I'm not sure this a practical solution to enact immediately. I don't know how responsibilities are delegated, but I think it must be pretty challenging to do head coaching duties AND call plays during the game. There's a reason so many head coaches delegate play calling to someone else; there's just a finite amount of hours in the day to prepare.
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You don't make a change for the sake of change. If Fuente isn't prepared to step in as playcaller, and can't complete that prep in 6 days, then he shouldn't do it.
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He says "drastically bad results require drastic action" in the ostensible context of why it's not ludicrous for Fuente to start calling plays, and your reaction is to indicate that because of this assertion, he should be on board with firing Bud Foster and Brad Cornelson????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
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OP never said anything about firing anyone, so why the "too"? This subthread is so bizarre. Four different comments from four different posters.
I think Fuente should call plays
>well I don't know that it's that feasible because logic and reason
>>well drastic times call for drastic measures such as perhaps maybe for instance Fuente beginning to call plays
>>>SO YOU WANNA FIRE BUD FOSTER TOO HUH???
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The difference is that Bud is probably the most well respected defensive coaches in all of football. He's also trotting 3 and 4 string players all over the field.
The offense lost JJ, but besides him they are relatively healthy.
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The offense lost JJ, but besides him they are relatively healthy.
They are not. They are worse at 3 of the 5 OL positions relative to last year due to injury / attrition / youth. Anyone who told you otherwise is poorly misinformed.
And btw, losing your primary QB sucks. Willis is doing his best to ball out but he consistently does bad reads on the read option. If you combine our inability to do much other than just throw it down the field then we aren't going to have much success.
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The major difference is that Mike Leach is the OC, and assumes all responsibilities as OC. Have you ever been in a situation at your job where you delegate work to someone, and then you have to pick up their share of the work, in addition to your own? It typically ends poorly.
I'm not saying an HC can't call plays, I'm saying that, in general, it's difficult to pick up extra responsibilities midway through a season.
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I'm not sure this a practical solution to enact immediately. I don't know how responsibilities are delegated, but I think it must be pretty challenging to do head coaching duties AND call plays during the game. There's a reason so many head coaches delegate play calling to someone else; there's just a finite amount of hours in the day to prepare.
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Why not start scripting plays out of halftime? Isn't that what they do on the first few drives. Seems like the more of the game we see, the worse our play calling gets
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Critics call it "rank and yank," and it's a controversial practice.
Former General Electric Co. CEO Jack Welch is the most passionate advocate. He believes that managers should assess their employees every year, and divide them into three categories: the top 20 percent, the middle 70 percent, and the bottom 10 percent.
The top 20 should be showered with praise, affection and various and generous financial rewards. "Sprinkling" financial rewards over a much larger group is a mistake, Mr. Welch argues.
The middle 70 should be given coaching, training, and thoughtful goal-setting, with an eye toward giving them an opportunity to move into the top. Keeping them motivated is the most difficult part of the manager's task, he says. "You do not want to lose the vast majority of your middle 70 – you want to improve them," Mr. Welch says in his 2005 book, "Winning."
As for the bottom 10 percent, "there is no sugarcoating this," Mr. Welch says. "They have to go."
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Loyalty is the double edged sword that kept both Stiney and Bud with Coach Beamer.
I think the ability to make these emotionally difficult moves is a big part of being a successful coach. If you hire good talent, they get hired away; if you hire bad talent, you have to be able to recognize it and move on.
To be quite honest this is one of the most difficulty part of any management position.
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Saban doesn't carry around very many coaches and is probably not all that close to his staff. He seems to hang onto guys too long at MSU. The only coach that really followed him around all that much was Kirby Smart.
Dabo probably doesn't have a whole lot of friends on the Clemson coaching staff.
Regardless, business and friendship is very hard to make work.
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Out of the crisis, W.E. Deming is an early good one (c.1983). A ton of great recent research too, search scholar.google.com if you're interested in reading more.
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Gut instinct would be to take over playcalling, but if things still don't go well, then a lot more fingers start getting pointed at him, and the aura of offensive genius quickly starts fading. It might be in his best interest to not do that and preserve the intrigue.
I would go out and find an OC who has success in a power run oriented offense (whether it's spread or more traditional) and try to incorporate their ideas into my spread system. We need to get a run game going for the offense to turn the corner.
I also think some staff changes need to be made on defense, but Fu gives Bud great autonomy there and if Bud isn't onboard, it could cause a rift in the program.
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I agree with this 100%. No doubt Bud would keep Wiles as he continually produces, at minimum, average D-Line play and when he has "dudes" out there, he produces great D-Line play. I think most people now realize how good Torrian Gray really was when he was here, I dont think Bud even had to worry about the secondary when he was head of DBU. I would love to have T.Gray back, but that is not happening since hes with the Redskins now.
Again I know we are depleted in about every aspect of the defense and the secondary for sure, but I wonder how well Bud, Mitchell and Nix have meshed given they've only been working together less than 6 months. Getting healthy and getting more time to mesh all the defensive coaches will lead to improvement next year. I mean we have nowhere to go but up from this year.I really like the fact that Cody Grimm is on the defensive coaching staff because that guy was a footballer, he could play. ** Remembers when Grimm chased down that Bama back and caused that fumble - sigh memories **
Speaking on the offensive side I think some play-calling duties, that is whoever is in charge of it, has to improve. We have talent, and outside of Josh Jackson, we have stayed relatively healthy so honestly there shouldn't be this much of a drop off. The first half is usually decent and then we either start thinking too much or outsmarting ourselves. Sometimes football is just imposing your will against a team and doing it well. I dont know but the second half of games (mostly the last 5-6 games) I have no clue what is happening in terms of scheme. What goes on in the locker room? Does the OC know that in-game adjustments usually need to be made?
There are a lot of reads that Willis misses in terms of giving or keeping, unless they are designed that way but sometimes the read (if its a read) is just wrong. I like our receivers against anyone, but Cornelsen doesn't give them that much of a chance with play calling. All the misdirection, sweep motion pre-snap smoke and mirrors rarely leads to any benefits. I could definitely be wrong in my observation here but the play calling is abysmal lately. With Stiney it was VERY predictable (bubble screens everywhere) but this offense is very unpredictable and not in a good way.
So yeah I would take Bud aside and just ask what do you need to get us competitive again and how can I help.
To Cornelsen : can you fix it? If not you gotta go.
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I mentioned this in the past, but I would encourage everyone to go back and listen to the This is Home podcast after the ODU debacle. First business would be to offer Brandon Flowers the job to coach our secondary. Talk about a recruiting boost and a guy to teach proper technique, problem solved.
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It doesn't make sense to start QP in probably the most important game for the program in years. Willis gives us the best chance of winning and we need to win next week. It's too late to give meaningful reps to QP without throwing him to the wolves.
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Fuente once said something about when he became a head coach, he started taking a more macro look at the program. Perhaps it's time to come down the mountain a little bit. That could mean calling the plays, or at least getting more hands on with the offense.
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Basketball head coaching is way more about overall Xs and Os compared to a football position coach that is goin over a positions specific technique and drilling and hopefully recruiting that specific position
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The reasoning Fuente gave for the Burden/Wiggins assignments never set well for me. He said he wanted both of them to have broader experience for their careers. I always thought that was really weird. I don't care at all about Wiggins or Burdens post VT career aspirations. I want them to succeed here. Now.
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Lots of RB coaches never played RB in college. I do think moving Burden back to WR coach would be helpful, though. We're seeing way too many dropped passes this year. Even with young recievers, I don't remember seeing that when Wiggy was coaching them.
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Take a long, hard look at your offense. Ask myself if I need an "x" type of QB to make it work, how good is it really? When Fuente's offense has been good, he had an NFL level qb, I have a feeling those are a bit more rare than we'd like to admit, does the offense have to have this level of talent to work? If so, it's probably a little flawed. Also, can we bring in someone to look how to plug an play pieces instead insisting on putting a square peg in a round hole?
It feels like we have the most offensive talent in a long time, why is it not clicking? My naive opinion is that we shouldn't need an all world QB and RB to make a decent offense. I know you need those pieces to actually win big time (LSU) but it feels like there are many other teams that have way better offenses with much less talent.
Based on total offense:
Teams ahead of Tech that probably aren't nearly as talented in every offensive position.
UAB, ECU, Nevada, ASU, UMass, Toledo, App State, Gt, Cincy, WMU, Baylor, UL-Monroe, Arizona, Ark St, UNT, Miami-Ohio, FAU, Nebraska, Utah St.
I know many of those teams don't have nearly as difficult of a schedule, but we haven't really this year either. Something's not clicking, got take as an objective as possible look and figure out why.
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Replace Nix. No position on defense had more experience yet looks like they have no idea where they are supposed to be. Floyd and Deablo regressed significantly and Ladler was strong in run support in his cameo yet can't tackle now.
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His hiring always bothered me some. Scott's untimely firing left us in a position where the pool of candidates to replace him was very limited and many of the available coaches were so because things had not gone well at the previous stop.
While I do find it hard to make conclusions on a guy who hasn't even been with the program for a full year, l would agree that initial returns are not positive on the field. One has to wonder if we would not have been better off leaving an interim there and finding a permanent replacement this offseason.
Nix's story kind of reminds me of Cornelson..rapid rise to a Coordinator followed by limited success and a reevaluation of potential.
Btw, the obvious answer to the original question is to fire Cornelson. He's a poor coordinator and a poor Recruiter..he adds nothing to the equation.
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I consider Nix a placeholder.
They lauded Nix by saying Bud needed a former DC on his staff like he had with Scott. Ok, great. Go get UNCs soon to be available DC John Papuchis, one of the best mid Atlantic recruiters out there. And Hokie alum.
And/Or.......can we get Gray back if we offer him the Co-DC title Scott had? With Buds job in two years?
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Well, he was in the booth for the first time since 1996 because of "doctor's orders?" May not be remembering the broadcast correctly, assuming they had their facts straight in the first place
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One thing I would have done games ago to try to light a fire under this team, is take away the 25 jersey and tell them no one gets it until they collectively prove they deserve it.
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Alternatively - give it to Willis until someone else outworks him. He's one player, if not the only one, who is exhibiting some fire that I think we need to see more of.
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I'll second this. Peoples has played his heart out. He may not have the gaudy stats of past great Hokie backs, but he'll go down as one of my all time favorites.
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Take the 25 jersey, put the lunch pail on the shelf, give captain duties to whoever works the hardest at practice that week.
Something that really bothered me was yesterday Dax was the hype man in the pregame huddle which tells me two things:
1) he's going to be a hell of a leader in a few years
2) we are lacking on seniors but upperclassmen leadership seems non existent
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Been saying that since, what, the ODU game? More so vocal "light a fire under your butt" leaders.
I still don't think Ryan is our starter next year, he's just not seeing the field as evidenced by the picks and near-picks and I question his on-field decision making at times though the receivers also need to do a better job catching the ball (Peoples' targeting/not targeting aside), but I don't doubt his passion one iota.
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I wonder what is going through Whit's mind right now.
Some change is needed on offense. Maybe changes, plural. Fuente needs more time, but Cornelson needs to go find another gig away from VT. I'm starting to sour on Vice too. What has happened to our O-line? Miami has a good defense, but we can't block anyone at anytime. There has been no visible improvement to me. The only positive I can mention is we aren't false starting 5 times a quarter anymore.
