Phil Steele has been counting down his Top 40 2015 teams on his website www.PhilSteele.com, revealing one new team each day on the way to #1. Today, June 26th, should be the unveiling of #16 which based on a previous posting should be the Hokies. As each new team is revealed, Phil gives access to that team's analysis for one day only. This is the same two-page analysis that you would otherwise have to purchase his annual magazine to receive. Very decent of Phil to provide it free of charge for a twenty-four hour period.
Just go to his website, www.philsteele.com and scroll down to the countdown. If the Hokies are there in the #16 slot, click on the hypertext link to be taken to the PDF.
I am not sure what time Phil posts his new slot each day, but as I have a plane to catch this morning, I did not want you to miss out. Keep checking back and it should appear as Clemson (#17) has been up all day Thursday.
Comments
Still Clemson at 6:30 AM
Still Clemson at 0638
Yikes! That website has not aged well.
Lmao so true
But you know what website has aged well...
Space Jam
Hasn't been updated since 1996.
Reading Clemson's report is painful in that PDF. Sounds like they have some issues going into the year, though they have plenty of talent. I hope we get a shot against them this year in Charlotte.
going to depend on their qb staying healthy. never thought Clemson would have a #1 defense either that came out of no where.
Website is subpar so you will buy magazine.
Subpar is almost generous haha.
I'm kind of jaded, I look at some pretty bad websites for work. Cults, gangs and the like especially at the boom in late 90's early 2000's all thought they needed websites. Some are even still up and running using the same graphics and such.
What do you do? (Please don't say fireman, I'll feel so dumb)
Edit: and why would it require you to look at these sites
Fireman, but I'm the terrorism liaison officer.
Edit: Think Homeland security but for the local level, bad news it's worse than most people realize. Especially certain states and areas.
I'd like to look at some of these sites but then I'd be worried I'd end up on some list.
This is a good example, a cult that all committed sucide to get in a spaceship, left two people behind to run the website and bank account.
http://www.heavensgate.com
Yeah, I remember when that happened. Someone was spared to run that website? There's a lot of Tl;Dr crazy in there. I like the one about how they oppose suicide, but are pro leaving their bodies. Also, $45 for the book? Was that the 1996 price? My ass Heaven's Gate. I guess all the real good stuff is on the Tor anyway amirite?
#16 Virginia Tech! Now Available!!
It's updated, btw. Here's the direct link so you don't have to see the homepage, ugh.
Many of you here are in the wrong business. Does this guy get paid for this? Fairly worthless information for people who follow this website. He lists Marshawn Williams as the projected starter in the backfield and Andrew Ford as the number 4 quarterback. ?Maybe he knows something we don't.?
and that's why we just look at it when it's free and don't pay for the magazine
While he desperately needs to higher a graphic artist (anyone with any design knowledge), Phil Steele is (IMO) the #1 college football statistician/analyst. His predictions come to fruition more often than any other pundit.
Yup. He is about at the level of information that is commonly found on fan websites dedicated to the team...
For forty different teams.
The value of Steele is that he does this for every. single. team. Basically every player you see playing on a Saturday, you can look up his relevant stats and recruiting ranking.
He then compares all the units across the board. He lists players, 1-250, at each position. He's got betting odds. He's got NFL draft data. He's got national recruiting information, compiled into a PS# that composites all recruiting rankings.
So, yeah, he missed that our 4th QB transferred. His 235+ page magazine is now useless.
yes he gets paid and he isn't going to know every single detail about every team in major college football. Andrew ford just transferred and who knows MW "could" end up being our leading rusher at the end of the year if he comes back from injury (I think it will be trey or JC). The only other thing he may be off on was riley starting at a safety spot it should be Reavis and Clark.
I don't mean to ruffle any feathers. When I turn to a page by a paid professional such as his I expect to see something up-to-date and that which I haven't seen before. From my point of view what was on the pdf was nothing more than cut and paste and not well checked, thus we see Williams, who while possible is doubtful to be starting and would have been more accurate to say so, and Andrew Ford who left some weeks ago with enough heads up time before publishing to not be listed. For fans of other teams who don't follow the Hokies I can see the merit.
That is an absurd expectation. For one, if the magazine is coming out soon, it's very likely that the Andrew Ford news came out after his deadline. Besides, 3rd/4th string qb changes aren't that big of a deal. Secondly, the value of what he does isn't about out-doing the people here who spend hours every day keeping up with every bit of minutiae on one team, it's so that you can keep up with every other team. 95% of what he says about us is dead-on, and shows some pretty in depth knowledge and analysis. To me, that says you can trust what he's saying about the other 39 teams, and get a quick 2-page run down on the state of every other program. Which is pretty amazing really.
BS, if heather dinich wrote this, everyone would be tearing her a new one..
im editing the rest out because everyone always gets so offended
but basically, its not really that "absurd" to expect a paid magazine to have up to date rosters
But you seem to be overlooking or ignoring the fact that t the roster could have been up to date as of Steele's deadline.
I'm not really making a point about the article itself, just the comment above mine saying it's absurd to expect an article thats typically behind a pay wall to be up to date at the time of its publishing.
I'm not trying to berate the article at all, I think its great what he does
Well, yeah, I get that. But all we can reasonably expect from the author is that everything be current and accurate as of the deadline. For all we know, with the recency of Ford's release, there's no reason to suspect such is not the case here.
