I know, I know, I broke the first rule of Fight Club and linked to a Dinich post: http://espn.go.com/blog/acc/post/_/id/53706/checking-in-with-vt-qb-logan..., but it had a telling quote from Thomas.
What went wrong last year?
LT: The leadership. We didn't have any one person or any group of people step up. That leader will drive a team as far as they want to go. I take some of the blame for that, and I think some of the other guys who are here take the blame for that. We're not going to let that happen for a second year in a row. Another thing is we got complacent with all of the winning that had gone on in the program, that it was just going to happen. Obviously we know it's not going to happen. We have to be better.
Everyone from the Frankinator on down is holding themselves accountable. Good news.
Comments
I think that this is a big step in the right direction for the team with him admitting a lack of leadership, which in my opinion helped lead to the overall complacency of the program. I am looking forward to seeing a hungry team in 2013.
Got that right.
The Hokies' Big 3 (Thomas, Gayle, and Exum) have to step up.
That said,
LET'S GO, HOKIES! #BEATTHESNOTOUTOFBAMA
Appreciate LT being honest...but come on, as a fourth year player and two-year starting QB, if they was a clear leadership void, maybe he should have stepped up.
I believe he addressed that.... 'I take some of the blame for that'.
Let's hope it's live and learn, and the same void doesn't exist this year.
I'm a big LT fan, but I'm a little bit worried about this. It seems like his personality is to lead by example, but he's got to be more vocal if we are going to get tougher...
He can lead by example if he plays better.
Part II is here: http://espn.go.com/blog/acc/post/_/id/53712/qa-with-logan-thomas-part-ii.
I think guys like Marcus Davis were probably detrimental to the team. When you have senior guys like him with not giving 100 percent it creates a very bad leadership example. I get the feeling that that kind of attitude aint going to fly with the new offensive regime, and we know that doesn't fly on the defensive side. Regardless of talent I think this team returns to what Virginia Tech football is all about this year and going forward.
Morehead already took step to fix that.
Interviews like this make me think of something: How were guys like Marcus Davis not universally hated by the rest of the players? All of them, especially guys like Tone, Logan and JC, seem especially committed to winning and putting 100% in. Guys like MD7 were essentially dead space on the field, harming our efforts to win games. They see that too, so how did it not spill over more? I understand most of them are friends, but at some point it goes beyond friendship.
I think we've seen our share of locker room poison (D. Hall, M. Davis), so I hope we can get some leadership out of the upperclassmen.
We're on the front page of ESPN College Football.
It also helps that he's the winningest active FBS Coach. We need to win that Crystal Ball before the Frankinator is gone.
we NEED it so bad. About once a week, I imagine what it will be like when we finally win it all and just the thought of it almost brings me tears.
She had an interview with Shane Beamer up today
http://espn.go.com/blog/acc/post/_/id/53814/checking-in-with-shane-beamer
I've included a couple of the more interesting snippets for those of you who don't want to give her page views:
Shane takes a lot of the blame for the running backs not performing well:
I don’t feel like I did a good job of coaching the running backs last year. I take that personally, the way we performed.
More specifically:
we never could settle on one [running back] last year, and I blame myself for not saying these are our guys and going for it. It’s hard. I knew during the season and going into the season it’s hard to play four. I’m realizing more now, but we really never felt like anyone separated themselves...but in football you’ve got to be able to get your two main guys and have some packages for a couple other guys. That’s what I hope we’re able to do going forward.
At one point he thought Tony Gregory was going to emerge as the top back:
Tony Gregory was a guy I thought was getting ready to turn the corner and maybe be that guy, and then he got hurt going into the Cincinnati game and missed a few weeks.
He also mentioned not letting the backs get enough carries to get into a rhythm:
I don’t think I was fair to Michael Holmes. Last year the most he carried the ball in one game was 12 times or something like that. Michael needs to carry the ball 15 or 25 times to really get into the flow. I didn’t [give] Michael and all those guys a great opportunity to do that last year because of the way we rotated them. I think if they get more reps and have more carries, the game will slow down for them and they’ll be better. I saw that a little bit with J.C. as the year went on.
So it sounds like Shane is a little more committed to settling on two or three backs this year, even if it means leaving talent on the bench.
That is actually encouraging. It means he is learning from his mistake. Hopefully this spring will settle the question, once and for all, who is the established running back and who will spell him.
If Shane had tried to dog the question, I would be worried, but I think he have good support from Loeffler and Grimes. I think those coaches are gonna help him decide who is the best back.