With the uva regime out, it will interesting to see what happens with this 7-on-7 club. I was happy that Tech steered clear of what appears to be a organization run by sketchy guys. However they will need to latch on to someone / somewhere to continue their success and it is a fresh slate in the state of VA. Not sure of Fuente's thoughts on these new AAU-type of organizations.
I also have similar thoughts related to some of the more tenured HS coaches in VA that have historically been more active in steering their players - thinking Hampton, Oscar Smith, etc.
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Locksley to UVA and the AAU pipeline to UVA is alive and well
Would be fitting. But I think UVA steers clear of Locksley. I doubt they want to deal with his reputation.
What exactly is his reputation?
http://www.thekeyplay.com/comment/367919#comment-367919
I could be wrong, but I was under the impression they had 2-3 years worth of amazing recruits but that there isnt really anyone left. Blanding and Brown I were their last recruits I know of. Are there more?
If I'm not mistaken, Burrell, Kumah, Settle, Stroman, Hand, etc were/are in a similar group up in Woodbridge, except no one is really steering them to a particular school. There was a Twitter post about it when we were recruiting Hand and Stroman.
Settle and Stroman were both from Stonewall Jackson. Burrell from Hylton, Kumah from Forest Park, and Hand from Woodbridge. Geographically similar (Manassas and Woodbridge are ~15 min apart) but no other real association that I know of.
It would be interesting to see a 350+ lb DT in a 7-on-7 league but I'm not sure they would make much sense.
Did you miss the spring game INT by Settle?
Not sure about the Oscar Smith comment, we've gotten quite a few over the years.
It was assumed Oscar Smith was "anti-VT" after Greg Boone came in 2005 and we moved him to TE and didn't give him a shot at playing QB. There were multiple 4* recruits from 2008 - 2010 that all never really gave VT a chance. IIRC, Phillip Sims even said something about this when he chose to leave the state and go to Alabama.
However, we got our next Oscar Smith recruit in 2012 with JC Coleman and things have appeared to change, since we also got Bradshaw '14 and McClease '15.
And even though we didn't get Sweat, I'd say were at least given a fair chance.
They latch onto UNC and send all the players out of state to Fedora
Implying the Oscar Smith coach steers his players seems pretty ridiculous to me. They have gone all over the country.
Edit: Auto-correct strikes again
He didn't ...he implied it.
Thanks, fixed it. I should have proof read it since I was using my phone.
Their AD too.
I'm thinking that the new staff should have a chance to develop new relationships.
If the relationship is already good, it should be relatively straightforward. If the relationship is a little stale, this is a chance to start fresh.
They're the new coaching staff at UVA.
After 3 years of trying, the Thoroughbreds are still trying to go to a Bowl game.
ha....i hope they're not holding their breath
>> I was happy that Tech steered clear of what appears to be a organization run by sketchy guys.
1. We didn't steer clear of it, we let our offense become so repulsive that players didn't think it was good enough for them. AND THEY WERE RIGHT.
2. These "sketchy guys" are fathers, uncles, "community activists", and entrepreneurs who give their time, much of it far below market value, in order to help kids many of whom come from economically disadvantaged backgrounds 1) develop as football players 2) develop as men and 3) raise their visibility among college coaches.
Thoroughbreds did well for alot of these kids. VT "fans" if that is what you are, who can't respect what they do should STFU.
So you want to sh** on Thoroughbreds, and the high school coaches. Anyone else you want to alienate? Go back to your HOO message board. You won't have to worry bout the Thoroughbreds or HS coaches any more. With JF and BF at VT, they'll all be playing for us.
I'm not sure you are aware of the thoroughbreds situation at all.
Such an underrated movie.
uh... no.
1. VT steered clear because Beamer wouldn't go through the coaches for recruiting. The class act coaches of the Thoroughbreds didn't like that so they went on to publicly say: "Fuck Tech. Fuck VT." blah, blah, blah and to publicly call out some kid who had expressed interest in VT despite what his classy coaches advised him not to do.
2. These "sketchy" guys while being dads, uncles, etc wanted access. London and UVA gave them that and let them in to Cvill whenever they wanted. Beamer wouldn't do that. So your "community activists" responded with... see point 1
Thoroughbreds did not do well for these kids. They funneled them to a program that was not good because they had gotten what they wanted. They openly stopped them from being approached by or attending VT events, coaches, etc. You may have noticed that many kids they "did well for" ended up leaving or transferring from the program they were funneled to.
So you want to sh*t on VT coaches and others that are not fans of them then I suggest you go to that Hoo message board yourself and be more welcome in your skewed point of view. Otherwise, do some basic research before talking or else follow your own advise and don't say anything at all.
but you know, keep it classy San Diego, oh... unless you are a thoroughbred coach.