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Not sure if this is 'one change', but I think he needs to honestly assess the culture he is trying to instill and methods by which he does this. So if I were CJF, I would:
Get through UVA. You can't implement new personnel or a new management strategies in 6 days. The next 6 days are focused on one thing only - beating UVA.
Once the season ends, sit down make a list of all the challenges you encountered this season and the preceding offseason. You grade yourself and your staff on how you responded to these challenges.
Categorize the issues into a handful of buckets - In game coaching, communication issue, organizational issue, etc.
Finally, you determine the root cause of each issue, and look for trends within and between different buckets.
Once you see the trends, you start thinking about why it was missed and how you can fix. Do you need new personnel (coaches or players)? Do you need to change the way your running practice? Do you need to change the way you treat people in order to get better results?
There was a lot of crazy stuff that happened this offseason/season. Some things were in the coaches' control (play calling, practice methods, etc), others are out of their control (kids getting drafted or injured), and some were a little bit of both (recruiting misses). I think it's important to separate the bad luck from the bad performances, and from there determine what change must be made to eliminate that mistake.
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Proven recruiters work at schools that don't need recruiters. In the odd case they don't, sanctions usually follow.
I've always thought the hire a recruiter argument was putting the chicken before the egg. Once you start winning big games recruits will start coming. In order to start winning you need good coaches. You can't convince me Saban could recruit if he didn't win. He's the grouchiest human on earth. He had to win first.
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I have no problem paying him 300k IF he can keep doing the recruiting he is doing now. I still think Shibest is worth what he is getting paid, had the best overall special teams last year.
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Select a skill and focus on it so that it s effective this week.
I'd suggest tackling for defense and blocking on offense. We didn't do either of these basic skill this week.
If we tackle the opposing team and we make a couple of holes on offense, we actually stop them and we actually get some yards, which produces confidence.
No time left this season, to do anything else.
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Decide on an offensive system and stick to your guns. Minus an actual running game, I think what we saw year 1 is pretty close to Fuente's ideal system.
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Get rid of whoever we hired as the 10th coach and get Daryl Tapp. If for nothing else he can give pre-game and half-time speeches. He had me ready to run onto the field when he gave his speech to the crowd before the Let's Go chant.
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I was in the bathroom at the end of the 3rd and heard this man plain as day, like he was a drill sergeant standing beside the urinal yelling at me to get on with it during a urinalysis.
I had to run back to my seat and ask the Mrs. who it was, because...DAMN!!!
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The Coaches Poll doesn't release full ballots until Week 15. Here are some fun highlights from Week 13:• Nick Saban has Clemson at #1 over Alabama (as he has all year)• Mike Leach has Washington State at #4• Justin Fuente has UCF at #3— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) November 19, 2018
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This explains so much. I am, quite frankly, pretty discouraged by it.
It kind of speaks to a few a things that may be at the root of why we have no answers.
Memphis, regardless of its win against Ole Miss was not going to be competitive week in and week out against P5 competition. UCF, like Memphis, is not going to hold up against P5 competition week in and week out. There are a lot of reasons for this. Primarily, the players and coaches are generally better at P5 schools. If you want to beat P5 competition you have to recognize that and prepare for it. Putting UCF at #3 kind of suggests he doesn't recognize that a G5 phenomenon is not going to be a steady P5 contender. It explains why we aren't seriously examining our offensive philosophy and play calling. It also explains the lack of relevant experience in most of his coaching staff. It seems that he thinks that football is football at all levels, Div II, FCS, FBS, G5 and P5. But it's not. There are nuances and differences. Sure Cornelsen could be an effective OC in Div II. Their DC's are on par with him. Paxton Lynch did great against G5 competition every week but he didn't fair so well in the NFL. Miss direction and "make a man miss" works against G5 defenses because their players don't have the same level of talent as P5 players. Making adjustments is harder at P5 schools. If we are being honest with ourselves, do we really believe Cornelsen is going to out coach Manny Diaz? No. Check out Manny's resume:
"
Frankly, this is pretty frightening to me. It's one thing to say, "Hey, those are really good." Most of the CFP voters think so as UCF is ranked #11. But does anyone (other than Fuente) really believe UCF is better than Notre Dame, Georgia, Oklahoma, LSU, and Ohio State? I left out Michigan, Washington St and WVU because they can always underperform and UCF may be able to jump them.
IDK. Very concerning.
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I don't think he's crazy for thinking it, nor do I think he's 'trashing' Fuente. Fuente and the bulk of his staff don't have P5 experience, and I think there are some concerns that are playing into not recognizing what worked in G5 isn't translating directly to the ACC.
Recruiting - The staff lacks recruiting experience at this level. I think there is a massive difference in recruiting time and effort when you're competing for kids to come to Memphis as compared to VT. There were players we had no business offering (Pimpleton, Glaze) and elite guys who we slow play or don't offer (Hakeem Beamon, Sheridan Jones) and guys in the middle, who could definitely contribute here that we slow played, or just didn't offer (Dazz Newsome, Greg Dortch). We've got multiple guys on our roster who have VT offers, and then Kansas, or Indiana, Kansas, and VT. That's great if you've got the best scouting dept in the nation, but for us, is extremely risky. We'll see how those guys continue to play out.. Just getting 'system' guys doesn't work at this level. Scouting/Game Planning - schemes are more complex, the players are bigger, faster, stronger, smarter and capable of executing more (offensively and defensively), which requires more study, planning, film work, technique coaching, etc. The 'quick pass and make a guy miss' offensive philosophy may work here, but we've not really seen it yet. By year 3, it is fair to begin questioning it's effectiveness S&C - Starting to see and hear more rumors about the S&C staff and it's effectiveness and approach. The bathroom pics look great, but does that translate to on-field success?
If that line on ranking teams between G5 and P5 (do you really think UCF is better than Michigan, Notre Dame, Georgia, Oklahoma, Ohio State?) is still that blurry, it would be very worrisome if that blurriness still exists re: approach to the above.
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Miss direction and "make a man miss" works against G5 defenses because their players don't have the same level of talent as P5 players.
Again Clemson would like a word with you. The misdirection, spread,uptempo offense is what they run and why they are the only team to legitimately beat Alabama in the National Championship. One of the reasons Fuente was almost hired by Dabo as the OC.
We need to be better offensively in the second half of games period. I feel like we abandoned the Uptempo part of our offense, which made us lethal year 1.
I definitely think Corn can do a better job and could possibly be replaced if he doesn't straighten his second-half play calling out.
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At Alabama's and Clemson's level you could run the triple option and beat nearly everyone.
A play action pass is a form of misdirection. Misdirection is an aspect of an offensive. When I hear our system described I hear "mis direction" and "make a man miss". Some of that comes from Fuente himself. Maybe he's playing it close to vest to protect the "secret sauce" in terms of not going into detail. But... We gonna need some of that sauce soon.
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Clemson was not this high profile program until very recently, and it just so happened to coincide with implementing a spread uptempo RPO offensive system.
They had success using this offensive system, and its propelled them to a national championship and being Alabama lite.
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Also to further disprove your post, did you happen to watch the Rams and Chiefs last night. They both run the misdirection spread type offenses and are killing it in the NFL.
As for Clemson, they have always recruited better than us. More recently, because of their success, they have had top 5 recruiting classes.
The offense is what got them there.
The offense we have right now is stacked full of freshman and sophomores, you need to give them another year before we can say its a failure. These things just don't happen overnight.
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This is a truly ridiculous post. If you are considering buying into the "Memphis coaches are trash" argument that I've seen floating around, perhaps take a second to consider that Beamer was hired from Murray State (a 1-AA program) with a record of 42–23–2, making the playoff a single time and losing in the first round.
Since people love to talk about Clemson, let's go ahead and mention that Dabo Swinney was 19-15 as a head coach through 2010. In 2011 he hired Chad Morris as offensive coordinator. Chad Morris' resume consisted of ONE SEASON as OC at Tulsa and otherwise had been a long time high school coach. Clemson went 42-11 with Morris at OC.
I could go on with plenty more examples because damn near every successful head coach once coached at a low level. The notion that a coach starting his career at a G5 school is indicative of his coaching abilities is utterly preposterous and completely unsupported by facts.
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So you're saying Clemson made a change at OC that yielded much better on the field results?
I could give a damn if you came from HS, if you're successful, you can't argue against results. When on the field results aren't being produced, you have every right to be scrutinized. In short, I agree with your closing statement, but I'm not sold on Corny being an effective OC.
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Being impressed with Manny's resume doesn't mean I think that is the only viable path.
Having a strong resume doesn't matter when you are successful. When you're struggling it does.
Dabo clearly can identify coaching talent. Morris turned Clemson around IMMEDIATELY and they did not regress.
I could go on with plenty more examples because damn near every successful head coach once coached at a low level. The notion that a coach starting his career at a G5 school is indicative of his coaching abilities is utterly preposterous and completely unsupported by facts.
What are you arguing against? I never said that. See my second statement.
My contention is that Fuente may not recognize the sizable difference between G5 and P5 and as such is not making appropriate judgments. All lower level talent is not going to succeed at the next level. The question is how do you identify those that can. If you look Cornelsen's resume there is no indication that his path was headed towards a P5 coaching position. The sole reason his is OC at VT is that he coached with Fuente at Illinois State. It's not like after his time with Fuente at Illinois state he went on to be the OC of an FCS team and had success. Instead he spent a year Ok St. and then was the OC of a DII school. I've studied this extensively. You should feel free to do so yourself.
I have said this many times. Fuente has the potential to be a great head coach. Every person has their strengths and weaknesses. If I were to point to a Fuente weakness it may be seeing more talent in his staff than there really is. It doesn't make him a bad guy and it doesn't make him a bad coach.
What is truly ridiculous is how you drew up arguments against things I never said.
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Long term:
Its hard to say, the areas we are struggled on defense are very very green. Nix just got here so can you put blame on him this fast? Vice has recruited some beef but they are young and a few are already playing.
The Burden/Wiggins position flip would be interesting but for recruiting, do we want to take Burden away from recruiting WRs as a position coach when we know we need a handful of good ones vs 1 or 2 good RBs?
Immediate:
The only thing he could really change in a week is the play calling responsibilities.
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Tennessee desperately wanted him as their head coach last year. He's not going to be our offensive coordinator. You might as well ask for Fuente to lead the team out of the tunnel on a unicorn as Metallica skydives into the stadium while playing Enter Sandman.
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Gundy's not leaving Okie Lite unless they fire him, which won't happen any time soon. And if he does leave, he'll have another head coaching offer before they escort him out the door. No way he falls back to the OC level.
Side note: I'd pay good money to see that perp walk. It would be more entertaining than a nature documentary of a lion fighting off a pack of hyenas to keep his kill. Probably bloodier too. COME AFTER ME! I'M A MAN! I'M 40! [fart noise]
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I feel like with current personnel we should stick with spread pistol looks we have the receiving core finally to do it but who knows hell I'd be fine going triple option just to beat UVA
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1) Throw fits on the sidelines ala Narduzzi or curse the officials out like Johnson. Nothing says you're a coach in control than acting a straight fool. And if your three little girls see it on TV? Who cares! You're showing emotion, and that's what counts.
