https://www.si.com/college-football/2019/08/15/virginia-tech-transfers-u...
BLACKSBURG, Va. — Do not catch a touchdown. If you catch a touchdown, I'm going to have to fight you.
Tre Turner's own Virginia Tech teammates encouraged him and other players to concede the Hokies' Dec. 1 game against Marshall last year, a game that determined if the season would extend to a bowl trip. As unbelievable as they are, these quotes are real, says Turner and other Tech players.
I honestly don't know what to type here about what this means or how it makes me think or feel.
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What a bunch of asses. Says something about the players that stuck around too if they were hearing a group wanting to throw the game and we win by 21.
Well this checks out
This quote from Hollifield explains A LOT about our current recruiting class if other programs were privy to this level of dysfunction within our program. There might not be a worse sentence you can read hear from your biggest recruit of a class than "What?! I just committed to a place where player don't think they're any good. It's not what I signed up for."
Hopefully this new information coming out of the program will help us out finishing this 2020 class, and really get us back on track with the 2021 class.
The situation was obviously bad but I can think of a lot worse things to be said. It reads more as a reaction to players than anything else, and Dax is saying things have changed.
I feel like Dax is the unquestioned leader of this team now.
Tre catching that 45 yarder makes it so much sweeter.
Well that means our portal action hasn't been "the new norm", at least not entirely.
Also get used to orange.
This is a really compelling article and a transparent look at what happens to a team accustomed to winning that starts losing.
Here is what troubles me even more- I find it incredibly hard to believe that every guy who was part of the problem actually left.
well it sounds like turkey bacon guy might still be on the team so....
I've never coached football, but I'm pretty damned sure turkey bacon doesn't win championships.
At least they didn't ask for Tofurky
This is the most worrying thing to me, how is that the line drawn in the sand? Whi gets upset over not having turkey bacon? Do we have players with religious dietary restrictions or are allergic? Cause I don't see any other way turkey bacon comes into play. It's really sad to see people how just weren't raised right. This team has bigger problems if some one asks for Turkey bacon and they back them.
Players: We dont want to lift until we all puke
Fuente: fair
TB player: We want turkey bacon at breakfast
Fuente: Um? Sure we can probably do that, :::looks at other coaches bewilderly:::
Players: Yo coach we don't know that guy he just snuck into this meeting.
Obligatory...
Don't some of the players get put on some pretty strict diets by the nutrition staff if they need to drop weight? If they are getting told to drop regular bacon at breakfast and have turkey bacon instead, but no turkey bacon is being served it could definitely be frustrating. Given some of the head scratching things we have seen from our athletic dept over the years, this doesn't seem like too much of a stretch.
Some guys just don't eat pork. I know...clutch your pearls but it's true.
A lot of people are brought up being told it's a dirty meat/animal so they don't eat it.
These are all adults in college, time to learn something important!
Do these same people not fish becuase they swim around in thirst own pee?
I mean most people just don't fish for any given reason so that is kind of a bad analogy.
And why not beef bacon?
Instantly read this to myself in his voice...
That's a concern of mine as well.
I'm sure it was a relatively small, but vocal minority that felt so strongly that they'd want to lose but that kind of toxicity can spread.
If we had the team on a spectrum, with "All In" guys like Dax on one side and "I hope we lose" guys (EDIT: NVM on the player's name) on the other...I would guess not everyone closer to the toxic side of the scale is gone.
It also makes me wonder how the disconnect between those guys and the staff got so bad? I mean, yeah, it was a bad year but I have *never* heard of a situation in which players are rooting for their own team to lose.
Will we see this happen again if we lose to BC (which I think isn't totally unreasonable)?
Will Fuente + Co. be better prepared to handle rifts in the locker room?
Not that I have sauces or any special knowledge, but I'm not sure I believe Hill was one of those guys calling it quits. He played pretty well up to being kicked off the team and didn't seem to be giving up. He wasn't even on the team during that huge losing streak in the middle of the season. And he's a guy who has the ability to make it to the pros. Why would he try to lose? That's not to say he didn't have issues. He got kicked off the team for what seems to be some pretty good reasons.
Good point, he's probably not the best example for this particular issue but he's certainly anti-VT now and the first person I thought of.
I don't know anything myself, but it's entirely possible that Travon was getting after somebody on the team (who this article is describing) for not trying, and the situation escalated to the resulting boot off the team.
ding ding, give that man a cigar.
Yeah but you know as well as I do French that when they go from the vocal majority to the silent minority its a huge change. College football teams of 125 people are always gonna have a few not bought in because of playing time, conflicts with coaches, etc. but the key is to have the majority rowing in the same direction, which it didn't seem like the case last year.
While I feel that this is likely true - but it is also possible that the guys that decided to stick around feel like their issues were addressed and are ready to turn the page and compete as a TEAM (one can hope at least)
A big part of this also is older guys giving up control of the team to new guys. This became Dax's and Tre's and Willis's and Keene's team last year and not Hill's and Savoy's and Kumah's and Jackson's. With the tension of the new guys taking over the leadership roles coupled with losing badly, I'm not surprised by this at all. With those guys now being the face of the program and having experience, they are probably way more comfortable being the voice in the locker room and saying "get on board or get the f out of the way" if there are still guys on the fence. Attitude reflects leadership so i'm not surprised it was this bad and i definitely won't be surprised to see a whole new vibe with the team this year.
We also don't have a lot of older guys. Last year we had 8 seniors (think on 1-2 were contributing and could be considered leaders). This year we have 2 (6 total). Guys like Dax and Hewitt are stepping up and leading by example to fill the void.
Attitude reflects leadership so i'm not surprised it was this bad and i definitely won't be surprised to see a whole new vibe with the team this year.
So much this! Did anyone else read this story and think about "Remember The Titans"? (the scene in camp in Gettysburg and Bertier's words- "Sometimes you gotta cut a man loose!"
Wish we could have pulled off a similar feat during last season as the Titans did in the movie, but I'll take it this season instead!
LET'S GO!!!
I'm gonna nitpick here, to defend Savoy. AFAIK he left for personal reasons as much as anything. College Park is ~10 miles from his family in DC. He's not trash-talked VT at all. Unlike Kumah and Hill who continue to run their mouths. Savoy wanted to be near family
Yea I shoulda clarified better. I didn't mean that each person I listed was being a cancer in the locker room. I was just pointing out how there was a changing of the guard in terms of production and now leadership. Young receivers surpassing experienced receivers and some (maybe not all) didn't handle it well.
There's always gonna be bad apples in any medium to large group of people.
They just need to not be in a position of people looking up, or supposed to be looking up to them.
I'm sure some of these holdovers could be swayed to be more positive by a good leader like Sam Rogers or Bryan Randall. Hopefully this team has that this year.
NBA: No Bad Apples
That's the version my 70 year old mother would come up with...
The hope is that Fuente "forced" all the culprits to transfer as opposed to just outright throwing them off the team.
Maybe some good news....
Bad cultures usually have a few vocal instigators and then people that are weaker that are just influenced by what's popular now (example:,Lindsey Graham with McCain and now Lindsey Graham with Trump).
My guess is that the moment the locker room "leaders" were removed and the new world was unveiled, the rest of the followers got right in step!
Best to get the 800 pound gorilla out of the corner and I'm the middle of the room now!!!
True but hopefully they are such a minority now (if they still exist) that will get on board or also leave (Ellis?).
Reading between the lines, this seems like the coaching administration is attempting to "take a bath" in one rare look behind the scenes to distance themselves from a divisive season.
I don't feel confident that all is magically well with foster leaving at end of year, continued incidents around workouts and coaches, complaints from students around said workouts, demands about players lounge, and turkey bacon.
I'll believe results when I see them. I'm sorry I've been a fuente fan 100% since the hire until last season (questions at least?) but this type of info tells me excuse time is over produce or leave.
That was my immediate reaction to reading the article - where did the attitude come from? And it never said that the transfers/dismissals actually excised the issue.
Getting to talk candidly with the coaches and the offseasons bknding did fix the issues. I'm sure there are more but the players really seem to be bonding more
Good to know
Wow. We all knew it was bad but this is incredible. I hope the cancer was removed and that this group gels into a team that can rally and compete for a Coastal championship and a shot at shocking Clemson.
Definitely confirms what we all saw first hand at ODU.
Reading this is shocking but not surprising... kind of like finding out a tumor is cancerous... it is always shocking to hear, but not necessarily a surprise.
Hard to win when you're playing against two teams.
Now that we're unshackled from this cancer I hope we start to beat the brakes off of every also ran ACC team on this schedule.
...and the refs. ACC refs hate us.
Cmon don't be an NC State fan
Oh man, this is on point!
seems like they handled last year about as well as we did
I'm really excited to see how this team does this year. I think the attitude is a lot better and this team will play for each other. We are going to be dangerous.
Agreed. Let's go in to this season with a chip on our shoulder and something to prove. 16 days till kickoff, but who's counting?
This kinda justifies everything that has been happening since last season. After reading that my confidence in Fuente and this program have been raised significantly. However, like French above, I'm not sure everyone has been removed, but one can hope that some of them have grown and changed.
I think that every team has "followers". There may have been some people with that attitude because they are easily influenced by others. Removing the bad attitudes probably helps folks with that kind of personality
I'm cheering harder for Tre this year than I would have anyway (which would be a lot).
How much are we betting that it was Kumah that said that?
Kumah caught a TD against Marshall so I'm going to say no.
I have heard a ton of scuttlebutt regarding Kumah, but he was their best blocker and second best receiver over the course of the last two games. It is so confusing.
I mean he had to produce so he could put good film out there in hopes of another P5 team taking a chance on him, but that doesn't mean he couldn't hope everybody else sucked and lose the game.
My sauces told me that Kumah left because the WR coach left and no real other reason.
Which is entirely reasonable considering he had graduated. He doesn't owe anyone anything at that point and if he wanted to go elsewhere then it was well within his rights. People need to quit bashing these guys and get over it. Onto the next season please.
Kumah was instrumental into flipping a 4* recruit to UNC instead of VT. There's plenty of bad blood there.
Instrumental is a stretch
We should really leave this alone because it doesn't do us or VT any good at all... BUT 4 DMs when there's obviously additional messages below (check the scroll bar) doesn't prove that Kumah is exonerated either. Doesn't mean he did anything more but that's still only part of the story and he controlled what messages were seen.
If you open the tweet there are a few more exchanges (referring to Goode and Adonis, I believe). I understand it's a clip that he controls, however, it was a conversation that he had. The exchange probably occurred without thinking he'd ever need to show anyone, so I'd like to figure this part is genuine. Only posted this to slow down people that are bashing and claiming unsubstantiated rumors against the guy. That is what doesn't do us or VT any good at all.
Don't speculate. Bad look. Delete this please.
TAVIEN PLS DELETE
I do remember him playing injured, doesn't sound like a saboteur to me.
IMHO it's probably Hill considering he was 1) Off the team already 2) A noted douche 3) Apparently likes to fight people
Let's just say chatter on 247 is it was Kumah not Hill.
Chatter on 247 is as toxic as raw sewage.
So we've got to assume it was Kumah, Hill, and Mook making noise right? I can't see JJ or Cunningham wanting to lose the Marshall game.
I'm really excited about the future of the young guys on this team. Think there are some real leaders in there that are going to flourish this season.
Was Mook around the team for the Marshall game?
Neither Mook or Hill were "on" the team for the Marshall game but I'm pretty sure both were in Blacksburg and had the ear of some of the young kids on the team.
both were in the stands with DJ crossen during the game and talking to players on the sideline.
2 things.
1. who cares what someone who is no longer on the team thinks.
2. you don't have to be part of the team to fight someone.
hypothetically speaking; I could bet on marshall and then DM tre turner and tell him if he catches a TD I'm going to fight him. I could wait outside of the stadium after the game and throw hands. then tre turner goes and scores a 45 yrd TD and I rethink it because eh it was only a $20 bet and I'm not that good of a fighter anyways. But if hazelton saw the messages and was interviewed and said yeah someone told tre not to catch a TD or they will fight him. it still happened.
I'm just over it. I'm with Fuente. leave it in the past. I trust all those people are no longer around. new season. new team. lets get after it!
(not directed at you gandia21)
DeAndre Plantin has been vocal on Twitter as well. I'd bet he had a part in it.
Forgot about him. Could've been Watts as well.
I don't think it would have been Mook. He was gone by that point
Highly unlikely that it was Mook, as he was dismissed before the season due to Athletic Department policy, not by Fuente. His father has posted support for the school and the coach on this website. His dismissal could have negatively affected attitudes but not by anything he did personally.
I hope people are just mentioning Mook as like a batsignal for JReynolds to come in and explain everything
IMO its disrespectful and terrible of a fan base to blindly guess at something like this publicly.
You're right that public speculation from fans isn't the best look, but there should absolutely be an investigation from the school or law enforcement, and names should be named publicly.
If in fact players were actually trying to throw games, how do we know gambling interests were not involved?
I agree that an investigation is warranted.
I get your point but respectfully disagree. We need to look forward and show out in 2019.
Unless there is any reason to think this sort of thing is continuing, let it die.
If this is just a case of sour grapes and hating on the program/coaches, then I agree there's no need to make this more public than it already is.
Edit: It sounds like these were just guys who didn't want to play in a bowl game. But it's astonishing to hear that kind of attitude coming from high level college football players.
I would say absolutely not in regards to naming names. That would be a horrible look and hurt recruiting even more. While I'm sure some of the players who transferred because of the negativity and not because they were part of it would like their names cleared, there is absolutely nothing to gain by releasing names and everything to lose (not to mention possible defamation law suits)
At this point its best of luck to anyone that left and we move forward.
Is it that blind though? The article says that those who had these feelings and made those statements are no longer on the team. It's pretty public knowledge of who has left. And frankly, anonymous users on the internet supporting their team are literally more productive to the program than players actively sabotaging games
Yes it is still blind. Some player left for other reasons. Some of the players may still be with the program. Supporting your team doesn't involve negative speculation into former or current players potential actions. Its an absolutely awful look if you get it wrong and you'll never know if you get it right.
I was going to upleg you for your great post, that I agree with but it's at 69 legs so I'm going to leave it be.
Other people didn't have the same courtesy so we're going for 100 now
Part of me wonders if Ellis was part of this when you see his parents acting the way they have been on Twitter. I agree with French that the purge probably hasn't completed but I would imagine the locker room cancers have been significantly reduced.
I am a Fuente fan and dont mean to be overly critical of him based on one article written more from a players perspective than a coaches but I got the impression from this article that the culture issueis something he noticed coming from a mile away but only stepped in to intervene after the season. I am definitely a monday morning qb here but I wish that team meeting was in September or October, not January.
Completely agree, and was wondering the same. I'm imagining he probably tried to manage expectations, but how do you tell a bunch of competitive kids that this season may not have a lot of wins, and you just need to go out there and try hard every down and improve, and down the road (when some of you have graduated) we will be better again. I'm sure the nuance was lost on some, and then when the team started losing, they lost motivation and it snowballed. Tough situation, but then again that's why the head whistle gets paid the big bucks. Managing this situation has to be within a successful coache's repertoire.
As a fan on the other hand, I will not tolerate any losing!
Forecasting is the most difficult job of any leader. You're always hoping for the best and preparing for the worst, but you have to be so careful about how and when you communicate such things with your group (team). I'm sure as Fuente looks back, he likely wishes he would have done some things differently, but thats the case for any leader.
I read it differently. Really Fuente was proverbially between a rock and a hard place. He can see it coming but he needs to win games and losing so many players is not a prospect any coach wants to happen. It appears he tried to appeal to everyone to make things work. They didn't. Some players just couldn't change so it was time to cut things out.
I really can't fault him there. But hopefully lesson learned.
What are you going to do?
Say "You older guys just aren't up to par, and the new guys just aren't experienced enough to replace you yet"? That some of the guys attitudes were the problem?
Fuente just isn't the guy to sugar coat things.
This article explains so much that was suspected. Let's hope the new culture of unity and purpose is pervasive and leads to Coastal crown, at the very least.
