This week vs. Pitt's stellar D will be a good test, but VT's offense with Hendon Hooker looks MUCH different, throwing about 15% less often and finding far more success. Here are the splits... pic.twitter.com/pLRC0vhZKs— David+ (@ADavidHaleJoint) November 21, 2019
Damn.
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Yep-that's what happens when you have a QB who can actually make the right read on the read-option and RPO.
A Hooker with a bum shoulder is way better than no Hooker at all.
that plays-per-turnover stat is pretty enlightening
4.2 TDs per turnover compared to 1.45 TDs per turnover.
That's the ticket.
"Didn't they say that about the U too?"
To be fair...those 6 turnovers helped us generate a whole lot more offense opportunities . Hope we can get multiple TO's with PITT.
We still had to capitalize off of those turnovers with a short field though...
I like our chances on D against a pass-heavy offense, wet ball, and Farley and Waller ball hawking all game.
A good Hooker always make the D better
They take a smoke a play more relaxed!
Pitt is going to be, by far, the best defense we'll play this year at least in the regular season. They allow fewer than 100 yards of rushing offense a game and have corners every bit as good as ours. They also lead the nation in sacks with 45. There's going to be a lot of bellyaching about our conservative, vanilla offense come Sunday I think because we can't play risky on third and long. Pitt runs special formations on third down and currently hold opponents to 30% on conversions.
Notre Dame.
ND is good but statistically i'm not sure if they are better than Pitt. I'm too lazy to look up.
They are in quite a few adjusted defensive efficiencies columns and FPI total efficiency.
FPI:
ND Defensive Efficiency: Rank 7, 83.7
Pitt Defensive Efficiency: Rank 18, 75.1
Edit: LOL since I was on the FPI page I figured I'd check the offensive comparison between these teams.
ND Offensive Efficiency: Rank 27, 67.9
Pitt Offensive Efficiency: Rank 88, 42.3
What does defensive efficiency mean / tell me? More 3 and outs relative to scores?
But you are right re ND vs Pitt. I looked it up on Football Outsiders; on Defensive FEI rankings ND is better than Pitt. I stand corrected.
I'm not going to claim to fully understand efficiency ratings enough to explain them on my own but I'll give you a few articles that helped me grasp the concept.
This one from when ESPN started back on these ratings in 2015 explains basically what it considers:
https://www.espn.com/blog/statsinfo/post/_/id/108838/reintroducing-espns...
This is a little more in depth on what EPA is and how its calculated slightly more in depth.
https://www.advancedfootballanalytics.com/index.php/home/stats/stats-exp...
Pitt allows 10 yards less per game than Miami, both are top 16
Points Miami 19.2, ND 19.3, and Pitt 20.8, 17th 18th and 27th respectively.
And this is why adjusted stats are important. I didnt look up offensive SoS but Notre Dame overall strength of schedule is 13 Miami 47 Pitt 49
I don't think we'll really get a good idea of how good our offense vs their defense will be tomorrow.
I hope we've been practicing with wet balls.
This might be an unconventional take, but usually wet conditions negates any speed advantage certain players may possess. If this is the case and the weather doesn't allow for any sort of passing attack, I'm perfectly ok with Patterson tucking the ball under one of those enormous biceps and pounding the rock over and over again.
There's a good article on TSL on exactly this. Basically stating that this is going to be a field position battle, but we can get enough points in this one to grind it out if we're smart on 3rd and longs. Gain 3 yards on the ground vs. taking a 7 yard sack is a 10 yard swing that will inevitably pin them 10 yards deeper. Anyway, it'll be (fun???) to see - I think we can still move it on them better than a lot of people think.
I hope you're right. I think it depends on how well our screens and draws are working. They are an aggressive and sometimes undisciplined team and we might be able to use that.
Hooker is the reason we will win this week, and next week. He's the real deal.
Its also worth mentioning the teams we're playing with Hooker are better than the ones we played without him (except for when Patterson was in against ND)
In the 4 games before he was put in, we put up 93 total points against BC, ODU, Furman, and Duke for an average of 23.25 points per game
In the 6 games since Hooker was put in we've scored 220 points against Miami, Rhode Island, UNC, #16ND, #19WF, and GT for an average of 36.67 points per game
If you exclude UNC and ND, which Patterson played most of the time, those numbers adjust out to 157 points scored against Miami, URI, #19WF, and GT for an average of 39.25 points per game.
The offense is 16 points per game better with Hooker in the game than it was at the beginning of the year. And this is while playing against better opponents.
