In the latest edition of Stewart Mandel's Mailbag, the veteran college football scribe proclaimed the Virginia Tech Hokies as one of his five underrated teams this season.
Podcast listeners already know how bullish I am on the Hokies. I believe Frank Beamer's program will break out of its recent slump. Last year's team went just 7-6 but did win road games against Ohio State (remember that one?) and Duke. Its offense was mostly abysmal, but quarterback Michael Brewer, entering his second year in the system, put up big numbers in his spring scrimmages. The backfield is deep and healthy. And the defense returns standouts like cornerback Kendall Fuller and defensive end Dadi Nicolas.
I could see this team winning 10-plus games.
I wouldn't describe Tech's backfield as deep or healthy right now. Shai McKenzie and Juice Williams, who are arguably Tech's top two running backs, are still recovering from ACL tears suffered last season. Trey Edmunds and J.C. Coleman both have had brilliant stretches throughout their respective tenures at Tech, the former more so than the latter. When Trey's running healthy (and he claims he is) he has a valid claim as Tech's top tailback option. Will the J.C. Coleman who carried the Hokies on his back over the last four games of 2014 (5.78 YPC, 81 carries) show up on Labor Day? Or will it be the inconsistent Coleman who struggled to find traction throughout much of his career. Travon McMillian had a breakout spring, but it's just that, spring practice.
There are now two ticketed passengers for the hype train currently boarding in Blacksburg, and they are both national media members. ESPN's Andrea Adelson boldly predicted Virginia Tech would win 10 games in 2015.
Comments
All aboard!
Yes.
Honestly, I just wanted a good excuse to use this gif.
Legend of Zelda gifs will always get a leg. Well done.
That moon used to weird me out.
Just imagine how the hype will be after we crush Buckeye souls on Labor Day
As long as there are no mission accomplished T-Shirts and we beat the team in purple the following weekend...
Bingo, I was on the hype train last year until week 2 and 3 happened...
"... until weeks 3 and 4 happened"
FTFY
Now I REALLY REALLY want to get "Mission Accomplished" shirts and to hell with the rest of the year.
did you hear steph currys "mission accomplished" in the interview after the GS win in game 4. I found it kind of ironic.
We need to have mission accomplished shirts, just in January when we win a national chanpionship.
Our hype thrusters would be activated to ludicrous speed
We are not underrated, at least not if the discussion of "underrated" means "underranked." We have been a mediocre football team for three seasons now. We haven't earned any national respect to expect to be highly regarded.
But if you know how to guage a football team, there are plenty of legitimate reasons to expect significant improvement from this program in the upcoming season.
That doesn't mean we're guaranteed success, but it means that the pieces are there for us to have the potential for success. For those who know that previous performance isn't always the best predictor for future performance in college football, the expectation for dramatic improvement is warranted.
Under/overrated isn't supposed to have anything to do with "ranking". The rankings were from last year, which is done. Any discussion now is in how we're regarded. People have us in low regard. For the reasons stated above, this writer believes we should be regarded higher.
The earliest preseason rankings/predictions for the 2015 season are out. Those are what I was referring to.
Which are based on predictions for success, not what you accomplished last year. "Underrated" just means that people expect us to perform at a certain level (our ranking), and this person is saying why they expect us to be better than that. You disagreed with the premise then spent 3 paragraphs supporting their argument is all I'm saying. There's no need to reiterate our recent struggles every time someone mentions us.
I have no clue what you're talking about, so here's a picture of a monkey riding a dog chasing a goat.
Good day.
Congratulations!!! You Sir, have won the internet!!!
There's so much hate in those little eyes. That poor goat.
MEANWHILE...AT LOLUVA
"See the pillow; be the pillow."
Caption:
Right guy: "So this is what it feels like when you have maroon bearing down on you"
Left guy: "No, this is step one in preparation for what you'll experience this Thanksgiving weekend. Usually things that are maroon are much tougher to deal with than this"
I'm so happy that all of this just happened.
My place of work blocks photobucket, but I'm going to assume hilarity and give you a leg regardless.
Actually I'd say they're based about 60% on last season, about 15% each on overall program perception and next season's team, and about 10% on trendiness.
