Fuente on whether he thinks he needs to take over play-calling: "That's not what's needed." #Hokies— Norm Wood (@normwood) September 30, 2019
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Fuente on whether he thinks he needs to take over play-calling: "That's not what's needed." #Hokies— Norm Wood (@normwood) September 30, 2019
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Fuck, man.
Did someone at least follow up with "Then what is needed?"
"At this point I dont know" - Fuente probably
I was wrong.
I never had any idea what heuplek meant, but I've been way off the mark when it comes to pronouncing it in my head. Hue-pleck.
Well, obviously, it's supposed to be Kev-in.
Both are you are actually right...
That's exactly how it would be pronounced.
Jeez do I love Andy Bitter.
He's right you know
Time to step up, Whit. If Fuente can't tell his bestie his time is up, then we need someone who can.
That was a depressing press conference, man.
It was what I expected, but still. We are completely dead in the water.
his press conferences are the same as they were in 2016, so dont read much into it
That was some cringe worthy material. Fuente looked defeated, lost, and exhausted.
Bold Strategy Cotton, Let's see how this works out for him.
I guess we will see if Corny is an Albatross or a scapegoat. If we continue to score 10 points a game, Fuente may have dug his own grave with this decision.
More context in the answer.
It's your ship man and the team is like the 3 piece brass band that decides to keep playing as it is sinking.
I don't know how inside you have to be to view the shitty offense on the field every weekend.
Ok. So, Fuente is saying he knows the answer? That's great, coach. Next step is fixing it.
That's what I'm hearing.
In his logic, calling a bubble screen isn't the problem. In his head a perfectly executed bubble screen should have WRs block the cornerbacks out to the sideline and the ball carrier should make the safety miss the 1 on 1 for a gain in yardage.
The play doesn't work.
Therefore his players aren't executing properly. The game plan is fine. Try again.
Hey remember that Hail Mary on 4th and short against GT to a hurt Cam Philips? That was a great play call, Cam just didn't execute.
I wouldn't call it a great play call, but I didn't think it was terrible. From what I recall, Fuente said he wasn't confident in the run game, and he wanted to put the ball in the hands of his best player (Cam). I was far more frustrated by the decision to establish the run when we were down two scores against BC with minutes left.
This is one of those answers where you're in a meeting with your boss and the whole team knows the action to take to correct course....but the boss shoots it down to look like he has control, but legit has no idea what's happening.
Also, I assume CJF has more say in the offensive room so the play calling probably has his stamp of approval on it. Since its looking so bad he is going to keep BC in place as a buffer for when the heat from Whit starts coming into play. If he comes out and says that he is already in on the play calling....not good.
Plus, what advantage at this point does he have in taking full ownership for the offense? If he takes Corn out of the equation and assumes those duties, then the offense inevitably continues to struggle because of myriad issues and flaws, then there is nowhere else to point any fingers. Plus the offensive savvy and expertise he is supposedly known for is gone quickly. That would also probably hurt him down the road at another potential coaching stop because he completely failed here. Always keep an excuse handy or someone to throw under the bus when the kitchen gets too hot.
How long until the beat writers start calling him "embattled head coach Justin Fuente"? That's my favorite part of the coach-in-crisis cycle.
Watching this presser, the guy has to go. There's no coming back from this. He's lost.
go back to 2016.. his pressers are always like this. just his style
He thinks that magically the OL will start picking up stunts, Willis will be better with the RPO, King won't fumble, the WRs will get separation, and Willis won't turn the ball over. All in a week. Right. Good Plan.
No, he said "that much change doesn't magically happen in a week." He's already resigned to getting blown out next week too.
Yeah. That much change probably takes a solid spring and fall practice cycle. If only we had been afforded such time.
Gotcha! So, next season!
All aboard the 2020-2021 season hype train!!!
Choo choo 🚂
Disclosure: I've tempered my expectations for this season even more. I was blissfully hoping for a 20th anniversary run to the NCG. But realistically, a 7-5 regular season as achievable and a marginal improvement over last year.
7-5 is hilariously optimistic, considering the product we've seen on the field through 1/3 of the season. We've already played 2 of the 3 easiest opponents we have all year, and Duke was supposed to be one of the other 4 "likely wins" to reach 7-5.
It'll take a massive turnaround to reach a bowl game at this point.
I'm not calling Duke world-beaters, but that "likely win" went down the drain when we could barely escape FURMAN!! Just saying.
You're not wrong, but the point still stands that we're going to be the underdog in every game left on the schedule except for URI and GT. Before the season, Duke was one of 7 of our opponents we were given a 75% chance or better of beating, with BC being one of two others with a 66% chance or better of beating. Now both of those games went way worse than expected, and we're looking at one "definite" win (URI), one "should" win (GT), 3 games as a close underdog (UNC, Pitt, Wake), and 3 likely losses (Miami, ND, UVA) from here on out.
Man I wish I was anywhere close to thinking 7-5 is a realistic outcome for us
I'll have some of what you're having so that I can also foresee us going 7-5. Because in my sober state, I honestly think we end up 3-9 with all shit breaking loose on here.
Don't forget our young DL playing out of position.
None of that is any more naive than thinking removing the OC from playcalling is any sort of a solution to anything.
I don't think anyone is saying that removing the OC is going to immediately solve any problems.
This season is already essentially over and any solution is going to take a couple of years, realistically. The way this team is performing its hard to see where they can manage two more wins. This is the right time to accept Cornelson hasn't done his job and hire someone else. It's pretty plain that the offensive staff as a whole has completely failed to even make any progress in any area over the last 3+ seasons. The solution is to hit the refresh button. The sooner, the better. But everyone who is aware of this also understands that it will take time for the new staff to build. All we're looking for are tangible signs of improvement. In year 4, this staff has failed to deliver. Why do we expect anything to change? Bring in a new staff and give them two to three seasons to show progress.
Trying to be constructive here - We know the team has major holes. However, turnovers are generally something you can limit with effort. That is, many of our turnovers this year have been unforced. If we can somehow limit those and protect the ball a bit, I think we can keep some of these games at least closer. We may lose, but geez we need to at least do that to try and be competitive.
You might have had a slight chance of convincing me if we lost 5 or more turnovers to Duke. But a decent team should be able to overcome a turnover or two. Especially at home. Our problems go so so much deeper than "effort" and "youth". Turnovers aren't the biggest issues by a long long way. The problems appear to be systemic. I'm not discounting the fact Fuente had some major challenges to work through. But what I'm upset about is that he's being paid a hell of a lot of money and there is regression, not progress. In year 4 that's a major concern
C'mon man... Because this shit has been working so great so far, right?
No words.
This is next-level stupidity.
He is saying without saying it that there is a talent problem at key positions. That is his responsibility but not something pulling Cornelson right now will fix.
Do you believe we are not more talented than Duke??
Their are OCs at G5 programs doing soooo much more with less.
Cornball may not be the only problem on offense but he is absolutely a huge part of it and he isn't the solution to anything.
Dukes d looked more talented. (Dig up the stars and prove me wrong I guess). And their qb was better than Willis.
Would (sadly) agree with you on the defensive side.
We have 2 4-star QBs sitting in the bench with much ore natural talent than Harris.
The problem is they have been under the tutilage of Cornelson.
and one of those tore his shoulder up in an orange no contact jersey at some point in camp.
It is the fact that we are down in the most critical positions. Stars be damned, we have no qb or running back or sack specialist.
Exactly. Well said.
Except it's not just key positions. Pretty much every position group except punter is no better than average in terms of the experience/physical ability combo. And most are below average.