2) Quit scoring TDs on the opening drives. Especially ones where you throw a screen to your H-Back who runs 20 yards down the field to score. That's not cool. You should only throw hail marys down the field and go 3 and out.
3) Fire your entire coaching staff. During the game. The next time a WR fumbles the ball, fire the WR coach because clearly that's his fault and not the fault of the player. And when the QB forces a throw into triple coverage when there are 2 WRs wide-the-freak-open on the other side of the field, fire the OC because it's his fault with his terrible play calling that the QB can't read the field.
4) Get Juggernaut to be your QB.
5) Take the next available coaching job that offers. Clearly you suck when you went 10-3 in the first year with IFord, Hodges, and Phillips. You went 9-4 with Phillips (and his sports hernia) and a bunch of new receivers and a R-Fr QB. And this year your starting QB goes out in game 3, his backup doesn't make the opposing Ds respect the possibility he might run, and you've had 20 different starters on D. You just suck. So leave.
6) Enjoy time with your family when you can get it. Keep being classy. Do things the right way. Make sure these kids are accountable to themselves, their team, their family.
7) Be more open with what's going on in the program. You don't have to be full open kimono, but stop treating the team as if what they are doing is national security level stuff. I know you want to protect these guys as much as you can and that's okay. The fanbase just wants to understand what's going on and why things aren't going that well.
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8. Go 4-7, being noncompetitive since September, losing every home game against FBS teams and hope your fans are gullible and stupid enough to buy your excuses- many of which you created and be fine with sucking and losing to UVA for the first time in 14 years.
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Recruit better. Whatever the cost, no excuses we need to be bringing in better talent. If we can recruit well in basketball there is no reason we can't recruit well in football.
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I'm working off rumors, admittedly. Rumors that Willis is a bit of a toxic person. Rumors that he smashed a bottle over the punter's head in the off season. I could totally buy his teammates quitting on him if they don't like him. I didn't watch the Miami game but I read on TKP that it looked like Willis was the only player fighting at the end. If that's true, could it be because his teammates don't like him? I remember thinking it was uncool when he lit into Peoples during the ND game. Especially since I'm pretty sure the mistake was Willis's. I just get the sense that Willis is a bad fit for VT and his toxins are destroying the locker room. A bad apple can spoil a bunch, especially if that apple is the starting QB
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I'll admit that I didn't see the actual incident but apparently Miami had a late/cheap hit on Willis in the 4th and a number of players ran onto the field to defend him, in the post game presser Willis apparently got a little choked up saying how much that meant to him, working off of those actions there are at least some players who like him enough to defend him
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The fans were ready to kill the officials they picked up the late hit on the QB flag and then only enforced the penalties from after Miami intercepted.
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Not only are you working on rumors, you're working on old offseason rumors and a single incident that happened 7 weeks ago. Unless you're implying that the WRs are intentionally dropping his passes as some sort of revenge, I haven't seen anything that suggests this locker room tension still exists between Willis and the rest of the offense.
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All I'm saying is that it's reasonable to expect a team to try to resolve their interpersonal issues, and generally when they aren't able to it bubbles out onto the sideline and even the field. And I haven't seen anything in public recently that suggests any animosity between Willis and his teammates, and the post somewhere below about his teammates standing up to Miami after a questionable late hit is evidence of the exact opposite.
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You make a good point. I'm not disagreeing but playing devils advocate.
It's also reasonable to believe that a bunch of guys who are losing to a rival would get upset if one of the rival players hits someone on your team late, regardless of whether they like the guy or not. It could have been more about anger towards Miami for being, well, Miami than about sticking up for their guy.
But your scenario is more likely. I'll buy it.
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Step up to the podium and admit I have no business coaching at a P5 school and gracefully step away and reject any additional money allowing Whit to go after a quality coach to really rebuild our football program... One can dream right?
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I think a shake-up in the coaching staff should be considered. I don't think they all need to go, but we need to see if there's a good replacement/upgrade available for Cornelson and/or Nix. Those two don't seem to be getting the job done right now.
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Fuente needs to ask himself that despite the setbacks does he think he likes where the program is going? Does he have the best staff in place? The best philosophy? Everyone's bought in? etc.
If the answer is "YES" then I don't think any changes are needed. It's tough to say that since we're struggling so badly but we're extremely young and injured and we're playing people much earlier than we needed to. This will pay dividends down the line when we have a more veteran team in the next few years (a la Miami's LBs this year), but for some it's hard to see that.
If the answer is "NO" to any of these, then it's easy to see what changes you need to make.
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Fuente, Jon Laaser, and Mike Burnop have been absolutely emphatic that the results we're all expecting are right around the corner in the postgame radio shows. So knowing that I'm not so sure we see any changes to the coaching staff even if it may be warranted when looking at the program from the outside. There's no reason to be anything but dubious of the claims that success will come very soon, but I at least appreciate the conviction in what Fuente thinks he has or is working towards.
Of course none of that matters if we have a repeat of this season next year. There will be trouble in paradise buyout or not, for better or worse.
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here's no reason to be anything but dubious of the claims that success will come very soon,
Absolutely. Success is no guarantee, but that's why I also don't rah-rah when things go wrong. You need to understand if you're trending up. Maybe an apt analogy is the stock market in the long-term.
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I wouldn't expect them to say anything less to keep morale and fan support positive. But any objective person simply can't look at the current state of our program and team and expect us to turn out a 9-10 win season next year just because of another offseason and experience under their belts. There are serious holes that aren't getting fixed overnight. There are problems on both sides of the ball that continue to surface with no adjustments made or possibly even available. I know the official vibe from VT is that everything is fine, but there is certainly a lot of trepidation among the fan base and probably in the back of their minds as well. Fuente could turn things around, and he also could very well fail to do so.
My concern about staff adjustments is the same as your assessment: if the administration thinks everything is fine, they likely will not make any changes. Every one of Fuente's hires so far has been a comfort/safe hire within his circle or network. I'm also concerned about how much blame Cornelson should shoulder for the offense versus how much this is truly Fuente's system, and he simply wants someone he knows/trusts to execute it. That would mean that it's highly unlikely he would ever bring in an outsider to run that side of the ball.
I'm worried that the administration will place too much unchecked faith and confidence in Fuente and the results simply won't follow without someone putting their foot down. If no one is willing to objectively sit down with him like Braine did with Beamer 25 years ago, I'm worried our overly optimistic trust will lead us right over the cliff if we're not careful.
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Barring a huge unexpected change... game 1 next year the VT starting DL is Belmar Hewitt Porcher Garbutt ... House gains won't be ready due to injury,. Their backups - who will need to play quite a bit in Bud's scheme- are going to be Proctor Burke Taylor DeBose... unless JUCOs or True freshman beat them out- which will be the "youth" issue again. That is what we are working with.... we can't go sign free agents in college football. So next year when these "veteran" guys struggle to compete against Pitt and GT, what do we say?
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If they struggle as much next year as this year, then it's time to make some major changes. But unless Bud follows up this dud of a season with another, 2018 will go down as an outlier in the career of one of the best assistant coaches in the history of college football.
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Yeah, their backups will be smaller and less experienced. So you mix who you have on the line (which is something Foster and Wiles have done for a long time). You don't go "starter" all across the front on every play. You rotate in experienced and inexperienced. Right now there is nearly no uninjured experience to rotate in.
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Change your slogan...or actually get the team to play HARD SMART AND TOUGH. This defense is the softest I have ever seen at VT- hands down. And it's not only youth. They are small, short, tiny - BC's players towered over them. GT's OL commented on how small we were. I though Hilgart was some elite SC guy? I don't see it. His slogan is perfect for VT, we just haven't executed any of it this year.
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And yet ppl were commenting that we looked bigger than FSU. Probably just the optics when we're getting beaten a lot. Hilgart has shown his "before" and "after" photos to prove players are getting bigger and stronger, so sounds like your argument about him doesn't hold water.
Also don't know what you mean by "some elite SC guy". He was praised by his peers of doing an outstanding job but it wasn't like he worked in the NFL or fed his players steroids.
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When BC, Pitt and GT run right down your throat, right in your gut of your defense as much as they want with little resistance, questioning your hyped SC guy absolutely does hold water. Look at the product on the field, not shower photos.
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I don't care how strong you are, you're not making the tackle if you're not in position to make that tackle. We're so far out of position this year we're basically holding the door open for ballcarriers. And one look at our ability to recruit DT and FS, and I don't see this getting any better anytime soon.
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Lol really, buddy? We've got no depth at DL right now and you expect Hilgart to magically solve our depth problem? Let me remind you that Ricky's been injured and so has Hewitt. We've got really no one else behind them. And DE's lost people to injury and attrition too, but yes lets go ahead and blame Hilgart for that. No one is playing at 100% right now due to depth issues and when you're not at 100% you'll get destroyed at the LOS.
You've lost total and complete credibility. Do yourself a favor - take a break from TKP / online forums. It'll help put things in perspective. We're all hurting right now but you're not making sense.
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Damn right its a "sticking point" with me. Virginia Tech should be able to run the football effectively with 3 senior OL - too much to ask? VT should not be gashed by GT for 500 yards rushing. VT should not allow pitt to average an NCAA record 23 yards a play or whatever the hell that garbage was. You want to blame the offensive line not being able to block at the point of attack on youth? fine. You want to blame Pitt setting offensive rushing yards against VT on youth? fine. I blame a lot of it on being out toughed physically and consistently by average football teams. 1 win UNC ran the ball down our throats for 500 yards . Whose accountable for getting blown away in the trenches? Beamer? Gentry?
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I said since before this season. You're just listing off stuff that happened this year.
You want to blame the offensive line not being able to block at the point of attack on youth? fine. You want to blame Pitt setting offensive rushing yards against VT on youth? fine.
I haven't said any of this. You're looking for things to be mad at me about.
1 win UNC ran the ball down our throats for 500 yards
North Carolina ran for 235 on us. You're like a parody of yourself. Just use the actual numbers, man.
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We are getting whipped up front. There are more reasons than just strength and conditioning though. Vinny is out of position and hopping on one leg. Several other guys are just victim of not enough time yet in the weight room. Some guys arent physically ready to go until junior or senior year and yet sometimes they get thrown into fire early.
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The Hokies rank #109 nationally in second half scoring offense and #117 in second half scoring defense... I would argue a good portion of that is due to strength and conditioning...
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Please. Who's job is it to keep the team healthy? put them in a position to be healthy? Train them in the offseason to be ready to play 12 games? We are getting our asses kicked in the trenches on both sides of the ball. Is it all "youth"? You should take a break from posting if you think VT's roster is strong/tough/competitive in the trenches right now. I don't expect hilgart to magically do anything except have the guys in position to compete physically- that's his job after all. Watch the games please. There are seniors on the OL getting destroyed. There are RS sophs on defense getting destroyed- its not all true freshman out there.
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So every injury we have is on Hilgart? Does that mean if he was truly doing his job that we'd have zero injuries all year / EVER?
I don't expect hilgart to magically do anything except have the guys in position to compete physically- that's his job after all.
You can't do that if your starting players are injured and can't compete properly and then our back ups are too young / not even good enough.
Put it this way - by your definition, if you were perfectly healthy then you could easily sub in for one of our players and play perfectly right? Didn't think so.