I think it's clear that Hooker is the better QB, and the better QB for this team.
I also think the whole team has improved.
The defense playing better is arguably the bigger turn around for us.
There is definitely a feedback loop where improving an offense helps the defense which helps the offense...
There's a limit of course, but it's not like the defense's improved performance happened in a vacuum.
So what you're saying is that we should move Hooker to TE?
I'll see myself out.
Wild Turkey
Something something Drew Harris
Something something Dwayne Lawson
I'm sure I missed some more easy ones...
I've always been intrigued as to how a wet Hooker performs...
Well a wet Hooker could be tight. Want to make sure you warm it up. By the end, things should be in top gear which climaxes with a big O and an explosive D.
Wet.
Dry.
Whatever it takes.
So I get that this is weird, but the defense turned on at almost the exact same time. Can we get a similar breakdown for the same games for the defense?
You also need to factor in an offensive line coming together. We're playing what, 3 freshman and 2 sophomores with some of them being true freshman. It takes time to handle true game speed. Lump that together with some poor blocking efforts in the beginning and an immobile QB and it's not a recipe for success.
But it bodes we'll for the next several years. Solid, experienced big uglies up front with speed and talent at the skill positions.
Not to mention we get Hoffman for next year, and we could potential redshirt someone like Nester who could probably benefit from it.
I still can't believe the coaching staff whiffed on that. Are Fuente and Willis' dad BFFs or what? Wasted September.
You can't just bench someone who receives a prestigious Maxwell Award nomination. They don't just hand those out like candy to anyone who's expected to be a starting QB.
I could be wrong, but I think Fuente was thinking that he wasted Josh Jackson because of Willis, so Willis got the nod. But I also think Hooker's shoulder wasn't ready to go on opening day, or all through fall camp, and that held him back from really showing off his skills in camp.
Yes Hooker's are great because they go away after you empty your wallet
I'm not surprised. I am also much quicker and efficient when a hooker is on me.
Literally the exact same thing I said I was reading those stats
These two stick out to me the most. Hooker actually opens up the passing game because of his ability to make the correct reads; this makes him a more effective runner as well. The second stat, shows how much more explosive this offense is, I absolutely LOVE that stat.
Onto Pitt, it's time to BREAK Nar-douchie's impenetrability to false starts:
I was looking forward to the truck unveiling, but good gravy, who would buy and drive one of those as a work truck? When gas is $6 a gallon, then maybe, but until then, who is going to buy one of these?
"You have a Hunger Games truck. That's......cool? I guess."
They talked about it on the news this morning and my favorite quote was a random tweet that said something to the effect of "Under no circumstances will I ever drive a triangle to work."
Also, guaranteed someone got fired for that glass breaking.
I wouldn't put it out of the question to presume that Musk knew how the glass would perform (shatters but nothing goes through it) before the demo and then used the demo to cause a viral laughfest. No press is bad press. Broken windows mean the truck is going to be shared around social media a whole lot more than just the unveiling of the Tesla Triangulero.
I'm just surprised they didn't do that "unbreakable window test" in private first.
But yeah, the Ford 150 has nothing to worry about aesthetics-wise from Tesla just yet. Those guys must have just watched "Terminator" when they designed that.
This concept for the truck would have been way cooler:
I have a Model 3 and it's the best car I've ever driven, and was super excited for the truck. While it's not for me at all, I'm okay with someone pushing the limits on design. Every other truck looks like every other truck.
Still, I'm hoping they come out with a slightly more traditional looking version, mostly because my wife would never sign off on that one.
I'd buy one for towing if the one that's actually more capable than gas trucks didnt start at double their price.
I'd love those towing numbers but a diesel will tow everything I realistically need it to at a similar price point.
No one. Not just because of the looks in general, but the fact that you can't even reach over the sides and into the bed to pick anything up without going through the tailgate (and I don't know anything about work trucks or needing a truck for a job).
I'm more disappointed with because with something as polarizing as this, only Tesla fans will actually buy it, and their not really increasing their market share.
This is one of the biggest things for me too. I don't remember the last time I dropped my tailgate.
I don't remember the last time I dropped my tailgate.
How is this possible? Heresy as a truck owner.
Because my rods are usually back there and I have a completely irrational fear that I will close at minimum $800 worth of rods in the tailgate if I open it so I make a habit of just not opening it.
At least Tesla understands that rear-view mirrors are for pussies, but, it's been done better.