What are the chances that he's saying "that's not what's needed" because he knows what's needed is a new OC/offensive staff rather than just taking the play calling away?
I know it's not what he meant, but I want to at least be hopeful about something today..
Not very high.
Tyrell Smith is out for the season.
He wants to players to be "tough enough mentally, emotionally, and physically to execute at a high level regardless of circumstances" yet apparently doesn't try to instill confidence in them either. According to him, the only way to gain confidence is "to do the right thing over and over again. You can't give it to somebody. You can show them how to earn it I think but in my opinion you get it from repeating the correct execution time after time after time." No wonder the team is falling apart, this guy just berates them and takes zero blame. Give me a freaking break.
Words from a man with no financial worries.
"Whaddya gonna do... Buy me out? Bwahahaha!"
How many times will I have to use this gif?
Didn't you buy the season package usage license on it? Rookie move there.
Yep and I listened to his short live video he posted. He's right. You can't just pass the controller over and assume it'll magically get better. They need to work together as a staff to put our guys in the best situation to gain yards, score and win games. That also takes so much pressure off the defense of having to try and be perfect every play, which we know is not possible.
I think the first step is to protect the ball - turnovers have destroyed us. Moral plummets
Agreed. We are one of the worst in FBS right now with turnovers. It is BAD. But the fumbles are on the players and the interceptions are a mix of both coaches and the qb.
I would buy Fuente's "I have all the answers on the inside and you don't know it" routine a lot more if we weren't in the middle of season 2 of spiraling out of control with no end in sight.
I want to post something rationale regarding Fuente right now but feel like the pitchforks are out in full force right now and no one's thinking straight.
Let me help you. All the pitchforks are out because the offense has failed to improve. In fact, it has progressively gotten worse each year since Fuente was hired and they managed a whopping 3 points against Duke in the first half. That lack of production put the defense in a hole they couldn't dig out of. All of this from a guy specifically targeted as an offensive coach who would bring offense to Blacksburg. In the time he has been here there has only been regression, particularly offensively. So it's pretty easy to see why pitchforks are flying
amen... 3 points against Furman at half. Bye week to prepare for Duke and the offense looked inept.
What was the worst about the first half on Friday was our defense came out balling and gave our offense a short field to work with 3 possessions in a row I think. We scored 3 points. That was brutal.
You might want to put your pitchfork away and use the ol noggin for half a second. Complicated situation usually has a complicated answer and saying "fire corny" or some other slogan for a quick-fix will rarely fix the situation, but i'll provide a few examples:
We are in an area that isn't due to things going wrong because Fuente took over, but because we were stagnant as a program under Frank (and dare I say, sinking even) that Fuente had to restart from 0 - not to mention getting rid of toxic ppl within the program itself. Talent was down and he's brought plenty in, but we only have 5 seniors on this team, so leadership is lacking on the team (yes coaches and players both), secondly, Foster's had one leg out for a while so that's been a handicap for a while now though it's hard to gauge how much it's impacted us. Nix coming / leaving within a blink of an eye sucked too. We also have two TRUE freshman playing on the OL which hampers us as well. I wish I could find it, but there's a table created on TOS showing the challenges that Fuente had / has gone through which shows this is not a trivial effort to try and make VT relavant again.
I'm not saying Fuente is void of blame because as rightly pointed out he's the head of the program, but I think last year and this year were going to be incredibly tough years based on where we are at the macro level; Fuente wasn't brought it to continue taking a team like OSU has after Meyer left, but what was close to sinking to make it relevant. We were always going to have lumps and this is indicative of it.
I for one still have faith. I'm willing to give Fuente a fair shot to redo the program properly and give him another two years. If by then we're not significantly better then let's reassess, but now - this is going completely to script, and Whit is aware of that.
If you think this is currently on-script, I have some oceanfront property in Utah to sell you.
I think his actual point is that this rebuild was never going to be as easy as some people here seem to think.
I know what his point is. I think his point is jumping through...all the hoops
Rebuild wouldn't have been so bad if you didn't run everyone off, could actually recruit talent and depth elsewhere than WR/OL, and actually then coach that talent to execute on the field. He is literally the reason we are where we are now.
Fuente won 10 and 9 games with the "impossible rebuild" lol... then the more his players play, the less competitive we are. yeah, totally the last guy's fault, since the freshman and sophomores that were here when Fuente was hired were not all NFL prospects- so it's a "major rebuild".... nevermind the head coach has had 3 recruiting cycles to try to fix that or try to retain some of those guys. To blame this on Beamer is ridiculous.
Fuente had one year of great players, and did a decent job of it.
Doesn't mean it wasn't a rebuild.
Shhhh don't talk logic with it. It won't get it.
what logic? Only Seniors and Juniors can play? compete? not quit against Duke? do you watch any other team besides VT? this idea that Freshman and Sophomores can't play until they are upperclassmen is garbage. Watch literally most other teams on Saturdays.
I do, but I think you're under the impression that having junior / senior players doesn't matter and that a team full of underclassmen is just as good as those full of upperclassmen. That's simply not the case at all. Maybe you should stop thinking of Tech being able to do with Bama and Clemson do - we're not at that level.
Ok yes, the 2016 class was a flop because of the coaching transition. Plus a bunch of the talent Frank recruited his last few years left early for the NFL. But Fuente's first class in 2017 are all in the third year in their program. You can't deny that a lot of Fuente's recruits have already transferred out, or have had zero impact, especially from that 2017 class. Go look at the classes and see how many from that vaunted class are gone or non-factors. Several guys from 2018 already gone as well. Frank left us a glass half full, and the next guy was supposedly going to elevate us. Instead the bottom has completely dropped out. Fuente's recruiting has been so far on par with and now even below Frank's last few years. We are on a complete descent course, and it's crazy that some people still want to blame Frank four years after the fact. Fuente has had every opportunity to right the ship and has done the complete opposite.
No one is saying we should be Bama right now. I think we just don't want to see a team that can't even compete with teams like Pitt, GT and DUKE. When we have lost over the last season and a quarter the norm has become that we do not even look competitive. That is coaching. Losing hard-fought but close (which could be 14 points at this point) games is one thing. Putting an embarrassing product on the field is another.
I think Fuente has said as much that he and his staff need to coach better so it's not lost on him either. I don't disagree that we need to be more competitive, but I disagree that saying "fire corny" will solve the issue.
eg: Offense needed to do better against Duke for sure, but Defense shouldn't have folded after the first quarter - how much of that is Foster to blame? How much of the O was lack of execution by QB? It's all intertwined.
As Head Honcho Fuente is responsible, but he's trying to right the ship from what I can tell. I'd be more concerned if he wasn't even admitting something is wrong. I will give him time (a year or two) to see where he lands before i ask for his head.
Admitting something is wrong and continuing down the same path does not feel like a strategy that deserves another year or two. I would certainly assume he is trying to right the ship. No one likes to suck at their job, and as a football coach his job is basically his life. However, that does not mean he is capable of righting the ship. Maybe we're seeing the Peter principle in action.
Defense definitely should not have folded (and I love all Bud has done but it is his time to retire). The overall team culture seems to result in everyone folding when adversity hits. I pin that on the guy in charge. If we had any sign that things are not trending off a cliff, I would feel better about Fuente. But he has shown a lot of evidence now (to me at least) that he is not the guy. He still has a some games this year to turn that around, but the trend has been going on for a little too long.
I can understanding losing with youth or bad QB play or whatever. I cannot understand a team with our talent not even competing against average-to-poor competition.