Wonder if that might be the reason the tackling seemed so elementary awful last year? Guys were afraid they'd get their asses kicked or have other stuff done to them if they made tackles.
Ashby must be the baddest dude in the locker room then because he was tackling every damn body.
The second coming of James Harrison
On a lighter note, everyone remember to not get mad when we wear orange uniforms this season.
I'm still going to get mad. I've chosen to die on that hill and will put my money where my mouth is.
As a fellow denigrator of orange jerseys, I will admit that the right combination of orange cleats could look fugging HOT.
gonna be right there with you. Orange should always be secondary, and these kids will know better someday.
Amen
Wow. I think we all surmised this, but to see it in writing is something else. I really appreciate Fuente's openness with this article and that they actually listened to the team and made changes. If we win 10 games and it's because of turkey bacon, I'm done lol.
Loved this:
He and his wife, Cheryl, still live in Blacksburg, but on the market is their 8,000-square foot, $2.2 million home. They plan to downsize and are currently on a waiting list for a housing community. The man who won more games at Virginia Tech than anyone else is on a waiting list in Blacksburg? Beamer chuckles.
For the guys who left the program who openly rooted against us- have fun trying to play at your new school or professionally when everyone knows you don't give a shit about winning. No coaching staff will ever want you ever again. You fucked yourself.
Hopefully with a cactus*
*credit to Alum07 for forever planting this in my mind
The old sit and spin
- The guys with a cactus in their butts
We get to play a significant number of those players this year. BUD FOSTER REVENGE TOUR LED BY DAX AND TRE!
That was absolutely infuriating to read. I had a much longer post here but I'm deleting it to stay within community guidelines.
I'm 100% with you on this, however I will just say that, on a positive note, I absolutely love the fact that we've got young guys on this team, that are clearly natural leaders, who ignored the negativity and outright threats and continued to play to win.
I've only played football in a small town high school, so I know it's a different world in some ways, but one way it is not a different world is that you have to have enough self respect and pride to never give up on yourself and your teammates. That's what makes this infuriating, but it is also why I love seeing that that's gone (at least mostly) and the young guys are still all in.
The good thing about all of this is there is nothing that builds cohesion like a collective struggle. This should bode well for those that stuck it out. Knowing that makes me even more excited about seeing what these guys bring this season.
I can only say Wow to this article. If this is in fact true, I would have to say that fuente is a very strong coach. Mutiny is tough to manage, and the noise from sour grapes makes for a shit show. I hope that this has been squashed, and coach can get back to teaching the players how to win.
I hope Tre Turner kicked someone's ass after that game.
Edit: I also hope that somewhere, on someone's phone, is video of said asskicking, and that someday, somehow, that video makes it to TKP. One can dream.
Wait, wait, wait- Beamer is ON A WAITING LIST?!?! Are you serious? Get this man in a home people!
But not like a retirement home home, get him in something simple but very nice and expensive
I'm sure this won't be brought up at the presser in an hour and a half
Prepare yourself, coachspeak is coming
Any chance you could get some video even just for twitter?
For anyone that hasn't seen it, it was brought up in question 3 and Fuente pretty much summarily dismissed it, saying "This year...let's talk about this year. I haven't read the article and I don't want to talk about it, like, I'm sure it's great, I'm sure it's well written, I'm sure it's fantastic, but...this year. We're moving to this year."
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKt1BnD0quY
I noticed that tech omitted that part in the transcript that they released. Not sure if that's a common practice but made me go hmmm
https://s3.amazonaws.com/sidearm.sites/vatech.sidearmsports.com/document...
Guys - let's not try and go on a witch hunt of who were the cancer and are they still around. If they are gone - great. If they are still there - I hope they get an opportunity to change their attitude. It certainly seems like it's better at the moment.
Or we can go all in on a witch hunt! /s
Wish there was a gif
It was interesting to see this article and it was a well timed piece of PR. It sounds like Fuente was pushing the team too hard or in ways that didn't make sense to them. Therefore he lost his connection to the group in the process. Most importantly, he lost some in the locker room who needed to be the leaders; not only did they choose not to lead, they chose to trash the team or leave. This is a huge leadership failure. All other factors aside, this is totally unacceptable from the head whistle. He wasn't proactive, he didn't anticipate and it cost the program and this team a lot. There can be no more of this.
A good first step back from this big time failure is that he spoke with his customers, and he deserves a ton of credit for that. I believe he is a genuine person who can really connect with people. I think he has a clear vision and a great demeanor and there is no doubt he will be a great head coach sooner or later.
I'd love to see the team go hard this year for Bud, and now, for the program as a whole. Time is up on this transition. Let's go beat some ass and shock a few people.
I was just about to post something similar about Fu...I know youre wrapped in your day to day, but it should take the end of the year to come in and say..."Ok, whats going on?"
This may be why he seems a bit "lighter" this year..
Hard Disagree
I certainly don't like it but sometimes shit just has to come to a head. We don't know that he wasn't being proactive. He could have decided to try to be diplomatic to everyone and was being proactive that way, instead of favoring one side. No coach is going to look great if he proactively starts pushing kids out for seemingly no reason. Can you imagine the fan uproar if he did that? That many players gone proactively? Come on now. Lets get some perspective here.
I almost posted this exact same thing. People were all over the staff and coaches for Adonis Alexander and Mook Reynolds' issues which were clear violations of policy and publicly known. I can't even imagine the reaction if veteran players had been kicked off the team with no comment.
Letting the culture and attitude of the team get so bad that 'starters deciding to transfer' was the least troubling thing happening on this team over the last 12 months is not now, nor ever will it be acceptable and that is 100% on the leaders desk. I know that's a pretty opinionated statement and different from how you may feel, but if you would, please hear me out.
Regarding this argument specifically, yours and others definition of proactivity is pushing players out before things got out of hand, as you stated. That's not what I was thinking of exactly.
Where I believe Justin was not proactive was change management (seeking feedback and involving the team in the change from the very beginning), setting expectations (perhaps regarding his own expectations for the season), and understanding that he would need leaders (especially the more senior guys) to embrace him on a higher order than others - developing relationships and layers of leadership that really help drive home the culture and keep people motivated even in down times.
Lastly, I don't think this is an indictment of the leader and coach he can be. I am assuming he just didn't know what he didn't know about running AND changing an organization like VT's football program. We weren't the end-of-the-rope Memphis Tigers that just needed everyone to shut up and listen because nothing else was working. At the end of the day, he did screw up in this area, he knows it, and after that screw up, he took the very best next step any leader could have.
Let's hope this year is one for the books. I think the guys will have a chip on their shoulder this year and I think our coaching staff is always growing and learning. That's a good recipe for VT football.
He had to change the culture and not damage the legend he replaced. Tough tightrope to walk.
Agreed. That is a unique and difficult challenge that I think he and the program has handled well overall. I still consider the fanbase lucky for where we are at this point in time.
I'm definitely not absolving Fuente of blame. (not that you said I was) He is the Big Whistle so everything is ostensibly his responsibility.
But I think a really important message in this article is just how much fan speculation goes awry and lands far from the truth. There were problems. We as fans could see it. Fuente said he could see it coming. But the intricacies were much different than what we fans understood.
As such, I think it's hard to speculate that Fuente wasn't being proactive and taking steps either similar to what you mention or others that we don't know about. I personally believe he was trying to be proactive and was trying to appease both sides. That plan failed and he needs to own that and learn from it.
Short of sending players packing there really would be no way for fans to see or understand the steps he took to prevent what happened from happening. That's for him and Whit to discuss, and why would that need to be made public? Managing an organization you never want dirty laundry aired but if you have to you want to control what laundry it is and when is the right time to do so. Explaining all the measures he took isn't the message to convey. A change in culture due to intervention and the team being right with themselves now after the turmoil is the right message to convey.
You have good points. I don't know at all what was or what was not done. The outcome seems to tell the story pretty plainly though, in my opinion - 'seems' and 'my opinion' being the operative words. I think Fuente cares about his players, the culture and doing the right thing. We should be on the up and up for the next few years here. Excited to see how it plays out.
I'm not sure this was a leadership failure so much as a transition that some players just weren't happy about.
I still have a lot of confidence in Fuente. He's moving in a direction. The players can speak their minds, but they need to either get on the train, or leave the station.
Reading some scuttlebutt from other sites, I think up until this year, Fuente's approach was hyper discipline based with coaches yelling at players and extra conditioning etc. Yelling just doesn't work for some people, and I think a contingent of the team just didn't respond and folded. I think he's made a concerted effort to be more personal and engaged with his players moving forward. I think it was difficult for him because he's honestly a pretty introverted and detached guy, but he's starting to come around to what it takes to build better team chemistry. We should see dividends.
Maybe this is a good place to add my thought.
The thing that troubled me about the article was the Fuente seemed to genuinely not know what was going on. Now maybe that's just the reporter's view, or something he got from a player. But what does it say if the coach got to January and honestly didn't know why some of his players were rooting against their own team?
Or was the "what is going on" directly related to the transfers? Or a general way to open up a transparent team meeting?
I don't think he didn't know what was going on; I just think he didn't know why it was going on. Can't fix a problem if you don't know the cause.
Big fan of this excerpt
Wow. All I will say to any of the players who were rooting for their own team to fail: Fuck you, good riddance.
Now, for the guys still here, I am excited to see how this season unfolds. It sounds like the locker room is worlds apart from where it was last year, and that should translate to the field. GO HOKIES.
EDIT: and for the guys who did not root for our demise, but pursued other options at a different school, best of luck to you.
All I will say for the players that were rooting against their own team is: WHY? Was this an attempt to push out the coaching staff by losing as much as possible? Players living the dream in hopes of achieving better don't just decide to root against their own success in a vacuum. WTF? Oh, and good riddance as well. I just hope whatever caused that change in attitude went with them.
It's just petty vindictiveness, isn't it?
By the time a player is rooting against their own team, it's clearly not going to get fixed for them. They're just mad they didn't get their way.
It's not in the interest for a player's team to lose, even if they're planning on leaving.
"maybe this year should be about the group of players who stayed here, the ones last year who battled both the opponent and their own teammates"
I'm glad this is out there in the ether for everyone to see now. This gets me pretty fired up for this season.
Kudos to Fuente for getting it turned around. But I'm more curious to know how things got that way? Were those guys just old blood that didn't jive with the new staff? This is a good article that reassures me things have changed but it didn't really answer many questions about how things got to be that way.
There is no way this didn't get out on the recruiting trail. We need to reset the narrative this season with some good wins and a good atmosphere in Lane.
The fact that they are gone also should have gotten out on the recruiting trail...both sides of the story.
Don't you think the 'cruits asked what NBA stood for?
What does NBA stand for???
N-Butyl Alcohol
New Biscuits Available
No Bitches Allowed
"What does NBA stand for???"
After reading this article, the only possible meaning is Nomore Bullshitting Asswipes. Or maybe not, asswipe might be too nice a term for a turncoat encouraging his teammates to lose a game.
Have we considered that it may be No Bitch Asses and not No Bitches Allowed? 🤔
I much prefer no bitch asses and that is what it's gonna be in my head
It did that's why some coaches were candidly doing a snow job in their comments about VT during ACC media days. It is absolutely being used in recruiting. And I'll bet a mack truck I know who is the most vocal doing it.
Perhaps a Brown Mack truck?
Hm... I almost got it guys.
Just need one more hint. /s
The rumors about Tre Turner wanting to transfer near the end of last season make a lot more sense now, and I think the fact that he stuck around and didn't says a lot about the state of the team now.
BC better take notice. This team is about to exercise some demons.
Damn right! Nobody likes fat demons.
BC coaches reading that article like
Can't wait to use this gif after the BC game...
A good season this year will be huge to impact this narrative. If we can win 9ish+ games then Fu can use that as fuel for the "you overcame the adversity" narrative and officially establish a new culture.
I don't know. I hate to say it but I think fuente has officially established his "brand" on the recruiting trail. I don't think you come back from that with a couple of extra wins this year.
I think the damage is longer form.
Beyond that, he's in uncharted territory now. We aren't watching a madman genius apply his formula, we are watching a guy figure out how to make things work, and stumble, on the fly.
This sticks around and hurts us in recruiting for a while. Not saying we can't come back from it, but it doesn't just go away either.
Counterpoint: Penn State football after Sandusky. Even though they had a coaching change, if they can come back from what happened at there, as an infinitely more serious sign of toxic culture around the football program, in short order then I think VT can bounce back almost entirely with a successful season and no major blow ups.
Thank you for this article, honestly.
Or
Gif attention to detail.
Left the original for collective enjoyment.
Boy, am I ready to see some football being played. I truly hope this team balls out to the point where we can put the '12-'18 seasons in the rearview.
Wait a sec, for the most part I actually didn't hate the 2016 season. There were rough points (Syracuse and GT especially), but also some VERY good points.
i'll give you '16, if we can beat GiT this year, I can't stand their fans or that school
A lot of what was seen last season makes more sense now. I really hope the better attitudes translate into a far better team this year.
I also like how Fuente addresses the 2020 recruiting class being small for various reasons.
Good move by Fuente/Athletic department to be a part of this article and control the narrative. A lot of members of the media think VT is falling part, but this article suggests that our decent downward is over and we're climbing up. Hopefully this puts fans and recruits at ease.
That said, I do wonder why the near-mutiny started in the first place...
I was thinking the same thing while reading this. Fuente wanted this story out there (which is smart) also seems like they made a point to let players be open with quotes too. That to me is the best sign of this article. There is a clear trust between the players and Fuente that they are doing what is best for the program and that everyone is on the same page moving forward.
I didn't think it was decent at all, in fact, I thought the downward was terrible.
I hate myself for chuckling at this. Am I becoming an English teacher?
Me too! lol
Damn! That puts this change in perspective.
This team is gonna overachieve and bury opponents.
https://media.tenor.com/images/add0d21e8ad5439f657892cb4eb02a5a/tenor.gif
This team needs to win this year.
After an article like this comes out the last thing we need to do is have another clunker of a season on the field. You better believe every recruit we are in on is paying attention and has read this article. If we don't start winning and doing so soon, things like this have a tendency to snowball.
Aside from the obvious, one big takeaway here is that Fuente opened the program up to an outsider and gave him access to players and coaches. I don't think we've ever gotten content like this that wasn't a reconfiguration of the same press-conference quotes that everyone gets. Hopefully this starts a trend?
I doubt it starts a trend. I think this was specifically designed to address this issue and put it to bed.
No way. This might be too tin foily for some folks but Fuente wanted this. He wanted to try to clear his name.
By saying his program became toxic? He just took a massive black eye. If he wanted this to come out it is counter to the strategy of head coaches.
All this stuff began to hurt the brand, not just Fuente. Everyone will look at this differently. I choose to look at it as a decision to say we screwed up, players screwed up, and it is in the past. This hurts Fuente more than it helps. It helps the program more than it hurts IF they win this year. He sees the same risk we do, if things are still bad then he just played his last card, it's gone, no safety net. No excuse will work moving forward.
That's exactly what I'm saying. That's why this whole article is bizarre to me.
I think this article allowed Fuente to control the narrative. He's saying the program was toxic, but we're passed that. If he didn't do this, there would be an open question around if the program is still toxic.
I see what you did there.
I see what you did their.
That should have been a pick 6.
Yep lol it should have. That was such a fun game to attend. Swirling monsoon in Lane. Rakeem Cato lighting us up. Logan doing Logan things. Almost an 80 yard fat guy touchdown? It's not a game that gets brought up very much because Marshall but that game is an all timer for me.
I totally agree. That game was my junior year I think and one of my favorites in Lane. Although if we had lost, it would have been one of the worst
We have different ideas of "fun" lol. I was following on my phone during a wedding in Lancaster, PA with spotty reception and about had a heart attack. Much booze was required after that final whistle.
Same feeing. I was driving down to the outer banks and listening on my phone, the whole time shaking my head in disbelief.
Agreed completely! How many people just on this chat board have said some variation of "Man this explains so much." And "Man! I am so much more excited for this season now". Definitely intentional.
