dandelions and thistles growing in the green grass on the other side of the fence.
Zooming out, would spending $6+M be good for VT? I think I would rather stay in the $4M market and pay more for top staff.
For me it is because Fleck has shown steady improvement at 2 different places. Fuente has shown, for the most part, a steady decline since he got here. I could easily view last year as a fluke if Fuente's win totals were something like 5, 8, 8, 11, 5 (COVID year) instead of 10, 9, 6, 8 and 5 (COVID year). Looking at the patterns, Fleck can get a pass. I mean anyone can have a good or bad season. Fuente cannot get a pass.
And again, I am not advocating for Fleck. A) I don't know enough about him and B) this is all an academic discussion since this rumor likely has little-to-nothing to do with reality. Just saying that I (and I'm one of those who said early on that COVID is no excuse as everyone else had to deal with it too) could overlook 2020 for Fleck given the track record but not with Fuente given the track record. If Fleck gets 5-6 wins next year, then I'd say maybe the drop off is not a fluke. But at the moment, it looks like one. We will see.
It is an academic conversation, I agree. I also have said that Covid is a very valid excuse for 2020. Some teams fought through it better than others but to think it didn't have an affect on the whole landscape is crazy. But, for academic purposes, lets say both teams could have maxed out at 10 wins in a covid free 2020. Then the wins look like this:
5 8 8 11 10
10 9 6 8 10
Other than personal bias, I have a hard time chosing which of those trends is better.
If the wins were 5 8 8 11 10 and 10 9 6 8 10, then yes, I would totally agree with you.
I think our trend looks like a downward spiral, and it may certainly be just that. However, I think 2020 was a bubble on any trend line. It makes this season all the more important and I don't know if we have the horses to make a course correction at this point. I did feel like 2020 was a 9 or 10 win team before Covid. Did the disarray drop us that far? I have no idea.
Setting aside how unlikely this is - plenty have already pointed out that this is most likely smoke by Fleck or his agent for leverage - but would Fleck really be worth a top 10 coach salary? I mean he has done some nice things at Minnesota in prior years, but would he really be worth that? Seems to be a stretch.
" a number that could potentially make him top-10 among his national peers"
Just curious from people who know more than I do. What their thoughts are on this.
No
I think Fleck is easily a top 20 coach, with top 10 potential. I'd be very happy with the hire.
That said, I've always heard he wants to stay in the midwest or pacific northwest, so I don't see him coming here.
The weird love for Fleck perplexes me. He has a not great reputation in his personal life, left some staff at WMU in the dark when he bolted for Minnesota, cares more about his personal brand, O and hasn't done that many great things at Minnesota on the field so not really such a big step you can ignore the other stuff.
Don't care about his personal life as long as he as his players aren't breaking the law. Trust me, there's some Beamer assistants weren't exactly outstanding family men.
I also disagree about his results at Minnesota. Their offense improved every year from 2017-2019. They lost their OC in a COVID year and went 3-4. Obviously would want to see how his team performs this year, but PJ is easily a top 25 coach right now, probably top 15-20.
Based on what? Again you have to real good to overlook a lot of personal issues and he isn't.
What's his personal issue? He left his wife for another woman? Not a good look, but I don't care about his personal issues.
Anyways, He's inarguably a top 25 active coach, and one could argue he's top 10-15. He doesn't have 'baggage,' and none of his players have had run ins with the law (to my knowledge). I can overlook the fact that he sleeps around if he wins.
Bud Foster is universally revered by Hokie fanbase 🤷♂️
Agree..Fleck to me has always been a style over substance guy.
He's had mixed results at Minn but he is also playing in the West which is significantly less challenging. Although to play Devil's Advocate, that may make him feel right at home in the Coastal.
I see him very much like a James Franklin. An above-average recruiter and very good self-promoter, but really needs good coordinators around him to handle the X's and O's and make the team actually successful on the field.
If you're going to pay him six million dollars at VT, I'm not sure where you going to fund much more money for Coordinators.
To me, his main advantage over Fuente is that he would bring some renewed excitement to a program that has been moribund for 5+ years, at least initially.
But I also agree with those above that this sounds like something floated by an agent to try and leverage more money for him @ Minn.
Until last year (COVID year when replaying an OC), his team has improved each season. 5-7 to 7-5, to 11-2, to 3-4 (COVID season). I wouldn't call year over year improvement 'mixed results'
It is such an irrelevant conversation right now, but it is a fun one IMO
Ehh..if you dissect the 11-2 2019 season, alot of things broke their way.
Their 1st 2 games were narrow victories over non P5 competition, followed by beating up on the dregs of the conference. They had a legimately impressive win over PSU and then got drubbed by Wisky.
You can make the case that Fuente's 2016 season was just as impressive, but he's been more or less .500 since. We already threw a bunch of money at one coach hoping that one great season wasn't an outlier...
I don't think Fleck is a bad coach but I also don't think he's a big step up from what we have. As others have pointed out, Fuente and Fleck have pretty similar Win%.
To me, he's Fuente plus a personality. At nearly twice the price, I don't see how that makes sense for VT.