The entire team quit once they faced any sort of adversity. They just had no fight in them.
That is 100% on the head coach.
I'd have to say that the defense folding is not really 100 percent Fuente - I'm gonna go ahead and give bud at least 50 percent of that blame, maybe more.
Are we really going to go back to the Youth, Inexperience, Lockerroom, Turkey Bacon Defense????
There are no seniors on the team largely because they were run out of the Program.
We look so inexperienced because we are poorly coached. There are Fr. and So. all over the country making impacts at key positions. Our young players look uniquely unprepared for the field due to poor preparation. Name me one Fuente-era Recruit that has made major strides from a Development standpoint....better yet, name me one Recruit that has even lived up to expectations (particularly 4* guys). This reeks of poorly coached team.
And the Lockeroom is bad because of Fuente, his personality and his inability to adapt and connect to his players (and nearly anyone else for that matter).
The problems start and the buck stops with Fuente. He is the problem here. He's the one that decided he needed an SI Article preseason to "highlight" how much the culture had changed, but the truth is that it hasn't.
there is a huge amount of real estate between Clemson and Bama and being competitive in a home game against Duke. The youth nonsense is 1. created by the current staff's inability to retain players and 2. A myth. many "young" players play well in the ACC and all over the country.
Yes, the idea that Freshman and Sophomores can't play is garbage.
However the idea that a roster with the fewest seniors and the 3rd most frosh in the FBS - and thus the youngest team - can play consistent, physical, smart football is also garbage.
You can argue about how and why and whether this could/should have happened, but to think this ceiling for this team is high is utterly naive.
From my front porch, you can see the sea.
.....
If you buy that, I'll throw the golden gate in free.
So in order for Justin Fuente to succeed at an ACC program and not get embarrassed by Duke at home he needs:
1. A winning team when he took over- 7-6 won't do, he needs a 9 win, rolling program to take over
2. A perfectly balanced roster so that he has 15 Seniors and 20 Juniors left over from the old coach
3. A defensive Coordinator that won't retire within 5 years
4. 7 years to win using his method
sure, no problem. Lol
I listed challenges that he's going through for people thinking an immediate 15-0 effect is what's expected. Like it or not, Fuente is rebuilding the program and yes time is needed. Frank needed time back in the 90's, and Dabo needed it and got it this decade. Newsflash in case you didn't get it - we were not a good program and we were festering on the inside when Frank left. But sure, go ahead and continue to think you know what's best lol.
Love the revisionist history. Beamer won 7 and 8 games his last two seasons- not 3 games. He left Fuente with a winning program, brand new indoor facility, and money on the table for a nutrition and merryman upgrade. But now we pretend Fuente took over Rutgers because he is not winning now. Give me a break. Beamer's last team didn't get embarrassed by Duke at home. Beamer also left Fuente Tim Settle, the Edmunds brothers, Cam Phillips, Isaiah Ford, Greg Stroman, Joey Slye, Adonis Alexander- all NFL players. If that is a festering program than like I said, Fuente can only succeed with a perfect situation set up for him.
Beamer left before his house fell down on top of himself, and Fuente came in and it did. I would give Beamer credit for not leaving it completely destroyed like Bowden did at FSU, but if you think Beamer left Fuente with a pristine program then who exactly is doing the revisionist history? I could argue that Frank left just in time for his legacy not to get tainted and let Fuente be the fall man but that's a whole different argument. In any case, the talent that Fuente has brought it is on bar if not above what Frank had and Fuente is building the depth that's needed - it's just going to take time. Yes Frank had some good players that Fuente inherited but other than Settle (who was going to fail out of school), I think most of them were upperclassmen and had leadership. If Frank had the program so great then Fuente wouldn't have only 5 seniors on this years team.
where is this talent? Where were they against Duke? oh that's right, they will only be good as RS Juniors and Seniors. And thanks for admitting that Fuente needs a pristine program left for him to be competitive in the ACC. I agree.
lol ok Buddy. Great job twisting words. I hope you enjoy your circle jerk of arguing with everyone, but I'm done entertaining your fetishes.
Nonsense. Beamer left Fuente with an incredible senior offensive core, a winning team (and may I remind you that most losses during 2014-16 were single digit losses not blowouts like today), TONS of goodwill with the media and fanbase and the greatest defensive coordinator of all time.
I honestly can't believe people still have this opinion and are willing to drag Frank's name in the mud to defend Fuente. Don't get me wrong, Frank's time was done but to even suggest that he left the program in a shit state is asinine. Fuente couldn't have had a smoother handover if he tried.
I don't know what to tell you other than you're wrong. It would be asinine to not have seen where the program was heading under him near the end. Love him to death for what he did, but this trajectory was happening for awhile. Retaining Foster helped for a year or two, but once he checked out then I'm not sure what you want Fuente to do.
LOL. What do we want Fuente to do? 4 years after Beamer retired? LOL. How about field a competitive team against Duke? oh that's right, Beamer ran the thing into the ground, so it's going to take 10 years to reach Duke's level again. LOLOLOLOL.
Develop players? Or can you only do that in Year 6 and 7?
I think you need "time" to do that, but i'm not sure - can't we just recruit RS college seniors right out of HS?
If only he hadn't driven every player with experience off the team.
My 2 cents - players who left were a) not talented enough or b) toxic per this last year situation. If you talk to the players from 2016 (ie Sam Rogers) they had nothing but glowing things to say about Fuente, but that's just my view on it.
Yeah A. doesn't work. We just got killed by 35 by Duke. If the young guys were more talented than the guys that Fuente ran off, then well we wouldn't lose by 35 to Duke. Argument doesn't fly. and how does a player get "toxic"? Either he was like that when he got here - so a recruiting miss or he became toxic under this staff's watch.
Mook Reynolds was kicked off the team for a Marijuana possession charge that was dismissed.
Cam Goode was kicked off the team within weeks for coming in overweight and out-of-condition.
Those were both, IMHO, stupid mistakes and don't fit either example a) or b) you have given.
The fact that you have a Fr. at a position of dire need who comes in overweight, and you decide to cut ties within weeks of camp starting tells so much about Fuente. To me it says, you don't have enough confidence in yourself as a coach to connect with the kid and get him to understand the importance of conditioning. Hell, give him a year, if he still isn't on-board, then let him go.
It's ludicrous to think that every 17-18 is going to come into CFB without some level of immaturity or limited discipline. If you, as a coach, can't deal with that, its gonna be really damn difficult for you.
It wasn't that he was overweight - it was because he didn't want to run and get into shape lol. To be clear, Cam wanted out; coach didn't kick him off. Hell I think it was David Wang called Cam out on his shit for it too and David was considered a team leader.
Pretty sure Mook's situation was a school level deal and not a football level decision
We don't need seniors to score more than 3 points at the half vs Furman and to not be blown out by Duke at home.
Again - complicated answer for a complicated situation. Anyone that works in an organization knows change takes time. I wish I could say "X" is the reason we didn't score more and lost, but it's usually more complicated than that. In general I trust Whit's judgement and if he sees the forest for the trees with what Fuente is doing then that's ok with me.
Right - its the Curt Newsome philosophy- only RS Juniors and older can play on the OL...
Wow. Are we UVA? Because you make us sound like we're UVA.
This doesn't add to the convo
My point is that your points would be valid if we were UVA and Bronco was struggling, because 'he inherited a floundering Mike London program' is a valid excuse.
Beamer did not leave us floundering enough that it's effects should still be felt 4 years later.
Just because Program A is a certain way doesn't mean that Program B is the same. No one likes using the transitive property for football games played so why is it like that for other program comparisons?
then I'm not sure what you want Fuente to do.