I agree. This was a pointed effort to stop the speculation about what was going on, and that the ship has been righted. We've been saying for a while other coaches have been using it against us on the recruiting trail. I'm guessing this was at Whit's direction.
But he spent all that time hanging "no reporters allowed" signs around Lane. He's got plans for a moat too but he can't get the EPA to finish the Environmental Impact Study.
As I read through the article I found myself surprisingly unsurprised. The collective $h1tstorm that lead to the 2018 football season is one for the ages.
All of you guys know that I'm not bullish on Fuente at the moment (I'm simply in a wait and see posture with the 2019 season), but dang... I don't know of a coach in the country that would have had success having been dealt the exact same situation (the one in the article combined with all the other stuff that the program dealt with).
Honestly, as I read the article I couldn't help but feel really hopeful for the future of VT football! We are, and have been for a few years, a middling P-5 football program in the worst division of all P-5 conferences, and still managed to go to a bowl game and beat our in-state rivals for the 15th straight year on the way. When one considers all the stuff that Fuente and Co. were dealing with last year, it really is a miracle that we won as many games as we did. Maybe the reason none of us really know what Fuente's vision is for this football program is because he's been managing this s$1t for the last three years and therefore hasn't been able to really lay the groundwork for what he wants to do.
In any event, kudos to the staff for keeping the young guys around, for learning on the job, and for taking a big step in the right direction for solidifying some sort of culture in Blacksburg.
"I don't know of a coach in the country that would have had success having been dealt the exact same situation (the one in the article combined with all the other stuff that the program dealt with)."
The problem is he let things get that bad in the first place. Ultimately if he wins this year it will look like he just had some bad characters on the team that sunk things. If this year is another clunker it will look like he only succeeded when Beamer left him a bunch of guys who got drafted by the NFL.
He's managing a transition.
He did a decent job of it, but last year we had lost a lot of the senior guys, and some of the leftovers were in open rebellion.
I expect things to start getting better.
it start snow.
So we're back to "the problem was the Beamer kids left over" that I was told was an oversimplification.
I hope it gets better. They have to prove it to me.
Yes, they have to prove it. To all of us, and to themselves, too.
But this article does prove that some of the problem was attitude, with players who felt pushed aside actively hoping for the program to fail.
If you have a strong coach, which every indication I've seen describes Fuente, you will either get on board with the new regime or will feel very uncomfortable about the situation.
Makes for an uncomfortable transition, but potentially a stronger future.
I'd say Harbaugh and Saban are strong coaches and I don't recall anything quite like this happening in the first three years of their tenures.
They took over a college football after 29 years of a successful, beloved coach who was known for being a nice guy, too?
Seriously, don't you think there might have been some similar changes if one of those guys had taken over at VT?
I do.
Well, Saban took over for Dave Shula, who's got a reputation as being a super nice guy.
The point is that in a profession full of coaches with strong personalities that change jobs and end up inheriting kids from previous coaches, none to my immediate recollection have had things happen so publicly as what happened to VT. Maybe it's a little off-base to pin it entirely on the kids and not at all on the head coach?
I think it's a little off-base to say that any coach could have come in and turned things around without upsetting any of the players.
No one's saying that except for the people holding Fuente harmless. There's a difference between "you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs" and "you can't make an omelet without setting the kitchen on fire first".
I suppose it depends on if you believe we just needed a new line cook, or if the kitchen needed renovating.
Fuente is a new head chef. There were going to be some changes.
Yes, it's ultimately all on him. But anybody that didn't expect any changes was sure to be surprised.
Did Saban and Harbaugh have a transfer portal? Different world.
This seems like an opportune time to remind everyone that you have always been able to transfer in college football. Usually it takes a year off if you do, unless you have a waiver (Shea Patterson is a pre-portal example), or are a grad transfer where you are completely unrestricted and immediately eligible. The portal has certainly brought more attention to it, perhaps even popularized it, but the only real difference seems to be that a lot of players early on in the craze got immediate eligibility in situations that they probably wouldn't have in previous years (Justin Fields, Tate Martell, etc.)
Hot take - this is one of the best GIFs in TKP history.
Thanks, I thought it had meaning on multiple levels as I created it, most importantly to make fun of myself and the portal taking over my off season life.
This is amazing
This is totally just taking a PR bath. Like you said, I'll believe results when I see them.
I think this follows us on recruiting.
I want Christmas to get here!
HELL NO! That means we only have TWO games left in the season.
I keep seeing variations of this narrative but I don't understand why people seem to think this situation was completely under Fuente's control. He's dealing with about one hundred 18-22 year old young men who have free will. Sure he probably could have done some things better, but he most likely could have done things far worse as well (we lose to UVA, miss a bowl, Tre and Dax transfer).
If it was so easy to make the perfect decision in every scenario, why hasn't anyone here become wealthy enough to donate enough for VT to be financially competitive with Alabama or Clemson? And why aren't any of us married to Emma Watson?
I mean, how hard can it possibly be to manufacture polyester athletic clothes and get some lowly-paid Asian workers to manufacture it?
Seems like all you need is a catchy logo and marketing. I mean, how is Under Armour "genius"?
We need some donors who can do that. Maybe we're just not doing our part as donors... /s
I wouldn't call it genius. Personally I believe that many times success results from luck as much as it does from genius (or the genius portion is actually exploited). Which goes back to my point that while it's likely Fuente made some missteps, I believe it's likely that much of the team chemistry issue was outside of his control and essentially bad luck.
a) Of course it's not all under his control, but part of his job is managing the roster.
b)It's not easy. No one is saying it's easy. That's why Fuente is paid millions of dollars a year. He gets all the credit for when things go well, shouldn't some of the blame fall at his feet too?
He's paid millions of dollars because that's the market value established for a mid/upper tier P5 coach. If Whit hired Rocco to be our next coach, you'd be getting paid millions of dollars too. I understand why people want to make a connection to his salary because it is a lot more money than the average person makes, but honestly it's irrelevant in this case.
Also I agree that Fuente likely deserves some of the blame. I think Fuente would agree and accept that as well. My point is that difficult situations happen and can't always be prevented. We suffered 4 straight losses but beat UVA and Marshall to make a bowl so I'd point out that the season easily could have been much worse.
I hope these guys feel like assholes when we get going this year
Seems to me that those assholes are incapable of introspection.
Any question about the NBA shirts now?
'Nother Beer Amigo
whoever I stole this from originally I'm sorry but I think about it every time this shirt is posted.
No problem amigo.
The front says more than the back, IM(ns)HO.
No Backing Away.
For the love...what does this stand for? Please...
No Bitches Allowed...just my guess. Perhaps No Bitching Allowed.
i'm guessing no bullshit allowed
This is pretty infuriating. Hokie club dollars at work, funding scholarships, housing, and exclusive luxury dining/training facilities to players who don't even think putting their best out there is even worth it. Its a slap in the face to donors and to their fellow players who put their bodies (and brains) on the line to play their heart out.
I hope anyone found to have said anything of that sort has their scholarship ripped away with the potential to earn it back. And if they graduated, release their name.
While I agree it's not proper, a contribution to the Hokie Club doesn't buy a certain attitude, or thought process, or agreement to act a certain way. It funds the school and their pursuit of athletes to fill out the teams. While every effort is made to ensure the product on the field, and the people within that product, are respectable and respected, it doesn't always go that way. Especially if you've been around high school athletes recently.
Correct, but it's a squandered opportunity, and immaturity on those athletes' part.
Agreed, but as a donor, you cannot dictate a behavior, especially from someone that is immature. Or doesn't appreciate the opportunity.
This is absolutely true.
I agree, but disagree. I'll explain.
The donation doesn't buy an attitude, but verbalizing that the team should take a dive HAS to be against the code of conduct of any sports team. And YES, the donation may not buy an attitude, but the scholarship does come with an adherence to a set of rules of conducts.
The lack of effort isn't even the whole thing, its trying to promote that attitude to other members of the team and undermining the coach.
Current players should be held accountable for cancerous behavior and players with one foot out the door should be called out.
Unfortunately, it's the head coaches fault. Any person is capable of being crappy to others and their team. It's the leaders job to make sure that doesn't happen. Fuente failed here and he can correct it.
I think he did correct it.
I think he probably did too, and I think he'll carry this one with him for the rest of his career. We all have lessons like those! I support Justin Fuente 100%.
I support Fuente 100%, but mostly because there is no point in not supporting him....
This is interesting given the fact that the first half against Marshall was the best the offense looked all season.
Also, I know everyone has to say the streak has to end at some point, but seriously, if UVA couldn't win last season, when will they?
Unity can be inspired against by a common enemy.
And, here is another thing I am chewing on. Why would Fuente and the communications folks work with the author and do interviews if this is the tenor of the piece? Here are the cons:
1) By laying blame solely at the feet of the departed players, it isn't a good look. It burns bridges in their hometowns and doesn't feel like there is accountability from the school and the system for letting the toxicity get to that point.
2) If they don't look like a completely different team this year, the tenor of the comments look disingenuous. This feels more like a rebrand- hey THIS year things are going to be different a mind better. Get your tickets now. Then if they lose, the excuse (the cancers) are gone. It is a big roll of the dice from a PR standpoint.
3. Are all the cancers gone? When you look at the guys who left, it is very difficult to correlate these comments with the effort shown on the field. Hill, for all the off the field issues, never appeared to be dogging it on the field. Kumah was blocking his ass off and was making more plays in the last couple of games than at any point in his career. Cunningham maintained a high level of blocking despite constantly being out-sized.
If there are guys I questioned their effort, two were facing severe emotional trauma (Savoy and Gaines.) There are a handful of other question marks still on the team. I am going to give them the benefit of the doubt to kick this season off. But I am worried.
What about Josh Jackson? I don't want to headhunt, but there is no mention of him being a potential issue. He had potential to become a solid QB but I always thought he lacked leadership skills and charisma on the field. Easily could translate to the locker room especially when you aren't playing.
You are basically speculating that a guy who BROKE HIS LEG FOR VT wanted to submarine the season
Never said he wanted us to lose. As a team leader at QB, one would expect him to still lead in the locker room. Just never seemed like he was never that person after he was injured. Watching Willis succeed better than most thought, QP and Hooker down the barrel, I don't think its that big of a speculation for him to not care about the rest of the season/career at Tech (hence why he transferred).
Were you on the sidelines or at practice? I'm not saying this to be a jerk, but how on earth would any of us know based on the brief shots of him on the sidelines in street clothes?
Josh Jackson won games in a VT uniform, played hard, played smart and got hurt. Now he wants to go somewhere he'll get playing time, which he knew he wasn't likely to get here. I think it's just that simple.
My take - without the ability to be in the locker room or huddle we have to work with what we read and *see*. What we saw from Dax is what we wanted to see from our QB and others. In my opinion Jackson just appeared to be too soft spoken and mellow (just based on what I saw). That can incorrectly imply a lack of leadership.
I agree, Jackson was too chill. Hell, Tyrod was a "soft spoken leader" but everyone knew he meant business and wanted to win at all cost.
Are you trying to say "Hakuna Matata" isn't the best motto for a college QB?
I mean technically, he didn't break his leg for VT...."You wanna see how much I love VT, gimme that sledgehammer...fuck you shin!"
He had his leg broken while playing for VT
That being said, I can't imagine JJ was one of those guys, but I can see where he didn't seem to be vocal enough, or passionate enough, to win over the locker room. His demeanor kind of reminds me of Cutler.
This is really what I meant. Shouldn't have said he is an issue, just saying I felt that he could have helped the situation since he was one of the last Beamer recruits/experienced players to be the glue of the team.
He was part of it
This is certainly the other side of the coin here. Some of the players (people here and elsewhere are accusing as being the problem ones) have already reacted on twitter. I do agree that there could be some backlash from the communities who might rally behind some of the kids who left here and feel attacked, whether warranted or not.
I think in the short term, it's a gamble Fuente is willing to make to correct the issues on the field and get the program heading back in the right direction. If we start winning and things get better within the program, we might be able to weather the storm of some bad press, hurt feelings, and (possibly) locked out of schools or certain areas. However, if things don't get better, then we just hurt a bunch of people who will continue to drag the program, and not have the wins to weather the storm. We are entering an extremely pivotal season here, with the stakes increasing more and more.
It's been said in a few places that this is a pivotal season for his tenure, so not much has changed IMO.
If Fuente had 1 fault. I do think he looked out and saw the talent gap between the guys who had left early different ways and the lack of talent of the 2015 2016 classes and pushed the young ones hard to close that gap . He had talent gaps and they had to be filled by 1st and 2nd year guys even though he knew they would not be ready he pushed maybe a little to hard and that he kind of admits as much in saying they backed off a bit
I don't think the tone lays the blame solely on the departed players at all. If nothing else Fuente's "What is it? What's wrong?" question to the team is an admission that he didn't have a true sense of what was going on with his players.
I think getting this out there is huge to address the elephant in the room and now they have an opportunity to look forward vs. back.
They will win 9-10 games this year.
Context here is everything. If it takes a special meeting to get things out in the open and resolved perhaps the trust level needs improvement?
Trust always needs improvement, particularly with a young team. That said, someone else isn't always to blame and most of the time it is multiple people, factors, etc. that play a role.
I take this as Fuente airing out his personal failures from last year and attempting to take ownership of his role. Are the toxic players being accountable for being crappy teammates? Will they stand behind a "let's lose" mentality? They don't get let of the hook just because someone else (Fuente, Hilgart, etc.) also made mistakes, and they deserve no sympathy.
All organizations, teams, families, etc. have issues - some deal with them and others avoid them.
Oh Fuente gets some of the blame but without vocal team leaders it can be very difficult to find out what is "wrong". The negative folks are rarely vocal to the management. It takes the leaders to facilitate these discussions. Fuente needs to learn how to develop leaders to help when there are not natural leaders in the locker room.
I manage 50+ people. The comment about a player wanting turkey bacon in the dining hall made me laugh. Another "non-issue issue". Sometime you can't predict the shit people complain about.
I think you can also reach out, but if no one is willing to talk, or perhaps they feel like they'd be beaten if they spoke up about it by teammates, that can hinder a leader's ability to handle the situation.
Team leaders stand up against those who threaten to beat or discipline someone. It's not easy and that's why not everyone is a leader. There are times that leaders become the source of negativity and a manager needs to recognize that and empower those who are silent.
I think its good PR. PR is important for recruiting. Recruits want to know why the season went poorly. This was a BIG reason why. Control the narrative.
And internally it sounds like Fuente is admitting fault with all the changes they have made this year. I think that is the correct way to handle this situation. I don't think there is any benefit to publicly admit fault...... if there are people who need to hear more address that internally correct those things internally and give promise for the future.
Agree with #3 - Fuente is definitely gambling here. Let's hope it turns out well.
I view the article as a response about the leadership on the team now. A lot of those guys are sophomores but they went through a terrible situation. Is all the cancer gone? Assuredly not, but if you have the right players in leadership positions, it doesn't matter.
We knew the root of the issue was leadership last summer when Mooks situation went down. There was probably a very clear decision to have Tre, Dax et.al quoted. That's the future of the team.
I disagree with you entirely about laying blame solely at the feet of players in this article, though, it does take some logical thinking or experience in management to understand what the REAL problem was here.
Fuente called an emergency meeting to find out what was going on., aka, what is this coaching staff doing wrong? He got the finger pointed at him and he made changes. That is in plain sight here. A problem emerged and Fuente didn't know what to do about it.
I like the move to let the story out in small bits - starting with the very relevant fact that some players wanted to lose and threatened their team members if they scored. That does say something about certain individuals and it's worth saying, in my opinion.
The narrative out of Blacksburg will develop bit by bit as the pre-season and early season progresses. The final story will be that Fuente lost a good part of his team as he is learning how to run a big and changing program, so he sought their feedback to right the ship. In that context, this whole thing was a natural occurrence.
We just need to win and I think we'll do that.
Let's be honest, comms and PR have not been a strength of this team/Athletic Department as a whole recently.
Devil's advocate, point by point:
1) Nobody was named. It doesn't read that they are blaming "everyone" who decided to leave either. It clearly says that some just wanted a change. I suspect, like Tre apparently, many just wanted out of the cancerous locker room. So kudos to Fuente for getting those who did to change their mind. I don't think this will have much impact at anyone's HS.