(Heck I might even pay money to see you try though).
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Yes, I totally argued that 40 something fans could play on the VT defense if healthy. Yep that's what I said/argued. Again.. whose job is it to have the team competitive physically? - notice I said competitive...not national champions, but competitive with 5 loss teams like GT and Miami? Whose job is that? There is one true freshman playing a lot on defense. Not 10..
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I think you're being reactionary due to the results this year. Last year we beat both BC and Pitt in very physical games. I recall Cutcliff saying we were the most physical team they had played last year after we beat them.
Is our physicality lacking this year? Absolutely. I think it's more of a talent/youth issue on D and a scheme/technique issue on O.
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IF we could play 40 fans on defense, I think we might get better results. We could swarm the heck out of the ballcarrier and still have 5 deep safeties across the back, along with 15 more in coverage.
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TBH, I always those "before" and "after" photos were dumb and pointless. They're always flexing in the "after" photos, and not at all in the "before" photos, which completely nullifies the few gains that can be clearly seen in the photos imo.
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If you call that "few gains" in a year, you clearly haven't spent much time around a weight room to know what it takes to get those results. Flexing or not.
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You really gonna act like size and strength is independent from youth? Like 18 and 19 year olds should be as big and strong as 21-22 year olds after several years in a S&C program?
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This is starting be be eerily like 1992... insert Fuente for Beamer and Babcock for Braine. Not so much that Fuente could be fired, but that it may be staff changes are warranted...
Shane Beamer was a Blacksburg High School sophomore during the 1992 season, which ended with a loss to Virginia.
"I remember ... walking off the field after the Virginia game and there was a fan hanging over the tunnel and I was right behind him and he yelled down at [Frank Beamer], 'Bye bye Beamer,' because he thought it was going to be the last game and he was going to get fired," Shane Beamer said. "Thankfully, Dave Braine and the administration hung with him."
Braine said it was not a tough call to retain Beamer after the 1992 season, even though that decision was questioned by some fans.
"I had a chance to watch Frank every day," Braine said. "I watched him in practice. I watched him in meetings. I watched him in film sessions. I watched him teach kids. I knew he was a good teacher and he was a good coach.
"He had scholarship limitations; he was on [NCAA] probation [for violations under predecessor Bill Dooley]."
Although Beamer was retained by Braine and then-Virginia Tech President James McComas, there was a coaching staff shakeup at the end of that 1992 season in the wake of a meeting between Braine and Beamer.
"That's a conversation that Frank and I had. I've never said to anybody the details of the conversation," Braine said. "When I came back from Dr. McComas' office, I told Frank that we were keeping him as the head coach but there were certain things we were going to have to do."
As a result of the shakeup, Beamer added four new coaches for the 1993 season, including defensive coordinator Phil Elmassian, and he promoted Rickey Bustle to offensive coordinator.
The Hokies blossomed in 1993, advanced to a bowl game for the first time since 1986 and finished 9-3.
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It is attractive to compare this year to 1992, but that team was competitive -- 5 losses were by 4 or fewer points. Even the recent years where we went 6-6, not every loss was a blowout like this season.
The lack of competitiveness this year really has me worried.
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This is a good point... as I recall, even when we were having 5-6 seasons the loses were competitive and you could see we were close. That is why this is all so discouraging... we are blown out vs. avg to decent teams even at home.
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Replace the current OC with someone more experienced and can employ the offense that Fuente wants. I believe the reason that Fuente's offense at Memphis was so successful is because he had that person in Darrell Dickey who worked along side Cornelsen. Too bad Darrell Dickey did not join Fuente at VT.
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Weren't Dickey and Cornelsen Co-OCs at Memphis, and Fuente chose to bring one and leave the other to handle the transition?
Seems like he brought the wrong guy since Memphis didn't really drop off too badly iirc, and Dickey is now doing decently well at A&M considering they play in the SEC West.
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You are correct; however, based on Fuente's offensive success at Memphis vs. his mediocre results at VT, one can reasonably conclude that Darrell Dickey must have had more say/input in directing the Memphis offense than Brad Cornelsen. It's the only delta between Fuente at Memphis and Fuente at VT. He brought everyone else with him (i.e., Vice, Wiggins, and Shibest).
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who knew we had so many OCs on TKP! everyone wants play calling responsibilities. until after halftime when the defense adjust and ask madden button aint working anymore.
seriously though. the my way or the highway road may end with you being on the highway. I don't know what the solution is right now. this seems a lot bigger issue than calling the plays. kids don't jump ship if they believe in you. winning or losing.
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If you create Plan A for the first half that exploits weakness A of the defense. You can assume that at half they will adjust to protect weakness A. A good OC should know this and find weakness B opened up by this adjustment and implement Plan B to exploit it.
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1. Seriously consider what my and the teams mission/vision is. What is the identity that we want at VT? And how do we establish that. Maybe that is happening and none of us can see any of it being realized. But the program seems to be directionless at the moment.
2. Figure out why the team isn't/won't be/can't be physical. This is one of the most concerning things to me. If the guys are putting in as much work in the S&C program as some suggest, then why, outside of Stephen Peoples, are we getting physically outmatched at every single position?
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I am afraid the changes coming next year may be far more drastic than anyone is so far anticipating.
Norm Woodisms aside, I'm truly not one to tell tales out of school. I don't particularly like rumors in general, and I won't blame anyone for thinking I'm a douche for being so vague here.
There has been a whole lot of smoke this year in terms of dismissals and performance. The news I got today ties up a lot of threads in a few ugly knots.
I won't repeat what I heard because there isn't any way to substantiate it that doesn't turn into a he said she said sort of thing, and frankly, my source could reasonably be construed as someone with an axe to grind. But the story explains a whole lot of our troubles this year, and if any of it is true, we'll be fondly remembering those halcyon days of last off-season.
Hell, I hope it's all lies. What one thing I would change is never having heard this.
If the coming off season starts going sideways in line with this, I'll dish. If it doesn't, well, I apologise for being a gullible drama queen after a few bourbons.
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I just think that for the psyche of the fan base Fuente needs to do something this off season.
I also believe that he's not one to take an action involving removing or re-assigning a coach. I imagine that in his mind such action would be "drastic" or "knee-jerk" and everything about Fuente makes me think that he puts maximum effort into appearing on the opposite end of the spectrum from "drastic" and "knee-jerk".
I would be surprised if any coaching changes are made this year. And as a result I think any potential excitement for next season will be completely wiped out.
This concerns me because if there's no excitement around the team there's less opportunity to engage fans and get butts in seats.
Excitement is important. Fans, donors, sports writers, talking heads all need to be excited about the program. The way this program is being operated is anything but exciting and if we're not winning I'm concerned that can be a recipe for disaster.
Just a few thoughts
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Comments
I'd start calling the plays myself.
I'm not sure this a practical solution to enact immediately. I don't know how responsibilities are delegated, but I think it must be pretty challenging to do head coaching duties AND call plays during the game. There's a reason so many head coaches delegate play calling to someone else; there's just a finite amount of hours in the day to prepare.
Plenty of Head Coaches do it. It's usually not the long term answer if you are firing your current OC to get there.
Drastically bad results require drastic action.
You don't make a change for the sake of change. If Fuente isn't prepared to step in as playcaller, and can't complete that prep in 6 days, then he shouldn't do it.
I'd argue consistently drastic bad results requires that. As in more than a season.
We were much better previous years due to more experience. I wouldn't change everything based on one horrible season.
Are you willing to fire Bud as well? I mean as bad as the offense has been, the defense is worse, so I guess Bud should get the gate as well, huh?
He says "drastically bad results require drastic action" in the ostensible context of why it's not ludicrous for Fuente to start calling plays, and your reaction is to indicate that because of this assertion, he should be on board with firing Bud Foster and Brad Cornelson????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
I think Alum's point is that the D has been drastically bad this past season, so by that definition OP probably would want to fire Bud too.
OP never said anything about firing anyone, so why the "too"? This subthread is so bizarre. Four different comments from four different posters.
I think Fuente should call plays
>well I don't know that it's that feasible because logic and reason
>>well drastic times call for drastic measures such as perhaps maybe for instance Fuente beginning to call plays
>>>SO YOU WANNA FIRE BUD FOSTER TOO HUH???
I think we should have Bud call plays.
Can't hurt, would be very interesting.
If that means that Dax would get the ball, I'd be for that. That kid just plays with reckless abandon. He's like a hybrid Sam Rogers and Cody Grimm
Sneaky athlete, real heady player, first in and last out kinda guy
The difference is that Bud is probably the most well respected defensive coaches in all of football. He's also trotting 3 and 4 string players all over the field.
The offense lost JJ, but besides him they are relatively healthy.
They are not. They are worse at 3 of the 5 OL positions relative to last year due to injury / attrition / youth. Anyone who told you otherwise is poorly misinformed.
And btw, losing your primary QB sucks. Willis is doing his best to ball out but he consistently does bad reads on the read option. If you combine our inability to do much other than just throw it down the field then we aren't going to have much success.
Wazzu doesn't even have an OC on staff. Mike Leach can handle it
#MikeLeach4VT
I don't know if Gardner Minshew was a diamond in the rough or if Leach and his staff know how to coach QBs but that kid is on fire this year!
The major difference is that Mike Leach is the OC, and assumes all responsibilities as OC. Have you ever been in a situation at your job where you delegate work to someone, and then you have to pick up their share of the work, in addition to your own? It typically ends poorly.
I'm not saying an HC can't call plays, I'm saying that, in general, it's difficult to pick up extra responsibilities midway through a season.
I don't understand what you're trying to say.
Start calling plays myself.
I'm not sure this a practical solution to enact immediately. I don't know how responsibilities are delegated, but I think it must be pretty challenging to do head coaching duties AND call plays during the game. There's a reason so many head coaches delegate play calling to someone else; there's just a finite amount of hours in the day to prepare.
Plenty of coaches do it and even if the nfl there's more and more coaches doing it now
Drastically bad results require drastic action.
Thank you!!
Why not start scripting plays out of halftime? Isn't that what they do on the first few drives. Seems like the more of the game we see, the worse our play calling gets
I'm not convinced that one or both of Nix and Mitchell know how to coach Bud's D...whichever one flunks the quiz, goes.
"You are the weakest link. Goodbye."
Critics call it "rank and yank," and it's a controversial practice.
Former General Electric Co. CEO Jack Welch is the most passionate advocate. He believes that managers should assess their employees every year, and divide them into three categories: the top 20 percent, the middle 70 percent, and the bottom 10 percent.
The top 20 should be showered with praise, affection and various and generous financial rewards. "Sprinkling" financial rewards over a much larger group is a mistake, Mr. Welch argues.
The middle 70 should be given coaching, training, and thoughtful goal-setting, with an eye toward giving them an opportunity to move into the top. Keeping them motivated is the most difficult part of the manager's task, he says. "You do not want to lose the vast majority of your middle 70 – you want to improve them," Mr. Welch says in his 2005 book, "Winning."
As for the bottom 10 percent, "there is no sugarcoating this," Mr. Welch says. "They have to go."
But what if you have friends in the 10%?
Isn't this true for all coaches?
Loyalty is the double edged sword that kept both Stiney and Bud with Coach Beamer.