Not sucking would be a good start.
Recruit well? Develop the players? Develop recruiting pipelines in-state including the 757? Maintain recruiting pipelines? Be competitive in ACC games? Have the stands be more than 1/2 full after half-time? Be an 'offensive genius' or 'QB whisperer' or whatever fake offensive platitude you want to give him? Make significant changes on the defensive side if Bud was really checked out since, you know, that is what head coaches/CEOs do?
Did he manage to do any of those...
In 2014, only one of our six losses was by more than one possession. In 2015, only two of our six losses were by more than one possession, and one of those was to Ohio State when Michael Brewer went down. Fuente inherited an experience-laden team that only needed a quarterback to turn those one possession losses into wins. Oh yeah, by the way, that quarterback wants nothing to do with the program now. Seven of our last nine losses have been by more than one possession, and that's putting it generously considering some were by three to five possessions. The offensive line has gotten worse, the quarterback has gotten worse, the running game has gotten worse, the h-back has gotten worse. Everything Fuente was hired to be has not materialized. Our offense is a JOKE. The playcalling has no rhythm or reason to it yet nothing has been changed. We whiffed on some major targets for the 2020 class. It is YEAR FOUR. Neal Brown inherited a WVU team that lost damn near everything and didn't exactly scrape together a good recruiting class. He is 3-1 so far in his first year beating a JMU team that would probably beat us right now, NC State who would definitely beat us, and Kansas who would also definitely beat us. This is all Fuente, and it's all bad. Find a way to make the buyout work, can his ass, give Bud the reigns for the remainder of the season, and work diligently to find a coach who the players will actually play for. If it doesn't happen now, it's going to happen later. No point in putting it off and having two new defensive staffs in a matter of years, because we all know that whatever Fuente decides will be underwhelming and not retained when this thing is really stripped down.
Amen... to pretend VT is some unicorn compared to WVU, UNC, Kansas, etc. is just an axe to grind against Frank Beamer and it's sad. Beamer handed Fuente a cadillac in comparison to most situations.
It's year 4.
Having a team this inexperienced is Justin Fuente's fault.
.....how is it completely his fault? Especially if there wasn't talent already there to be used in the first place. Cupboard wasn't bare completely, but we whiffed on a lot of evaluation in the end with the Seth Dooleys of the team. More talent was needed across the board and that's what we're seeing now - a young team still.
Seth Dooley was signed 4 years before Fuente coached his first game at VT and 7 years before Duke beat us down by 35 points at home. Damn you Seth Dooley- a 3 star recruit and back up DE, you are making it really hard for Fuente 7 years later. LOL
The entire staff is at fault, and the buck stops on his desk.
There can't be more than a handful of Beamer recruits left on the team, these are *his* guys and this team is *his* responsibility.
There are no more excuses.
There is nothing analogous about Beamer's rough patch to what we are currently seeing.
1) When Beamer began, there was barely any "program" to speak of. There was no name recognition. Pitiful facilities. No major conference affiliation. No money. No winning tradition. Nothing.
2) Even during Beamer's worst seasons, such as 1992, we were somewhat competitive. You really have to go back to the 1970s to find a team as terrible as what we have seen the last two years.
Every single Virginia Tech fan I know would be okay with a down year or two. That is not the problem. The problem is that the program has completely jumped the tracks. Every single component is trending down. Every one.
I cannot understand how anyone can have even a shred of optimism. I have been a hardcore fan since 1995 so my perspective is limited. My father has been going to the games since the early 1960s. I trust his judgment. This is a very dark time for the program.
"We are in an area that isn't due to things going wrong because Fuente took over, but because we were stagnant as a program under Frank (and dare I say, sinking even) that Fuente had to restart from 0 - not to mention getting rid of toxic ppl within the program itself. "
a) This is year 4, and there's empirical evidence in Charlottesville that you can resurrect a moribund program in 4 years time;
b) Fuente had to start from 0...which is why the team won 19 games and a division title in his first two years.
So how long does Fuente get until he owns this mess?
UVa got lucky on a quarterback who can make lemonade out of lemons.
Take away Perkins and Reed, and they're a middling team in the ACC Coastal.
Bronco has also built a defense that can hold GT and Pitt under 10 yards a play and Duke under 45 at home.
A defense that can hold GT and Pitt to 10 yards a play?
Is that even enough to win games?
I don't understand that analysis, but I seem to remember that UVa had some decent players on defense when Bronco showed up.
Fuente had NFL draft picks on defense when he showed up and Pitt and GT steamrolled him into the ground last year. Bronco's defense has been much better than ours the past 2 years. They give effort, they tackle, they aren't soft, they don't quit. That's coaching.
Isn't Bud still coaching the defense?
I skewered Bud after ODU last year- I killed him- I was suspended from posting on here. I've been as critical of Bud as anyone. Duke 2019 is not about Bud Foster and Frank Beamer, no matter how much you want it to be. the head coach didn't have us competitive against Duke.... duke... worst loss since 74 at Lane. It's on him.
Duke hanging 45 points on VT is absolutely on the defense.
And you'd be admitting that if you weren't on the "fire Fuente" bandwagon.
Sure, Fuente is responsible for all of it. But he has little choice about the defense at the moment.
Someone said this two posts above:
The defense was the only unit that looked even remotely like a competent group on the field on Friday. They came out on fire and played their nuts off until the game started slipping away. The front was disruptive, the DBs were actually playing pretty well, and we were dominating the game defensively for a bit while the offense was choking it away.
Bud had his group ready to play. The offense did absolutely nothing to help them, and when they coughed it up inside our own red zone Duke scored the easy TD. From there, it's hard to play tough defense from behind when your offense has no hope of producing anything. Yes, we should have made adjustments to cover some of the weaknesses that Duke identified, and yes, Bud should have gotten them more disciplined so they didn't fold when faced with adversity, but the defense is certainly better than last year and the only group that's even remotely close to looking like a functional unit. Yes the 45 points looks bad, but that's far from the whole story here.
They played their nuts off for one quarter, before Duke made adjustments that completely overwhelmed them.
The offense did OK in the first quarter until the failed Hooker/King exchange seemed to completely shake their confidence.
Right, so if that one poor exchange hadn't happened we'd have scored 70. Those single poor exchanges will get after ya...
Correction: Those turnovers will get after ya.
Which is an indictment of this coaching staff that were four years in and seeing so little progression...
No idea you got down voted. I countered 1.
The idea that the head coach has no bearing on the talent level of the defense is so ridiculous
Sure. But nobody is promoting that idea.
We're talking about the idea that the Defensive Coordinator has no bearing on the execution of the defense. There's talent on the defense. And in spite of that talent, Duke hung 45 points on us.
There is plenty of finger pointing to go around here.
There isn't a coach at VT who isn't looking for answers this week.
Who the hell has said Bud has no bearing on the execution? And there ain't much talent on the Defense.
You're just desperate to blame anyone but Fuente
Above dc Wilson said that duke 2019 is 💯 percent on Fuente. To which I and several others disagreed. Bud has his hefty percent to bear.
We are not competitive against Duke- in football. If that puts me on the "fire fuente" bandwagon, so be it. After a year in which we weren't competitive in most ACC games, yeah Fuente is accountable here- even for the defense.
Duke 2019 from a defensive perspective sure is on bud. I feel certain defense is his baby and Fuente is pretty hands off (assumption). Buds defense folded. And no, I'm not dismissing the million other problems with the team, but bud and the defense are clearly not getting it done.