2) PR is always about timing. You pay for what you get and so releasing this article just before the season makes the MOST sense. It sets the tone and yeah, if it helps ticket sales you take it. That's a win win, which is what PR is all about. If they are not a different team and these same issues are still around Fuente is not gonna be here much longer anyway.
3) Saw this comment a few times and here's my reply. People that are always pushing others to perform badly ALWAYS want to look good themselves. They want other people to take the bullet while they keep looking like shit don't stick to them. It surprises me in no way that players who could have been the cancer performed well in any game. That's why they were pushing Tre and others to do their dirty work for them. Secondly, some players who were on the dark side could still be on the team but they weren't the leaders (or I would suspect) and so will follow the tenor of the program because that's what they do, follow. And if they are still bad, well, the new leaders like Dax and Tre will hopefully be able to work with Fuente to either set them straight or cut them loose. Those are all positive steps.
Totally agree on #1. I've seen this too many times from leaders. It's always easier to blame and replace people rather than understand and address the real issues and causes, especially when you are part of it as the leader! Time will tell. Given this is only what has been released publicly, so here's to hoping everyone in the program is taking a hard look at themselves and making any necessary changes.
I agree with your points. This whole angle is a huge PR gamble for Fuente. It is concerning that he either knowingly allowed team chemistry to deteriorate to such a degree before taking action, or simply was unaware of the pulse of the locker room. For all the praise that people give Fu (some warranted, some not quite yet), I do believe he was somewhat naive walking into VT from an overall program management standpoint and recruiting. This is not Memphis, and you can't simply copy and paste that blueprint here and expect the same results. You are also dealing with athletes of a different caliber who have significant options other than VT coming out of high school. I hope that he has learned and adjusted his approach accordingly, and signs seem to indicate that is the case.
However, if the team looks just as poor this year, Fu and Co are going to have a tremendous amount of egg on their faces. The whole circling the wagons against the bad guys and NBA talk will be a laughing stock if this team can't prove something on the field. It will be hard to give this staff much credibility. The stakes for this season are now incredibly high.
I don't see this as a "gamble" at all.
That statement makes the assumption that this is just spin by Fuente, as opposed to an angle that an SI reporter decided to take.
Now that's just a bit too harsh. I hate always being the defender of Fuente (I think he needs to produce some results but deserves our support and the time to get it done), but this is a downright insulting take. He's made mistakes, no doubt, but I don't think his approach (or the challenge of it) is quite so simplistic as people here seem to imply.
Fuente was going to be judged by this season's results no matter what. Many of the other discussions on TKP reflect that. I don't think this article makes a whole lot of difference, except maybe to the players affected. With any luck, it's a little additional motivation for the team.
And UVA still couldn't beat us
That was my takeaway too
Hope we can send Bud off in style with a 16 game win streak over those guys. 16 is a number UVa doesn't like very much (think UMBC seeding)
Big Play Tre just took a HUGE jump up in my All Time Favorite Hokie Rankings. Give me 11 guys like him, and we can do great things here. What I really want to know, though, is did the fight actually happen, and how badly did Tre kick his ass?
I'd take 22 guys like Tre, plus some specialists, but its a good point.
One other thing VT fans live in a bubble . There are 120 other teams and they all have problems see FSU and others We don't hear about them but we are not on their message pay boards ect. The thing is it will blow over and the good thing when you look at it we did not lose a player that hurt us or that may have been a problem getting beat out by other guys . Other than Hill who is better than anyone at that spot we really probably helped ourselves last year because we either played guys before they were ready and they got experience and they guys like Mook , Alexander and so on would have been gone this year anyway
Holy Fuck.
I'm just going to put this out there because I see a lot of speculation and some folks actually making accusations at former Tech players (side note: If you ever want to see the depraved depths of humanity, there's always Twitter, Yahoo Answers, and the comments section on YouTube). I get it, we all want to know who these players were and we don't want this sort of thing to have happened in this program - a program that we all love.
But maybe...JUST MAYBE...NOT EVERY PLAYER THAT IS GONE WAS MAKING THESE STATEMENTS.
I mean, I know it may seem hard to believe, but perhaps there were players that left for any number of other reasons, not the least of which is to get playing time after graduating (which this article quotes Fuente on, by the way). I'm not being an ass here. I just want us to actually consider the fact that great care was taken to ensure that nobody - not coaches, not players, not anyone - named any names here.
Those of us with a proclivity to tinfoil headwear may say that it's because this is all a PR piece. Others of us might argue that it's the high road. And there may still be others who find other explanations. Either way, finding out who said what won't change a thing.
Just my 2¢
You nailed it. It's in the past. The names of the guilty are unimportant to the future. Move On, WIN, re-establish VT's perennial winning football tradition.
Should be noted that this is NOT giving them a pass. It's done and over...go Win!
Yes, exactly.
Except Bud. Bud always gets a pass.
This adds a whole different level of emotion to Willis at the end of the UVA game just breaking down. Imagine struggling through the mockery at Kansas, leaving a scholarship to get a shot at VT, dealing with the cancer in the locker room, finally getting a shot and having teammates attempt to throw games, and being expected to jump in as a leader. Dude has stones.
To add to the UVA game; how about his pick-six saving tackle. Took guts and glory to oust a CB running free toward an endzone on your ball.
Wasn't Willis the one that was getting into fights when he first arrived? I remember people here calling him out on it and saying he was a giant dick. How enlightening it is to see that he was actually being a fucking bad ass and highlight just how little we as fans actually know about what the hell is going on.
My old roommate is a bouncer at TOTS. Says he's a pretty nice guy when he's there.
Take that for what it's worth.
You would have a very hard time convincing me that Willis is an empathetic figure in all this.
why? honestly interested. I seem to be missing something if this is the case
I don't think he was talking to players about torpedoing the season, but, the team often reflects the quarterback and I just don't think he always looked like the most prepared guy to be successful. He is really good against one type of coverage, and if a team can do something else, he is going to struggle until his anticipation and reads are quicker.
Unless you know some inside info or something, if you're just basing this on a hunch or just what you see on film I gotta disagree here. Maybe he doesn't make the right decisions on the field all the time but there's no way the guy we saw so fired up to beat UVA and Marshall at the end of the year is a guy who doesn't care about winning or is negatively affecting the locker room in that department.
We will see. I will happily eat crow if he comes out and shreds this season. I have heard plenty. But, I deal with what I can see on the field. And what I see is a guy with NFL physical ability, but who isn't excelling at the next level things which makes a championship caliber quarterback.
Oh, we're talking about two different things then. Execution is one thing and I agree he did not look the most prepared last season in games. I do think he can make that jump and I also wonder how much of what was going on with the team was impacting the individual play of the rest. Could be we see Willis making serious gains with a team that is single minded.
What I was talking about, and I believe Nerd was, is Willis coming into a toxic locker room and still rising to the top despite the shitstorm around him. That has execution in it but I think we were both talking more about his emotional tenacity and leadership than physical execution.
Noteworthy: no quotes from the senior QB.
Tre after catching that touchdown:
Very possible Kumah was part of the negativity/division in the locker room but he's right on this. He played hard during the final stretch of the season. From the start of November through the Cincinnati bowl game he had 237 yards and 5 TD's, which is 42% of his total yardage for the season and 71% of his receiving TD's for the year. French also noted he was blocking hard throughout the ending of the season.
Yep...Dude was a monster..that TD he had against FSU was pure grit...
That is what I said. If you told me to watch the film of Marshall and the bowl and tell you who wanted to lose and get it over with, Kumah would not have been on that list. He was doing all the effort stuff better than most of the returners.
Whenever Kumah was getting the ball during the season I was generally happy. He had the drive to go up and get those 50-50 balls all season. He was working hard for the Hokies.
This ODU game is going to be interesting..
Tell me about it! There will be many pushups done that day!
There's no stopping twitter "fans"
I still don't really understand why he left. I think he still would of had a big role on this team. I guess he is one of the guys that left because of the negativity and not that he was a part of it.
Sometimes you see dysfunction and neither side comes off as one you want to associate with...
I'd like to know for whom this response was given. Are people shitting on him on Twitter? I don't Twitter so I don't know. If so, that's stupid. If in response to the article, not sure he was named so why respond that way?
He's not blindly responding to the article. Twitter can be a dark place sometimes. Guarantee people were @ him.
People are 100% @ing him and other players as well. They have been all off-season. Twitter is a cesspool for that kind of stuff.
Twitter....TKP can be a dark place
sometimesnow.Yes lots. Namely a guy with 0 followers following 0 people who made an(other) account just to @ kumah
Fans really suck at letting sleeping dogs lie.
Call me crazy....but intentionally playing poorly is equivalent to a violation of the Honor Code. We are Hokies - this is inexcusable. Your buddy has a little bag of weed in the car when you get pulled over....that's not good, but the kid should get a second chance. Zero tolerance for this type of behavior.
tre pls
Dammit - I cannot stress this enough, but there are people out there doing just this...
DO NOT TWEET AT FORMER PLAYERS ACCUSING THEM OF TRYING TO THROW THE GAME.
It's absolutely pathetic that needs to be mentioned.
Yeah there are precisely zero VT-benefitting outcomes from doing this. Zero positive outcomes in general.
That describes 99% of Twitter.
Indeed. Its a silly place with silly people. Why do keep caring about what's happening on it?
Unfortunately, it's a relevant part of pop culture, and we are directly reliant on people (recruits) most of whom use it regularly and/or catch wind of things (like our program division, locker room problems, etc.) through that medium.
In the first few weeks of having an account, I found out that Apple had a recall on ipods. Told my sister and turns out her's was included in it. Sent it off and got a brand new, newer generation. There is some value to the other 1%
The power of Twitter is that news can reach the whole world in a matter of seconds.
The weakness of Twitter is that anyone can reach the whole world in a matter of seconds.
I have a feeling you're preaching to the choir here.
Coach Beamer always seemed to be a "player's coach" but as he neared the end, he probably Leaned more toward the "carrot" (great relationships but less accountability and discipline - leads to a sense of entitlement)
Wouldn't surprise me at all if Coach Fuente came in and overcompensated towards the "stick". That, combined with upgrading talent probably created a real show down....
Some people have commented that "Fu should have known sooner". I'm betting he did and didn't care. My guess is he decided something along the lines of: "I don't care how you feel, these are the minimum expectations for our culture and our team. Accept them or leave".
Funny thing, as soon as he "cleaned out" the folks who wouldn't submit, notice how he allows more players to do interviews, how his attitude is more open, how he's letting his assistants shine more!
BTW: you don't think this article was by accident do you??? I'm sure he knew that Tre and Dax were going to be quoted! Hell, he might have even set it up!
Heard a dude say one time that creating a culture is like child birth. Messy, chaotic and painful, but it creates a new beautiful life! His players meeting mentioned in the article was his delivery room!
We get to meet the "Real Coach Fuente" this year with his newborn culture. Can't wait to watch the kid grow up!
I know this wasn't your main point but I've got to nitpick the comment about upgrading talent. Beamer regularly produced All-Americans, multiple all-conference players, and loads of NFL draft picks. Fuente has marginally improved our recruiting rankings, but I'm going to take All-Americans and NFL players over recruiting stars any day of the week for measuring the talent of the team.
I'm optimistic that Fuente has cleaned out the trash in the locker room, though, and I'm hoping we'll see a noticeable difference this season.
This story pretty much invalidates every argument of "it's just a third string slot wr that transferred" that we've heard over the last year or so as players decided to leave. Obviously something was broken, let's hope that we've fixed it and are working actively to ensure it stays fixed
Does it? Their attitude doesn't change what position they held on the depth chart.
Yeah, it does.
Maybe some of the people who transferred just happened to be third string, but anyone saying "everything was fine, it's the new transfer rules, people want playing time" are being naive. Something was broken. Hopefully now it has been or is being fixed.
I thought it was a widely accepted and foregone conclusion that there were team chemistry issues last year. It can absolutely be true that there were significant chemistry issues AND that many transferring players were likely looking at reduced roles moving forward.
Yes, it's a both-and. But there have been a litany of commenters here that only wanted to evaluate each player going into the portal individually in a vacuum, rather than taking anything close to a higher-level perspective. We had five players enter the portal in a two day period, and some people had a "well the numbers always work, nothing to see here" attitude towards it.
Maybe I wasn't clear.
With respect to the argument of "this transfer doesn't signify that there's anything wrong with the program, there's nothing to see here, every program deals with this"?
yes it absolutely does
edit: yeah that
edit edit: taken directly from the dejuan ellis thread:
After this article everyone downplaying the drama within the program all offseason needs to eat crow. If they won't admit it now, they never will.
Well, hang on a second with all that crowing.
Are you saying the Ellis transfer indicates the drama level hasn't changed since last year?
I have the distinct impression that it's somewhat of a different situation at this point.
Please tell me I'm right.
No, that isn't what I'm saying.
Please tell me you aren't pretending that same shit wasn't said in 200 other threads throughout this offseason. People claiming everything that was happening inside our program was being over-dramatized, explaining it away as "happens everywhere," or "it's just the transfer portal," when we now have clear, explicit examples of above average toxicity within our program.
All I'm saying is that I see a huge difference between last year and last week, so maybe it's better not to mix those quotes/time periods together.
I'm hoping that most of the toxic attitudes left with those players, and that it's getting better at this point.
My opinion is that the sticking point for most on here was the source of the drama rather than the existence of drama. Essentially "transfers are going to become more common with the transfer portal. Yes we still have more than normal right now but the numbers are augmented by the coaching change and culture shift that came to a head last season."
It's very concerning the defeated attitudes of some on the team before the season even started. Not wanting to go to a bowl game to extend the streak is also just deflating to me as fan. I am just going to put this out there. I wonder how many of those players wanted to see certain players drop passes so that they could ensure more playing time for themselves? A couple of those players who were still on the team were concerned about playing time this upcoming season. One of them was a quarterback who reportedly didn't think he should have to compete for the starting job. Another was a receiver who was also looking at getting passed up by Tre Turner.
Very upsetting seeing this article. Also, based on some of the items in the Article, I'm seeing a "me first" attitude, As French pointed out, we wonder how much of that culture is still around. Coach Frank Beamer around 2006-2007 made some remarks on the Monday night program about cleaning up the program, getting rid of the troublemakers and getting good character kids. Hope Fuente is moving in the right direction, you have to get rid of the bad apples.
Having said that, I think some of the guys stopped playing or transferred for genuine reasons like Josh Jackson for Playing time.
The negative player attitudes in this article reminds me of:
I sure hope those guys are gone.
I can't/don't know how to embed tweets on my phone, but Tre tweeted something like "🤦🏼♂️" earlier.
A lot of these guys still on the team are still friends with guys who have left the team. We've established that Kumah definitely wasn't actively rooting against us, but I think the speculation should stop there.
For as divisive as Trevon Hill was, he's still friends with guys on the team. Cunningham, Jackson, Savoy, all still friends with guys on the team. Seeing fans speculate about guys' commitments to the team via quotes of self sabotage to other teammates probably doesn't make these guys happy.
Additionally, in regards to Tre's quote about getting fought, I actually don't think it was as deep as it looks. In all honesty, I think whoever said it to him might have been joking. I'm sure whoever said it probably didn't want the season to end, but no one was going to throw hands over someone catch a touchdown pass.
I say that because my senior year of high school, my basketball team's season wasn't that great. In my first three years of high school, we always had 1 or 2 all state players in our starting line up, we lost a combined 10 games I think in those 3 years, and we even made it to states once. My senior year, we barely finished above .500, we weren't happy with our coach and some of his decisions (none other than Jim Justice, WV governor actually), and we just weren't having as much fun. When it got to be the first game in sectionals, we all kind of joked with each other that we didn't care if we lost that night. When it came down to it, though, we ultimately won in a crazy game that I think went to overtime if I remember correctly, and we celebrated the same way our guys celebrated beating UVA and Marshall. We ultimately lost in the regional finals in a game we felt like we had a good shot to win, and it sucked.