I think the ability to make these emotionally difficult moves is a big part of being a successful coach. If you hire good talent, they get hired away; if you hire bad talent, you have to be able to recognize it and move on.
To be quite honest this is one of the most difficulty part of any management position.
Well... Some of them learn.
Saban doesn't carry around very many coaches and is probably not all that close to his staff. He seems to hang onto guys too long at MSU. The only coach that really followed him around all that much was Kirby Smart.
Dabo probably doesn't have a whole lot of friends on the Clemson coaching staff.
Regardless, business and friendship is very hard to make work.
So what? An underperforming employee is still underperforming, whether they are your friend or not.
This is so out of touch. Merit based rewards never work.
#Sauce?
Out of the crisis, W.E. Deming is an early good one (c.1983). A ton of great recent research too, search scholar.google.com if you're interested in reading more.
Look at GE now.....
Gut instinct would be to take over playcalling, but if things still don't go well, then a lot more fingers start getting pointed at him, and the aura of offensive genius quickly starts fading. It might be in his best interest to not do that and preserve the intrigue.
I would go out and find an OC who has success in a power run oriented offense (whether it's spread or more traditional) and try to incorporate their ideas into my spread system. We need to get a run game going for the offense to turn the corner.
I also think some staff changes need to be made on defense, but Fu gives Bud great autonomy there and if Bud isn't onboard, it could cause a rift in the program.
I trust bud to put the program above his personal relationships. I do not have that same faith in Fuente
Take Bud out to the Farmhouse Restaurant and ask him what staff changes (if any) need to be made on his side of the ball to help him be successful.
I agree with this 100%. No doubt Bud would keep Wiles as he continually produces, at minimum, average D-Line play and when he has "dudes" out there, he produces great D-Line play. I think most people now realize how good Torrian Gray really was when he was here, I dont think Bud even had to worry about the secondary when he was head of DBU. I would love to have T.Gray back, but that is not happening since hes with the Redskins now.
Again I know we are depleted in about every aspect of the defense and the secondary for sure, but I wonder how well Bud, Mitchell and Nix have meshed given they've only been working together less than 6 months. Getting healthy and getting more time to mesh all the defensive coaches will lead to improvement next year. I mean we have nowhere to go but up from this year.I really like the fact that Cody Grimm is on the defensive coaching staff because that guy was a footballer, he could play. ** Remembers when Grimm chased down that Bama back and caused that fumble - sigh memories **
Speaking on the offensive side I think some play-calling duties, that is whoever is in charge of it, has to improve. We have talent, and outside of Josh Jackson, we have stayed relatively healthy so honestly there shouldn't be this much of a drop off. The first half is usually decent and then we either start thinking too much or outsmarting ourselves. Sometimes football is just imposing your will against a team and doing it well. I dont know but the second half of games (mostly the last 5-6 games) I have no clue what is happening in terms of scheme. What goes on in the locker room? Does the OC know that in-game adjustments usually need to be made?
There are a lot of reads that Willis misses in terms of giving or keeping, unless they are designed that way but sometimes the read (if its a read) is just wrong. I like our receivers against anyone, but Cornelsen doesn't give them that much of a chance with play calling. All the misdirection, sweep motion pre-snap smoke and mirrors rarely leads to any benefits. I could definitely be wrong in my observation here but the play calling is abysmal lately. With Stiney it was VERY predictable (bubble screens everywhere) but this offense is very unpredictable and not in a good way.
So yeah I would take Bud aside and just ask what do you need to get us competitive again and how can I help.
To Cornelsen : can you fix it? If not you gotta go.
I mentioned this in the past, but I would encourage everyone to go back and listen to the This is Home podcast after the ODU debacle. First business would be to offer Brandon Flowers the job to coach our secondary. Talk about a recruiting boost and a guy to teach proper technique, problem solved.
Start QP
I don't think this is a bad idea. Might as well have him grow into the position with the rest of the team as they are growing.
It won't happen though.
It doesn't make sense to start QP in probably the most important game for the program in years. Willis gives us the best chance of winning and we need to win next week. It's too late to give meaningful reps to QP without throwing him to the wolves.
What about HH?
I'm not sold on Willis giving us the best chance at winning - we're 2-5 with him as a starter, and a half a yard away from being 1-6.
I am not an advocate of burning QP's shirt at this point in the year, but I am not opposed to him playing the entire UVA game.
QP playing the entire UVA game wouldn't burn his redshirt.
QP playing the entire UVA game and then coming in for a QB Draw for 2 yards against Marshall would burn his redshirt.
Right - was trying to say that he can play against UVA all we'd want, but he better not touch the field against Marshall if that game is played.
Fuente once said something about when he became a head coach, he started taking a more macro look at the program. Perhaps it's time to come down the mountain a little bit. That could mean calling the plays, or at least getting more hands on with the offense.
Outside of nixing Corny...
Swap Wiggins and Burden. Wiggins played RB in college and Burden played WR in college. Let's see if that gets us better RB play.
I think it's really hard to coach a position you didn't. I know Fuente did it but some guys can do that. No everyone is Fuente.
Remind me again what position Buzz played in college?
Basketball head coaching is way more about overall Xs and Os compared to a football position coach that is goin over a positions specific technique and drilling and hopefully recruiting that specific position
I said some guys can do it. Some != All. Buzz could fall into some.
Mike Leach was a lawyer and he seems to be doing quite well not having played football.
I thought Mike Leach played B.P. Richfield in tv series 'The Dinosaurs' before he got into football?
The reasoning Fuente gave for the Burden/Wiggins assignments never set well for me. He said he wanted both of them to have broader experience for their careers. I always thought that was really weird. I don't care at all about Wiggins or Burdens post VT career aspirations. I want them to succeed here. Now.
Lots of RB coaches never played RB in college. I do think moving Burden back to WR coach would be helpful, though. We're seeing way too many dropped passes this year. Even with young recievers, I don't remember seeing that when Wiggy was coaching them.
Maybe we can replace Corny with Condoleezza Rice, I hear she is getting into football... s/
Take a long, hard look at your offense. Ask myself if I need an "x" type of QB to make it work, how good is it really? When Fuente's offense has been good, he had an NFL level qb, I have a feeling those are a bit more rare than we'd like to admit, does the offense have to have this level of talent to work? If so, it's probably a little flawed. Also, can we bring in someone to look how to plug an play pieces instead insisting on putting a square peg in a round hole?
It feels like we have the most offensive talent in a long time, why is it not clicking? My naive opinion is that we shouldn't need an all world QB and RB to make a decent offense. I know you need those pieces to actually win big time (LSU) but it feels like there are many other teams that have way better offenses with much less talent.
Based on total offense:
Teams ahead of Tech that probably aren't nearly as talented in every offensive position.
UAB, ECU, Nevada, ASU, UMass, Toledo, App State, Gt, Cincy, WMU, Baylor, UL-Monroe, Arizona, Ark St, UNT, Miami-Ohio, FAU, Nebraska, Utah St.
I know many of those teams don't have nearly as difficult of a schedule, but we haven't really this year either. Something's not clicking, got take as an objective as possible look and figure out why.
Replace Nix. No position on defense had more experience yet looks like they have no idea where they are supposed to be. Floyd and Deablo regressed significantly and Ladler was strong in run support in his cameo yet can't tackle now.
His hiring always bothered me some. Scott's untimely firing left us in a position where the pool of candidates to replace him was very limited and many of the available coaches were so because things had not gone well at the previous stop.
While I do find it hard to make conclusions on a guy who hasn't even been with the program for a full year, l would agree that initial returns are not positive on the field. One has to wonder if we would not have been better off leaving an interim there and finding a permanent replacement this offseason.
Nix's story kind of reminds me of Cornelson..rapid rise to a Coordinator followed by limited success and a reevaluation of potential.
Btw, the obvious answer to the original question is to fire Cornelson. He's a poor coordinator and a poor Recruiter..he adds nothing to the equation.
I consider Nix a placeholder.
They lauded Nix by saying Bud needed a former DC on his staff like he had with Scott. Ok, great. Go get UNCs soon to be available DC John Papuchis, one of the best mid Atlantic recruiters out there. And Hokie alum.
And/Or.......can we get Gray back if we offer him the Co-DC title Scott had? With Buds job in two years?
Bud only has a couple years left? News to me
Well, he was in the booth for the first time since 1996 because of "doctor's orders?" May not be remembering the broadcast correctly, assuming they had their facts straight in the first place
Nix is here as a potential in house replacement for Bud when he retires. Fuente adores his previous experience as a defensive coordinator.
His last year at MTSU, his defense finished 118th in S&P+.
Not all experience is good experience.
I went to MTSU's 2017 Football Roster to see if he was dealing with some similar issues. On defense, they had:
SR/rSR: 9
JR/rJR: 12
SO/rSO: 8
FR/rFR: 19
He looks like he had quite a bit of JR/SR leadership, so no, his experience doesn't help with our current predicament.
Bring Torrian Gray back home
One thing I would have done games ago to try to light a fire under this team, is take away the 25 jersey and tell them no one gets it until they collectively prove they deserve it.
I like this a lot.
Alternatively - give it to Willis until someone else outworks him. He's one player, if not the only one, who is exhibiting some fire that I think we need to see more of.
Peoples?
I would also add Dax to 3rd on the list. That dude has a couple fuck ups last night but his first half he was an animal.
I'll second this. Peoples has played his heart out. He may not have the gaudy stats of past great Hokie backs, but he'll go down as one of my all time favorites.
Take the 25 jersey, put the lunch pail on the shelf, give captain duties to whoever works the hardest at practice that week.
Something that really bothered me was yesterday Dax was the hype man in the pregame huddle which tells me two things:
1) he's going to be a hell of a leader in a few years
2) we are lacking on seniors but upperclassmen leadership seems non existent
Been saying that since, what, the ODU game? More so vocal "light a fire under your butt" leaders.
I still don't think Ryan is our starter next year, he's just not seeing the field as evidenced by the picks and near-picks and I question his on-field decision making at times though the receivers also need to do a better job catching the ball (Peoples' targeting/not targeting aside), but I don't doubt his passion one iota.
I think it is time to move on from the 25 permanently.
Start calling the plays myself
Find an OC that actually has experience calling plays, recruiting for a system, and successfully executing a(ny) system, ideally in a P5 conference.
Run engage eight every defensive snap. Hail Mary every offensive play and have Michael Vick scramble for an easy 20 yards.
This works too
All yer stadiums are belong to us.
If only someone could set us up that.
I think at this point we just need to go all in and hire Condoleezza Rice. We may be able to outbid the Browns.
You forgot the /s
I wonder what is going through Whit's mind right now.
Some change is needed on offense. Maybe changes, plural. Fuente needs more time, but Cornelson needs to go find another gig away from VT. I'm starting to sour on Vice too. What has happened to our O-line? Miami has a good defense, but we can't block anyone at anytime. There has been no visible improvement to me. The only positive I can mention is we aren't false starting 5 times a quarter anymore.
Changes Plural, is that Cartoons's cousin?
Not sure if this is 'one change', but I think he needs to honestly assess the culture he is trying to instill and methods by which he does this. So if I were CJF, I would:
There was a lot of crazy stuff that happened this offseason/season. Some things were in the coaches' control (play calling, practice methods, etc), others are out of their control (kids getting drafted or injured), and some were a little bit of both (recruiting misses). I think it's important to separate the bad luck from the bad performances, and from there determine what change must be made to eliminate that mistake.
