I was thinking about the recent changes in the coaching staff, the constantly evolving landscape of college football, and the media's perception of who VT is. I came to this conclusion: Tech is the TB Rays of college football. Rewind time with me, if you will, 15 years. VT was playing in the Big East, our biggest victory to date was over Texas in the Sugar Bowl, and, from a national perspective, were an up and coming program. Fast forward to today. We have a highly revered coaching staff, we've been to the big dance once, have flirted in top-tier bowls, have had a couple home-run hitting alums, but are always trumped by our big brothers whom sport, historically, older traditions and deeper pockets.
TB Rays: respected coaches, relatively new to the baseball scene within past 15 years, a few great players historically(Longoria, Price, Upton, Crawford), one of the lowest paid salaries in baseball, have played once in the WS, but play second fiddle to division rivals Boston and NY...teams with richer tradition and...deeper pockets.
The recent news regarding Grimes has been a shot of reality for us Hokies. We are a great program, and have been for almost 2 decades. But until we can win on the biggest stage, with less horsepower under the hood, the bigger, more expensive sports cars will continue to control the pole position. Hopefully Beamer can get just the right mix of talent, skill, coaching...and a little luck to prove to the talking heads-and a nation, that sometimes you can win with less shiny tools in the toolbox. Go Hokies.
VT = The Tampa Rays of College Football
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Not a bad analogy. Baseball and College football are similar beasts. Historic and deep pockets will almost always trump everything else. Its just not a fair playing field most of the time.
Atlanta braves would be a better comparison:
Bobby cox= frank Beamer
Great regular season performance, players and coaches love them, disappointing post season performance
Both guys turned around programs that were in bad shape when they started
Atlanta is middle of the pack in payroll, I believe VT is mid 30's in revenue
Both are good at finding under the radar talent and developing talent
Great comparison, couldn't agree more.
Atlanta Braves won a title.
Would Moneyball era Oakland be a better comparison? Great regular season performance, found creative ways to win as a disadvantaged program (Moneyball vs Beamerball), but never could win the big one and then eventually others started playing ___ball too and the advantage went away before they could claim a title? Also, the A's have started reinventing themselves lately and are having success... maybe that's another parallel we can draw when we look back in a few years?
Nailed it.
Maybe the Rockies? Made the Series a while back, swept by the Sux (sorry I'm a Yankees fan). Either way were good until recently. They have Tulo, CarGo, and had Jimenez when he was really good.
Tampa HAS NO FANS. None. Their fans are called "The Blue Seats" for a reason. They 1,000 fans that they do have are terrible, awful, dreadful people. On the internet, you don't want to talk to Rays fans. They post things like porn "Money shots" as gif's for big home runs.
They have a genius, wiley, clever, annoying-as-hell coach. Joe Maddon is a complete opposite of Frank Beamer. They dress up like clowns for road trips. Does Frank Beamer dress our guys up in "nerd themed" clothes for road trips?
They have Luke Scott, Yuneal Escobar and that reliever who got off of a rape charge in Texas. They've got (or had) Fernando Rodney and his stupid crooked hat and Sean Rodriquez and his stupid face. They've got the educated but mouthy David Price.
They have no money, none. If you want to compare Tampa to someone, it's Fresno State. That's a program that has won some, has had some sketchy characters and has no money at all.
Frankly, I could not think of a worse choice to compare to VT. Yes, I'm a Red Sox fan. But this comparison will drive me nuts all day! Grrrarrrrrraaaaarr!
Really? I couldn't tell...
Some valid points, for sure. I'm simply comparing performance + history of national relevance + money spent. I lived a portion of my life in Tampa, post college, and would never compare the fan bases. But...you can't deny the similarities in the ascension of both teams, and the broad-spectrum view of their likenesses. The AL East...arguably the best division in baseball...even considering the BoSox :)
because the ACC is the best conference in football... oh, wait... #goacc
But we had Marus Vick..that covers a lot of the character issues
I do not recognize that name.