Then there's the conversation regarding the editor (who may or may not be Steele himself in this case, no clue). Before going to press, you have to look and see what's changed. You've got a fourth string QB transfer. Okay, is this worth doing a last minute revision or printing a correction? No, probably not. Had it been Michael Brewer or Isiah Ford that was lost instead of Andrew, I'm guessing we would at least see a printed correction as and addendum to the original projection.
Heather Dinich never provided this much information about one team, let alone as many as Phil Steele covers.
You could compile a year of Heather Dinich's columns and not find as many facts as in this two-page writeup of Virginia Tech.
his stuff is more about his statistical analysis than his players. looking at it from the wrong perspective JMO.
For some reason the version I am looking at the forecast ends like this
"were actually tied for last in the Coastal LY but are"
Anyone else having that issue?
beat me by 47 seconds
that's how it ends.
yeah I got the same thing
It's a cliffhanger...tune in next week to see how it ends....
Same Bat time. Same Bat channel.
Tune in this SEASON, to see how it ends.
wow that is hard to read
Can someone help me out with the last sentence of his forecast? Like....where is the rest of it? Its gonna be a big letdown if its just cut off
just appears to end like that.
Tune in this season, for "an avalanche of thrills".
VT is certainly capable of delivering on that.
He also said our non-shutout streak ended. We were not shut out last year. We scored against both Miami and Wake Forest.
"VT nearly had its shutout streak end."
Emphasis mine.
the non-shutout streak in regulation ended. He doesn't clarify, so he is correct.
Pretty impressive how spot on this is. He pretty much distills in 2 pages what we've spent the last 7 months figuring out. Looking forward to seeing the other teams.
Wow.... awful editing... They completely cut off his outlook on our upcoming season before it starts, which is, you know, what you buy the magazine for. What a complete joke
Ugh, and the shorthand is not exactly easy to read sometimes. Not a fan.
Well if you really want to know you could, you know, actually buy the magazine....
ummm... do you want to work for free? If his purpose is not to sell the magazine for money, what would be the purpose of the magazine, a hobby?
This guy would make an excellent Air Force bullet writer!
Holy shit, I was thinking the same thing while reading this earlier today. Short, straight to the point, acronyms galore. EPR 101.
Nah, those aren't approved acronyms. Needs to review Tongue and Quill IMO.
Maybe I'm missing something, but does he actually make any predictions other than the starters? The "forecast" is just going over recent Hokie history.
About 95% of that forecast is discussing past performances and the 2014 team. Unless the meaning of "forecast" has changed, it seems more like a 2014 "recap", even if it shows pretty clearly where Phil thinks the team is going.
I guess the forecast was going to be in that last 1 1/2 lines that were left blank?
Holy crap I had to guess on half of those acroynyms. Maybe he could add like a half a page more and just spell the words out. What's with all the shorthand? Did a court reporter write that thing??
If you get his magazine, there is a glossary. Literally, this is a 230+ page magazine. It's a lot of info.
I get that it is 1 guy doing all of this but it was really just a regurgitation of stats from the last few years. It gave really 0 insight into this season. I got a little nauseous reading it with the format.
Which is exactly what Steele does. He isn't in the business of saying "This team will go 9-3 or my name isn't Lou Holtz!" He gives you the data so you can interpret on your own. The only predictions he does are the last line of each unit outlook, like this for the WR's:
"Despite (technically) being a little less experienced, I expect this year's returnees to be the top receivers making this unit more experienced and stronger, especially with a now veteran QB."
For Steele, that's praise. We lost Byrn and Stanford, but he thinks the WR corps will be better. He's not trying to tell you how many games we will win becuse that's a fools erand. He's telling you that we will be better at QB, RB, WR, OL, DL, LB, DB and ST's. That's all the units! That's huge praise for Steele. Usually you will have a group or two who he will say "this unit loses some experience and I will call them down a notch."
He has us ranked 16th, clearly he thinks we are pretty good.
he does statistics and predictions. I don't think that is the full write-up for any of the teams. notice the line where he projected how we would do last year in scoring defense and he was off by like .6 points. He's giving a prediction that we will finish 16th in the country...
Not to get too far off topic here, but has Stanford completely left the team? Last I saw/heard, he's still living in Blacksburg and enrolled at VT. I suppose it's possible he could still be in school and no longer with the team but I just hadn't heard the final verdict on him.
He's great on the radio during the season. Breaks down the match-ups better than anyone in the business. He knows every player in D1. It's seriously insane.
This is for the casual fan, readers of TKP shall gain no new information on our team here.
So you knew Bud Foster was the only 4-time Broyles finalist!?
That was news to me.
HA! He should be a finalist every year.
Finalist? Ha! Not trying hard enough. Whit should hire the guy that actually won the award four times!
/s
Looks like I missed out. I'll buy the magazine though, I do every year. Phil Steele is the best in the business. You guys are right, us obsessed Hokie fans know all about our team, but I don't know that much about any other team. Nor do I care to keep browsing their fansites to learn that much about them. That's where his preview comes in. It's enough info to keep you reading and satisfied until that first Thursday night game. The abbreviations can seem like another language, but once you learn them it reads fine.
As of 9:28am on 6/27, the VT article is still there.
I agree with you though, compared to the other magazines, this one packs in the information.
Oh nice, I guess I just assumed it was down and we all know what happens when you assume! Thanks for the heads up.
Not sure how we can criticize an article that points out that we'll have had the Cup for 4,015 straight days.