Should we get a paver and a sledgehammer, then? ;^)
They also beat tech in the bathroom, remember.
See if we can play all of our games in the state of North Carolina! /s
I'd start calling the plays myself because I am good at it.
Hire a proven recruiter.
Proven recruiters work at schools that don't need recruiters. In the odd case they don't, sanctions usually follow.
I've always thought the hire a recruiter argument was putting the chicken before the egg. Once you start winning big games recruits will start coming. In order to start winning you need good coaches. You can't convince me Saban could recruit if he didn't win. He's the grouchiest human on earth. He had to win first.
That's not accurate. There are plenty of good recruiters who aren't at Alabama or OSU.
Aazaar Abdul-Rahim would be great hire, who's a strong recruiter in the DC area - where we're lacking. Fire Mitchell and/or Nix and hire him.
Going to have to offer him above 300k.
He makes $250k now, and is on a staff that will likely not be there next year. Mitchell makes $270k as is. Nix is dead weight, Shibest is overpaid.
Don't make this a 'VT is too poor to pay good coaches,' thing. There is money to pay him.
I have no problem paying him 300k IF he can keep doing the recruiting he is doing now. I still think Shibest is worth what he is getting paid, had the best overall special teams last year.
Totally off topic but whenever I read Shibest my brain autocorrects it to Shitbeast. Just wanted to throw that out there.
Hire Sam Rogers
I suggest taking all the coaches and staff to the Cascades for an overnight team building event. Whoever makes it back alive keeps their jobs.
I'd grow a beard.
Get the ball out early. If you miss on a quick pass on first down don't drop back the next two downs, just run the ball.
Run more hurry up. It actually worked the series or two we did it last game.
Select a skill and focus on it so that it s effective this week.
I'd suggest tackling for defense and blocking on offense. We didn't do either of these basic skill this week.
If we tackle the opposing team and we make a couple of holes on offense, we actually stop them and we actually get some yards, which produces confidence.
No time left this season, to do anything else.
Decide on an offensive system and stick to your guns. Minus an actual running game, I think what we saw year 1 is pretty close to Fuente's ideal system.
Steal Abdul-Rahim and Canada from the terps
Get rid of whoever we hired as the 10th coach and get Daryl Tapp. If for nothing else he can give pre-game and half-time speeches. He had me ready to run onto the field when he gave his speech to the crowd before the Let's Go chant.
He was screaming to stand up and I turned to my wife and 2 friends and said, "When Darryl Tapp says to stand up, you stand up!"
He is 100% the nicest person you will ever meet. He doesn't have a bad bone in his body.
He came into my store when I was back in Blacksburg and bought a piece of jewelry for his gf, can confirm, nicest guy you could meet.
I emphatically endorse this comment.
I was in the bathroom at the end of the 3rd and heard this man plain as day, like he was a drill sergeant standing beside the urinal yelling at me to get on with it during a urinalysis.
I had to run back to my seat and ask the Mrs. who it was, because...DAMN!!!
I like UCF, but #3 in the country?
Meet Pete Moris.
via GIPHY
So, can anybody do the lip-reading thing and tell us what Pete said that made Frank roll his eyes?
This explains so much. I am, quite frankly, pretty discouraged by it.
It kind of speaks to a few a things that may be at the root of why we have no answers.
Memphis, regardless of its win against Ole Miss was not going to be competitive week in and week out against P5 competition. UCF, like Memphis, is not going to hold up against P5 competition week in and week out. There are a lot of reasons for this. Primarily, the players and coaches are generally better at P5 schools. If you want to beat P5 competition you have to recognize that and prepare for it. Putting UCF at #3 kind of suggests he doesn't recognize that a G5 phenomenon is not going to be a steady P5 contender. It explains why we aren't seriously examining our offensive philosophy and play calling. It also explains the lack of relevant experience in most of his coaching staff. It seems that he thinks that football is football at all levels, Div II, FCS, FBS, G5 and P5. But it's not. There are nuances and differences. Sure Cornelsen could be an effective OC in Div II. Their DC's are on par with him. Paxton Lynch did great against G5 competition every week but he didn't fair so well in the NFL. Miss direction and "make a man miss" works against G5 defenses because their players don't have the same level of talent as P5 players. Making adjustments is harder at P5 schools. If we are being honest with ourselves, do we really believe Cornelsen is going to out coach Manny Diaz? No. Check out Manny's resume:
Frankly, this is pretty frightening to me. It's one thing to say, "Hey, those are really good." Most of the CFP voters think so as UCF is ranked #11. But does anyone (other than Fuente) really believe UCF is better than Notre Dame, Georgia, Oklahoma, LSU, and Ohio State? I left out Michigan, Washington St and WVU because they can always underperform and UCF may be able to jump them.
IDK. Very concerning.
Holy over analyzing Batman!!
Seriously, you just created an entire argument around what a coach ranked another team in a poll.
This is a whole new level of reaching for reasons to trash a guy
Don't get me wrong. I'm not happy with Fuente and I think he should be held accountable for many things. But this, this is something else entirely.
I don't think he's crazy for thinking it, nor do I think he's 'trashing' Fuente. Fuente and the bulk of his staff don't have P5 experience, and I think there are some concerns that are playing into not recognizing what worked in G5 isn't translating directly to the ACC.
Recruiting - The staff lacks recruiting experience at this level. I think there is a massive difference in recruiting time and effort when you're competing for kids to come to Memphis as compared to VT. There were players we had no business offering (Pimpleton, Glaze) and elite guys who we slow play or don't offer (Hakeem Beamon, Sheridan Jones) and guys in the middle, who could definitely contribute here that we slow played, or just didn't offer (Dazz Newsome, Greg Dortch). We've got multiple guys on our roster who have VT offers, and then Kansas, or Indiana, Kansas, and VT. That's great if you've got the best scouting dept in the nation, but for us, is extremely risky. We'll see how those guys continue to play out.. Just getting 'system' guys doesn't work at this level.
Scouting/Game Planning - schemes are more complex, the players are bigger, faster, stronger, smarter and capable of executing more (offensively and defensively), which requires more study, planning, film work, technique coaching, etc. The 'quick pass and make a guy miss' offensive philosophy may work here, but we've not really seen it yet. By year 3, it is fair to begin questioning it's effectiveness
S&C - Starting to see and hear more rumors about the S&C staff and it's effectiveness and approach. The bathroom pics look great, but does that translate to on-field success?
If that line on ranking teams between G5 and P5 (do you really think UCF is better than Michigan, Notre Dame, Georgia, Oklahoma, Ohio State?) is still that blurry, it would be very worrisome if that blurriness still exists re: approach to the above.
Again Clemson would like a word with you. The misdirection, spread,uptempo offense is what they run and why they are the only team to legitimately beat Alabama in the National Championship. One of the reasons Fuente was almost hired by Dabo as the OC.
We need to be better offensively in the second half of games period. I feel like we abandoned the Uptempo part of our offense, which made us lethal year 1.
I definitely think Corn can do a better job and could possibly be replaced if he doesn't straighten his second-half play calling out.
At Alabama's and Clemson's level you could run the triple option and beat nearly everyone.
A play action pass is a form of misdirection. Misdirection is an aspect of an offensive. When I hear our system described I hear "mis direction" and "make a man miss". Some of that comes from Fuente himself. Maybe he's playing it close to vest to protect the "secret sauce" in terms of not going into detail. But... We gonna need some of that sauce soon.
Clemson was not this high profile program until very recently, and it just so happened to coincide with implementing a spread uptempo RPO offensive system.
They had success using this offensive system, and its propelled them to a national championship and being Alabama lite.
Okay. I'll go with that.
Clemson didn't have great recruits. Clemson used misdirection and "make a man" miss. Clemson did well.
VT doesn't have great recruits. VT uses misdirection and "make an man" miss. VT is flailing.
Same level of recruits. Same system. Different results.
Where does that point?
Also to further disprove your post, did you happen to watch the Rams and Chiefs last night. They both run the misdirection spread type offenses and are killing it in the NFL.
As for Clemson, they have always recruited better than us. More recently, because of their success, they have had top 5 recruiting classes.
The offense is what got them there.
The offense we have right now is stacked full of freshman and sophomores, you need to give them another year before we can say its a failure. These things just don't happen overnight.
Worth noting that Alabama was tied with the Citadel 10-10 at halftime.
Follow up question -- Does Fuente fill out his own coaches poll ballot, or does he have a staffer do it?
Usually a coach fills out the top 5 or top 10 and a GA does the rest. I'm not entirely sure Pete Moris isn't doing the whole thing for us. Not a joke.
This is a truly ridiculous post. If you are considering buying into the "Memphis coaches are trash" argument that I've seen floating around, perhaps take a second to consider that Beamer was hired from Murray State (a 1-AA program) with a record of 42–23–2, making the playoff a single time and losing in the first round.
Since people love to talk about Clemson, let's go ahead and mention that Dabo Swinney was 19-15 as a head coach through 2010. In 2011 he hired Chad Morris as offensive coordinator. Chad Morris' resume consisted of ONE SEASON as OC at Tulsa and otherwise had been a long time high school coach. Clemson went 42-11 with Morris at OC.
I could go on with plenty more examples because damn near every successful head coach once coached at a low level. The notion that a coach starting his career at a G5 school is indicative of his coaching abilities is utterly preposterous and completely unsupported by facts.
So you're saying Clemson made a change at OC that yielded much better on the field results?
I could give a damn if you came from HS, if you're successful, you can't argue against results. When on the field results aren't being produced, you have every right to be scrutinized. In short, I agree with your closing statement, but I'm not sold on Corny being an effective OC.
Yep, when Clemson wasn't doing well, they made coaching staff changes and re-committed to recruiting elite talent.
I don't think anyone would have a problem with VT doing those things.
Strawman much?
Being impressed with Manny's resume doesn't mean I think that is the only viable path.
Having a strong resume doesn't matter when you are successful. When you're struggling it does.
Dabo clearly can identify coaching talent. Morris turned Clemson around IMMEDIATELY and they did not regress.
What are you arguing against? I never said that. See my second statement.
My contention is that Fuente may not recognize the sizable difference between G5 and P5 and as such is not making appropriate judgments. All lower level talent is not going to succeed at the next level. The question is how do you identify those that can. If you look Cornelsen's resume there is no indication that his path was headed towards a P5 coaching position. The sole reason his is OC at VT is that he coached with Fuente at Illinois State. It's not like after his time with Fuente at Illinois state he went on to be the OC of an FCS team and had success. Instead he spent a year Ok St. and then was the OC of a DII school. I've studied this extensively. You should feel free to do so yourself.
I have said this many times. Fuente has the potential to be a great head coach. Every person has their strengths and weaknesses. If I were to point to a Fuente weakness it may be seeing more talent in his staff than there really is. It doesn't make him a bad guy and it doesn't make him a bad coach.
What is truly ridiculous is how you drew up arguments against things I never said.
If I'm Fuente, I beat UVa. Whatever it takes. Any means necessary.
If he preserves the streak, the heating pad goes from the red button, to the yellow one.
More and more, I think Leonard needs to be on the staff to point out obvious, but sometimes overlooked, truths.