My point is, there was clearly lots of turmoil last season. I think that, at times, guys weren't as adamant on playing any longer than they had to. When you get on that field, though, your competitive nature kicks in, and you realize the reason why you play the sport: because you love it.
Perhaps this is a move by Fuente to put everyone at rest regarding locker room issues, or it's to motivate the team. Regardless, I just don't think we should be pitting the players against each other, intentional or unintentional.
This is why I never say once a Hokie always a Hokie in these cases and the whole "best of luck to him" fuck that! I hope everyone of them lose for trying to destroy our team.
This story makes my head explode. I ran track for VT for one season in the early 90s, and I was friendly with some of the football players. Starters or walk-ons who never played a down in a game, they would NEVER have done that. This was before VT was big-time, and those guys worked their asses off to win games and get VT on the national stage.
The idea that there would be players (plural!) last year that were rooting for the team to lose. Holy fucking shit! Fuck those fucking fucks.
For track we used to do workouts where we hopped with one leg up the steps of Lane Stadium, and I used to regularly puke during track workouts. And the football players worked WAY harder than we did. To work so hard and WANT to lose? Those people shouldn't transfer, they should quit sports.
God! I need the games to start!
I'm really confused with how players could have been thinking they weren't any good coming into the season last year. They had just come off 2 winning seasons and we had not experienced any type of set backs like ODU and the other crazy losses.
Not really sure what to think of the article...at first I thought Fuente should've recognized these problems earlier, and held that team meeting sooner...but there's really no way of knowing what he knew or didn't know. Then I wondered which players might've said those quotes...but that is useless speculation.
Two things I think really need to happen, in order to help our recruiting.
1) Our players have to be extremely involved, anytime prospects are on campus. Other coaches will surely try to use last year's atmosphere and transfer #'s against us, and probably tell recruits that of course Fuente is going say everything has been fixed, the mood is great now, etc... The only people that can truly prove to recruits that things have changed, are the players. They need to be very involved.
2) We need to win, obviously. 9+ games. Which, to me, means our DL needs to take a giant step forward.
Agree, you kinda open yourself up to these questions when there's an article about and it seems like you tolerated malcontents on the team the entire season.
I do expect to see a lot better attitude this year...especially from the defense and I hope we dont see Willis embarrassing another player like he did Peoples in the ND game year either...the only one that can apparently do that is Tom Brady
all I have to add is that turkey bacon is not bacon.
I had to re-read the first quote in the article because it just didnt compute with me that anyone playing for the Hokies squad could say that. I felt pretty naive going through the entire article. Goes to show the difference between being a fan and a player, something I do a very bad job of remembering.
That being said I am pumped for the UVA game this year. Their fans have been talking way too much this offseason and I think our boys will be raring to go
Oh man, I just want the season to start. Sick of hearing about last year. I just want to beat the hell out of BC!
Does anybody else have just that little voice in the back of their heads that is whispering the inmates are running the show?
I read the article about the complaints and Fuente changing workout times, lightening them up, changing things in other areas, etc. and wonder if they aren't easing too much. Then again, all the players seem to be committed hard core right now.
Regardless, after we win 10+ games this year everything should be back on track.
I don't get the impression it's like that.
I think they made some adjustments, but they're still running a football program.
Hopefully, the folks who just couldn't be made happy are gone, and the ones who are left are talented and want to do their best.
That is what my optimistic side is saying as well.
Fuente at the presser today seemed kind of irked that he was asked about the piece.
Tried to move away from it quickly.
I would be pissed to be asked about it and move on too. 2 weeks from Kick off THIS year and that is old news. Win 9-10 this year and nobody cares.
That's the odd thing about this entire scenario to me...he had to know it was coming. Multiple active players were quoted and Fuente himself had a brief quote in the story. And it wasn't in a local paper or a message board somewhere, it was in Sports Illustrated.
It certainly could be seen as a situation of Fuente and the Program trying to "prove" how they've cleaned up the Program and Re-molded the culture. The trouble is, that's still to be proven and its a pretty high-stakes situation to set yourself up for this season.
If the team is disappointing on the field or has more off-field or lockeroom issues, you really don't have a leg to stand on and the levee may really break for Fuente at VT.
Not saying it is going to happen and sincerely hope it doesn't, but the past 18 or so months have not left myself a ton of confidence that a few players (now all departed, apparently) are the only underlying issues here.
I'm not sure this is all that high stakes. It's what happened, and probably doesn't really change people's assessment of Fuente one way or the other.
I'm also not surprised that Fuente doesn't want to relive it or focus on that.
You're coming off a 6-7 season surrounded by lots of bad publicity off the field for two consecutive offseasons and you choose to allow a national publication (admittedly nowhere near as prestigious as it once was) access to your players to write a very unflattering profile of your team barely 2 weeks before the start of the season??
Said article paints in very vivid terms an extreme level of dysfunction within your Program and also makes light of some things that appear quite flippant (we will be hearing about the Turkey Bacon bit for quite a while).
The only real positive side or reason to allow a Journalist access to all of this is to point out how much improvement is being made, with the obvious expectation that that will lead to much better results on the field.
If that doesn't happen, you look bad. Period. With a portion of the Fanbase already uneasy about the direction of the program (lack of access, lots of player turnover, Foster retiring, subpar recruiting class), I'm not sure how you would otherwise define this situation than high-stakes.
What I'm saying is that 95% of this story was already out there, and has been thoroughly discussed on Twitter and internet forums. We already had the 6-7 season and the players who left and their twitter accounts in the public view.
So allowing Sports Illustrated some access to the current team's perspective isn't a huge gamble.
As far as the team looking bad, this mostly gives the asshats who wanted to lose a game just to spite Fuente a black eye.
Doesn't make this season any more or less important. Just gets a different perspective into the public sphere.
If you consider is that having definitive confirmation that there were players actively attempting to sabotage VT Football last year only 5% of the story, then I couldn't disagree with you more.
This was SHOCKING to read and I was certainly already under the impression that there was lots of bad Chemistry last year.
Moreover, Internet forums are a far cry from Sports Illustrated where lots of non-VT fans who may have had no idea about any of this now have access to it. It certainly doesn't create a positive impression of the Program for someone not familiar with VT.
The point of the article for VT and Fuente is to make the case that the "bad seeds" are now out of the Program...hopefully that is true.
But don't be naive as to the timing of this article...its 2 weeks before the season. If this was something Fuente didnt want to deal with, you would release this article on a Friday in March (conveniently after Signing Day) so it gets buried under March Madness, ect. This article was written now with the hope is that VT will excel on the field and change the narrative around the program in 2019. If it doesn't happen, it will not be a good look for Fuente or VT.
As shocking as this was to read, it's just a couple of horrid details to a story we already knew. Yes, this was 5% of a story we've already discussed for almost a year now. We can call it sabotage, or we can write it off as a couple of guys saying some stupid stuff. I suppose if there is any take away, I'm not as sympathetic to the guys who left.
Bottom Line: We can get hysterical about it, or we can just say "Fuck those guys. Good riddance."
You know which camp I'm in.
I think the concerns of this being a bad look for the program are a bit overblown.
Here is the what you can see on the SI main page:
"Inside Virginia Tech's Internal Turnaround After a Season of Division and Negativity
Struggles and pessimism divided the Hokies in 2018. But after a wave of dismissals and transfers, Justin Fuente has reunited Virginia Tech into a team that truly wants to win."
All things considered, that's a pretty positive summary to have on the main page.
This falls in line with what I have been told. During the last couple of CFB's signing periods the school was signing whom ever they could get. Not vetting recruit's backgrounds and personalities. I truly thought that this purge was done in the first 2 years. I believe that it has now been finished. I'm ready to move forward and look forward to a new mantle. Dax, Tre, Rivers...rock it!
Would I love to know the perpetrators ...Yes
Do I want to know who French is watching...Yes
Bill Roth mentioned on the radio today that he was disappointed that local reporters were not given the story. I don't agree. VT needed this to go national and SI was the proper foil. Would this have been given national attention with the Roanoke Times? Probably not.
House is clean and Hokies rock 2019+!
The Saber has some interesting takes on this. Apparently the turkey bacon, orange shoes, and "easier" workouts mean we're now soft and UVA will kick our ass en route to an 11-1 regular season and an 11-3 final record after losing the ACCCG and the Orange Bowl.
Another example of why that site is a waste of time.
I still cannot process the information in that article because I cannot fathom having people like that on our team....
Yeah, it seems pretty vindictive for a Hokie.
or wanting turkey bacon...
I am surprised no players ask for the smoked turkey legs they have only had the chance to smell on game day.
I didn't see anywhere that real bacon isn't on the menu....this could be an accommodation for folks that have religious dietary restrictions.
Having a little trouble wrapping my head around all of this. Athletes wanting to lose. No pride or self-respect? Disappointed that apparently the coaching staff didn't know about the dissension. Disappointed that the players didn't have a brawl about this at the time.......if you're not happy, leave....now......don't hurt the team and those who want to play hard.....get off the field and get off the team......now.
I blame AAU basketball for all of this. Transfer portal, my ass. Don't let the screen door hit you.
Damning article? More like articles be damned! Am I right guys?
Gotta wonder who (though I know it's not guess at names). It's pretty clear Dax, Tre, Willis, Peoples, Keene, Hezekiah, Ashby, Dzanzi, Darrisaw and many others were balling out and going hard every game. Just makes it easy narrow it down
Mixed feelings on this. At first blush, it feels like a PR move. Fuente is as tight-lipped on the program as we've ever seen, and yet he's giving quotes to an SI reporter, and said reporter is getting player quotes that no one else around the program is getting? Seems weird.
I totally believe there were bad personalities on the team, and guys who needed to go, but won't get too caught up in desiring or going after names. Ironically, if it's who I'm assuming, they weren't even that great of players to begin with.
In all, I feel like this confirms one of my biggest concerns with Fuente, which I've railed on for 2 years - he has seemed in over his head at times and often seems like he's struggling to learn on the job. Coming from Memphis, a program that was the end of the road for guys, is insanely different than a major program like VT. From running the day to day, dealing with and managing personalities, and clearly recruiting, there isn't much comparable with Memphis and VT, and where CJF may have had the luxury of screaming at guys, being their only offer, mot necessarily having to relate to players, etc., that's not how things work at this level, and he needs to adapt. I'm also fairly concerned he let it get this bad. That shit needs to be addressed quickly and deliberately.
Looking back, I think CJF really would have benefitted from building a new staff and not just bringing in his buddies w similar levels of experience. Only having limited support from a seasoned staff, in Foster and Wiles, likely wasn't enough to flatten that learning curve. Here's to hoping he's getting it straightened out.
Fuente also coached at TCU, so it's not like he's a stranger to big time football.
I was concerned about him bringing a lot of staff from Memphis as well, but guys get screamed at all the time in P5 programs. This was about a culture change, not that they were doing anything that is miles apart from what happens at most P5 programs.
Most of the staff Fuente brought with him had P5 experience and one of the guys who didn't now coaches at Bama So seems like he was a decent hire too. Then there are the guys he kept over from previous staff should he have not kept them? This line of G5 coaching staff that so many on here and social media in general want to rally around is nothing but bullshit.
People want to talk about mistakes the staff has made in games or recruiting I'm all for that, but claiming the staff is over it's head is laughable and tiresome and lazy.
You still believe Vice was a coach at Clemson even though the official Clemson coaching staff and media guide has been posted for the 1 or 2 years he was there, which confirm he was only a GA? Because that is tiresome and lazy.
Regardless of whether or not he had P5 experience in the past, Vice has been pretty successful (and I'm one of the people that was highly suspect of him initially). The only thing left for him to convince me of is that he can develop all the talent he's stockpiled into a truly upper echelon line. This season and next should really be telling in that regard as his guys are starting to get old enough that they should be producing.
All I'm saying is that I don't think Vice is a good example of a G5 position coach that's in over his head. I always thought the Galen Scott situation was very iffy, and frankly there's a part of me that's glad he screwed it up because I doubt he was going to work out as the next Foster. Corny needs to convince me from a play calling perspective. Time has healed some of the wounds, but I was livid at times this past season in that regard.
Yep. Look at Washington's coaching staff under Chris Peterson. It's almost entirely Boise State people with far less P5 experience than Fuente had on his initial staff- and most of Fuente's hires since then have had substantial P5 experience too (Mitchell, Nix, Williams). Funny thing is that the same posters touting the value of P5 experience claim those coaches are garbage too.
I think most coaches bring a lot of their staff from a former successful program.
What would be surprising is if they didn't do that.
And by all accounts, Nix was a terrible hire. So maybe coaches with P5 experience can be lacking, and coaches with G5 experience may do just fine.
Look at Clemson's staff. 4 coaches P5 experience. The rest came from much smaller colleges, GA positions, or even just high school. We love looking at Clemson as the perfect model, but look at all that inexperience...
Can you give specific instances? I've never felt this way.
Torrian and Shibest each had 10+ years of P5 experience when Fuente came in. Mitchell had 6+ years at Texas Tech and WVU, in addition to stints at BYU and ECU. Vice had a few years at Clemson too.
When hiring (in general), there's a delicate balance between hiring 'new blood' and people you know you work well with. I think promoting from within is good for culture, and can decrease confusion.
Appreciate the civility.
Again, I said 'seemed over his head' so this is going to be my opinion - there isn't hard and fast fact that will say "Fuente is learning on the job," but below are areas, especially in combination of one another, where it seems to me like he's underprepared or learning as he goes
Approach to hiring
Approach to recruiting
The overall handling of tough recruiting situations (offers, pulling offers, relationship building in the 757/804/703 etc.)
The calling out of players in post game pressers, not taking ownership
The walling off of almost all program activities from fans, media
Struggling to build excitement around the program, especially during offseason speaking engagements, garnering donations, etc.
Fuente clearly has his 'style' which is different from what we may have been accustom to with Frank, but these are all areas where approaches need to differ when at a lowly G5 program as opposed to a historically top 25 P5 program - much as your management approach(es) would change if you moved from running a regional bank in SWVA to running a Fortune 100 bank.
I think the frustration a lot of the time with some of your comments is you imply that you have an extremely in depth understanding on how a G5 football program is and should be ran and you also have an extremely in depth understanding on exactly how a P5 football program is and should be ran. An even better understanding that Whit Babcock at times it seems. But it's just not the case.
If your main takeaway from that post is "I know how to better run an AD than Whit Babcock," I'm not sure what to tell you and we should just move on. That's clearly not the case at all.
I'm just letting you know how it comes off. It's just hard to look past the irony of a guy with zero college coaching or athletics experience questioning a current college coach for not having enough experience and pointing out where he needs to improve and how he needs to do it.
You don't need coaching experience or athletics experience to know when someone isn't doing a good enough job based on the expectations you have for them.
i will be the first to admit that i thought outoftowner was just a troll when he started posting here, and i called him out for it, and i was wrong. it's pretty clear to me that there's just different expectations for our program and our staff than most people around here have. It can definitely come across smug sometimes (but tbh i get it because smugness and sarcasm can be a defense for the hive mind around here), but it never feels to me like an "even i could do better" kind of tone.
edit: case-in-point, he caught a downvote for pointing out that the perception of his comment was misplaced based on (he feels) a mis-perception of his tone. that's dumb.
Yea I don't downvote him. I'm just saying where the frustration comes from. My frustration isn't the criticism of the program. They aren't meeting expectations, but there's a difference between saying "we have to do better recruiting" and "he isn't doing well in these areas because he's in over his head and doesn't have the experience".
vs
one of those is leaps and bounds more categorical and unequivocal than the other, and it's not the one that outoftowner actually wrote 🤷♂️ i don't know what else he has to say to get everyone to realize that it's his opinion and his perception of the program and of the staff
I get that it's his opinion. It's just an annoying opinion to watch someone make time and time again who doesn't have any insight into the program. Also when you come out and say it feels like something confirms your opinion, thats making it sound more categorical than just an wild thought. To each their own though.
confirmation bias in play all around. he's disposed to look for negativity about fuente for two years, and a lot of us around here are disposed to look for categorical negativity from some other commenters on the site
classic internet!