I would argue that we are currently 'rated' accurately, but have the potential to surpass that expectation.
This is one of the most concise, well-thought-out summaries of my expectations I've ever seen on this site. Kudos to you, Illinois, kudos to you
Also, I totally forgot Stewart Mandel existed since he went to Fox
It's like, I want to be excited. I want to feel confident in my team. I was very encouraged by what I saw at the Spring Game from the O, but I need to see them be at least competent in a real game before I'll allow myself to get really excited.
Just like OSU last year.....wait.....
We've got to prove something on the field before we're considered 'underrated.' For now, the most I would consider us is 'undervalued,' simply because we haven't proven anything yet.
SIMPLE ANSWER: YES
DETAILED ANSWER: HELL YES
TL;DR ANSWER: HELL FUCKING YES
I prefer our team play with a chip on their shoulders every game, and use every perceived slight as motivation to win. Think Miami 2009. What a great win that was!
Spaceballs = instant +1
we're underrated if the people rating us don't give us a chance to win the coastal. I think most people view us pretty accurately though and until the offense comes around we're going to be a barely above .500 team. this season sets up nicely for us to get some momentum again.
ALL ABOARD THE HYPE TRAIN!!
Hope you were able to get a seat early....
Yeah, I got on. See below.
I found this one and like it better:
Ok, last one from me, but I was looking at train gifs and I'm not sure if this is the stupidest train, or the most awesome train ever!
I'm gonna go with the stupidest camera man ever.
I feel it is an attempt for the National Media to start the narrative on Ohio State early. Ohio State Schedule is HORRIBLE this year. They need to build up the Tech game as a strong team. That way if OSU wins they have a good win and if they lose again they will not slide as far as they did last year.
Their schedule isn't horrible for the mere fact they're playing in Lane this year against the one team that pantsed them at home last year.
Ohio State plays in front of big crowds a lot, but I'm not sure they've ever played in a more hostile environment than what they'll see in Lane on Labor Day. There's just something about our stadium and night games that makes us a terror of a team to play.
See I would agree with you if it was 2011, but we have been pathetic at home 2012 onwards.
Florida State thursday night- Narrowly lost when we should've won.
Miami last season. Do I need to even go over that game again?
We have been abmysal at home and are under 0.500 against P5 teams at home the past three years. Lane stadium is a shadow of the terrordome it once was. Whatever home advantage we used to have obviously doesn't exist anymore.
I hope to be proved wrong, but until then OSU playing at Lane doesn't really help its schedule that much.
I hate that I agree 100% with this post.
I don't like it either, but it's the truth. My orange and maroon tinted glasses came fully off once the Wake Forest game happened...
To me, three years does not a program make, or break. Yeah, we've struggled of late, but jumping off of the wagon just because it slowed down isn't warranted at this point, in my opinion. Waaay too much like a 'hoo-type move for my taste.
I think you're making some broad assumptions here. All vtStronk was saying is that we have lost any tangible home field advantage over the last three years. The stats certainly seem to support that assertion. Three years is plenty enough to establish a trend, and we have established a trend of mediocrity at home since the 2012 season. Opposing teams don't have much to fear playing in Lane lately.
I have no idea where you're getting anything about jumping off a wagon or being hooish out of a conversation about results on our home field over the last three years.
Illinois Hokie, yeah, you're right. In the last three years, we have lost some of the cache of our home game edge. I guess it just seemed to me that after the 47 years I have been watching the Hokies, three years down doesn't seem as momentous of a problem as others may see it. I understand the point being made, but I'm still not sure that teams don't worry about playing at Lane, anymore or less than anyone with a fearsome home reputation. True, we haven't been walking the walk like we were when we established the reputation, but I think teams still take it into account when preparing to come to Blacksburg.
Now, the wagon and the hooishness, I will own up to being a bit pissy. No excuse, other than it was about 5 this morning, after 4 hrs sleep, trying to drink coffee enough to go fishing. But, three years. Three. How many years has VT been playing football?
Anyway, thanks for helping me try to keep my wheels on the road.