I hope you don't mind, but I read this in Bill Burr's voice.
Seriously, it took me about 3 hours to calm the fuck down from this comparison.
It's all good buddy. We may disagree on which ball club is most like ours, we may not see eye to eye on which way the toilet paper roll should face, and heck, we may not like the same dessert (pie, by the way). But at the end of the day, we get to talk about a common thread: our love for Hokie sports. May the day come when we can all get on here and disagree about which looks best: the orange championship t-shirts, or the maroon. Gobble gobble.
Are there people who believe the toilet paper should feed from below? Or are there just people who don't care enough to flip it over if they put it on wrong?
Because, clearly, it should go over the top. It just functions that way.
Correct, but most ladies value appearance over function in their TP, and think it looks better to the back. My advice: pick your battles...carefully, lol!
Interesting comparison. Without giving this much thought, I would probably argue Boise State is more the Tampa Bay
DevilRays of College Football. They do more with less than even we do. Take a look at their national recruiting rankings, courtesy of 247sports since 2008:2008 : 60
2009 : 63
2010 : 111
2011 : 53
2012 : 60
2013 : 55
2014 : 97
Now compare that against Tech:
2008 : 15
2009 : 25
2010 : 32
2011 : 36
2012 : 21
2013 : 21
2014 : 22
Now we have oft discussed the merits and caveats of recruiting rankings, and I'm not trying to have an argument about which coaching staff developed more top end talent. What I am trying to say is that Boise has managed to put together a collection of players that execute the system well enough to dominate their league and compete - if not defeat - the big boys when given the chance. The Rays, over the last 8 years are a great example of this approach. Even the Red Sox - excuse me while I go throw up - this past season assembled a collective that included stars, prospects and a good deal of retreads (Cody Ross & Jonny Gomes) that won a title.
Regardless, this does further the discussions we have had on the site over the last year regarding how the coaching staff needs to continue to assemble a team full of players that fit the system - running back, o-line, etc. - and not just the most athletic or talented group of individuals.
Not to detract from your point, but Cody Ross wasn't on the Red Sox team that won a title. He was only there for the 2012 season and was traded to the Diamondbacks last year.
Well phooey. Thanks for the assist.
Sorry for being "that guy." The only reason I know this is he is from my hometown, so I've been following his career pretty closely. Not many athletes from that neck of the woods make it out to have successful pro careers.
I wonder how Boise was able to keep Peterson around so long. I knew he'd go to a pac12 team, but I thought it was going to happen about 4 years ago...
At least we aren't like the marlins. New everything and still suck. Kind of like uva except that the marlins actually have more fans than uva does for their spring game
... barely.
Marlins won two world series before regressing (due to ownership dismantalling the team) the year after.
15 years later and our biggest bowl victory to date is still that sugar bowl.
Didn't we beat* Michigan in the Sugar Bowl a few years ago?
*It was a catch.
Nope. Legit loss. Never should have come down to overtime, let alone a video review.
We were dominating that game between the 20s, only to coach ourselves out of an easy W. That game was the quintessential Big Game Beamer.
Big Game Beamer didn't tell David Wilson to try to make something out of nothing which resulted in a >15 yard loss. One of many bad plays. Still question the one overruled interception and the PI, non-interception on Hosley though. IMO, Beamer only messed up the fake punt. Everything else in that game was played as best as you could have asked.
No big game Beamer was the one who completely abandoned the passing game that was shredding the UM secondary once we got in the RZ.
That DW run was one play, the issue was all of the other running plays and the relative lack of passing plays that were working.
That one play though put us without any chance of going for a touchdown and having to settle for 3 points. Also, Beamer isn't the one calling the plays. Abandoning the passing game could, and should, be pushed back to Mike O'Cain since he was the playcaller. Based upon delegations with Stinespring as the OC and O'Cain as the playcaller, it was my understanding that the two of them developed a strategy and gameplan pre-game and then O'Cain implemented it by calling the plays during the game. Play selection is not Beamer's fault.