Hard to get it done when you have no talent.
Sure but for us to be winning at half with our line field goal, Bud defense would have had to have been pitching a shutout or scored more than our offense did. That seems unreasonable.
We gave up way to many points to duke, I agree. But a lot of it snowballed after we had given up and imo it's way worse that we only scored 10 points
Eventually you run out of juice....
"Take away a team's good players and they're bad" is an argument, I suppose.
Not every situation is analogous, but my whole point is I'd give him another year or two to see if he needs to be fired or not.
Seems to me a program up the road from us started in a worse spot and had the same start date for building the program up and is on a much better trajectory than we are.
Seriously. The idea that Fuente took over some floundering program is ludicrous.
The key similarity between the two teams is that both coaches have their players.
The key difference between the two teams is that Bronco has done a heck of a job identifying the talent he wants (and can realistically get) and developing those players. I know the offense is a one man show, but his defense (which is his side of the ball) is really good.
Yea, when you start near the bottom you have no where to go but up.
You're right. Had the program been allowed to go a little more downhill we could reasonably expect to be on a trajectory towards a winning culture instead of staring down a strong possibility of back to back losing seasons and losing to our in-state "rivals". What were we thinking in trying to right the ship so quickly?!?!
Sure, he had to rebuild a bit and get his guys in, blah blag. I expected some below expectation years. But to scrape by 2 of the 3 easiest games on the schedule and then get demolished by a basketball school at home at night, after a full 2 weeks to prepare?
Let's be real- Rebuild or not, we should have beat Furman like they stole somethin. Instead, we were sweatin through damn near the entire game. ODU was allowed to hang around. After what they did last year, we should have curb stomped the fuckers just to set shit straight. Instead, we sweat through it and give up when one thing doesnt go our way in a conference game that frankly, we should win.
Losing the bowl streak will go over like a fart in church in our fan base. Losing to LOLUVA is probably worse. And both look to be inevitable at this rate. Something needs to be done, and it needs to find footing real quick, or we're gonna be poor and praying for lightning in a bottle in coach form.
Uhhh, not to wave my pitchfork, because I don't actually want Fuente or Cornelson gone right now, but the "sinking" program had the talent, culture and leadership to win. The 3 years of Fuente program is bad, thankfully not historically bad, but still bad. "Foster's had one leg out for a while so that's been a handicap for a while now." ......do you know anything about Foster? That's not the character of the man, you're just plain wrong. He's leaving because of family concerns and clearly seeing that he's not going to get help with recruiting from this staff. "We also have two TRUE freshman playing on the OL," because the "TRUE freshmen" are better than the developed players, not because the talent level is that big of a difference, but because they haven't been coached by this inept staff to be bad. Look at our blocking, that's not mistakes, that's intentional, the only way to not get called for illegal downfield blocks.
Fuente gets his 4 years to show improvement, the first improvement of his entire VT career. Maybe hes just a victim of doing so well with Beamer's guys, but you can't honestly believe getting worse every year is "completely to script." The reason Fuente gets his 4 years is simple. he has upper-classmen who are his guys now. If those guys were "low character" guys who left in the offseason, that's on Fuente. If those guys are all hurt because the S&C program, practices, drills, or whatever else aren't properly preparing them for the rigors of FBS ACC football, that's on Fuente. If those guys don't know how to be leaders, that's on Fuente.
Personally, I like the "Interim Head-Coach Foster," plan in any of its variants simply because it lets a man who deserved that shot live it. If Fuente's as great a character guys as we all thought, he negotiates a lower buyout in a bigger sum. There is culture of VT football anymore. We need a Wisconsin style coach, to go full power mode and play tough, bluecollar ball like VT football culture of old. Hell, pick up Harbaugh from Michigan when they fire him, and a good Oline recruiter/ O-coordinator to complement. #InWhitWeTrust #OneMoreTime (unlesss he leaves, then i guess we'll be trying to figure out AD and hoping the AD can fix it all behind Whit)
"Are you talking about me?"
Don't abort the post now. Swing away...there are rational people on here believe it or not.
Sure, but their numbers are small.
Downvote undone. Not a personal attack, just a slight overgeneralization of the current state of TKP.
If you're suggesting that anyone who is frustrated with the utter lack of progress this team is making under the current staff and want to see significant changes aren't rational then I don't believe you could be convinced that the sky is blue just because you're color blind.
Yes sir. Off a bye week we suffered our worst home loss in 40 years- to Duke. Fuente has more 20 point losses in a year in a half than Beamer did his last 5 years as coach. Rational? lol. anything less than burning couches is rational at this point.
Just awful. This program deserves better.
burning couches is for celebrating a win, at least that's what WVU believes.
Michigan State would beg to differ.
I think everyone is frustrated and not happy - show me one person that's content with what happened and i'll show you a UVa fan.
But in seriousness, I'm suggesting rational fans are the ones that aren't saying "FIRE XYZ" because they realized we were worse off than we had liked and understand the circumstances we're in.
Those imaginary "circumstances" are not an excuse for getting blown out by an average Duke team at home by 35 points. No circumstances warrant that for a Coach and DC that make nearly 6 mil combined coming off a bye week- none. Duke took our lunch money- in football- in year 4 of Fuente by 35 in Lane and you still want to blame Frank Beamer. LOL
Oh, one can be rational and still want a coaching change.
Don't get me wrong. I absolutely agree with that.
You should edit your post and change "rationale" to "rational".
Correct grammar is always a good start.
typo on a phone but you should continue to contribute to the thread with grammar corrections. Really insightful.
Grrrrrr!
Spot the joke next time, Mr. Insightful.
If that was a joke then I apologize but I didn't get it.
It's all good. Sometimes I'm bad at jokes.
I dont know how anyone has faith in this staff anymore
That's the $15mm question, isn't it. In my view Fuente can buy himself one, maybe two, more years by firing Cornelson on Saturday after the uva game and bringing in a completely new staff for the offense. But when that doesn't happen (I seriously doubt it will) Whit needs to pull the trigger. With Bud bowing out I think it's the best time for a reset. We shall see. I'm hopeful that Whit is working quietly behind the scenes to identify the next head Hokie, to be announced Monday after the uva game.
There is no excuse to wait until after the UVA game to fire Corny. Do it now, and if he's unwilling to do that, he should be fired himself. Based on today's press conference, he should be clearing out his office this afternoon.
If anything, today's press conference is a sign that Fuente should be clearing out his office. Nothing was said as an indictment of Corn, and that's a problem.
My concern with just firing Corn is what legitimate play caller is going to touch this OC position with a 10 foot pole? If someone took the position and then FU still got canned in 1-2 years (which I don't see how he'll last that long) then they could be out of a job just as quickly as they got one.
If the offense improves linearly over the two seasons and VT is scoring more than 20 points against ACC teams regularly (a feat we may not achieve this season) then maybe Fuente doesn't get fired. Any OC worth his salt would look at this opportunity to prove their worth by saving Fuente's job
If you see it as savable at this point. That would be a risk vs. reward business decision that I could see an unproven, young "up and comer" making but not an established, proven play caller.
I think we're kidding ourselves if we think we can get an established, proven OC at VT. We are at the point where we need to roll the dice on a young, energetic guy early in their career. We should be targeting coaches who have playing experience in a successful offense and likely with the established proven guy you'd prefer. If we can't get the guy you want we should at least shoot for someone from his coaching tree
Maybe but even if we luck up with a young energetic guy who pans out will that be enough to resurrect the program, or will it simply hold us steady at a state of mediocrity? The problems are too multifaceted to be fixed by a new OC alone (and even a new DC). There's a culture problem that starts at the top and I'm afraid that Fu is just too stubborn to change himself.