So it's just a metaphor for modern society, then.
More available data has just become a means to for people to select just that which supports their forgone conclusions, and binds people with those who believe as they do.
Hmmm....I can't imagine what other commenters you might be referring to. ;^)
In all honesty, 99.5% of the posters on this site have absolutely zero insight to the program, but you don't give them beef for posting opinions - which as GGC pointed out, I'm being completely transparent with - if the tone is all sunshine, and blindly giving Fuente the benefit of the doubt. To me there is no difference. Speculation and opinions are speculation and opinions. Sometimes there are assumptions made to make things seem totally rosy that seem like much more significant stretches to me than assumptions I (or a few others) make on the other end of the spectrum. I find "in Fuente we trust" style posts to be massively annoying and not adding to discourse, but I don't call them all out or go on about them.
We're all fans and want VT to be successful. If I play devils advocate in my posts, it's not because I hate the program, coach, or think I can do better myself, but because I've got high expectations, I want to see us incrementally improve, and ideally compete for a NC. There are regularly things to be very happy with. I don't post all that often, comparatively, and to me, throwing on another "let's go Hokies" type post in long lists of them doesn't add much value to the site or conversation, so I often refrain from doing so.
I'm not sure saying the coach is out of his depth is adding that much value, either.
Saying "I can be critical of this program all I want, and it's just because I have higher expectations than you folks" is weak sauce. That's not realism. It's negativity. Trashing Fuente IS trashing Whit. Fuente is Whit's most important hire.
If you're going to criticize, be specific. Tell us how you'd do it better. I'm perfectly fine with that. Otherwise, you're just a critic. I can find plenty of Fuente criticism at that level of detail over at the Sabre. Bar1990's comment, below, is at a good level of detail. I can agree, or disagree, but I get what he's saying, and I can debate it if I want. It's a bit different from saying "Fuente is out of his depth", which is nothing, really.
Fuente isn't perfect, but he's our guy. He's the only head coach we've got. So for me, supporting him is not just the right thing, it's the only thing. I want him to succeed. Because not succeeding doesn't necessarily get us a better coach, just a different one.
I get that some people want more access to the program. It's a legitimate complaint. But we've heard it. Hearing it again isn't going to change Fuente into Buzz Williams. It's not going to happen. That's not who we hired to run our football program. So when I see that gripe, I just wonder "why?". It's not going to change. So maybe it's something we should just accept.
I agree with this point of view.
The comparison between Fuente and Williams is a good one. The best answer to the different treatment of each coach by the fans is:
Williams had a much more public persona but I am not sure you really got an inside view of the program.
The list can go on but I think it is evident that everything was not always rosy in the Williams program but the trajectory was always up. If Fuente's football team wins in 2019-2020, then there will be no complaints from the fans.
If the program ever backslides, the fans will begin to voice their disent. This happens to all coaches and Williams left town before having to deal with the questions of irrational fans during a year or two rebuild.
I actually do remember quite a bunch of noise around the way Brent handled running people out of his program. But he had a history of it at Marquette and did it here and also did it at A&M. He tried to do it to Devin Wilson but couldn't really.He made a huge deal about the mythos and ethos of having OKGs -- he basically set the parameters for culture and is shameless in running people out and ignoring other recruits when they don't fit. It seems like CJF struggled with that, but it's also much much harder to turn over an entire football roster than it is a basketball one, and it's much easier to punch above your weight with fitness and scheme with a younger basketball team than it is a younger football one.
Why are you using quotes to make quotes that I never said? You're putting words in my mouth and making statements that are blatantly false, and if the way you infer, my apologies, but again not context.
I've been very specific in my criticisms of Fuente. The rest I'm just not even going to get into with you anymore. It's the same thing over and over. We've beat this horse.
I paraphrased you. It's not an inaccurate representation of your statements. I can pull out the exact quotes if you prefer.
And you weren't specific. You just rehashed all the general complaints about Fuente. None of that demonstrates that his situation is akin to a local branch manager of a bank being overwhelmed with a Fortune 500 Bank CEO job. That's just hyperbole.
So yeah, give your opinion. But be prepared for people to disagree. It's OK. It's an internet forum. That's what they're for.
"i can fabricate quotes to fit my narrative if i want to because i definitely understand your position more than you do"
taking a page out dc's playbook to construct a straw man since you're already prepared to disagree, I see
I said I paraphrased.
But here are actual quotes. From different places within this discussion, so tell me if I've failed to capture their essence.
"In all honesty, 99.5% of the posters on this site have absolutely zero insight to the program"
"my opinion has not been shaped by making wild guesses or random accusations."
"Sometimes there are assumptions made to make things seem totally rosy that seem like much more significant stretches to me than assumptions I (or a few others) make on the other end of the spectrum."
"If I play devils advocate in my posts, it's not because I hate the program, coach, or think I can do better myself, but because I've got high expectations, I want to see us incrementally improve, and ideally compete for a NC."
to be fair, you did indeed say you paraphrased, but i was just paraphrasing you 😉
anyhow, I read that as saying "most of us here know just as much as the next person and it isn't really that much, and rather than assume the program is on the best possible trajectory, I tend to focus on how much more work is obviously ahead of us and how far we are from being where I want us to be"
That's funny. Did you just paraphrase him?
probably more accurately than you did
I get where you're coming from. I agree that there is criticism to throw out there. We have gaps in recruiting right now, I also wish the program was more open and we had a little more access, and our offensive performance at times are all things I get having a gripe with. I'm cool with having people posting that and talking about it. When people post stuff calling out the staff that I'm not sure has a ton of factual support, I call them out. Go through my comments, it's not just you. I think we're all just ready for the season to get going so we can actually see progress or regress and quit speculating. I'm with you though on this, if we go 10-2 and win the costal we'll have people still being overly negative but think it's just being insightful and if we go 6-6 we'll have people defending Fuente to the end. I'll be annoyed by both.
Thumbs up
I don't quite understand why "learning as he goes" is a problem.
Nick Saban, in his first stint as a P5 head coach (MSU) went 6-5-1, 6-6 and 7-5 in his first three years. Clearly he was learning as he went and developing "The Process". I suspect Saban is still "learning as he goes" today, too as he navigates new challenges.
I agree with you, and acknowledged a learning curve in my OP. We've also heard he's very stubborn, so I'm again hopeful that he's taking lessons learned and changing for the better.
It's about the speed with which you adapt. You want to be agile, fail fast, and iterate as quickly as possible. You don't want to be Will Muschamp, who had to be fired after 3 years before accepting that teams without an offense rarely succeed.
Agile is not fast - it is nimble and reactive to change. It DOES NOT guarantee anything will happen quicker.
Sorry - too many "Agile Software" gurus at work make this mistake and it drives me nuts.
it doesn't mean being quick to change, but it does mean changing quickly once that decision is made, no?
Without being in the room how do we know his "approach to" or "handling of" anything? You may be unhappy with the results, but that doesn't seem to me to add validity that anything is over his head. We cant ask him to make hard decisions, be the leader, and when he does, we don't like it.
I am not personally in the room, that is true. 247 (regardless of your opinion of the posters) often offers significant insight into the program - especially the recruiting side. I prefaced the post with that it was my opinion knowing I'd be challenged on it, and will also lend that my opinion has not been shaped by making wild guesses or random accusations.
So, a couple of these I definitely agree with you:
I do flat out disagree with the hiring complaints. There's 5 hires to review:
With the exception of the Nix hire, I think all the hires are/will be okay. And given the circumstances (off cycle hire, pressure from the fan base), I'm willing to forgive this hire.
I also flat out disagree with the 'throwing his players under the bus' complaint. Of the 2-3 instances I remember, the comments about the players were taken out of context, and when listening to the full sound bite, it was beyond obvious that Fuente was accepting blame. I think Andy got some blow back on twitter for cutting some of Fuente's comments short when tweeting.
As far as approach to recruiting goes, I'm undecided/am not knowledgeable enough to judge his approach. It's obvious that the results are less than desirable, but I'm not sure specifically what he and the staff need to do differently, what limitations they have, etc. I fully acknowledge that recruiting is under performing, and believe there's a huge risk that our program suffers a long term setback if we don't rebound in recruiting before UMD, GT, and UNC do (assuming UGA, Clemson, and PSU continue to recruit as they are). There's only so much talent between Baltimore and Atlanta, and we have to compete against one or more programs in each city. I just don't know what Fuente needs to do differently. OR if he needs to change anything - it's possible that Jham and Jafar could be just as good recruiters as Zohn - time will tell.
Pulled an offer from Tajh Capehart, but someone else would have to expound on the ramifications of that.
I'm one who has thought the Capehart and Goode situations seemed potentially troubling but if you think about it from the perspective of Fuente feeling like there were attitude problems already brewing in the locker room, then it makes a lot more sense that Fuente had an extremely low tolerance for incoming players adding to that.
I agree with your comment in general. With Cam Goode, they told him to show up in shape and he didn't.
They released him with no restrictions, and nobody else in the P5 picked him up.
I'm not sure that's a strike against Fuente, unless you think they should have had someone doing weekly phone calls to check up on Goode in the off-season.
The strike would be more that Goode was the only DT signee when we had a pretty obvious void at DT on the horizon. It seems reasonable that Fuente, Foster, and Wiles each share some degree of responsibility for that strike but there's not enough information to more precisely assign blame.
Some people default to things ultimately all falling on Fuente as the head coach. I tend to think Wiles and Foster were likely given freedom to manage the defensive roster, have been in their current positions for 20+ years, and were intimately familiar with the current roster and future players necessary to have a successful defense.
He wound up at UCF.
I'm on a phone, so keeping it short - I think your stances are fair. I do disagree with some.
The "throwing players under the bus" thing may just be a piece of a bigger issue I have, which is dealing with the media in general. I think he struggles there.
I count the Torrian situation as part of his hiring. He cut TGs pay and then ended up giving Mitchell, a worse coach and much worse recruiter basically the same salary TG had, essentially trading them one for one, which is a loss.
Lechty was a hire which was very tough to get excited about
Nix was not employed at the time and should have never been hired.
Recruiting is by far the biggest concern for me. Who we offer, but mainly who we don't and who we 'cool' on given our needs is also very confusing at times. I get scared of the number of 0 P5 offer guys we accept commitments from, especially early in the process. The Capehart situation was a mess, and I've seen elsewhere there are certain 757 schools we're still struggling to make inroads bc CJF has trouble relating to players. Whether or not it's 100% true is one thing, but perception, especially while recruiting, plays a huge role and is often unfortunately reality.
Damn that was a tough article to read. To hell with anyone wanting to lose so they didn't have to practice for the bowl game. I was going to games as a kid when those guys fought their hearts out knowing there wasn't a bowl game or a conference championship at stake (ala 1990 uva game). It's so much more to be a hokie and get the chance to play on that field in front of the best fans in the country. I hope and pray all of those who made these statements are far away from Blacksburg. I have a good feeling about this team and their motivation to get back what we've lost over the last few years. Saddens me to see any Hokie say the things quoted in that article. Good riddance to anyone who said anything like that...gonna be a smash mouth and high effort year...let's go...
ala 1990 UVA game - great game. Helped bring down the goal posts as a student that day. Those players played hard!!
Damn right Johnny! They laid the foundation for the next two decades...1-2 star guys and walk ons just leaving it all on the field for each other and for Blacksburg...disgusting to see what some of these recent (all be it a small amount) "Hokies" said and apparently did on the field...let's go!!!!!
The timing of this article is pretty amazing...
1) the info is 6+ months old. We are just hearing it. For everyone involved - they are over it and have moved on.
2) by now, all the exiting players have had the chance to move on and find new programs. Imagine if this had come out immediately.
3) Bud has announced. He was able to make his decision without it being tied to the article.
4) it's pre-season fodder and will be "old news" in a week as the season begins.
5) if we do have a winning season, article serves as a great baseline of a feel good story into signing day for recruits and their families.
6) by getting out in front of it, VT controlled the narrative and the timing. Imagine if this came out right before the Miami game or the week before we honor Bud!
Yeah, I'm pretty sure the timing was no accident.
You know what?
I'm here for the 2019 season. Either they've fixed this shit or they haven't. We'll know pretty soon. Sitting around speculating about past events is just an enormous waste of my time.
Aside from that, I'm not here to give some shit-stirrer any additional clicks.
That you, Fuente?
I assume this is an orchestrated strategy. Both the athletics department and university have communications staff whose sole purpose is to cultivate image. I'd be shocked if this sort of access were given without this being part of a communications plan.
There's two ways this works:
1) Tech staff wants this out there and actively pitch the angle to bigger outlets with reaching and set up the interviews.
2) SI pitches Tech staff on it and Tech talks it over and decides it's a good one to pursue and then is able to shape it with access.
It's a poorly executed strategy IMO.
I agree with French's analysis of the PR aspect of this, it's not a great look.
If they're trying to say they cleared out the bad element and are a new team, it risks burning relationships with HS coached of guys that were moved off the team.
Plus if you were looking for control/spinning the messaging around this...why is Fuente so seemingly uncomfortable addressing it?
PR hasn't been a pretty glaring weakness under Whit.
Everybody seems to be jumping to the conclusion that there was some PR plan in action here. However, it may not have been an offensive action. There were enough public quotes to write this story without one on one access. My initial assumption was that SI contacted VT and said we are writing a story about the locker room of VT football. Would you like to provide your side. Fuente responds, yes we will give you access to certain players so you can tell the whole story. They may have even requested the timing but it is also a possibility that this story sat on a shelf for months. I guess we will never know.
If there wasn't a PR plan in place, that's a PR failure in itself IMO.
Yeah, I think only football has the PR been poor. Buzz is an anomaly so I'm going to give him a pass on that, but the hiring of him was top notch, plus the way the transition was handled from Beamer to Fuente couldn't have gone any better.
Agreed, should have clarified that it's really been a football issue post-transition.
Seriously, what does he do differently? If he says nothing (no article) he's out of touch and/or out of control. If he goes to direct or heavy he runs the risk of defaming Beamer's legacy... tough spot.
Best way out of this...shut up and win! If that doesn't happen it won't matter anyway! Guess that's why these guys get paid handsomely!
New here so I know I have to earn my lumps:
My honest opinion about all of this:
The group that seemed to struggle was the last recruiting cycle from Beamer and the First rushed recruiting group from FU.
Based on the trend we saw at the of Beamer's tenure, there was a strong thought of complacency and lack of effort from those guys.
Fast forward a year, new guy comes in, balls to the wall training and practices, things they didnt like, his new class comes in and is in an environment of pissing and moaning but quitely. These players learned this behavior, become "leaders" in the locker room and become more vocal and began to push their weight around when coaches arent looking.
Three years later, shit hits the fan and 4 or 5 bad eggs give up and create an environment that brings the team to a crippling level of me over the team.
The struggle was gonna happen sooner or later with a coaching change, just turned out to be really bad and two years later than expected. Give props to a head ball coach to own up to his mistakes, late noticed, but still open to fix the problems.
He has his team now, there will still be issues behind closed doors but our team leaders are driven differently. They already spat in the faces of mediocrity, now they will step on the cockroaches that come out in the light.
Where they go from here is up to them.
Welcome. No lumps from me on your stated opinions... other than doughnuts are closer to cake than pie (and therefore inferior).
via GIPHY
There's just one more thing you need:
Personally, I find this article very helpful. Last year's (previously) inexplicable defensive effort has a believable explanation.
I also better understand why Fuente has been so close-mouthed about the internal workings of the program, and the fact that Fuente (and VT) allowed this article to be investigated and reported has meaning in itself:
a. they recognized there was a *serious* problem.
b. they feel they have turned a corner and moving in the right direction now.
Item B is critical to Fuente's future IMO, and time will tell. The importance of this season just went up a bunch. Not only does the team need to show improvement from last year, but decisions have to be made regarding CBF's replacement sooner than later. The recruiting has suffered from this locker room, and will suffer more from defensive indecision.
I for one think this year's team will be much improved over last year.