That fake punt play was the worse. Called a time out to set it up. Our D was shutting them down, pin them deep, get the ball back, score, win in regulation. Instead, give it to them on the 50, score to tie, lose in OT.
And this is not the benefit of hindsight; it sucked just as hard in real time.
Michigan got lucky too, remember their first touchdown when Whitley and another defender (can't remember who, I think it was Fuller) collided into each in what surely would have been an incompletion if they didn't.
Or the fake field goal that we played perfectly and it was deflected into an OL's arms and resulted in a first down?
Luck happens in football, the game shouldn't have been close enough for any of that to matter. Us turtling in the RZ is what lost that game.
I remember. That goes down as one of the luckiest plays I've ever seen. That down was 3rd and Texas, and Michigan had done NOTHING to that point. If the defense had gotten off the field on that play, a big nail would have been driven into the coffin. Robinson should've been sacked, but he got off that desperation heave. Whitley collided with Antone. Kyle Fuller was almost sacking Robinson at the time.
As a Mets fan I like to compare us to UVA. We only bring in talent for it to die.
If VT is going to be like any fanbase; it can't be a team that has won a world series (Marlins or Braves). I can see the Rays being a good comparison.
But why not the Cubs? Loyal Fanbase. Sell out in good times and bad (mostly). Travel well. Small stadium that gets a lot of national respect. Constantly get their hopes crushed in October, and are still waiting for a marquee post season win.
A casual fan might read that as a criticism; but a real fan will know its true, and the truth hurts sometimes.
The Cubs won the World Series in 1907 and 1908.
All good points, but I wouldn't say Price, Crawford, Upton and Longoria are "historically" good players when they're all still in the league.
To me the worst coaching mistake was the fake punt, BUT if CFB kicks a fg on the third trip inside the 20 instead of going for it on 4th down, VT has a 2 score advantage (9-0) and this puts extra pressure on an already struggling UM qb that didn't tie shoes. Once we didn't get the 4th down attempt UM could somewhat relax as they were only one busted play away from taking the lead...and that is exactly what happened....that loss still angers me....VT was clearly the superior team on the field, but were not the best coached team that day...my opinion only.
This is where I have some problems as a football fan.
What, exactly, is bad coaching?
Poor clock management, certainly, I believe that's bad coaching. But a play failing to work, I'm not so sure how much of that is "bad coaching," and how much of it is, "Gee, now that I saw how the defense came out and played that last play, I would have ran to the left instead of to the right."
Going for it on 4th down inside the redzone when your team has been on the drive and for most of the game moving the ball at will, I don't think that's bad coaching. Just because it didn't work doesn't make it the wrong call, because the call was made before the knowledge of it not working.
Not trying to start up an argument or bring up painful memories, just think that sometimes as fans we have to remember that hindsight is 20/20, and be careful not to change our judgement on play calling simply because of the results.
I get your point. Going for it on 4th down near the goal line is not necessarily bad coaching. It's gambling. If you're not a gambler, you may perceive a risky call as a bad call.
I get your point, but in that situation you put points on the board every time you get the chance. Again, this is only my opinion, but I think you kick the fg, make it a 2 score game, give your rookie kicker another opportunity to boost his confidence, keep momentum on your side, keep adding pressure to a struggling UM offense, etc...I feel it would make more sense to go for it the 1st or 2nd time down (I know DW made that a moot point on his one run) rather than the 3rd. To be up 2 scores changes the feel of a game. On defense, a 6 pt lead is only one play away from a 1 pt deficit. I'm not downing CFB or anyone else, my OWN opinion is that was a poorly coached game for him.
Yeah, if you have the option to make the game a two score game you should really take it unless you are vastly overmatched (we weren't) or you can down the ball and run out the clock. It's crazy not to take the points in that situation. An inordinate amount of bizarre plays happened in that game, but freak plays are not uncommon in football and it's a huge risk that one will come back to bite you in that situation.
Accurate. Except that we pack out our stadium... Tropicana Field, not so much. ;)