2017: Why we win and why we lose

So we have officially hit the worst part of the football year. When the season ends we can at least ride out the football high until NSD. During the stretch between NSD and the beginning of Spring Practice we can either curl into the fetal position and rock back and forth while youtubing the same old clips of Tyrod hitting Danny and then Dyrell against Nebraska, MV7 skirting the sideline to get us into field goal range at the Miracle in Morgantown, and remembering when "these people are losing their minds" in Lane... OR we can occupy ourselves by creating more discussion focused around massive speculations that will probably never pan out the way any of us actually expect. I for one will plan to do plenty of both.

So here's the plan. I want to take a look at why we win in 2017 and why we lose in 2017. Many of us tend to be a bit homeristic and always predict the best case scenario, while some of us tend to be a little bit more pessimistic and elicit the "debbie downer" moniker from our TKP peers. This will force us all to take a look at both sides. Now I tend to be a bad news before the good news kind of guy so I'll start with "why we lose" and then move to "why we win."

Why we lose

Defense: Off the cuff our defense may look to be in good shape with a lot of key/experienced players returning but there are some glaring problems. First off some of the losses could be more significant than we care to acknowledge. Even though we only lose one DB he's a significant one. The current proposed responses are to either shuffle the secondary up completely, or insert a completely inexperienced kid, and possibly even a true freshman, into Bud's coveted DBU.

Second off the losses on the D-line look to be very problematic. Currently, while very talented, we are paper thin at DT. If Vinny is forced to move back inside we are looking at a very inexperienced/unproved set of DE's (with the exception of Hill). Even so the 2 deep at DT is still looking sketchy.

Lastly and most importantly is depth across the D-block. There is truthfully no position on defense that we can say we are deep with viable players right now. Yes we have some talent coming in at LB and DE but most of those freshman will probably need a year or two before they are serious contenders. My big concern is with injuries. 2015 was a tough year for injuries on defense but in 2016 we were pretty fortunate. Our two DE's played banged up a lot but missed very little time. Stro missed a few games but has one of the more viable/experienced backups in the secondary. A DT missed a little time but our 2 deep was fantastic. Honestly an injury at any position in 2017 could leave us massively exposed.

Overall our defense doesn't look to be way down but I'm afraid we will struggle late in games on account of a lack of viable depth. However if a key injury or two happens things could end up being much worse.

Offense: The challenges on offense are pretty clear. At QB the only guy who has taken a snap for the Hokies is Jack Click and he has not attempted a pass. Most of us however consider the real competition to be between a redshirt freshman and a true freshman (holy feed em to the wolves Batman).

Now assuming JJ takes the job I for one am a little nervous. Last year Evans really leaned on one of the best WR trios in VT history when it came to the passing game and when it came to the running game he relied on his ability to hit LB's and fall forward three yards. JJ will have neither of these things. Cam is set up to have a great year but I'm afraid he will draw all the focus of opposing secondaries. I hope some other WR's will step up but nobody else did last year so unless somebody has improved by leaps and bounds since last year our receiving corps could be a one man show.

Unfortunately I don't see the running game improving much either. While we return Dragon we lose our bigger back options in Juice and Shai. D.J. Reid hasn't shown that he is ready for a bigger role yet and it's probably too much ask the true freshman to step into a significant role. So basically with no real positive additions or changes to the running game in 2017 I see no reason to expect anything different from what we saw in 2016.

Overall I see a definite dip in year two under Fuente. We can invent reasons to be positive all day but when it's all said and done it's impossible to not see some regression with the amount of talent we lost. Things should improve over the next year or two but I expect to see a lot of growing pains in 2017.

Why we win

Defense: Bud is back. Not only does he look rejuvenated with Fuente under the helm but his 2016 crew looks close to back to what our spoiled fanbase has come to expect. The best part is that we lose very little. Losing Chuck is tough but we have good options to plug that spot. Bud has always shuffled around his secondary to make sure he has the best players on the field and he'll do the same in 2017. However if Hunter can come in and be that immediate impact player then Bud wont have to do much shuffling anyway.

On the D-line we lose some key guys but the talent is still there. Our starting DT's look to be one of the best tandem positions on the field. Vinny and Trevon both have plenty of proven experience at DE and House got plenty of reps late last year. Several guys will have to step up in the rotation but it's hard to not be excited about the talent we have at the top of the depth chart.

Oh and how about those LB's? This is really the first time in a while that I haven't been worried about either of those positions. Not only do we have some depth coming in with this recruiting class but we have two very experienced very good players at that position. Tremaine improved tremendously over last season and we still aren't exactly sure how high his ceiling is. Motu still has to clean some things up but he still looked like a new man this past year. I finally feel like to don't have cringe every time announcers mention that Bud refers to him as "the eraser."

Overall with another year of experience our defense looks to be just as good and more than likely a little improved in 2017.

Offense: Yes we lose a lot, and yes that will be tough, but we aren't without genuine hope. While losing Evans hurts we forget that he was in his first year playing D1 ball last. JJ will be in the same boat except he has had a full year in the program learning the offense and the skills needed to succeed. Also I think many people are not giving JJ quite the credit he deserves since he doesn't have LT3 size or TT5 mobility. At the end of the day JJ is still a duel threat guy and from what we have heard from Fuente he has been on of the better passers on the team. The reality is we know Fu wont ask a ton of JJ (just like with Evans). If he can run the scheme, and protect the football we will win games (we all know the turnover statistics from last year and how they correlated to our W/L record).

As far as receivers go we certainly aren't without options. I truly believe that the ankle assassin has proven that he can carry the WR1 load. After him I am confident that some guys will step up. While some might worry about the fact that nobody really stepped up after Ford, Cam, and Bucky last year I feel that that was more a product of how good our top 3 were as opposed to how poor the rest of the WR corps is. With the amount of openings there are I expect some guys to step up and take advantage and impress us.

Another significant factor that many of us seem to have forgotten is that 2016 was only year 1 in a completely and radically new offensive scheme. Honestly though our offense was so improved it's pretty easy to forget. I for one can't wait to see what CornFu will pull out with a team that isn't completely green to what the coaching staff is trying to do.

Overall I expect very little if any regression. JJ is not Evans but that's not to say that he is worse than Evans. Fuente has said many times that he will adapt his scheme to the players he has. In year 2 of a more polished Fuenteball I expect a lot of games where the initial perception is that the offense hasn't been that impressive, but when we look at the scoreboard we notice that we have seemingly out of nowhere hung 35+ on the other team.

Phew... Alright so I know I'm long winded and you probably didn't read everything I wrote, but that's ok. More than anything I want to hear your thoughts?

Why do we win in 2017 and why do we lose in 2017?