We seriously f***** up rolling the dice on someone unproven when we were in a position where we didn't have to. We lost our gamble and now we have no choice but play the same roulette again and hope for different results. So stupid.
This is eerily similar to Fuente's "play-calling has nothing to do it" comments he made after the Boston College loss last season.
Source.
He really has to go. I'm tired of everything I read about this program being negative. If we don't show up against Miami this week (and let's be real we likely won't) this Rhode Island game might be the least crowded game at Lane in recent memory..like 2018 Marshall levels without all the other circumstances involved.
Players don't seem engaged, even the ones we were excited about..had a weird feeling that all the off-season stuff about Fuente becoming more "fun" and the players coming together felt forced..like they were trying to will it into existence.
I would LOVE to be wrong about this situation but it just seems like a lost cause at this point..
Although to be fair when I was in undergrad around 2015 I heard people on the men's soccer team say they were purposefully trying to lose in the ACC tourney so Brizendine would get fired..and then a year or so later they had that deep NCAA tournament run so who knows..
I'll be at URI regardless because I'll be in town from the west coast and we have a big tailgate planned, but there's a reasonable chance we lose that game and I hate it.
Will see you there. I did some undergrad work at URI and attend pretty much every game since I starting getting season tickets in 2004. I missed the Nebraska game (Dad was having open heart surgery) and I missed this years Furman (Dad was in hospital for Kidney's).
There's a 0% chance we lose that game come on
0%? We had to come from behind to beat Furman... there's definitely a chance
Current ESPN matchup predictor is giving URI 4.7%. The fact that a winless team from the CAA has ANY + probability of winning this should shake us down to the core.
yikes...Furman was only 1%
I think anything less than 42 points vs Rhode Island should be grounds for dismissal...
And yet we'll squeak one out 23-21 and Fuente will go on as if nothing is wrong.
I'd like to know from someone who has a much deeper understanding of the etiquette and professionalism surrounding reporting why it seems like there aren't any real "tough" questions asked to Fuente during these press conferences? I understand that what constitutes a "tough" question is highly subjective, but it seems like a lot of the meaty questions are being held back. I can't say that if I was given this platform as a reporter, I wouldn't dial back my criticism of the program right now, but it seems like someone out there wouldn't beat around the bush as much. This presser had a little more pointed questions, but I was hoping after the Duke game, the reporters would light into him to get answers and I was sorely disappointed.
It's the Adam Schein approach. Schein gets Tom Brady, LeBron, Mike Trout, Antonio Brown, Roy Williams, Coach K, Alvin Kamara on his radio show regularly. Nobody else comes close to this guest list. Why? the next remotely tough/pointed/non sunshine BS question Schein asks will be his first. These people want continued access to Fuente, so they just lob him softballs. Hard questions get them less access. Ask the folks that covered hoops when Buzz was here.
I have exactly zero experience in either side of reporting, but I imagine there are at least two factors:
- Reporters who repeatedly ask tough questions may be asked not to come back
- Reporters know that Fuente isn't likely to get baited by tough questions
It's called an "institutional bias" and I'm sure it exists in Sports media as well. The culture fosters a certain type of reporter. You don't get to be one for long if you ask certain questions. The institution has a way of weeding out people who don't conform to how the game is played. Which is why you get such bland trivial and banal questions that never probe very deep.
Next press conference , let " Jason in Arlington" ask a few questions.
The only answers Fuente is going to provide that will get him any credit at all are going to be results on the field, or an announcement of major changes to the program.
He doesn't generally give up anything in press conferences, and a reporter pressing him hard isn't going to change that.
And based on the on field product for the last 17 games don't you think we have the answers we need?
I have no answer for that.
I'd like to believe Fuente has a plan, but if the whole plan was to fix things with Kill, we've got problems.
Bud's ineffective, and we have no answer at QB. We need at least one of those to be working ASAP.
Look at UVa. They have a decent QB and a defense, and an opportunity to win the Coastal. (Choke)
Lol. I can't possibly be the only one to see the irony here. You're essentially saying Fuente should go.
I'm not saying that, but he does need some answers.
He'll be needing to make some changes. That's not irony, that's reality.
No, no, no. The reality is that he refuses to make the necessary changes. The irony is that you're still waiting around for answers you're never going to get.
Fuente isn't firing Cornelson. If he was ever going to, it would have happened by now. He should have been well aware that he was tying his reputation to his staff after the miserable '18 campaign. He decided his staff was good enough and he's learning, perhaps, that he made the wrong choice. But it's too late now. I don't think firing Cornelson at the end of the year will happen. If it does, it might buy Fuente an extra year but he'll be under an immense amount of pressure to show measured improvement with the new staff and he may not have the time to do it. Had he fired Cornelson last year, as it was clear by then that he wasn't performing, then the results this year could be a bit more easy to explain, so long as progress was detectable week to week.
You're still assuming that Kill was originally Fuente's decision, which we cannot prove.
Also I agree with VPIhokieME. The ideas that you are expressing sound like you are waiting for Fuente to reveal the answers to fix the issues with the team when unfortunately the paradox of the situation is that we wouldn't be where we are now if Fuente knew.
The 2 options are:
1) he doesn't know how to fix these issues, or
2) he does know how to fix these issues but is unwilling to.
I have no reason at all to believe anything different.
Whit impresses me as the kind of guy that if he demands a change, it will be a big one.
How about 3.
He does know the issues, is willing to, and the fix is not an immediate one?
That is typically the case for a lot of things. To think a person who has dedicated their life to the game does not recognize the issues that are causing our struggles is crazy. Being able to fix those issues quickly is an entirely different beast.
If he knew them, he could have mitigated them before they became actual problems. He could have at the very least sustained the success and momentum he had when he took over. He did not. The team has regressed and we are realistically fighting not to be last in the ACC right now in football. Like how hasn't that sunk in? To everyone? There is a really good chance we will be one of the worst teams in college football this year. Straight up, can you honestly say we would beat Rutgers?
There's nothing Fuente could say that would explain Friday night because Friday night was inexplicable... and inexcusable.
The worst Frank Beamer/Bill Dooley team would not have lost to that Duke team at home 45-10.
Exactly. Frank's 2-8-1 team lost 43-23 at home to #1 Miami, 28-9 in the Carrier Dome against #10 Syracuse, 16-7 at home to WVU, and had 5 losses by 4 points or less. Last year, when everyone was saying it was our worst season since 1992, I was in the corner thinking it was our worst season since before 1992. You have to go back to 1973 to find our previous season with 4 or more losses by over 20 points.
I have some experience here and can give you an answer/opinion:
Most of the guys covering us (if not all) are fairly junior or low level guys in their profession. They're not writing for the Washington Post or New York Times, They're writing for Roanoke, Richmond, etc. They can't afford to piss off Fuente or anyone in our AD. Therefore, they don't want to ruffle feathers and basically ruin what they have of their careers. Larger sports programs usually have more experienced and respected reporters. Those guys typically ask the tougher questions and are more critical on who they are reporting. I hate to admit it, but the guys reporting on us are basically tools of the VTAD. They ask and write what our AD wants them to.
I've been around awhile. In the 1980's and 1990's, there were a few guys around us who printed what was on their minds. That was before we had any significance in football, but those were senior guys who had earned that right in their careers. I wish I could remember a few of those names, but that was years ago. A few of those guys were very controversial.
Bill Brill was one for the RT, back in the day.
Ah, yes! Thanks!
