Jordan Karhoff
6'4 215 lbs
TE
ST Francis de Sales, Columbus Ohio
Picked the Hokies over Miami and Texas A&M. #9 Tight End in the country in 247 Composite. Credited Ty Howle as his primary reason for committing
4 🌟 .927 Composite
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Guys, I'm thinking James Franklin might be a good recruiter
Yes, he might be.
Holy cow. I am not used to this.
stonks intensify
TO THE MOON!
This is amazing. 4 stars committing completely off my radar.
Karhoff was the first guy Bourque started recruiting after he committed
He must be a big fan of our dressage team?!
James Frankin is out recruiting Ped St. based on the Average Composite on 247
Incredible
So many QB croots this guy gets it, LFG.
Beginning to think the roster level is about to be much higher than the last few years
There's honestly no reason for us to recruit receivers. We just need 4 tight ends every year.
Maybe this will be the year we'll finally start actually using those tight ends.
You mean to catch passes as opposed to throwing them, right? That would be refreshing.
5 x 4* players in 3 weeks.
Counting transfers: 24 x 4* players in 27 weeks.
Karhoff is the second highest rated commit in our class by composite, fourth by 247
Guys...I love James Franklin.
James Franklin, probably
I was still celebrating our latest OL recruit and BOOM! JMFF adds another 4 Star! Fill the roster with 4 stars coach!
The TKP gang is like ...
Pump up that blue chip ratio!
Dang! And you KNOW Texas A&M has that NIL money.
I don't want to get too far out in front of our skis here, but the floor of our talent is going to end up being higher than the ceiling of most of the VT teams of years gone by. It's early, but with the transfer class and this recruiting class Franklin is putting together, it is truly the kind of transformation this program has desperately needed. If you want to run with the big boys, this is how you start
Now we just need coordinators that can actually plan around and coach those players. If we have them the sky is the limit.
Wait...so is it hard to recruit elite players to Blacksburg? ...asking for a (not) friend (named Justin Fuente).
It is, which is why we had to bring in an elite recruiter as a coach.
Landing 4*s like:
If JMFF was a fisherman:
Awesome news. Also, good lord this feels insane. A composite 4 star committing without any chatter or lead up to it on this board would have been the biggest news of any VT recruiting cycle since the early fuente years (or maybe before that).
Under franklin it is still huge news but it happens as an exclamation point on a run of high-rated recruits, not some lone standout
Under Franklin, its just a Tuesday
I know we've discussed it so many times over the years about how recruiting truly is a skill, but man what does Franklin say to these guys that Fuente and others could not figure out?
Again it's more of a rhetorical question. I know there is a lot more to sales and relating to people than just the words you say. But man, the guy is like 6 months into this job and is making it look easy by comparison
He doesn't buy into the excuses. He is able to relate to the players and coaches and get them to care about wanting to come here and primarily to play for him. But also part of that is selling VT as a whole, which should be an easy sell, but for some reason over the years our staffs have used it as an excuse to why they couldn't do their jobs.
Having more money helps, but there are schools with bigger budgets than us below us in the rankings right now. Fact of the matter is we have an insanely passionate fanbase that didn't give up on the program after what everyone has witnessed over the last 10 years, a storied history of some excellent players and teams, 2 #1 overall draft picks and a reputation of 'man, college football is better when VT is good' coming from the likes of ESPN. VT should have always been an easy sell, and now we have a guy who knows how to do it. Oh, and having a relatively easy path to the playoffs isn't a detriment, either.
I think it also helps when the person calling recruits is a proven Playoff-caliber coach vs the G5 lightning-in-a-bottle or long-time coordinator-rookie-Head coaches.
You aren't a proven Playoff-caliber coach by buying into the excuses anywhere. I mean he definitely had issues at Penn St and banged the drum about what he needed from the school to take the next step, but that wasn't about buying into the excuses, it was about calling out the need to improve.
Its the kind of coach we needed. A guy who expects the best out of us and will push for it, both internally and externally. With the culture we have had since Beamer, I don't think that kind of mindset was ever going to be able to be cultivated in-house. For the longest time, we've always had more excuses for why we couldn't do something than plans of actions on how to accomplish it. We needed an outside perspective to show us what was possible here, and the stars aligned at the exact perfect moment to allow us to get probably the absolute best most ideal candidate possible for this school when we needed it most.
I think it's less about what he says, and more about (1) strategy, (2) operations, and (3) financial backing.
Fuente had a one person recruiting department. And as soon as there were holes on the roster, he abandoned his strategy and was just grasping at straws. I think Pry had the right strategy, but didn't have the management skills, personnel, or funding to execute. I think CFJ is able to capitalize on all three.
Insane win. He has alwasy been really high on VT but the guy was all but committed to Miami until we landed PB. To change the tide that much in less than two weeks is incredible. Even more incredible is to get it done right before OV's. He easily could've just held off and taken his visits just to be sure, but we convinced him to end it before even getting to the campus of last year's runner up and one of the highest paying programs in A&M.
This info makes it even crazier to hear about.
If this happened from 2015 to 2025 our reaction would have been, man something weird is going on, this can't be right. maybe there's some strange extenuating circumstances or this kid has some kind of injury.
Now our reaction is damn, James Franklin is at it again
Guys...JMFF is HUNGRY
This is just un fuckin believable
Part of me is waiting for a meteor to strike and destroy Lane a week before the season starts or something. Are we finally allowed to have nice things?
Then I saw the news about the rector being fired. Wasn't he the main one trying to get JMFF here? I wonder how this change impacts the football movement.
Well, although too few and far between, we've had good things before and we'll have them again. Just glad I've lived long enough (so far) to see another go-'round with football. This one is sooo different than how our last run developed, however, and that makes it imminently more exciting in that it has happened seemingly over night. If I'm dreaming, don't wake me up.
With what was said about the WRs and all these TE recruits I wonder if we are going to run 13 personnel like what has been taking over the NFL.
I think that's a penalty. Too many men on the field, or something. But hey, if you're not cheating you're not trying. And it's not cheating unless you get caught.
They don't ask how, they ask how many
No, it's doable. You just have only 1 WR on the field.
1 RB
3 TE
1 WR
-----
5 eligible receivers.
Franklins teams always had heavy TE usage. With one of the best TE coaches as our OC I would expect 12 and 13 personnel to be common. I also think there will be a third TE recruit in this class (Sam Faniel).
Agreed. Building a strong TE class
12 I expect but 13 is a bit odd
The Dad Joke thread is back over that way...
Re-rated by 247 from 90 -> 93
This can't be right.
Pre Franklin, new comments on a commitment thread = bad news.
Post Franklin, new comments on a commitment thread = good news.
I assumed he decomitted when I saw the new comments.
Yeah, I'm still programmed for that too
No one tell them CJF is at VT now.