So that's the one thing you wouldn't change?
Oh... right. Good point.
Long term:
Its hard to say, the areas we are struggled on defense are very very green. Nix just got here so can you put blame on him this fast? Vice has recruited some beef but they are young and a few are already playing.
The Burden/Wiggins position flip would be interesting but for recruiting, do we want to take Burden away from recruiting WRs as a position coach when we know we need a handful of good ones vs 1 or 2 good RBs?
Immediate:
The only thing he could really change in a week is the play calling responsibilities.
Go hire gundy as OC if he leaves ok state that guys knows offense
I really hope you forgot the '/s'
I'm just going off of hearing the commentators say he was in the hot seat and I've always liked his offenses ability just not his defensive mind
If I read correctly Gundy has a ridiculous amount of extensions. I don't think he's going anywhere
Fuente would be a candidate to coach OK State. That's no /s.
Not this season he isn't.
Tennessee desperately wanted him as their head coach last year. He's not going to be our offensive coordinator. You might as well ask for Fuente to lead the team out of the tunnel on a unicorn as Metallica skydives into the stadium while playing Enter Sandman.
We may be able to get two out of those three.
And we may be able to find an OC named Mike.
But then that wouldn't exclude Mike O'Cain. And that's not a risk I'm willing to take.
Gundy's not leaving Okie Lite unless they fire him, which won't happen any time soon. And if he does leave, he'll have another head coaching offer before they escort him out the door. No way he falls back to the OC level.
Side note: I'd pay good money to see that perp walk. It would be more entertaining than a nature documentary of a lion fighting off a pack of hyenas to keep his kill. Probably bloodier too. COME AFTER ME! I'M A MAN! I'M 40! [fart noise]
Fire Pete Morris
Get an offensive coordinator who has established success with a power run game in the P5?
Current P5 coordinators - Scott Loeffler
Strong track record - Brian Stinespring
I feel like with current personnel we should stick with spread pistol looks we have the receiving core finally to do it but who knows hell I'd be fine going triple option just to beat UVA
Yes let's go ahead and install the triple option during a short week of practice. That would go really well.
1) Throw fits on the sidelines ala Narduzzi or curse the officials out like Johnson. Nothing says you're a coach in control than acting a straight fool. And if your three little girls see it on TV? Who cares! You're showing emotion, and that's what counts.
2) Quit scoring TDs on the opening drives. Especially ones where you throw a screen to your H-Back who runs 20 yards down the field to score. That's not cool. You should only throw hail marys down the field and go 3 and out.
3) Fire your entire coaching staff. During the game. The next time a WR fumbles the ball, fire the WR coach because clearly that's his fault and not the fault of the player. And when the QB forces a throw into triple coverage when there are 2 WRs wide-the-freak-open on the other side of the field, fire the OC because it's his fault with his terrible play calling that the QB can't read the field.
4) Get Juggernaut to be your QB.
5) Take the next available coaching job that offers. Clearly you suck when you went 10-3 in the first year with IFord, Hodges, and Phillips. You went 9-4 with Phillips (and his sports hernia) and a bunch of new receivers and a R-Fr QB. And this year your starting QB goes out in game 3, his backup doesn't make the opposing Ds respect the possibility he might run, and you've had 20 different starters on D. You just suck. So leave.
6) Enjoy time with your family when you can get it. Keep being classy. Do things the right way. Make sure these kids are accountable to themselves, their team, their family.
7) Be more open with what's going on in the program. You don't have to be full open kimono, but stop treating the team as if what they are doing is national security level stuff. I know you want to protect these guys as much as you can and that's okay. The fanbase just wants to understand what's going on and why things aren't going that well.
I know you're /s...but I want #7. Stop the secretive drama.
8. Go 4-7, being noncompetitive since September, losing every home game against FBS teams and hope your fans are gullible and stupid enough to buy your excuses- many of which you created and be fine with sucking and losing to UVA for the first time in 14 years.
One thing?
Recruit better. Whatever the cost, no excuses we need to be bringing in better talent. If we can recruit well in basketball there is no reason we can't recruit well in football.
Bury my foot knee-deep in Cornys ass if he calls for a draw on 3rd and forever.
Winning?
Boot Willis off the team and win back the locker room
Is Willis a problem in the locker room?
I'm working off rumors, admittedly. Rumors that Willis is a bit of a toxic person. Rumors that he smashed a bottle over the punter's head in the off season. I could totally buy his teammates quitting on him if they don't like him. I didn't watch the Miami game but I read on TKP that it looked like Willis was the only player fighting at the end. If that's true, could it be because his teammates don't like him? I remember thinking it was uncool when he lit into Peoples during the ND game. Especially since I'm pretty sure the mistake was Willis's. I just get the sense that Willis is a bad fit for VT and his toxins are destroying the locker room. A bad apple can spoil a bunch, especially if that apple is the starting QB
I'll admit that I didn't see the actual incident but apparently Miami had a late/cheap hit on Willis in the 4th and a number of players ran onto the field to defend him, in the post game presser Willis apparently got a little choked up saying how much that meant to him, working off of those actions there are at least some players who like him enough to defend him
The fans were ready to kill the officials they picked up the late hit on the QB flag and then only enforced the penalties from after Miami intercepted.
Willis must be toxic. He throws a half dozen passes a game right into the receivers hands, and they dropthe ball. Must be a toxic pass
I guess the reason we have no run game is because the floor is lava?
Not only are you working on rumors, you're working on old offseason rumors and a single incident that happened 7 weeks ago. Unless you're implying that the WRs are intentionally dropping his passes as some sort of revenge, I haven't seen anything that suggests this locker room tension still exists between Willis and the rest of the offense.
Good thing for you I'm not Fuente. I just get bad vibes from Willis. Don't know why. *shrug emoji*
His body language with Peoples after the botched goal line play against ND definitely didn't offer any encouragement.
All I'm saying is that it's reasonable to expect a team to try to resolve their interpersonal issues, and generally when they aren't able to it bubbles out onto the sideline and even the field. And I haven't seen anything in public recently that suggests any animosity between Willis and his teammates, and the post somewhere below about his teammates standing up to Miami after a questionable late hit is evidence of the exact opposite.
You make a good point. I'm not disagreeing but playing devils advocate.
It's also reasonable to believe that a bunch of guys who are losing to a rival would get upset if one of the rival players hits someone on your team late, regardless of whether they like the guy or not. It could have been more about anger towards Miami for being, well, Miami than about sticking up for their guy.
But your scenario is more likely. I'll buy it.
What DID happen there? I was talking to an old timer (graduated in '76) when the late hit went down and completely missed the events around it.
Pretty sure someone took a cheap shot at Willis after the pick, disguised as a "block" 40 yards away from the ball.
My note was sarcastic. About dropped passes
Oh, so Willis didn't coat the footballs in poison before tossing them downfield?
No, he did. The receivers just lucked out and had the dropsies, so they live to drop passes another day.
Willis and JJ won't both be on the team next year. Both could start games for someone and both can probably transfer as graduates and play right away.
And Fuente isn't picking Willis over JJ.
. JJ is the most popular kid in the team.
Step up to the podium and admit I have no business coaching at a P5 school and gracefully step away and reject any additional money allowing Whit to go after a quality coach to really rebuild our football program... One can dream right?
He has won 24 games in three seasons.
I would say Bud won those games as this this O could not beat many high school defenses but everyone is entitled to their own opinions
Congrats Skip Bayless, you just had the least intelligent take in this entire thread!
I think a shake-up in the coaching staff should be considered. I don't think they all need to go, but we need to see if there's a good replacement/upgrade available for Cornelson and/or Nix. Those two don't seem to be getting the job done right now.
Fuente needs to ask himself that despite the setbacks does he think he likes where the program is going? Does he have the best staff in place? The best philosophy? Everyone's bought in? etc.
If the answer is "YES" then I don't think any changes are needed. It's tough to say that since we're struggling so badly but we're extremely young and injured and we're playing people much earlier than we needed to. This will pay dividends down the line when we have a more veteran team in the next few years (a la Miami's LBs this year), but for some it's hard to see that.
If the answer is "NO" to any of these, then it's easy to see what changes you need to make.
Fuente, Jon Laaser, and Mike Burnop have been absolutely emphatic that the results we're all expecting are right around the corner in the postgame radio shows. So knowing that I'm not so sure we see any changes to the coaching staff even if it may be warranted when looking at the program from the outside. There's no reason to be anything but dubious of the claims that success will come very soon, but I at least appreciate the conviction in what Fuente thinks he has or is working towards.
Of course none of that matters if we have a repeat of this season next year. There will be trouble in paradise buyout or not, for better or worse.
Absolutely. Success is no guarantee, but that's why I also don't rah-rah when things go wrong. You need to understand if you're trending up. Maybe an apt analogy is the stock market in the long-term.
I wouldn't expect them to say anything less to keep morale and fan support positive. But any objective person simply can't look at the current state of our program and team and expect us to turn out a 9-10 win season next year just because of another offseason and experience under their belts. There are serious holes that aren't getting fixed overnight. There are problems on both sides of the ball that continue to surface with no adjustments made or possibly even available. I know the official vibe from VT is that everything is fine, but there is certainly a lot of trepidation among the fan base and probably in the back of their minds as well. Fuente could turn things around, and he also could very well fail to do so.
My concern about staff adjustments is the same as your assessment: if the administration thinks everything is fine, they likely will not make any changes. Every one of Fuente's hires so far has been a comfort/safe hire within his circle or network. I'm also concerned about how much blame Cornelson should shoulder for the offense versus how much this is truly Fuente's system, and he simply wants someone he knows/trusts to execute it. That would mean that it's highly unlikely he would ever bring in an outsider to run that side of the ball.
I'm worried that the administration will place too much unchecked faith and confidence in Fuente and the results simply won't follow without someone putting their foot down. If no one is willing to objectively sit down with him like Braine did with Beamer 25 years ago, I'm worried our overly optimistic trust will lead us right over the cliff if we're not careful.
Barring a huge unexpected change... game 1 next year the VT starting DL is Belmar Hewitt Porcher Garbutt ... House gains won't be ready due to injury,. Their backups - who will need to play quite a bit in Bud's scheme- are going to be Proctor Burke Taylor DeBose... unless JUCOs or True freshman beat them out- which will be the "youth" issue again. That is what we are working with.... we can't go sign free agents in college football. So next year when these "veteran" guys struggle to compete against Pitt and GT, what do we say?
If they struggle as much next year as this year, then it's time to make some major changes. But unless Bud follows up this dud of a season with another, 2018 will go down as an outlier in the career of one of the best assistant coaches in the history of college football.
Just be ready for the fact that 2019 is not going to be much better from a DL standpoint.
Yeah, their backups will be smaller and less experienced. So you mix who you have on the line (which is something Foster and Wiles have done for a long time). You don't go "starter" all across the front on every play. You rotate in experienced and inexperienced. Right now there is nearly no uninjured experience to rotate in.
Change your slogan...or actually get the team to play HARD SMART AND TOUGH. This defense is the softest I have ever seen at VT- hands down. And it's not only youth. They are small, short, tiny - BC's players towered over them. GT's OL commented on how small we were. I though Hilgart was some elite SC guy? I don't see it. His slogan is perfect for VT, we just haven't executed any of it this year.