Good insight, thank you. I figured this was the case, which is unfortunate, but I guess it's the same politics that exist anywhere you go and in any profession.
So much this...
What we've got here is... failure to communicate. Some men you just can't reach. So you get what we had here last week, which is the way he wants it... well, he gets it. I don't like it any more than you men.
For those who want to extend their Friday night pain, it's here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLuvkmht_Jg
I for one, stunned.......we're going to "tweak things" for next Saturday?
I now dread the matchup of the team with the chain of turnovers vs the team with the turnover chain.
For a fanbase that needs some signs of life or hope or life raft, I got nothing from that presser. Same old same old.
This guy pretty much nails it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7Lf2rN0_8c
Here it is embedded..
Trying to figure out who took more sips of water during on camera time...Justin Fuente or Marco Rubio
This motherfucker laughed as he took a sip of water and said, "Fire away, I'm sure you've got a lot of questions."
I'm glad this is funny to him.
This presser and all the revelations from it:
I watched the press conference and I think Fuente came across as feeling safe with his job. The fact that he basically said that play caller wouldn't change and that others don't really see the day to day goings on etc. I hope Whit isn't behind the scenes making him feel safe about his job security. You know, the everyone thinks they are a coach kind of talk. I hope Whit is taking the poor results from our football team as seriously as we the fans. I have read other people's take on this press conference and they described Fuente as arrogant. He appeared a bit defensive to me, but he just doesn't come across as someone worried about losing his job. I am concerned and would like to hear more meat from the head coach about how he is going to fix these problems going forward. 🥺🧐
Why would he be? He'd walk away with $15m. Poor guy.
As fans we want the coach to be candid. Perhaps because of the prevalence of both real and perceived coach speak, when they are candid, I'm not sure we pick up on it or buy into their responses.
Play calling is something many of us have mentioned, me included. So that drew the media tweets.
But here are two responses that didn't get to twitter...
"it starts with those guys [QBs]...you gotta have predicted outcomes, you gotta execute the play called, distribute the ball to the correct place"
"you get that [confidence] from doing the right thing over and over again...you get that from repeating the correct performance, the correct execution, time after time after time...he [Willis] knows he's done it before...it's a matter of buckling down and finding a way to do it on a more consistent basis."
I'm not sure we'll see improvement this week, but I think we'll see someone else under center. And I think he thinks QB is the biggest issue he has in play calling, not the play call itself.
And it isn't helped by the fact that your most experienced guy has a hurt throwing shoulder, your next most experienced guy (who it largely regarded as a running threat) has a hurt nonthrowing shoulder, and the next guy has been on campus for just over a year.
Fu really wanted and needed Burmeister and Hoffman to be eligible. Burmeister is a legit threat in the zone read and Hoffman is more than competent in the line calls as well as just being a nasty badass the kids can look up to and set the tone.
I can only hope that Hooker is developed enough to give our team a fighting chance against Rhode Island. Player development and recruiting is also a major concern for many with this current staff.
"That's not what's needed" is another way of saying "That will not fix the root cause". Taking Corn out of the picture may be a band-aid, or it could be lemon juice on the open wound. Either way, Corn is not the root cause.
Over/Under on the number of players to enter the portal before the season even ends?
I guess it depends on when a coaching change is announced; they have to wait to get a waiver, right? Anyway, as soon as any sort of coaching change is announced, players are likely going to rush to the portal.
The playcalling is not what concerns me. It is pretty terrible at times, but you can stay competitive with suspect playcalling and even scheme (see the Stinespring era).
My concern is the lack of team toughness and execution (not saying the players aren't tough, because I believe they are out their fighting). It appears to be a culture problem from the outside. As soon as one thing goes wrong the game is just plain over, and that has been the trend going back to last year. It appears we coach and play not to lose instead of trying to win. It was preached that these culture issues were a last-year problem.
Does it look like anyone is having fun? All of this is supposed to be fun.
I feel like even in game number #
12 in Bristol, after we fumbled it the first one or two times, the floodgates just opened up.I agree that was a bad sign, but that team seemed to figure it out with big comebacks against ND, (nearly) Clemson, and Arkansas. That year I was more worried about how we seemed unprepared or uninspired when the games started, relying on halftime adjustments to win.
Last season we seemed to come out fired up only to be derailed and then get blown out. I thought we looked OK for a lot of the ND game last year, even after Willis' sack-fumble-TD.
Seems like we have finally combined the worst of both worlds. Look totally unprepared to start and collapse under the first crack of adversity.
Corny calling plays reminds me of when I took my first multiple choice exam in what was a graduate level philosophy class that I got mistakenly enrolled in because it was mislabeled as an "Intro to Philosophy" course.
The problem on offense has a very easy answer. We do not have a power 5 ready QB on this team. The reads are there. The lines gives 2.5 to 3.5 seconds. The running game does not work bc every other team knows this and stacks the box.
Without a good QB this offense blows. Hendon and QP are not the answer. That's why they let the Oregon kid come.
You all complain about the bubble screens and jet sweeps but those are setting up plays that the QBs are failing to execute.
I wish we could get our hands on some ALL 22 tape so I could explain how extremely poor the QB play is. I mean they are not making the correct reads on any option play.
This is the same offense that Oklahoma and Ohio State are smoking people with.
Corn makes some strange calls but the execution is so poor from the QB right now, I am not even sure I can call them head scratching plays.
You mean that regardless of offensive play calling the execution from players is poor?....but....but that takes away from our "FIRE CORNY" anger!
TBF blame lays on both players and coaches, but that's why I reiterate it's not so clean-cut as to just fire someone and hope it'll change miraculously overnight.
But presumably the OC is partially responsible for coaching the players up to be able to execute right?
Yes, and creating packages that they can execute that does not limit the potential.
Shoot, there are programs out there that can throw up more points with far less talented athletes because the system works. There's nothing in the world of football that says the playbook can never be edited; Corny thinks otherwise and just refuses to let other QB's run certain plays, rather than creating new plays for their talents.
In other words, he cannot adapt.
Yes. That is an obvious statement and at some point does not help the discourse I am trying to start. I am not trying to be a Coaching staff apologist. In fact, the defense playing lights out and then giving up 40+ in the last three quarters truly shows me that Bud has lost his drive. Duke adjusted and Bud changed nothing. He used to be a king of in game adjustments but they just kept running the same 3 defensive calls.
Anyways, this Coaching staff has a proven track record in developing QBs, maybe not at the level we expected but it's still a better track record than a majority of CFB coaches. At some point the talents is just not there. Look at the NFL, as the game speeds up, talent shows. How many good college QBs fail in the NFL. You have world reknown qb coaches at the NFL level that fail to get talent to grow. The fan loves to blame the coaches not the fact a top QB drafted talents is just not there.
Techs current QBs are busts at the moment. Maybe QP can still develope but it does not look promising, but it's looking like the two 4 star QBs might not be ACC caliber. But but 247 said otherwise. It has to be coaches not the talent.
A bunch of people in the know have said Burmeister was by far the best QB on campus and he was below average at Oregon. Let that sink in.
As fans, we may have to come to realization that the team might just be bad.
"this Coaching staff has a proven track record in developing QBs"
They do?
2004-2006: Luke Drone, All Conference, playoff appearance. Short NFL career.
2007 - 2009: Andy Dalton, All Conference, 2nd round pick. Still in the NFL.
2013-2015: Paxton Lynch, breaks a ton of Memphis records, First round NFL.
2017-2018: Jerod Evans, broke almost all VT records. Short NFL career (like 15 days on GB practice squad). I like to think he would be another accolade if he stayed.
