Virginia Tech AD Whit Babcock will meet with the media at noon tomorrow for a press conference, followed by interim head coach Philip Montgomery.— Kolby Crawford (@kolby_crawford) September 15, 2025
Retirement announcement?
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Probably not.
Seems like BOV wants to keep him on in Advisor role for now.
Gives him time to try and find a landing spot and to continue to likely negotiate his buyout.
Expect more along the lines of pep-talk about Montgomery and "new direction" of Program.
Also puts him in front of media instead of Sands.
I suspect his landing spot is on a beach or golf course somewhere.
He'll get consulting gigs as he wants them. He's obviously well-respected within the college sports ecosystem -- I think outside those of us who live or die by VT football, the take on him will be largely successful big-picture operator who got unlucky with one hire and then just went the wrong way on the second.
Tell that to espn, sports illustrated, and the coaches who wouldnt come here until he is gone
Don't think we will get a ton of substance from this tomorrow. Probably introduce Monty as the interim, discuss the Pry dismissal, maybe touch on the ongoing transition of the program and AD.
But based on some of the paywall message board posts from those connected in the last 24 or so hours, I haven't been as pumped up for the future of VT football in a very, very long time. Sounds like some monumental changes and resources are on the way. Sure we will learn more from the BOV meeting on the 30th.
Im a lot more skeptical. Until I see actual proof - financials, outreach, strategic hires, etc I will refuse to accept that the administration is moving in a positive direction.
Yep. Actions speak louder than words. I don't trust anything that anyone associated with the school has to say anymore, I only care about what they do. They lost the benefit of the doubt years ago.
I'm here for the hopium. Why not?
This is boiler plate discussion about the coaching change. Someone from the press should ask about Whit's future and/or the department's long term direction if they are with their credentials.
I haven't heard that, but you never know, the timing seems suspicious.
I've talked to a few people, and the common threads are he has his title, but no authority. He will help bring the new athletic director up to speed. And it feels like there will be an amicable departure, but I don't have clarity on the timing, 9/30 BOV meeting, etc.
Gut feeling says its just to introduce Montgomery as interim HC and to have a presser on what is next.
However, after all the rumors last week, I wouldn't be surprised if he's announcing he's stepping down, effective at the end of the school year, and he will be working with the school to find a good successor to the role.
This has been discussed in other threads, but Chris Coleman was on the TSL pod and basically said he didn't think Whit had done a good enough job of staffing up the athletic department for anyone to step in as an interim AD if he were to leave in the coming weeks.
May 2026? I hope not that is WAY too late. Any new AD worth his weight in salt wants to lead the new VT Football HC hire. The transition so the new AD can do that must happen during the remaining football season and be done by Thanksgiving.
It will take time to find a new AD as well - and Whit's role between now and when he retires will be to aid in the transition process.
There's no one in the building (per TSL) that would make sense to step in as an interim AD.
Has anyone seen where this will be streamed/televised? It's not on HokieSports.
https://www.youtube.com/@hokiesports
Looks like the feed is already live.
It's live on hokiesports
Seven words:
"Meet your new Athletic Director, John Ballein"
Mic Drop.
Whit says that, Ballein comes out, they hit Monty with a double steel chair shot, give the crotch chop to the camera and walk off together, with Travis Wells screaming "bah gawd, tune in next week!!"
He is already transitioning for retirement. Don't scare people.
John -> Jane? ;^)
I resemble that remark , lol...(though still a ways til retirement .
Not taking questions? what?
pussy ;^)
I'm sure that directive came from the BOV/Sands. They want to control the message and know that Whit would be asked tough questions.
Can someone post a link to the stream?
found it
https://hokiesports.com/virginia-tech-football-weekly-press-conference
Nothing is more indicative of his cowardice than not taking questions.
Dropped the water bottle like it was a pass from Drones
Perfect way to start this off. How symbolic
The revenge of Fu!