Re: Hilgart
And yet ppl were commenting that we looked bigger than FSU. Probably just the optics when we're getting beaten a lot. Hilgart has shown his "before" and "after" photos to prove players are getting bigger and stronger, so sounds like your argument about him doesn't hold water.
Also don't know what you mean by "some elite SC guy". He was praised by his peers of doing an outstanding job but it wasn't like he worked in the NFL or fed his players steroids.
When BC, Pitt and GT run right down your throat, right in your gut of your defense as much as they want with little resistance, questioning your hyped SC guy absolutely does hold water. Look at the product on the field, not shower photos.
I don't care how strong you are, you're not making the tackle if you're not in position to make that tackle. We're so far out of position this year we're basically holding the door open for ballcarriers. And one look at our ability to recruit DT and FS, and I don't see this getting any better anytime soon.
Lol really, buddy? We've got no depth at DL right now and you expect Hilgart to magically solve our depth problem? Let me remind you that Ricky's been injured and so has Hewitt. We've got really no one else behind them. And DE's lost people to injury and attrition too, but yes lets go ahead and blame Hilgart for that. No one is playing at 100% right now due to depth issues and when you're not at 100% you'll get destroyed at the LOS.
You've lost total and complete credibility. Do yourself a favor - take a break from TKP / online forums. It'll help put things in perspective. We're all hurting right now but you're not making sense.
dc has had an axe to grind with the S&C staff from go. It's probably the first thing I ever had it out with him over on TKP.
Yep.. 4-6 and nont competitive with Pitt Miami BC or GT physically at all... But I have an "axe" to grind. LOL
We both know this has been a sticking point with you since before this season.
Notice I didn't even say how I felt about the current state of the S&C program and you still want to jump down my throat.
Damn right its a "sticking point" with me. Virginia Tech should be able to run the football effectively with 3 senior OL - too much to ask? VT should not be gashed by GT for 500 yards rushing. VT should not allow pitt to average an NCAA record 23 yards a play or whatever the hell that garbage was. You want to blame the offensive line not being able to block at the point of attack on youth? fine. You want to blame Pitt setting offensive rushing yards against VT on youth? fine. I blame a lot of it on being out toughed physically and consistently by average football teams. 1 win UNC ran the ball down our throats for 500 yards . Whose accountable for getting blown away in the trenches? Beamer? Gentry?
I said since before this season. You're just listing off stuff that happened this year.
I haven't said any of this. You're looking for things to be mad at me about.
North Carolina ran for 235 on us. You're like a parody of yourself. Just use the actual numbers, man.
UNC had 500 yards of offense. point stands - they have 1 win.
Well that's why you're wrong and, as I said, have lost all credibility lol.
Go ahead and argue the point.. I'm listening. Argue we aren't getting whipped up front. Go ahead.
No. I think anyone who's rationale realizes it's a huge cluster-F of things. Nothing is as simple as you make it out to be.
I'm done feeding your troll'ism.
Nothing says non trolling like the ole "Im right you're wrong" persona. Enjoy.
We are getting whipped up front. There are more reasons than just strength and conditioning though. Vinny is out of position and hopping on one leg. Several other guys are just victim of not enough time yet in the weight room. Some guys arent physically ready to go until junior or senior year and yet sometimes they get thrown into fire early.
The Hokies rank #109 nationally in second half scoring offense and #117 in second half scoring defense... I would argue a good portion of that is due to strength and conditioning...
Please. Who's job is it to keep the team healthy? put them in a position to be healthy? Train them in the offseason to be ready to play 12 games? We are getting our asses kicked in the trenches on both sides of the ball. Is it all "youth"? You should take a break from posting if you think VT's roster is strong/tough/competitive in the trenches right now. I don't expect hilgart to magically do anything except have the guys in position to compete physically- that's his job after all. Watch the games please. There are seniors on the OL getting destroyed. There are RS sophs on defense getting destroyed- its not all true freshman out there.
So every injury we have is on Hilgart? Does that mean if he was truly doing his job that we'd have zero injuries all year / EVER?
You can't do that if your starting players are injured and can't compete properly and then our back ups are too young / not even good enough.
Put it this way - by your definition, if you were perfectly healthy then you could easily sub in for one of our players and play perfectly right? Didn't think so.
(Heck I might even pay money to see you try though).
Yes, I totally argued that 40 something fans could play on the VT defense if healthy. Yep that's what I said/argued. Again.. whose job is it to have the team competitive physically? - notice I said competitive...not national champions, but competitive with 5 loss teams like GT and Miami? Whose job is that? There is one true freshman playing a lot on defense. Not 10..
I think you're being reactionary due to the results this year. Last year we beat both BC and Pitt in very physical games. I recall Cutcliff saying we were the most physical team they had played last year after we beat them.
Is our physicality lacking this year? Absolutely. I think it's more of a talent/youth issue on D and a scheme/technique issue on O.
IF we could play 40 fans on defense, I think we might get better results. We could swarm the heck out of the ballcarrier and still have 5 deep safeties across the back, along with 15 more in coverage.
TBH, I always those "before" and "after" photos were dumb and pointless. They're always flexing in the "after" photos, and not at all in the "before" photos, which completely nullifies the few gains that can be clearly seen in the photos imo.
Agreed. I think it's a dumb gimmick.
I don't look at the photos as much as I look at the values. Did a person go up in healthy weight or not? etc.
If you call that "few gains" in a year, you clearly haven't spent much time around a weight room to know what it takes to get those results. Flexing or not.
You definitely can't just flex Hazelton's delts or Smiths quads into existence. Look at those things.
You really gonna act like size and strength is independent from youth? Like 18 and 19 year olds should be as big and strong as 21-22 year olds after several years in a S&C program?
This is starting be be eerily like 1992... insert Fuente for Beamer and Babcock for Braine. Not so much that Fuente could be fired, but that it may be staff changes are warranted...
https://www.roanoke.com/hokies/frank-beamer-dave-braine-recall-early-str...
It is attractive to compare this year to 1992, but that team was competitive -- 5 losses were by 4 or fewer points. Even the recent years where we went 6-6, not every loss was a blowout like this season.
The lack of competitiveness this year really has me worried.
This is a good point... as I recall, even when we were having 5-6 seasons the loses were competitive and you could see we were close. That is why this is all so discouraging... we are blown out vs. avg to decent teams even at home.
Re-hire Torian Gray and Kevin Rogers.
Drop everything and start working on the Time Machine. Once that is running, he can go back and try again over and over until we go 15-0.
Reminds me of something Stewie Griffin would try to do...
Replace the current OC with someone more experienced and can employ the offense that Fuente wants. I believe the reason that Fuente's offense at Memphis was so successful is because he had that person in Darrell Dickey who worked along side Cornelsen. Too bad Darrell Dickey did not join Fuente at VT.
Weren't Dickey and Cornelsen Co-OCs at Memphis, and Fuente chose to bring one and leave the other to handle the transition?
Seems like he brought the wrong guy since Memphis didn't really drop off too badly iirc, and Dickey is now doing decently well at A&M considering they play in the SEC West.
You are correct; however, based on Fuente's offensive success at Memphis vs. his mediocre results at VT, one can reasonably conclude that Darrell Dickey must have had more say/input in directing the Memphis offense than Brad Cornelsen. It's the only delta between Fuente at Memphis and Fuente at VT. He brought everyone else with him (i.e., Vice, Wiggins, and Shibest).
who knew we had so many OCs on TKP! everyone wants play calling responsibilities. until after halftime when the defense adjust and ask madden button aint working anymore.
seriously though. the my way or the highway road may end with you being on the highway. I don't know what the solution is right now. this seems a lot bigger issue than calling the plays. kids don't jump ship if they believe in you. winning or losing.
If you create Plan A for the first half that exploits weakness A of the defense. You can assume that at half they will adjust to protect weakness A. A good OC should know this and find weakness B opened up by this adjustment and implement Plan B to exploit it.
Read message boards to figure out what Im doing wrong
1. Seriously consider what my and the teams mission/vision is. What is the identity that we want at VT? And how do we establish that. Maybe that is happening and none of us can see any of it being realized. But the program seems to be directionless at the moment.
2. Figure out why the team isn't/won't be/can't be physical. This is one of the most concerning things to me. If the guys are putting in as much work in the S&C program as some suggest, then why, outside of Stephen Peoples, are we getting physically outmatched at every single position?
Pull the stick out of my ass.
(In all honesty, this thread was already too long for me to read so I'm just going to assume no one else said something similar above)
Hire a recruiting "ringer" with a proven record.
I am afraid the changes coming next year may be far more drastic than anyone is so far anticipating.
Norm Woodisms aside, I'm truly not one to tell tales out of school. I don't particularly like rumors in general, and I won't blame anyone for thinking I'm a douche for being so vague here.
There has been a whole lot of smoke this year in terms of dismissals and performance. The news I got today ties up a lot of threads in a few ugly knots.
I won't repeat what I heard because there isn't any way to substantiate it that doesn't turn into a he said she said sort of thing, and frankly, my source could reasonably be construed as someone with an axe to grind. But the story explains a whole lot of our troubles this year, and if any of it is true, we'll be fondly remembering those halcyon days of last off-season.
Hell, I hope it's all lies. What one thing I would change is never having heard this.
If the coming off season starts going sideways in line with this, I'll dish. If it doesn't, well, I apologise for being a gullible drama queen after a few bourbons.
I don't hate you, but I hate you right now...
Gah! You can't just cliff hanger us like this!
Now I need bourbon to figure out what could possibly go wrong!
Thoughts:
Posted on another thread, and lots of rumors, there is smoke to Bud leaving.
Massive attrition
Someone on the team or coaching staff did something horribly wrong, and is getting fired or kicked off the team.
Fuente interviewed for another opening and is lame duck, leaving after UVA game
Okay, I need bourbon.
This is not informative and only fuels the fire.
Would it involve interviewing an NFL coach?
Does it involve Fud Boster?
So with "said news" does that give you hope for the future or leave you with a slightly less hopefull feeling? In an effort to maintain vagueness here
Nothing to do with hope but a whole lot of disappointment with several people at all levels of team over several different issues.
Like I said, hopefully just stories. I'd dismiss altogether if they didn't explain a whole lot of dysfunction.
I expect we'll know for sure next off season.
Could you just add a more overall sense of vague, general distress?
This seems like a great thing to sit on until you have some actual news with a source.
"Noone knows for sure" seems like something read off of a magic eight ball.
Get a sample of Michael Vick's blood and use it to clone an 18 yr old version of him. I think they did that to a sheep once.
I just think that for the psyche of the fan base Fuente needs to do something this off season.
I also believe that he's not one to take an action involving removing or re-assigning a coach. I imagine that in his mind such action would be "drastic" or "knee-jerk" and everything about Fuente makes me think that he puts maximum effort into appearing on the opposite end of the spectrum from "drastic" and "knee-jerk".
I would be surprised if any coaching changes are made this year. And as a result I think any potential excitement for next season will be completely wiped out.
This concerns me because if there's no excitement around the team there's less opportunity to engage fans and get butts in seats.
Excitement is important. Fans, donors, sports writers, talking heads all need to be excited about the program. The way this program is being operated is anything but exciting and if we're not winning I'm concerned that can be a recipe for disaster.
Just a few thoughts