2018- 2019: Josh Jackson, led freshman QBs in stats.
This is a track record a lot of coaches in america would love to have.
Was Corn with Fuente from '04 to '09? That is when Fuente was at TCU, right? Was Fuente the main recruiter for Drone or Dalton? Can Fuente take credit for identifying those talents? I know he can take some credit for coaching them, but it is shared with Patterson.
What about their QB's from '10 to '12?
Was Paxton a flash in the pan type of talent?
Can Fuente take much credit for Jerod? Did not recruit him, couldn't convince him to stay, really just utilized him.
Fuente did not identify or recruit Jackson either. He helped Jackson put up pretty good stats for a freshman, but could not convince him to stay either. We do not know why Jackson left. Was it depth chart or was it Fuente and Jackson felt there was something better out there? Probably a combination of all of those.
The point is, I'm not sure how great this track record truly is. It certainly is not bad, but maybe Fuente was anointed prematurely.
Granted, Fuente stepped into the one of the most unusual coaching situations in history and Bud's situation has not made it any easier.
Yeah, Cornelson was not around Drone or Dalton at all and the last two guys on your list hated playing for Fuente. Not a ringing endorsement. I'll give you Paxton Lynch.
That's a hell of a post. 👍 I agree. At this point, my biggest complaint with Fuente and the staff is that they can't seem to get good players on the team and the good players on the team keep leaving - for various reasons. That's the biggest problem - recruiting and retaining talent. And that really might be the nail in his coffin as it doesn't look like we have many studs coming in.
On the zone reads from Willis, it has always seemed that he is making a decision as to what he will do before he really makes the read. It is happening too fast for him.
I've felt, that if they were going to commit to this type of offense, then they need to slow it down, ride the mesh point a little longer, until the defender actually commits. I guess this can be risky, especially with an OL that isn't blocking well. And I feel like HH was trying to ride the mesh point a little longer on the fumbled exchange to KK.
This is a very small part of what is a much bigger problem. But I have to feel that if the QB and RB could make the zone read better, and we had a QB that could make the right read, then the offense would gain a lot of rhythm and continuity. However, maybe someone with some more football knowledge can weigh in on this.
Well, I ain't the guy with more football knowledge but I watched a wake forest game (thank you ACCN) and they have the slowest developing RPO I'd ever seen. It was almost a let's see if a running lane actually opens up and then I'll hand it to you, if it doesn't I'll throw it. At first I thought it was stupid since it got blown up often because of the delay, then the more I watched the more I realized it was a high risk high reward concept, and a 4-0 record sure results in high reward.
No idea if that would help us (high risk low reward?), but if Willis is slow reading RPOs, it would give him some more time to make a decision and clearly McClease could use an occasional running lane.
Dear Justin,
via GIPHY
Ha
I feel like this sums up this thread perfectly.
Wearing a jean jacket to a football game. Le-gen-dary.
Justin doesn't exude leadership to me - he never really has, and while I think he may be a good football mind, I think he just totally doesn't get the leadership side of things - which is why we have someone who struggles to recruit, who struggles to build relationships, and who's program as a whole seems overly susceptible to odd lacks in judgement or poor attention to detail.
Removing playcalling duties from Corn is more than just taking playcalling out of his hands - it's a charge and an admission that something isn't going well, a committed attempt to addressing the issue, and a reminder to his team and fans that poor performance won't be accepted. To state playcalling isn't the issue - whether true or not - is just not a good rallying cry at this point, and makes me wonder if he's even willing to try to make improvements. He could let his babysitter, Lech, call plays and it probably wouldn't be any worse. At least act like you've got some leadership balls or try to generate some goodwill. Not even trying is just so demoralizing for fans, which has to trickle down to the players too.
If by lack of leadership you mean not connecting with the kids and being the guy everyone wants to play for I agree. I don't mind his stoic vibe but I don't think it plays well with recruiting. He is super uptight. Just my take.
First time comment here...just a quick thought. Fuente and Cornelson have plenty of issues, but the primary concern is that neither of them seem capable of changing their "system" to meet our QB talent or offensive roster. Of course they had success with Jerod, he was built for the misdirection offense...limited arm talent, big body, RPO, limited turnovers, etc.
News flash, Ryan Willis is not that guy. I don't particularly like Willis, but the one and only thing he CAN do is spin it down the field. It seems like whenever we are actually moving the ball it is because they let him throw it down the middle of the field more than once per drive. Why can't we run the chuck 'n duck with Willis and the 4-5 receivers? That should open up the defense to setup our stupid sideways plays and molasses-slow run game.
Preaching ball-control and limiting mistakes while running Ryan Willis out there every weekend makes Fuente look like an idiot...save that shit for QP. Yes, Willis is going to turn the ball over every now and then and will probably try to squeeze it into coverage more than Josh Jackson would, but the only way to win with him is to make it rain. We have Damon, Hez, Tre, Kaleb, Phil, Tavyion, Mitchell, and Keene. Why are we running such a controlled offense?
Amen, brother.
Our wideouts had 4 inches at minimum on Duke's DBs. We hardly took any shots at them. We have all the WR talent in the world, but refuse to utilize on anything more than jet sweeps and bubble screens.
I dont think Willis has the arm right now. I think it has been shaky for a few games. It looked to me like the top 3 quarterbacks may have been injured, with only an assumption that QP took a nasty hit to the head and didnt return.
Looked like he had plenty of arm to reach Hazelton late. I just cant believe why we are unable to continuously work medium-to-deep down the middle of the field. No secondary in the ACC can cover 3-4 WRs down the field and a TE working up the seam.
That ball was under thrown
To paraphrase French- the Duke defense was begging for VT to throw fades, which is normally 80% of VT's passing attack but VT barely tried any fades.
I agree. There was an insistence on running and it showed. King fumbled and I don't remember seeing him again. Our offense should be getting our best players (king and the wrs ) the ball in space. We forced the run. It sucked.
My only hope at this point for Fuente if he's not going to call the plays himself or fire Cornelson is that he is spending a lot of time with the Offense and specifically Cornelson and mentoring him to be successful. He has to be the head coach of the whole team but the offense could really use a lot of his help. Not saying the defense doesn't have glaring holes that need to be shored up but I think if the offense can get in a groove and start clicking the defense will play a lot better.
Edit: I don't know if someone already said this so I apologize if it's already been brought up. I just woke up and 200+ comments is a lot to digest first thing in the morning.
Just being real, there's nothing Fuente can bring to coaching defense over foster. Somebody on here will say that's not true (go ahead VTKey I love you) but that's not his wheelhouse and Buds been doing this a long time. I don't expect Dabo popping in to throw wrenches at veneables boys either. Fuente really should be 95% dedicated to the offense and special teams
I agree, he should be very invested in the development and mentor ship of the offense and should only periodically peek in on the defense. But as head coach he still needs to have interaction with all the players of the team.
Yes, yes it is Justin. Not only is it needed but it is long overdue.
Players leave the program because staff doesn't fulfill what was promised.
They know they are underprepared and not developed correctly. That's why they leave.
With the transfer portal, our team will be perpetually young if we can't get this garbage coaching staff replaced with one that understands VT, Virginia, that can recruit and develop players.
It is already over.
As a fellow Hokie said, what does relieving Cornelson of his duties really get us? We have to find somebody else to call the plays. The Head Coach hasn't called plays in what a decade? Do you ask somebody else from the offensive coaches to do it? Who? To my knowledge none of them have any experience calling plays.
Hell I can call 3 jet sweeps and a punt.