Woof this is awful. Just reading verbatim. Barely looking at the audience. Dead man speaking.
Was thinking the same. Reading from the page, wiping his face as he talked, no emotion or tone in his voice. Seems like he's at the end.
He's had a rough couple of weeks.
Dead man speaking but still seemingly putting himself in the future of these plans a lot? Seems like it would have been a good time to announce his retirement
Hurts his position negotiating a buyout if he does that. He'll play ball to get his check and then ride off to the sunset
Sounded like a dead man walking. I love that.
Yep. GM of football and dedicated football administration completely separate from the AD. Sounds like this is where it's headed.
We can keep Whit as director of non-revenue sports. Its the one area I feel like we've been consistently better at since he got here.
Don't think that's happening. New faces all around.
I wouldn't be opposed to that. Not sure if it makes sense financially unless Babcock takes a paycut or cuts are made elsewhere in the non-football side of things.
Early guess for this role, if I had to right now.
Jeff King, former TE for the Hokies, Carolina Panthers and Arizona Cardinals, who is now the current Director of Player Personnel for the Chicago Bears.
I'm here for it. Also, why limit him to just football? Look at these basketball stats!
29 receptions and 6 TDs in basketball is super impressive!
He's also a huge Iditarod champion:
Jeff King (born 1956) is an American musher and sled dog racer. He is generally credited with introducing the sit-down sled which has largely replaced the standing sled traditionally used by distance mushers.
King moved to Alaska in 1975 and began racing in 1976. He won the Yukon Quest in 1989, and the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in 1993, 1996, 1998, and, at age 50, the 2006 Iditarod,[2] making him the oldest musher to have ever won the event, a distinction he held until 2017, when Mitch Seavey won at age 57.
A professional baseball player with Pirates and Royals too.
As another person with a common-name doppelganger, I appreciate his range.
Oh my gosh. Yes, I even remember Jeff King with the Pirates. Had forgotten him.
man did we smoke the Terps that night. THAT is what Thursday night should be like, all the time.
I certainly don't want to resemble the Bears at this moment. Well actually, we already do.
Why is it always have to be a Hokie?
Jeff King was one of my favorite players when he played, but at this point, I think we need brand new perspectives and experiences that don't have any ties to the Beamer years or the way things used to be. It's time to move forward and upward and onward and Burt Ward.
I'm not even saying that we need to separate ourselves from the Beamer era. It just feels like anytime any opening comes up, everyone's first instinct is to figure out what former Hokie could fill the role. I get the idea that VT wants to hire people who want to be here, but that list of individuals has to be bigger than just people who have previously been here.
I'm absolutely saying we should. Not out of any disdain for Frank. But if there's any inkling of a thought that we'll do anything, down to the smallest detail, a certain way because that's how we/Frank did it when I was here, I'm not for it. Now obviously there's common sense exceptions, but the entire landscape of this industry has changed.
All credit to Frank for doing what he did, but the identity of the VT brand has to move on. Frank was awesome. Frank did downright amazing things to bring national attention to VT. But that was from 1987-2011. It's 2025. We have to stop trying to drag our history into the present and future in hopes that it will return us to the glory we had.
I don't give a shit that King has any background with Frank. Honestly, that was 20 years ago, any connection that was there is probably flimsy at best by now.
What I care about is that he's an alum with NFL front office experience, and for this role we are going to want someone with that exact kind of experience he has, and I am going to guess it'll be much easier to convince him to take the job than someone who is unaffiliated with VT and has watched this from the outside.
Yes, it might be easier to attract him to that position, and all your points are valid. But I, along with bar1990, are really really tired of trying to shoehorn these former players into coaching positions merely because they played here during the best years in VT football history. Now, GM isn't a coaching position, and King has a stellar resume. I'm just so tired of the "coming home" narrative and the mom and pop, family business schtick. I don't want "This is Home." I want "This is The Terrordome. We'll kill you."