Gotcha. I've been in that mindset plenty of times. It just confused me because I didn't get a hint of any sort of "abandon ship!" sentiment from vtStronk's post.
I don't think it's lights out for the program, and ultimately I do think this skid will be a blip on the radar. I believe in what Loeffler is trying to install, I think Stacy Searels is the best OL coach we've had since J.B. Grimes, and I am very high on Zohn Burden and believe he might be customer manufactured to be a legendary VT receivers coach.
I think we've also lost most of the prestige we built during the 10-win streak. And I think that's a blessing in disguise, because maybe we can return to the blue collar, chip on our shoulder mentality that built the program. I'm legitimately more excited for the 2015 season than I've been in quite some time.
have you posted this before or am I having de ja vous?
I've expressed everything I said here separately in other posts, so I'm sure you've probably heard me hit each of these points before.
It is precisely that chip on the shoulder thing that got me stirred up in the first place, Illinois Hokie. I was part of the reason for our reputation, as were all of the fans that gave up their ears and vocal cords for the cause, and I just don't want us letting that wane. I agree with your assessment, and feel free to repeat yourself as often as you please, you're spot on.
I made it to one game last season -- at home at night against Miami. Yea....sorry....there was no terror. I hope we do get back to those days. And I do think hosting OSU coming off a natty champ will help.
Cheers!
So you're staying right the heck home this Labor Day, right?
Ohio State has a horrible schedule? Say it ain't so! *rolls eyes*
Nah, you're right it's pathetic. And finally they can't use the stupid cop-out "well, Hawaii was a real powerhouse back in 2005 when we scheduled the game." VT could easily be by far the best team they play this year. Sparty will probably be good again, but that's seriously it. Everyone else on that schedule is average at very best.
Vegas certainly doesn't rate the Hokies highly, not yet. A 2 TD spread or more at home against anyone, is a lot. Yes VT is underrated.
Is there a difference between thinking we are under-rated and thinking many of the teams ahead of us are over-rated?
I am optimistic.
If I'm interpreting it correctly, this means that anOSU will not be able to overcome the castle like home field advantage we enjoy in Lane, and will leave Blacksburg with hurting hearts after we shoot a hole in their dream of repeating as FBS champs by beating the pants off of them.
I got that my true love will meet me for burgers at the White Castle wearing some yoga pants.
Which is pretty cool.
That's funny I came up with "I love it when you keep your top off" +1 to yoga pants leave those on!
All aboard the train to the top of HYPE Mountain.
Well considering we've been a mediocre football team the past three seasons with a pretty poor home record, I wouldn't say we are underrated. Not yet at least.
Let's wait until the Ohio State game to judge.
Yep and I like it. I think this offense could legitimately put up 28 PPG average against our schedule. The D could legitimately allow 17 PPG average against our schedule. At least 10 wins is my expectation.
God I hope not. 28 ppg would have been good for 72nd in scoring offense last year. I'm hoping for an average in the mid-thirties. And as our scoring offense goes up, our scoring defense will go down. A Foster defense thrives on playing with the lead.
At 28 PPG last year, we would have lost 2 games (Miami and BC) and tied ECU at the end of regulation. We would have still beaten OSU and even pulled out a win against WF. I'm fine with 28 PPG if our defense is allowing only 20 PPG though.
LOLz
Our average should be way above 28 PPG, and I would hope to see it around 33-35 over the course of the season.
Against all of the good teams in our conference, if we're not putting up 21-28 points at a minimum, we probably aren't winning most of those games. Against the 1-3 pasties, we should be putting up numbers in the 50s or 60s.
This is blown out of proportion a bit, I think. There are maybe 3 or 4 good teams in our conference...Our schedule certainly isn't a gauntlet. The teams I'm most worried about are Miami, BC, GT, and NC St. Outside of that, our conference schedule is pretty soft.
I'm not saying that we should shoot for 28 PPG as a goal, but rather that last year that would have sufficed for a 10-win season. All I really care about is that our offense scores more points than our defense lets up. In fact, our offense doesn't even have to score the points. It can be our special teams or our defense, just as long as our points > their points.