This also sums it up nicely...5-0 vs 2-3
I'm hoping Hooker starts the 2020 season undefeated in his career.
If we make a good DC hire, and this young defense can continue to improve and be a top 20-30 defense next year (maybe better), then why stop there...Hooker could go his entire VT career undefeated.
If Hooker finishes enters 2020 undefeated in his career, he's probably the Heisman frontrunner next year, because that would mean we would have won the ACC by beating Clemson in Charlotte, and then probably beaten someone like Alabama in the Orange Bowl.
If we go undefeated this year, we don't make it to the playoffs or the national championship: no Heisman.
If we go undefeated with Hooker next year, the question will be whether it's all because of him, or because the team as a whole is awesome.
Lately, we have to give some credit to a dominant defense.
Also, we ain't played nobody, Pawl.
If Hooker finishes off this season beating Clemson and whichever high end SEC team that we would play in the OBowl, who at this point would be Alabama, he's the Heisman frontrunner going into next season.
I do. If Ryan WIllis got nominated for a Maxwell award preseason, Hendon could defnitely do it by ripping off 8 straight games going into next season, including Clemson and some other team that is probably pretty damn good.
We've won two games in a row. We didn't even win all our games in November. Yes, we've improved.
Fan base loses it's mind.
Let's just win today. That's all I'm saying.
He would get buzz, but absolutely wouldn't be the front runner. Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields will certainly be the top 2 favorites, and it won't be particularly close.
Isn't it funny that we're talking about this team going undefeated, when 2 months ago a lot of the fan base was losing hope with this team.
Just something to think about.
Welcome to the internet
After all, we've won... (checks schedule)
two in a row.
Granted, we all know it's really better than that, but still.
Make it 3!
Keep it going!
I'm enjoying it.
Let's go 1-0 this week.
These stats are meaningless without time of possession.
Pitt leads that
^ This guy gets it
It's still astonishing to me that he wasn't starting to begin with. What could he have possibly been doing in practice to not earn a starting spot over the quarterback who everyone, Fuente included, knew turned the ball over way too much and couldn't run the read option? It's not a case of benching Logan Thomas for Mark Leal or Sean Glennon for Ike Whitaker where we would have actually been worse with the backup. It's obvious how much better this team is with Hooker behind summer. We basically punted on the entire first month of the season.
I understand starting the season with Willis. But after BC, ODU, and Furman, I think not changing becomes a real issue.
That being said, I'm not convinced everyone in the football program didn't *need* that Duke loss. Sometimes you need a good swift kick in the face to wake you up.
Yeah, that Duke loss certainly made Fuente look in the mirror and think about what he was doing. The Jerry Kill hire was shortly after, Hooker started the next game, and he changed the way the team practiced. Part of being a good coach is not getting stuck in your ways and realizing when it's time to change the way you are doing things.
Kill was hired on September 16, before the Duke game. Otherwise the rest of it is correct. Fuente corrected the mistake he made at QB before the season was too far down the drain. He deserves both blame for making the mistake and credit for admitting and fixing it.
Agreed
I think HH has made a great difference in our offense r/t his ability to read the defense and make good decisions. I believe one of the reasons he did not start opening day is his health and it played a factor in when he is allowed to replace RW. He did miss a game r/t injury or not being able to practice r/t an injury. That tells me his shoulder injury is variable and could worsen in an instant. Meaning he is not healthy and JF may have been considering HH's future beyond football (I hope this is the case)....or being healthy to lead his future teams. My hope HH finishes the season strong, recovers from injury, and we get to see a 100% HH next year.
I suspect this to be the case too. Willis is already dealing with being replaced. What's the point of bringing him down further by basically saying he wouldn't have even played in the first place if HH was healthy? It won't change those L's to W's. Furthermore if Fuente says this, how do we even know that was the case or not? Fans would be left to speculate that he's maybe just trying to cover his ass for a bad decision. Nothing to do here except continue moving forward.
It may come down to team morale. The players know what is going on inside the locker room. I find it telling that HH not only amped the O but the D came around about the same time. Just sayin'
I'm just blown away that in the offseason he seemed like the longest chance to be the starter and play well here. Willis had inside track to the starting job. QP was/is supposed to be the next star and Hooker was in the transfer portal. My high inside sauces told me he had serious trouble with the playbook. Here he is now, probably the MVP of the team. Quite the turnaround.
I'm SO glad he didn't transfer.
He has been instrumental in this season's turnaround.