This is what I disagree with. NFL GM is going to be very different than college GM. There will be some guys with the skill set to do both. But just like with coaches, that sample size will be very small IMO.
The ability to evaluate a player's capabilities would translate between the two, I would think.
And to be able to organize a front office that focuses on not just scouting new talent, but coordinating the continual search for new talent across the country that is already playing college football, the ability to retain the players you already have, and the ability to contract negotiate against other schools. Someone with hands-on experience in an NFL front office who is being groomed for a GM type role is exactly who we would want.
Cases in point:
FSU is not stuck in Bowden's shadow. Granted, they've had further success after him.
PSU is not wishing for a return to the Paterno years...well, maybe a bad example....
You think Jimbo is going to stand in anyone's shadow? His ego is so big, it could cause an eclipse.
I guess if we don't have the prestige or the money to hire the best we can, we have to try to lure people back with their nostalgic views of the glory days of VT football
"Be ahead of the curve instead of behind it" in reference to the changing CFB landscape.
Get real, Whit! That's impossible thanks to the incompetent assholes who run the ACC, yourself included! We'll always be behind the curve unless we luck out with some billionaire alum who are willing to financially support VT athletics.
At least the coach seems to be ready for this. Looking at people, speaking confidently, and has a realistic plan for first steps. Obviously may not change what we see on the field but WAY better than Whit Bumblespeak just now.
I mean it's not surprising. One is having an audition for his next gig, the other is waiting to be chopped from his current gig.
Guilting people to come because it's military appreciation day?
I can appreciate the tone he's bringing. Maybe its the accent. I dunno
All except his saying Coach Pry has laid a great foundation. I get it but not something I would have used.
uh yeah, that part i'm not excited about
He may or may not think that but it's just basic courtesy not to trash the guy that just got canned.
I mean he's not gonna go up there and tell the truth, which is that he + Pry have steered the football program into a ditch. He wants to play ball, get paid, and retire...can you blame him?
I don't know Whit the person but I haven't heard anything negative about him outside of his day to day tasks, I imagine he's a good guy who ultimately isn't up to the task of being an AD at a school with the unique challenges that VT faces in 2025.
Whit is likely just being a good company guy. He's basically had all of his substantive decision making power taken away from him (I mean your boss issues the press release instead of you Sunday, and the BOV is literally doing your job in materializing this restructuring and assembling the committee for the new coach). That can't be a pleasant spot to be in. Could he resign and not put up with that? Absolutely, but then he forfeits his buyout and any other post employment benefits he might otherwise get. So he's going to be a good soldier and assist where he can/where he's asked until a buyout is negotiated and his replacement is named. Simple as that I think.
100% in agreement.
He screwed up the football program, but it wasn't out of malice. He simply isn't cut out to be our AD. He and Pry fall into similar boats to me - they seem like nice guys that are perfect examples of the Peter Principle.
To be fair, in many aspects he has. Won everywhere except on the field though.
I do agree that Pry did bring in some very-much nedeed foundation. He expanded the football personnel, reinstalled relationships with HS coaches and football alumni, and broke away from the Beamer administration (to a degree, and arguably not enough). He quickly embraced NIL and paying players. He has also been the most vocal about VT being a big time football brand.
Where he failed was coaching/coordinator hires, roster building in key spots, gameday preparedness, in-game management, and modernizing the VT schemes (until he hired Siefkas, which solved one issue but was another failure in coordinator hire).
I might be more inclined to agree if not for the perception of the players on the field the last two weeks. Did he do some good things, especially in mending fences? Yes. But if the foundation was solid, the entire team wouldn't have been a complete void after the Vandy loss. Just too many inconsistencies on the field for me to trust his foundation.
I think it's classic coachspeak - he's got to find a way to motivate the team over the next 9 games and things could get dicey. You don't motivate anyone by trashing the current circumstances.
Put another way - there is no benefit to him being brutally honest other than fans want to hear it.