I'll politely dissent. That's the mindset that allowed our offense to not carry its weight within the program for the majority of the previous decade. The idea that we're winning so everything must be okay glossed over glaring deficiencies within the offense that directly led to the collapse of the offense subsequent to the 2011 season. We should expect equal contribution from all three phases of the game, and 28 ppg over the course of a season doesn't cut it for the offense. What it does is set us up to get our ass handed to us in games like the Stanford Orange Bowl when the defense faces an opponent they can't handle. The offense can't answer the bell because they've been allowed to get by with mediocre performance.
Understand, I'm not asking for our offense to underperform. I'm just asking for us to win. Whatever you may think of the mindset, you and I both want the same end result and that is a victory. There will be games where our offense gets stymied and our defense picks us up. We're used to that happening more often than not. The inverse will also occur. In the end, however they may be scored, as long as we have more points than the opponent, I'm happy.
Definitely, we both want the same thing: wins. And sure, there's gonna be games where our offense runs into a buzzsaw. I'm not talking about facing the occasional brick wall defense. I'm saying over the course of a full season, an offense that averages 28 points per game is underperforming. We can't use the fact that we have an elite defense to gloss over the fact that our offense isn't contributing its fair share. We did that for a decade and it hurt us as a program.
I don't have the stats but I don't think you can find a VT offense that averaged more than 28 points per game more than 5 times in the last 20 years. That includes what 7 10 win seasons, multiple conference championships and a natty title game appearance. 28 points per will win 10 or more games all day long
I withdraw this comment I forget how many cupcakes VT piled up 40 or more points against to skew the averages. But in true legit top 25 matchups 28 points usually seals the deal
hey when you pit the two best teams in the history of everything against each other it only takes 9 points
#lsu #bama #9-6
2010, 2009, 2007, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1996, 1995. That's 13, which is a few more than 5. The 2011 offense was at 27.9 points/game.
I reiterate the comment about cupcakes inflating the per game average.
Just counting games against 1-A teams that finished .500 or better, it happened 5 times from 1995 to 2003 (1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003). I stopped there. VT used to have a functioning offense that could put up points.
I think those "functioning" offenses were a product of talent more than anything else. Talent (Tyrod Taylor) masks deficiencies in the system. I don't think we've had a "functioning" offense in the last decade. Just supremely talented athletes who could mask poor scheme/coaching.
Yeah, but three of the five offenses he mentioned were Bustle's, and the other two were Stiney's first two years, when he was basically still going through the same motions he'd seen Rickey use. There's no doubt that it eventually devolved into superior talent covering up for schematic deficiencies; the spike in output under Tyrod was from within the same system that Glennon had produced offenses ranked in the triple digits.
2003 is kind of a rip your heart out year. Statistically it was a great season, and there was reason to believe that Stiney was going to be a hotshot OC. But the doors fell off shortly thereafter.
Notably all of this was pre-Newsome. 2010 was the real outlier.
Pre-Newsome, yes, but Stiney had attempted to implement a zone blocking scheme without really knowing anything about zone blocking prior to Newsome's arrival. So damage was already being done to the O line, and then Newsome drove it into the ground.
Stinespring's tenure as OC was marked by the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing. Newsome can have success with his scheme. Witness his success at Emory & Henry after leaving here. But here, Stiney kind of just let Curt do his own thing and didn't account for the type of OL he was producing.
Plus the OL recruiting went to shit.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a Newsome apologist. But the bulk of the offensive ineptitude still falls in Bryan's lap.
Exactamundo!
I have never been able to understand the logic of those who laid all the blame on Newsome. He wasn't in charge of the offense. Nor was he in charge of the team.
I will say, Newsome's skill set is limited. He seems to only have success in a spread option offense. It says something that every single year he was here, we had to abandon his zone blocking scheme because it wouldn't work in a pro style offense.
Because he was in charge of an offensive line that consistently performed terribly, having four straight years of being 90th or below in sacks allowed and never higher than 77th while he alone coached the OL, and not really having his players improve? This includes a 2007 offensive line that was arguably the worst in the country. Also, the fall off in performance directly correlated to his time as o-line coach. This was all despite having a fair bit of talent.