I hope that VT maintains our historical defensive identity, and continues on the path Foster has put down: A "thinking" defense that uses twitchy fast athletes who understand (and master) gap responsibilities. It is fun to watch and what I want to watch.
If the next DC is dramatically different in the types of recruits he is targeting... then it is going to be a rough couple of years.
I vote JHam/Wiles coDC, with JHam the long term answer.
Holy crap I am ready for the 2019 season to start so we can finally get off of the topic of the 2018 season.
I'm a realist, I know this will keep coming up some, but I feel like we have just rehashed the same nonsense over and over again for months.
The beatings will continue until the morale improves.
Well, not really. I'm with you. I look forward to some football, and I sure hope VT benefits from a year of experience.
This is just the school deflecting from the over enrollment numbers isn't it?
Wish that I could say this is/was unexpected, but I think most folks acknowledge that's not true.
Can only hope that they have their shit squared away by now, but until they take the field against BC,
The SI article was probably written as a response to the Acc coaches anonymous remarks regarding VT football. The remarks made about the our program were concerning and possibly being used against us on the recruiting trail. Fuente and the athletic department probably thought it was time to get the truth out there. Hopefully, this will put some of the "what's going on with VT football" talk to rest.
I think it puts a lot of "what WAS going on" to rest and makes us feel much better about "what IS going on", but raises a few questions about what is/will be going on. Overall I am happy the outlook appears to be much improved but will be validated with the W/L and what we see on the field.
VT's locker room has been fine and our attrition is no more than any other school. S/
Your right it's actually less than several schools thanks for keeping reality in mind.
LMAO that you would actually type this after that article that literally says the opposite and is confirmed by Fuente and the players. Thanks for the chuckle.
I shared the article thanks for telling me what it says. Also it's not debatable that Tech had less players transfer out than several schools.
Yes, and Jose Altuve has better power deep stat splits than Babe Ruth. It's not about the "raw numbers"... Penn State's guys are actually being recruited over by 4 and 5 star players, and the guys leaving are not telling the team to tank before the bowl game. They also didn't go 6-7 with a historically bad defense and home season. Its not a matter of VT having 16 transfers/dismissals and Alabama or Clemson or Ohio State having 17 to justify whatever point you are trying to downplay the disaster that was last year. You posted the article but didn't read it very well.
TKP community: We are excited and optimistic about this season, and think all of this is behind us and everything is going to be ok.
dcwilson40:
This article really tied the offseason together, man.
This and VT_Fencer's response are beautiful.
As much as everyone would like to downvote DCwilson's comments, there is some truth within them.
His delivery may be abrasive and aometimes frankly negative, but he does raise some legitimate points.
Simply pointing out that we are not the leader in transfer exits is not really looking at the entire issue. Many of the other schools ahead of us are considered "power" programs that have players leaving because they are buried on the depth chart with no hope of getting to the top. Penn State is a very prime example of this. Franklin has really turned up the recruiting there, and there are upperclassmen there that are getting pushed behind due to this.
In our situation, that is not really true. I think the most concerning thing is the number of projected contributors that have left or wanted to. Keaney, Cunningham, Kumah, and McClease all projected to be guys getting field-time this year. That points to a more systemic or cultural issue within the program. Maybe it was just with those guys, but I think its naive to believe that there are zero more underlying issues.
I hope the culture has truly changed on the team and 2019 is going to be a much more successful year. But, I also think it is unwise to point out that simply because we don't have the most transfers or because an article states that the culture of the team is much better that that necessarily means that everything is completely solved.
He made a verifiable false statement about Tech being behind every other school in portal numbers.. I called him out on just that. He doubled down with his usual rant. As for the examples you cited: using DC criteria that "guys leaving bigger programs are leaving because of higher ranked recruits"
Cunningham 3 ⭐️ : Mitchel 4 ⭐️
Kumah 3 ⭐️ , Ellis 3 ⭐️ and Savoy 3 ⭐️ : at least three maybe four higher ranked WR's in 2018 and 19 classes
You're being way to literal here. Someone posted recently the portal numbers, and we had like the 4th or 5th most of any school. Sure, we're not the MOST (as you called out DCw), but we're damn near the top of a list of 130 FBS programs.
Which is it? Are our portal numbers just par for the course and normal and the SI article was totally bogus? If you trust the SI article to at least be somewhat accurate, you've got to concede that things probably weren't peachy keen around the program. Admitting something was up, which is hopefully quashed now, isn't going to strip anyone of their fan card.
Some folks have moved along, and it appears that we may be better off because of it.
If we've mostly cleared the queue, I'd say we're probably good on that now.
Not to be a dick, but if you're writing a comment just to correct him on portal numbers, without addressing his central point, it's kind of adding unnecessary noise to the thread.
Edit: I know my comment is also adding unnecessary noise, and I thought about it before posting it, but I think it's worth mentioning in hopes of others remembering this in the future.
Edit: So what's the point? Your noise is better?
impossible everyone knows my noise is the best noise
nevermind
Do you honestly think there's a central point in that post that hasn't been discussed? It reads to me like he was flaming to get attention and then play the "see you're not even allowed to have an opinion around here" card.
Then just downvote it for noise and don't add a comment.
Your examples are mostly speculative.
--Mitchell has yet to see much playing time in games that matter, its unclear that Cunningham left because of him.
--With Kumah --there has been plenty of talk of attitude issues and he got as much or more PT than any other WR coming down the stretch of 2018.
--Ellis left last week, 1 week into practice with lots of Twitter noise suggesting conflict with the coaching staff was the major issue
--Savoy - "When Sean Savoy made the decision to transfer from Virginia Tech, football wasn't on his mind. With his mother's health declining, he just wanted to find somewhere to go to school close to home. "
If you look at the schools that top the Transfer list, there are two common themes--- #1 Power Programs that are expected to contend for the CFP or #2 Schools with recent coaching changes.
We fit into neither category at this point, yet, there we sit--right among the top. That's what's concerning...that was (I think) the point of DCWilson's post, even if he made it in a very brash way. To not allow that both the Transfer numbers and the contents of the SI article at least create some legitimate concern with Fuente's direction at this point is really not any more fair than DCWilson calling out Foster's Coordinating abilities.
So when a higher tier player at a better school beats out an incumbent it's because they recruit better, but when a higher tier player beats out one at Tech it's a lost locker room.
It's clear their were issues, it's right there in the article. But again this isn't a one issue problem. It's multi dimensional and has lots of causes and effects. But the one thing that isn't true is that this is something unique to Tech.
I just made a post, refuting pretty much every example you gave of VT players leaving because they were beat out by Underclassmen---other than Cunningham which is pure speculation without even a message board rumor to back it up; and your response was to essentially ignore everything and infer that I somehow have a bias against VT?
The reason DCWilson posts the way he does is because a select few people here are have absolutely zero tolerance for any message that is not 100% Pro-VT. Its so easy to rile you up and he knows just how to push the buttons.
For my part, I don't care to argue this out endlessly. I love VT and hope we win every, single game we play. I hope out program thrives and really, truly do hope Fuente leads the Football program to great places. But given the body of evidence so far, I am not convinced that he is the person to do that (I am also not convinced that he is not). I think he still has a lot left to prove and it is more than fair to point out and concede that there are things both he and our Program as a whole could be doing better.
When guys leave Clemson or Bama or USCe they don't blame competition either there is always a reason. So again I'm not disputing there were clearly issues but this isn't unique to Tech and Tech isn't the worst of the portal feeders.
So which one of these players would have started this year? No great athlete is going to admit they are leaving a place because they weren't good enough to start.
ETA: /S in case it wasn't obvious. I don't have a dog in this fight.
The numbers always work out...
/S
What response do you want to this? " Well gosh, it looks like DC is right and VT is actually literal garbage. This convinced me!" Why? What is fun, productive, or entertaining about this?
Even if my statement is hyperbole in response to hyperbole, the point remains. The entirety of this post is bashing the team with no context, or really even any content. It contributes nothing, suggests nothing, debates nothing, solves nothing, helps nothing. All it does is project blind negativity, flailing about in an attempt to create more negativity. The point of this post is to simultaneously ruin other peoples fun while proving you somehow know better than everyone else. Its childish at best.
If you have solutions, post them. If you have questions, ask them. If you want to complain at a group of people with no ability to change the situation you are complaining about, stay your current course. But don't be upset if people respond poorly, because you aren't giving them much choice.
You missed the /s after my post and you have not been following the topic for months. It is what it is. Yes I pointed out - sarcastically- that the party line was just blown up in a large way by SI. The reaction by some is to keep denying reality. It's cool. I posted a sarcastic one liner- yes to be sarcastic.
Well, as long as it's just this one time...
/s
you're three days late to the party, my guy. just let it go.
edit: but for everyone downvoting him, why not downvote my comment further up the thread that says basically the same thing?
Tone and tenor. You can say the same things in different ways and get different responses. I used to have to tell parents all the time that their kid wasn't accepted. I absolutely could have said "your kid is dumb, we don't want them" and you can predict the response. Going with "it was a competitive year and we think your student needs additional time to grow before they are ready for the academic rigor at XYZ university" tends to diffuse the tension a lot better.
Your original response came more across as "yepp, this confirmed there were issues"
DC came across more as "you all are dumbasses"
he put a big ole S/ at the end of it too for good measure. yeah the tone isn't great, but some people are just gonna feel attacked regardless
But if I came in, rubbed your nose in it, flaunted that I was right and you sir are a dumbass, then put a S/ at the end, it's not protection. It's not some mythical "dibs" or "shotgun" that protects you if people see through what you are really saying. Sarcasm isn't some gift that prevents you from any repercussion.
LOL-kinda like the Southern lady talking about another female adding "bless her heart". The "bless her heart" allows you to say ANYTHING before it without being "insulting"
e.g. "Sue Ellen is the biggest slut in the county... bless her heart".
Girls with two names are always the biggest sluts in the country. /F
(/F is for fact)
Are there any two named girls in the outer banks right now? Asking for a friend.
Actually yes. My friend has a restraining order against her and said she desperately needs a new boyfriend. Would you like her info?
Lol. I think we met her. Luckily I'm home now...
FTFY. Southern gals are usually compared within their county, not nationally. ;^)
Can't be nationally ranked if you never leave the county.
Wait, are you saying "dibs" and "shotgun" are mythical??!?
My life is a lie.
Just wait till you find out cake is better than pie. French has been lying to you all along.
You left off the /s
via GIPHY
Yes. Even if you didn't realize it. :)
Are you questioning Bud Foster?
https://www.thekeyplay.com/content/2017/august/20/justin-fuente-and-bud-...
As I recall, he's an expert on defense.
Well, and maybe pancakes.
nobody said anything about anyone being a dumbass but you, though
This is old news now. I'm with Fuente. Fuck 2018. The sprinklers are sprinkling, and lines are being painted. Time for 2019.
Hit the pause button dude...wait till there's something 2019 to bitch about. I'm sure you'll think of something before half time of the BC game.
Sirius XM ACC Network ACC This Morning interviewed the author of the article today. It seems like this all came together within a couple of weeks of being published. Interviews occurred during summer/fall. Author seemed to think there was a turnaround in the locker room.
The other interesting tidbit was that he did not intend to write this article when he visited. His initial thought was to write something related to Bud's announcement. This article came about because of his interviews.
I'm sure there's a link to the replay of the show - I'll try to find it if I get time.
Thanks for posting that.
Sort of eliminates the "This is just Whit doing public relations" and "Sports Illustrated is our lapdog" theories.
Also possibly explains why Fuente hadn't read the article, and looked flat-footed when asked about it.
Yep Andy shared this earlier this week. Because Bud won't talk about his retirement the author took goldmine quotes from some players and went in a different direction.
Interesting...
He certainly went a different direction with it, and can STILL do an article about Bud.
Won't be a great article with no quotes from Bud.
He may be able to get some of those later, but you could certainly do an article about him without him directly giving you quotes.
According to Mike Barber, the interviews with the players took place without a school PR rep present as required for whenever the players do interviews with the local guys. Sure looks to me like VT wanted this story out there.
If you believe the reporter, even he didn't know what direction he was going to take with the story when he was on campus doing the interviews.
A notoriously tight-lipped staff let a reporter from a national magazine have free access to players to write a story. This wasn't an accident by VT. The reporter showed up to do one story, VT gave him a bigger one.
I didn't say it was an accident. Maybe the VT staff feels better about the locker room now than it did in the past.
If you have some kind of proof that VT rigged this story up, I'd like to hear it. Actually, it just doesn't even matter.
Here are a few words to consider:
if the illusion is real
let them give you a ride
if they got thunder appeal
let them be on your side
let them leave you up in the air
let them brush your rock and roll hair
lets let the good times roll-oll
let the good times roll
let the good times roll
lets let the good times roll
we'll let the good times roll
If they feel better about the locker room, they're not showing it- you don't see more interviews with local beat writers. They're still keeping a lid on things, but just this one time they decided to let players talk freely with a reporter. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out.
OR...Maybe the Leaders within the Locker room wanted this story out there...If I was the new Leader (Dax / Tre) I would want to take the opportunity to put this information out and set the stage for a new chapter...which is something we haven't looked at...The players taking charge with the narrative which to me would be a HUGE positive sign in the locker room. Shouldn't discredit that they couldn't or wouldn't come up with this on their own.
This take feels like a reach by someone wearing their orange and maroon glasses. However, it is entirely possible that it's true. I like it.
Let's go...
HOKIES!!!
I don't care to speculate on the specific players involved, but I will say that I sort of envision a more dynamic situation than simply two factions of players (i.e. good attitude vs bad attitude).
I imagine that a lot of the off-season and early season dismissals, transfers, etc. made up some of the toxic personalities in the locker room. Tre's comment about this time of year last year, the locker room was quiet, no one wanted to be here. That says the issues were in place before the season ever started.
I feel like at that point things did not get better, because there was no senior leadership willing to speak up and take charge and lead. Things may have gotten worse towards the end of the season because of poor performance, record, winning Marshal game to go to Bowl seemed like a bit of a consolation to some of the players I am sure, and I'm guessing some of the players did not take well to the new leadership roles that Tre, Dax, and some others were carving out for themselves.
It boils down to the fact that the situation was way more dynamic than this story portrays. It was probably much more individuals than a clear faction of toxic personalities. In the end, we have a young team, it looks like we will have some good and strong leaders on the team moving forward, and the players, staff, and Fu all seem to be putting this behind them and focusing on the winning in 2019.
I'm excited for some football!
I respectfully disagree. I read the article. It was blatantly obvious that the locker room was clearly divided between Team Turkey Bacon and Team Pork Bacon.
That is a valid point. It seems like there was at least a clear divide on that issue. It is never about wins and losses, always food debates, like cake vs pie.
Wait 'til we find out there are actually 4 factions: team turkey bacon cake, team turkey bacon pie, team pork bacon cake, and team pork bacon pie.
We were lucky to make it out of the team picnic last year against such odds.
To quote my dad, who had to severely cut back on pork bacon after a heart procedure: "turkey bacon is fine, but it's just not the same."
I ate a turkey sausage link once. It was convincing enough for me to never even try the bacon.
Is like Bourbon vs. Beer? Can the answer be yes and yes? Can't you just have both turkey and pork bacon? There's a time and place for each. This locker room dynamic seems so complicated. Beyond my comprehension.
Ah, I see you are a member of PETA. People Eating the Animals.
I always thought it was People Eating Tasty Animals.
I've eaten some not so tasty animals before so I try not to exclude anything.
Bacon does not need the descriptor "pork" unless it is not pork. Doing so calls into question the fact that BACON SHOULD BE MADE OF PORK (/F) and all other bacons should be gathered into a pit and burned, with the resulting carbon squestered eternally so that it does not pollute the landscape with its non-pork-bacon foulness.
You don't want good meat to go to waste. Just remove the term bacon and I'll eat it. Bacon should be reserved for pork products.
Good point, it was probably a lot more nuanced than "bad guys" and "good guys." The team took some serious hits with dismissals, injuries and ineligibility before the season even began. Then, once the frustration of losing games (and in embarrassing fashion) set in, most likely some guys just didn't have the maturity to handle it.
