Edit: Ranking the ACC's teams after looking at each position group... 1. Clemson2. Cuse3. MiamiMakes sense. Wake's the biggest surprise, but think Deacs will be good. pic.twitter.com/qWmXq9qdyT— That's so David (@ADavidHaleJoint) July 15, 2019
He ranks the VT receiving corps at 2nd behind Clemson and the Special Teams 3rd behind Syracuse at GT.
Overall VT comes out as 5th.
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Seeing Wake ranked ahead of us is a hard pill to swallow
These are pretty bogus the more I look at them. He's definitely starting early on his annual prop up of the Atlantic well beyond their actual quality. I'm not saying I could do better putting a list like this together, but he is way too bullish on the Wake defense given how absolutely atrocious they were last year. Same with Syracuse, DL #1? good grief. They literally lost to Clemson because their defense had so little depth that by the 4th quarter Etienne was going 12 yards upfield before being touched every play. The very next week Pitt had two one hundred rushers and almost another 200 yard rusher.
Honestly seems like he is propping us up if he has us 5th given how absolutely atrocious we were last year.
I was surprised the OL was so low, and that the DL was as high as it was.
I think he has our O-line underrated just based on projections, but looking at last year I guess I can understand. We've really recruited that area well and I think this year you should start to see that group be a strength, at least I hope. QB is kind of an unknown, but could be a step us as well. Obviously if we get Feaster our RB group should be placed in the upper third of the conference. I also think we could surprise some people at DB this year if we stay healthy.
GT's special teams second? lololololololololololololololololololololol
Yes, but they're last or next-to-last in everything else except RB, so who cares
Hale is big on their punter. Other than that I don't know if it's justified or not.
To be fair, perhaps their new coach will introduce some high school level kick coverage concepts and actually practice them. This also could be the year that they attempt and hit a 40 plus yard field goal with the game in question.
I'd like to know his criteria before getting into nit picking his rankings.
Clearly he hasn't heard that Tavien Feaster is definitely coming to play at VT
tavien pls
I have two huge complaints.
Things I agree with:
Similar complaint with BC...lost 4 starters on the O-line but will have the 2nd best offensive line???
We too have a 4* QB as our backup. All we need to do is list him as the starter to be as good as Cuse?
Makes me sick to my stomach to read this, but leg.
Syracuse's QB situation isn't nearly as far off as his FSU QB situation ranking. We have Willis, who has gotten the job done on the field (and just named to the Maxwell) with a budding star in Patterson behind him, and they have Blackman who has failed to impress and already lost the job once with Wisconsin transfer Hornibrook as the backup (and throw in a new offensive coordinator to boot). And that duo is ranked right behind our two? Put Willis' stats up against Blackman's and explain that ranking to me.........
What indicates that BC is going to have the 2nd best offensive line in the ACC after losing 4 starters? Find it hard to believe they can just reload and its not like they have some blue chip OL recruits coming in behind the guys who left.
BC almost always has a good line, partially because their TE's are part of the line. They run block 60% of the time.
I think he's completely lost his marbles as it relates to the OL situation.
I also think he has the Syracuse QB way too high at this point.
Would be better if he didn't even do a total. Not every position group should carry the same weight, and other areas of strength may do a better or poorer job of masking deficiencies. Best thing I see is that areas scoring the weakest are areas I expect a huge improvement this year.
I don't have enough faith in the kicking game to put ST that high, although I'm 100% clueless about the rest of the conference there. So I'd just expect us to be closer to mediocre than we are.
Though I still think Bradburn is a boss.
While I disagree with a few slots, I do find this pretty interesting and helpful as an overview for each team. Does anyone know if any other writers across the country have done this for a different conference.
Also, get used to every media member ever being super high on Cuse this season, warranted or not.
...and Utah.
Seeing UVA ranked ahead of us in all defensive categories...smdh. Too lazy to post big pile o shit gif.
So this means we are going to be the fifth best team and are going to go to the Belk bowl
I would like to know if he did his CB ranking for our team with or without Webb. I am also not sure if I should get my hopes up that Webb can improve our secondary with all of his glass tendons.
I sincerely hope Webb recovers fully. I do. But he has not played a down of P5 football in an actual game. To think that he is Brandon Flowers re-incarnate is a stretch.
Wow, that Clemson bunch must be pretty good at sportz!
They ain't played nobody this year, Pawl!
We are ranked too high for a 6-7 team that lost some quality starters but hopefully I am just being overly pessimistic after the last few seasons, and are the Demon Deacs bak?
Here is their 2018 game log for reference.
They went 7-6 and took some real ass-whippings themselves. They lost to Clemson 63-3 and I think gave up like 15 yards a carry. I don't think they are back, but they did end the season blowing out Duke in front of an embarrassingly empty Duke stadium, like I'm talking less than 1000 people probably. They also beat Memphis by 3 in their bowl game.
edit: It was 11.8 ypc given up against Clemson
edit2: The Wake Forest defense gave up 200+ rushing yards 6 times last year, at one point doing it in four straight games: 220, 241, 267, and 471.
edit3: For comparison, the VT defense gave up 200+ rushing yards 6 times as well, giving up 400+ TWICE. Holy shit. There was some atrocious defense played in the ACC last year. Pitt almost ran for 500+ yards on us.
edit4: Syracuse gave up 200+ rushing yards 4 times.
You have to realize that whenever some sports writer does a preseason ranking like this, it's based on who each team was at the end of last season. Current situations and personnel have little to do with their thinking in most cases. So if team X had an ok 2018 season, good DL, but had a below average OL due to injury, they're considered to have a good DL this year and a below average OL this year. Nevermind that all their DL graduated and that the three 4 star OL that redshirted last year are ready to play this year. Perception is reality, at least until Aug 31st.
No one has mentioned UNC at #2 running? WTF. Above BC? I don't understand the metric used to judge running based on these rankings cause I only believe Clemson is in the correct position. I mean would any one at most those schools not trade their top RB for Cam Akers and not think they hoodwinked FSU.
I was about to say the Cuse QB looked good then I looked at his stats, he was so-so and will need improvement. Then I looked at Wake's QBs stats. Hale is saying that two frosh QBs will improve more than a rising RS Sr QB? It's not unheard of but it's hard to say which of those 3 will be the best this year.
I really want to know what he was smoking when he did this.
a David Hale joint
Hale is a turd. But football is almost bak (Da U is not)