Just ask French about Newsome.
While Stinespring wasn't great, Newsome's offensive lines crippled the offense for a long time. They were both culpable.
Sorry, and I mean no disrespect to you or the esteemed French. It's a simple organizational behavior problem. Why was Newsome retained once it became clear he was not up to the task? If his offensive (pun intended) lines crippled the offense, why did Stinespring not do something about it? Why did Beamer not act sooner? We can blame Newsome all we want, but those two above him who had the responsibility to the organization and the power to act deserve far, far more blame. He wasn't going anywhere until shown the door.
That's fair, I can agree with that.
you should start a blog wholly devoted to ripping into stinespring. Maybe you could call it firebryanstinespring.blogspot.com
well, when you figure that we only needed to get a safety to beat wake, we would have had more than enough points to spread around to win all our games and still only have averaged 28 ppg.
Hokie Hype Train 2015! Where can I find a ticket?!?!?!
While I desperately want those 10 + win predictions to come true , I have more sense than to believe them. Frankly ,the writers just get caught up in their obsession for attention or something to make them come up with this shit.
It's because people want to hype up the Ohio State vs Virginia Tech game more than they have faith in Tech. Don't be surprised to see us ranked preseason for that reason as well. Two ranked teams playing each other always looks better than just one.
I disagree with this. Most things I read don't even mention us when talking about the top 25 teams' toughest games.
Uh, okay...
Yes, sports writers have to come up with things to write about in the offseason, but he could have picked any team in the country. It's not like VT has a particularly large fan base, is particularly notable, or have any connections with Mandel that I'm aware of... Also, Mandel has no financial incentive or any real reason to boost viewership/hype a game for a company he doesn't work for anymore... Maybe he actually believes it.
No.
You gotta over-deliver before you can be under-rated imo. We haven't over-delivered for a full season in a while.
Wait a minute guys, are some you saying you don't think we will be successful this season if we score a touchdown and pat every qtr of every game? Bullshit! We average 28 and we will win the Coastal if our "D" stays relatively healthy. Our schedule sets up perfectly for that avg.
I think it's more that people don't think 28 pts/game and a healthy D will happen.
The likelihood of our offensive output being static and equally divided among all quarters of play across the entire season is approaching nil. It has never happened, and I would put money on it never happening within any of our lifetimes. If history teaches us anything, there will be games where we score bunches of points, and there will be games where points are at a premium. Ultimately, I will say again, if the offense averages 28 ppg across the season, it is underperforming.
no doubt Illiinois Hokie. We are talking averages for a total game. Perhaps the more meaningful avg is the scoring avg the first 3 qtrs. pick your poison. The same argument can be made if we have a dominant defense. We may not need 28 pts if our defense is averaging 21 or less. We held osu to 21 points in their house with 3 offensive turnovers one of which was inside our 15 yard line. Explain to me why 28 pts is under performing. Doesn't it kind of depend on the particular game anyway?
Sorry it took me so long to respond. This didn't show up as a reply to my comment and I just stumbled across it.
There's a bunch of reasons to say why a 28ppg offense is underperforming. First and foremost, you have to throw out what the defense does when judging an offense. Like I said elsewhere, the mindset of "oh, our defense holds opponents to 20 ppg, so scoring 28 ppg should be fine" is the exact mindset that leads to the Stanford Orange Bowl: when the defense meets and offense that has its number, our offense is unable to carry the team.
There are standards of efficiency, conversion, time of possession, red zone TD %, etc etc etc that should be used to judge an offense, but defensive performance shouldn't factor in.
Simplest stats I can give you, last year we scored 36 TDs. That ranked 90th in the nation. We got the ball inside our opponent's 20 yard line 48 times and only came away with 25 TDs, 97th in the country.
An offense is judged by the degree to which it takes advantage of the opportunities it is provided. We have failed to capitalize on those opportunities rather spectacularly over the last three seasons, and we still averaged 24.1 ppg. If we actually start executing as an offense, we're gonna score a hell of a lot more than just an extra 3.9 ppg.
Whats Glendale, AZ like in January?