And ultimately, this was probably the killer. I remember reading about how Bryan Randall pulled the team together after a tough loss to NC State in 2004, and the team responded with 8 straight wins and one of the best seasons in VT history. I'm sure something similar happened in 2010 after the JMU loss.
Unfortunately, this year's team doesn't have a lot of seniors to lean on either. But it sounds like guys like Dax and Tre Turner (and hopefully Willis) are taking on that leadership role.
Was just thinking about the "anonymous survey" of ACC coaches last week. The one quote about "I don't know what's going on at VT"? My guess is this article was put out to answer that specific question.
There are 12-15 players and their families that need reassurance that what they are seeing is real.
This article goes a long way to shut down negative recruiting and to answer the questions that have been swirling.
Lets try to get to 1000 post on this irrelevant bull s******t .
Has anyone pointed out that this is very common across all sports, especially in the pros?
It's rare that a reporter gets specific quotes from players, but this happens all the time.
Examples:
Dwight Howard.
The Worm (Dennis Rodman - maybe not a troublemaker, but didn't bond with teammates).
Michael Jordan punching his teammate in practice (Steve Kerr?).
Magic Johnson getting his coach fired.
Latrell Sprewell choking his coach.
Shaq and Kobe fighting for years.
New York Knicks.
TO (Terrell Owens) destroyed the Iggles, fighting teammates, dissing the QB (Donovan McNabb)
TO destroyed that other team he went to after Philly.
TO destroyed that other team he was at before Philly.
The Seattle Seahawks defense rebelled over the past few years because guys on the defense thought their coach favored the QB too much. Everyone is gone except the QB.
Multiple teams Reggie Jackson was on imploded because he fought with teammates and/or coaches.
Jeff Kent.
Barry Bonds.
Zac Grienke can be difficult.
That Cleveland Indians pitcher that got traded.
Puig (more misunderstood than a troublemaker, but he had his problems a few years ago).
The Chicago Bears in the mid-80s should have won multiple championships, but the coaches hated each other.
Bobby Petrino leaves Atlanta MID SEASON.
This happens all the time.
The trick is identifying and addressing the problems, and moving forward. That's what the story is about.
The problem with this argument is there are a lot more teams that don't have these problems... or the problems aren't big enough to become an SI story.
The other problem with this argument is you referenced Terrell Owens multiple times and that guy was a straight up lunatic. None of the guys on our team compared on any level to TO.
1. Every team has problems. Most teams are not worthy of a national story written about them.
2. TO destroying three teams is three times the fun, but he's only one example out of 17 that were just off the top of my head. I bet we could brainstorm a hundred if we wanted to.
3. I know at least one guy who was considered so detrimental to the team last year that he was sent packing after the ODU game. Considering he was probably our top defensive player and a potential team leader, something was wrong there.
Most teams are not worthy of a national story written about them.
Correct. And we were one of those teams that had such bad problems a national magazine did a story on us. That's really bad. As my friend said to me yesterday... "VT's locker room sounds like the remnants of a place where a bomb went off."
As someone who has seen several actual bombs go off - I'd say that is being a little dramatic.
Obviously he was being very dramatic but the point being, the perception isn't good. I told him the issue has been resolved, I suppose time will tell.
VT's locker room sounds like a place that changed coaches after 29 years.
To expect that this wouldn't have any turmoil at all during the rebuilding of the team may have been wishful thinking.
It also sounds like a place that has been through something, together, and where the people who are still there are there because they want to be.
Let's just hope that we're done with that, for the most part, and it's part of the process of getting better.
Was just watching some highlights from last season and realized something. Turner was wearing #25 for the Marshall game when he caught the 45 yd TD, which he was threatened not to catch. The #25 makes this story even better!
New motto:
"Always play like you're #25."
Add that to:
FWIW, I was talking to my friend about VT's situation in the locker room last year, and what we were facing this year. My friend played a D1 sport and said that his team went through a similar situation with players that were cancerous in the locker room. His senior year, the coach kicked some players off the team and a few others left. They won the national championship the next year.
Write it down! Natty it is!
Seems legit
After watching Last Chance U, this article became A LOT more believable. It's insane how a team can turn on itself, and how inner turmoil can derail a season. I applaud CJF for keeping the team on the tracks even though it was a second away from derailing, multiple times throughout last season. Hopeful that all of the fat has been trimmed and that we can get back to the family atmosphere that was clearly absent last season.
When I think back to this article, I'm hoping that the players that are currently on the team are still buying in. I hope that the guys in the locker room still love/believe in each other and still love/believe in the coaching staff. It becomes quite easy to turn on each other when things are going poorly. If the culture change is as real as this article made it seem, they're going to push through it. All this stuff about the bad apples being gone? Well, it's going poorly right now. Let's band together and get turn this ship around. Make me proud of the resiliency you show.
Unfortunately, from the rumblings I've heard, this isn't necessarily the case. Some are attempting to be leaders, but not in a manner that the rest of the team buys into. The culture will change when the coach is changed. And there's better handling of the captaincy or more in-depth interaction/connection with the team and players.
I don't know anything, but I imagine this is how it will go. Once a program gets to this level, once you're performing this poorly on the field, once the fan base starts seriously talking about coaching changes, the momentum of that sinking ship is not something that reverses. I feel bad for the players. But not a single player on this team knows what it takes to win at this level. That is what happens when you end up with a young team. Not to mention, none of the offensive coaches know what it takes to win at this level. They've never had to recruit, redshirt, develop, and manage week to week and year to year in the P5. It is a different game and they are failing miserably. Fuente walked into the most unique situation ever, and some of that has worked against him. But damn, I don't know what he can possibly do at this point to try and recover.
This, I have to disagree with. Certainly Fuente has won games at this level. Is his experience just too limited? Maybe. Either he doesn't know, or doesn't want to ruffle feathers. But he does need to identify and make some adjustments. Whatever he did last year wasn't enough.
Seems to me that this kind adversity either makes or breaks you. The team has enough talent to win these games. The question is "Will they rise to the occasion, or let adversity define them." So far, everyone out there looks lost, so the energy isn't going to the right place.
And "at this level"....ODU, Furman, Duke.......not like it's the $EC with Georgia, Auburn, LSU, Bammer, Florida. "This level" is a low bar, and it's not being cleared.
I think these players, with this level of experience, can beat the teams on our schedule.
The current coaches, and the players, need to step it up. They need to wake up and smell the coffee, and stop looking like deer caught in the headlights.
Figure it the fuck out.
bingo!
Okay... Vtkey with some fire about the current situation. I like it!
Legs to you good sir!
"The team has enough talent to win these games." .... why? because 247 composite says so? Or based on what they have actually done on the field? I hear all this about "talent" then come game time, we can't score for long stretches against Furman. Doesn't add up.
Talent is different than play-calls on the field and how the talent is utilized. You wouldn't put your math wizard in for questions about opera, so don't call plays that don't utilize the talent. Just because they didn't score for 5 drives doesn't mean they aren't good players. Means there is something bigger wrong.
I agree. To translate to the business world I don't think I have ever seen anyone come back from a PIP (performance improvement plan). Once you get to a certain point, there is no turning back, and I don't see this team winning more than another game or two this season (RI and maybe GT). For Fuente to save his job he would need at least another 5 wins this year.
I am dreading the game this weekend.
Thinking about it though, the transfer portal has been our enemy last year and will be this year to some extent. But once a new coaching staff is in place, it will be our best friend. Because the portal will be the quickest way to re-balance the age of the roster. That and smartly redshirting every player possible will be important.
I hope you're right. But we may be in for a Louisville type or rebuild if
WhitFuente isn't fired after this season.Whit is a typo right?
Oops... Fixed.
Yes. Chris Coleman has talked about this, and I agree. REDSHIRT EVERYONE.
A coach fighting for his job isn't going to redshirt everyone unless those players straight up revolt and refuse to play in order to preserve their own eligibility, and that would come with its own set of concerns that might give a potential new coach pause.
I'm not talking about this coach. I'm talking about the guy coming in that will try and clean up the mess this coach left us in
Yes. I'm on board with this especially RE King since he's gonna get pounded the rest of this year
Eh, maybe you don't redshirt everyone but if we keep sucking at passing, you certainly don't play Simmons, Payoutte, Bowick for sure. And if there is a DT that can redshirt, put Porcher in there and tell him to take his lumps, so we have some experience 2 years from now.
Can I ask for more on this? I would think it would be the opposite - redshirt noone. It isn't like we're expecting Fuente to have five years left, so to try to save a guy's eligibility doesn't seem like the option I'd take. Get everyone a little burn. Everyone needs to be game ready and being given an opportunity to show what they can do in the game.
There have been comparisons of Fuente's and Beamer's talent pools. In truth, they're fairly identical. We're still a decent P5 program; we're not a blue blood. We're signing our high 3* kids, and a couple four stars class after class. (Not getting into the 2020 class here; that's a pretty long discussion on it's own, but that class is definitely not on par with normal).
Beamer played the long game. He ran a system that neutralized our talent disadvantage to the Florida State's and Miami's of the conference; he redshirted players almost as a rule. Fuente isn't doing this as much (whether we've chased too many kids off or the "portal" has done more of this damage is an argument for a different thread); if an upperclassman is struggling, he'll play the frehsmen behind him (with the exception of the QB position! The man has his faults but he is fiercely protective of his QBs, and that's a good thing. Kinda wish he could afford to apply that logic to everybody on the team, actually.)
Kind of like playing JuCo players; if you absolutely have to get them on the field; do it- just don't make it a habit.
Beamer's approach allowed high school kids to grow into their college form before they see the field. (Schools like Duke and Wake Forest do this as well- they're just not big enough talent magnets to sustain consistent success. When we do it, we're effectively fielding a team of four star players from high-3 star recruits. Duke and Wake probably aren't turning their low 3-stars quite into 4 stars; but similarly the majority of their players are better and smarter athletes by the time they're seeing the field.)
The short-term "play a bunch of freshmen" mentality means our talent appears to have dropped. Not because the kids we're getting aren't as good as the ones we used to get; we're playing too many damn kids who just aren't ready to play consistently and effectively. And freshmen aren't much better or smarter than they were in high school.
(The Alabama's and Ohio States rake in so much talent they NEED to stay away from redshirting just so they can continue to sign big classes; basically if they're only signing 10 kids next season, a bunch of their kids will just go to Michigan or LSU. Urban Meyer famously wouldn't redshirt; only extremely talented players with a medical issue were considered under his Florida and OSU teams.)
If we're trying to salvage the season and see if we can keep the bowl streak alive, maybe the short term advantage of playing more talented freshman would be the way to go?
Overall we really need to get back to redshirting kids again- we're not Clemson, and even if we're talking 2016 (a successful season where we won 10 games), we're not close. Getting to that level will take years and years; even if we're successful all that time "program elevation" isn't guaranteed. (i.e. VT in the 2000's).
We're not going to BE Clemson any time soon. But if we at least want to compete with them, we're going to have to take the kids we get and give them time to develop like we used to; regardless of who the coach is next year. And we're not going to compete with Clemson this year either way.
May as well be smart and plan for the future.
Yes. This is perfect
Good post, enjoyed the analysis and optimism.
Really something we're playing so many freshman on OL. Given some are such
highly rated recruits, I don't have a problem with it.
Makes sense.
And if this is the case, do you think Fuente has figured this out, and just doesn't know how to break it to the fan base?
Does that mean we need to be more patient as fans?
Shouldn't some of Fuente's players be coming into their own by now?
One of the things Beamer always depended on was a stout defense. What's happening? Is this all the result of too many players leaving during the transition?
To be as positive as possible, this is the take I had in another thread. Fuente probably knows what the issue is and is willing to fix it but it's not a quick one.
I'm not sure redshirting kids in this day and age is as beneficial as it was 15-20 years ago. For one, kids are playing more football at younger ages so they're more developed. Two, with graduate transfers being immediately eligible I don't think you can assume a kid will stick around for that 5th year on campus.
I believe participation in youth football is actually down. Even if you're stating that football players 15-20 years ago were smaller (true), I'm just trying to generalize that an average sophomore is bigger/faster/stronger/more invested in a coaches system than the same average freshman (in other words the rate of growth/strength/speed of players as a whole can't possibly surpass the rate of difference a year makes to any individual player).
The transfer portal is certainly a game changer. However even before the transfer portal existed, older kids generally transferred out once they realized they were being passed on the depth chart. If you foster growth in a system, I don't see anything to suggest you won't manage to have redshirt seniors populating your roster.
From a quick dive through the ACC rosters on Ourlads (14 teams, the first 22 starters listed on each team); there are an average of two 5th year starters on each side of the ball (46 total) for each ACC team. Currently, only FSU and Virginia Tech have one each (Ryan Willis is ours).
BC, Louisville, NC State, Pitt and Syracuse have no true freshmen listed as starters. We have two on our Offensive Line.
IMO, today's Freshman and Sophmore's are much more ready to play than yesteryear....my evidence is most teams play freshman and sophomores without hesitation now successfully.
Do you have any numbers to break down to suggest that "most" teams play underclassmen more frequently and more successfully? It seems to me that it's mainly 5* superstars breaking out at blue blood schools. Which is still interesting but that's not "most teams", and certainly not something we can expect to replicate at the level we generally recruit at.
GREAT answer, brockman.
I think your entire explanation is entirely sensible. The only caveat I can see is the truly talented freshman - think Trevor Lawrence and those of his ilk - should see the field earlier, if only to get game experience. King might fall into this category (though I am not trying to compare Lawrence and King, just that our roster has talent that falls into the Fr/So category).
I think you see this situation clearly - though I'm still not entirely convinced that generating experience from the youth isn't a sustainable approach.
And this is where I fall on the side of "if you have made up your mind to fire the guy, do it now"
The last thing we want is Fuente out there lame ducking it desperately trying to save his job after we've internally made the decision to let him go. Desperate coaches make desperate personnel decisions that suit themselves in the short term while sacrificing the future. Given our current situation, that would only worsen the situation we're currently in.
I find the article interesting and it explains some of the woes in the program. There is no doubt there are chemistry problems and off field theatrics. And it think it still continues. This explains why Bud says "We had a great practice, thought we were ready" only to get smoked. The coaches continue to misread the teams preparedness. That means to me the off field crap is still bubbling. To call VT now a family is a bunch of crap. You can see a nonverbal chill and demeanor in the air. Compare how Fuente is treating his guys compared to Dabo, Bronco Mendenhall, and Mack Bown, for example, and you can tell VT is still ice cold. So I don't buy that it's all warm and fuzzy now. I am president of a chemical company, and when you lead an organization, there is always crap going on and bad actors. But it is up to the top guy to deal with it and make sure it does not become a cancer. Guys will embellish and spin stories that are not always true and can damage team morale. There are ways to deal with this. Most important is communication. When this crap is going on it has to be identified and the top guy has to broadcast around it. Shine a flashlight on all behavior and expose it. Open door policy. Tell your guys you wanna hear it all, but it has to be constructive and not whiny bitchy stuff.
It appears to me Fuente has failed to do so. He has let this fester too long. He is a shut your mouth and circle the wagons kind of leader. His message is don't tell me anything even if there is an elephant in the room. That approach causes anger in some of the disenfranchised players and leads to strife. He continued this approach until it exploded on him. Has he fixed it? I doubt it. A lot of this is just his personality. With his management style, these cancers don't go away. I hate to be pessimistic. This guy may know football. Be he is in some serious need of remedial education on how the manage people.
One could argue that one of the early errors Frank made as the program started the decline was not giving Tyrod a res shirt year.
We would have been better eating a poorer season in 07 or 08, or both, and had a developed LT as a pass catcher.
That would have been so cool to see
That and had we hit one of EJ Manuel, Tajh Boyd, or Marquise Williams, things would have been MUCH different those years.
Yes. Didn't we burn Tyrod's red shirt in a game against LSU that was essentially already over?
Yes, but he also played the rest of the season. It was more than burning it in a meaningless game...
The more egregious burning of Tyrod's shirt came after we couldn't gain 3 yards on offense against mighty ECU and lost, so Beamer panicked and played Tyrod the next week.