Not a Flek fan for the reasons mentioned on this thread already, but beating up on the dregs of the conference would be a good starting point for VT going forward
Being able to soundly beat the likes of Liberty and Old Dominion would be an improvement, let alone the dregs of the ACC
Fair point...that would be a step up from our current situation.
And to be clear, if you were to give me the choice of Fuente vs. Fleck for the same $$$...I would take Fleck if for no other reason than he would at least bring some enthusiasm to the Program. But for 6 mil???....hard pass.
Puke. Hard pass.
I'm sorry but I would rather have Fuente than Fleck. One of the most annoying, self-promoting coaches in college football.
IMHO, if the defense significantly improves this year: (1) Grab Tony Elliott, (2) Offer Vice OC/OL (3) Offer George Whitfield QB coach (4) Retain the defensive staff and (5) Restock all of the Fuente guys with guys who can recruit.
while i really like hamilton, and think he will improve our defense this year, i would think elliott would bring clemson's D-Line coach as his Def Coord...and i would be okay with that.
Vice as an OC makes no sense to me. He's a good OL coach and a great talent evaluator but that doesn't make me think he can design an offense.
I agree but pair him with Elliott and Whitfield and you should be OK in that regard. Allows for extra money to really get established position coaches and Jerry Kill-type analysts.
Yeah, promotion is the whole deal in anything. Sell Sell Sell. With this comes the promotion of VT. I'll take him.
- Mike London
I agree that it sucks VT gets thrown into these types of discussions. But, this has almost zero credibility at this time.
It's good fodder for the self-indulgent pessimist.
He can row that boat somewhere else.
preferably gently down the stream and away from blacksburg
Merrily merrily, merrily, merrily
This rumor is but a dream.
Hokies going 10-2 this year and there won't be a new coach
Hope you're right, but that requires a loootttt of things to go right for us.
This feels like that time a few years ago when an "insider" reported "Fuentos" might leave to coach at Florida.
This is madness. You're telling me Fuente goes 9-3, or 10-2 this year, but Fleck does that same, we will be getting Fleck, and Fuente will be out? Maybe Whit talked to him last December, but he was really showboating Fuente as our coach during the recent funding campaigns. We haven't even played a down this season. Bonkers.
Fleck can stay in Minn. Are we really an attractive landing spot for Tony Elliot??
Clawson, please.
I can't wait for the chorus of "Yeah "Hokies", lunchpail and Sandman was cool, but moving the entire program's branding to "row the boat" across the board is fine with me, traditions and the actual school mascot are overrated. Lol.
Need that /s in there.
Partial... he did it at Minny- a B1G school that had played football for 150 years. Everything they wear now has row the boat on it.it comes with the package. If he comes here, it will be stitched on the collars of our jerseys.
I believe he actually started it at WMU. There was a dispute when he tried to bring it to Minn, but ultimately Fleck is allowed to use the phrase/branding. I highly doubt Fleck ends up here but if he does I'm not looking forward to oars all over our jerseys and merchandise.
Gimme Foghorn Leghorn rowing a boat down a river of Hokie Tracks in orange digital camo on a helmet.
WMU owns the trademark. For him to continue to use it, he must have Minn paying licensing fees to WMU.
Link to USPTO Trademark Search ROW THE BOAT
Why on god's green earth would Minny do that? seriously? They have a marketing and apparel deal with a small company out of Eugene Oregon, you may have heard of them.
I seem to remember something about Fleck donating 10k a year to the WMU scholarship fund to be able to use it.
Honestly, best counter argument in this thread.
There's a real winner in here somewhere about the dangers of boating after entering night, mixed with rats fleeing a sinking ship, etc.
never pegged vance vice as a loud sweater kinda guy
If we're throwing around 6 mil for a coach (and I really hope we're committing cash to get someone), it's not gonna be for PJ Fleck and its definitely not gonna be talked about in June.
Wikipedia is obviously not an indicator of anything, but I did find it ironic that the VT section on Fuente's Wikipedia is a bit light on details. If you've been coaching somewhere for 5 years, one would think there would be more highlights than a single paragraph. The funniest part to me is the last sentence. Was it the last time there was good news and excitement out of the program? Yikes!
Does somebody need to edit that page to include that Fuente owns the only two losing seasons for Virginia Tech since the early 90's.
Okay but we're not Alabama. It's not like we had any national prominence when he showed up. The 14 and 15 teams were better than their record sure but you'd have to apply that same logic to last year's team.
IIRC, we were the second winnesting FBS team from 1993 to 2013 (I think Boise was #1). We're about to fall out of the top 20 winningest teams from the last 20 years.
We were at bare minimum national relevant for not-insignificant amount of time. Not the case any more.
that's a massive fall in just 7 seasons..ouch
I'm not saying I would be excited about it, but the fundamental difference between Fleck and CJF is that of culture. Fleck builds it CJF does not.
For 6 mil, high freeze will come up to bleaksburg and tear up the scrip clubs!!!
aren't the closest ones like 45 minutes away? so I've been told
SOUTHERN EXXXXXXPOSURE