Interesting. So what do you think VT's future with them will be? If the coaches are all a bunch of dads/uncles/family of these players, what was so detrimental about that as to not allow them access? I thought players' families were allowed access anyhow, since we're all about the family atmosphere. I think the VT bashing and funneling of players to LOLUVA was pretty stupid on the group's part, but is there irreparable damage done? It doesn't look like the group will be going anywhere. I can see why Beamer, being his very old school self, was very hesitant or reluctant to work with these people with recruiting and only wanted to work with the actual school coaches. I'm curious to see what our approach will be in the area with a brand new coaching staff and a clean slate in Virginia.
I don't think anything is irreparable, especially with Fuente coming in now. But the issue was that Beamer and Co talk directly to families, not middlemen. And these coaches wanted to be the gatekeepers to these kids and their families. Is that right or wrong? I think that is up to the coach, but in this case, given how truly classy the thoroughbred coaches responded I would say the correct decision was made at the time.
Now it's up to Fuente. By all accounts he is a no-nonsense guy, so I am doubtful of him putting up with it either.
I definitely agree here. The program is sketch as fuuuuuuuuu
I would think the actual school football coaches and players' families should work to steer their kids away from the group in this case. If they aren't actually looking out for the kids' best interests and want to act as gatekeepers to get what they want from college programs, then you would think people will start to realize this. On the surface, I think it definitely sounds like it has the potential to be sketchy af.
Something's gotta give. Either Fuente and the new staff will find a way to work with them, or the group will dissolve and players will start listening more to their high school coach and families. We can't let the rift continue, though. Thanks for your insight on the matter; I really didn't know much about why anyone in their right mind would be sending top football players to UVA and Timecop.
It's already breaking down. Thoroughbred kids are starting to branch out on their own despite the "advice" given.
why would parents allow it? well, really the answer needs to be from the parents but it has been speculated that these "coaches" are promoting their services as a means to help these kids get to the next level and their established access equates to a higher potential for reaching that success. If you are a hard working double income family with little to no time to do that for your kid yourself then that would be attractive. But how much they are aware of their kid getting funneled to one program over another, or away from a potential interest is not known.
the problem with any gatekeeper is that they inherently have personal interests that bias them and how helpful they are for the kid(s) they are helping. Anyone remember that RB from Oklahoma (I think) named Bryce Brown. Same kind of thing.
Fuente is going to have to deal with this one way or another. We're all going to rip him if he doesn't start bringing that type of talent to Blacksburg. He'll eventually get fired if he doesn't have the players to get him to ACC championship/CFB playoff contending level. Does he choose to play in the shadows to get these guys or is he going to take the moral high ground and attempt to have the same success with the blueprint we used 15 years ago?
I think it was John Wooden who said something like: "There are two types of coaches: Ones who win with great talent and ones who are unemployed (or on the path of getting fired)." The recruiting battles are going to be fun to watch.
+1 #owned
Didn't most of them turn out to be busts anyways? Blanding turned out to be as expected but the rest of them fell pretty short of expectations (granted some of them came from pretty terrible circumstances and I do respect London a lot for being a father figure for kids who were in some pretty messed up situations)....and according to this article, we didn't take a 'bred quarterback because his grades sucked, that's the reason why they hate us:
That QB is probably Corwin Cutler, son of the man who famously went off about how much he hates Virginia Tech and whatnot.
I'm trying to remember exactly what happen...so basically Turtle's father ran the 'breds, we didn't give his son an offer because of his grades and then he steered the rest of the guy that we wanted (Blanding, Brown, Mizzel etc.) away from us? That seems a little childish to me.
Here's a little about Cutler's father and what happened there. This is also from the thread about Cutler transferring from UVA because he "wasn't wanted." http://www.thekeyplay.com/comment/272861#comment-272861
Yeah, so Cutler said he was going to transfer because he was going to be the #3 guy behind Lambert and Johns, then Lambert said he was going to transfer two days later, then Cutler recanted?
I started to dig through some of the past articles about the 'breds...listen I think on the surface, these guys did a pretty tremendous thing in terms of guiding the players to go to great colleges (say what you want about UVa, it's still a division one program w/ good academics). Some of these guys grew up in awful circumstances (the story of how Blanding's mother worked two jobs in order to send her son to all of these camps was really touching) and having strong role models in an impressionable part of their childhood is awesome. I think no one on this board is going to find fault in that. However, there was this cloud of nefarious behavior and they fact they kicked Tech in the nuts by steering 4* and 5* guys away from us is what we upset all of us. There's a goddamn good story here and it would be cool to see everything out there now that the dust has settled and we're getting an overhaul on our staff.
VT offered Bucky Hodges as a QB and not Corwin Cutler, who's dad helps run the 7 on 7 club. Cutler gets offer from UVA. Thoroughbreds funneled all their guys to UVA and shunned VT thereafter.
That's an awful lot of phone calls between London and the Thoroughbred coaches considering they said they have a "minimal role in recruiting, not wanting to overstep their players' parents or high school coaches".
Washington Post article on UVA & Thoroughbreds
I don't think I've even called my wife on the phone that many times within the past year.
On one hand, I think UVA is exploiting a loophole here by not directly calling players or their households that often. But on the other hand, a lot of good it's done them, huh?