Stopped watching. Lots of Blah Blah Blah...yawn.
VT needs to market the hell out of their new plan that absolutely conveys to any coaching candidate and potential player that "shows them the money" (and resources).
VT needs to show the CFB nation they are serious and then starts immediately executing. They show this and they have a chance to attract a legitimate HC.
Until then, no coach worth a damn will come here.
With all the extremely positive changes that I think are around the corner for the future of VT football, I would absolutely love it if Monty can rally the troops and give us a fun run the rest of the way out. I hope he can change up practice and spark the team a little bit.
As nice as it is to think that can happen, my gut tells me that there is very little that will stop us from being absolutely dummied by everyone else on the schedule this year. This is a bad team.
In my opinion, this is now a one game season: beat UVA.
Reporters not asking nearly enough tough question
I think if Whit had taken questions there might have been tougher ones. What are they going to ask the Interim coach that they didn't ask? He isn't going to speak to search committee, restructuring, etc as he likely won't be a part of any of that.
Coach Montgomery, did you know that Coach Pry was fired somewhere in the middle of the 2nd quarter, or were you waiting to hear the news with everyone else before they contacted you?
I don't think asking rough questions to an interim head coach is going to do any real good
Hard to ask tough questions to an interim coach who won't be around 4 months from now while the AD is cowering away in a corner.
Tempo mentioned multiple times. He ran far more uptempo at previous spots. Do we think we see more of that coming up?
With our defensive performance thus far. That concept scares me. I'll just start taking the over every game - likely covered by our opponent with no help from us.
I don't think it's a bad idea... We don't have the talent at QB to make good decisions. The offensive line can't execute any great blocking schemes. Why not just simplify the game for everyone and make them go fast?
Of course, that could destroy the defense. But they're basically getting destroyed anyway anyways.
It's a shame the powers that be could not have anticipated all of these "necessary-to-be-relevant" changes before Pry's HC career was sunk. It almost feels as though Pry was hired to be the sacrificial lamb to show them - "if you thought it was bad before, hold my beer"
I think you could make that argument more towards Fuente than Pry.
We could have given Pry a blank check to hire assistants and he still would have hired bad ones and still would have bungled game management. I would be absolutely floored if anyone beyond a High School level ever hires him as a Head Coach again.
Fuente could have maybe been successful but it would have required much more support and alignment from the Athletic Dept. and Fuente to adjust his disposition and people skills---and in the end, neither side were willing to make those things happen.
I meant it more that they saw how bad it was with Fuente, but were still not willing to make the necessary changes to the program with his successor, so this coaches job was to really illustrate how bad it can get if we're not committed to playing big boy football
Maybe. But the largest budget in all of college football wouldn't have made Brent Pry a good HC. He was simply really bad at his job. Period.
A fair point
LOL you can't make this up....
"Detail" is there too....yet our AD and former Head Football Coach exhibited neither.
Speaking of dead, the first part of Monty's speech sounded like he was addressing a recent tragedy* (just a few instances of sincere but out of place phrases). Seemed a lot more comfortable during questions.
(edit: a generic tragedy like loss of a loved one; not meant to imply a specific event)
I think in the context of the team and players, it probably feels that way. While I'm sure they aren't happy with the on-the-field results, these are people that spend a majority of their time together and seeing it all come apart is probably traumatic at some level.
Whit looked like he was being held hostage in Beruit.
This you, French?
https://youtube.com/shorts/weoxcvdaxZc?si=RMw2zojvD2RPD1bh
I love Stagner. I haven't laughed so hard at anything like his stuff since Roy D Mercer was alive.
Just how big of a boy are you anyhow?
I'll put a pop knot on you big enough to hitch a bass boat to.
Lmao - love me some Roy 'Damn' Mercer prank calls.
"How big a boy are ya?"
"I'm about 6'4" 250 pounds"
"Oh that's just ripe ass whippin' size."