Illinois Hokie's Recent Comments
Upvoted for general content.
Will now create dummy account to upvote second time for Hilgartafterya.
I wonder if Div. II, III and FCS have more injuries because of deficiencies in S&C, or if the higher level of play at the CFP level causes more knee injuries.
I have a feeling that's going to be a requirement of every position coach Fuente hires.
Seriously? Is that the direction we're steering this now? Accusing our new head coach of creating cushy vacuous job titles for his friends?
Is that across all divisions?
Is making the playoffs considered a tier 1 bowl?
If we're that competitive with Georgia on position coach pay, I feel really good about this pay scale.
Actual candidates? No clue. I don't even know who out of our previous DBs have gone into coaching. But it's not like TG has a magic formula for coaching the position. He's very good at it, but there's a definite type of coach we'd go after if we had to replace him. A replacement candidate for Gray should have the following on his resume:
- Excels in man coverage techniques.
- Can teach a variety of leverages, with emphasis on inside leverage.
- Coaches a variety of techniques to all players to facilitate rotation in the defensive backfield.
- Experience coaching run stop support.
I really want to see a study on this. We talk about knee injuries, it feels like we suffer a lot of knee injuries, but I have no idea what the "average" number of knee injuries per season is at the CFP level.
Ladies and gentlemen, no more calls please. We have a winner.
Hilgartization.
This a bunch.
If anything, the "us vs. them" mentality is what's being displayed in some of these comments.
I'd be interested in seeing how many P5 programs use a flat salary for position coaches, I'm guessing it's a thing.
I'm assuming this would be during spring break? Otherwise...classes?
Gray is a fantastic DB coach. However, I don't believe he is irreplaceable. Foster's tenure is long enough that we could even fit the "Played under Bud, so knows exactly what Bud needs" requirement.
As always, you make great points. Please don't take me quoting them in bullet point form as me dissecting your argument, I just want you to know which point I'm specifically replying to at the time.
Otherwise I see no reason why a new manager would come in and ask existing coaches to take a pay cut.
Again, Fuente is not a manager. He's the CEO. The corporation is restructuring. What you made under the old structure isn't factored in to the new pay scale. These are new positions. (I know you disagree with the sentiment that these are new positions, but if you can accept the corporate restructuring analogy, which in my mind is a way better analogy for a coaching change than hanging a "Under New Management!" banner on the outside of Lane Stadium, then every old position was abolished and new ones were created.)
Gray and Wiles had a value established.
To be fair, all our position coaches have a value established.
What is the reasoning? "I want to start my staff on a balanced pay scale so everyone will will be back at the same footing for me to assess."
This assumes the flat position coach salary is so Fuente can assess coaches. But it's just as likely Fuente is just going to treat a position coach job as an "entry level position" with the same base salary for all position coaches. Perhaps the identical base salary will be complimented with performance incentives and bonuses, or promotions in title down the road. We don't know what the logic, or structure, of the identical base salaries is.
This is saying that Wiles and Gray were overvalued before.
I disagree with this. Rather, I think it's safe to say Fuente is using different logic to arrive at his pay scale than Frank used. I don't think it's inherently insulting/devaluing to say, "I want these guys as my position coaches. I offer position coaches $260K a year," and not alter that salary based on what they made under a previous employer.
Employees are not apples to apples, and compensation should not be apples to apples. Even employees that do the exact same role should be valued differently for a variety of reasons.
I think I agree with this in principle, but I also believe that the same job title within a company should have the same base salary. You recognize performance with incentives and bonuses, not with base salary. At least that's how I look at it. I personally feel it's more a slap in the face to have two people with the exact same job description (implying the same inherent worth to the company) have two different base salaries. That breeds a culture of favoritism, or at least the perception of one. It's a far better system, IMO, to present a level playing field where performance is rewarded on top of the base salary, for transparent and empirical reasons.
Again, we'll know a lot more when we figure out exactly what the incentive/bonus structure under Fuente is.
I just don't like that decision.
Completely respect that.
But their years of coaching in college do matter
Only if Fuente implements a pay scale that rewards prior experience. But all appearances, he is not. His pay raises appear based on titles/promotions/added duties. It looks like he's attempting a more egalitarian approach to the pay scale than Frank did. Of course, this is year one and we're operating with limited information.
This is why Zohn is making less than every other position coach.
I mentioned something about that elsewhere on this thread and I'm too lazy to find it. I really don't think Fuente is sold on Burden. It took a long time for the announcement that Burden was going to be retained. This and a buck fifty will buy you a cup of coffee, but I really think Burden's reduced salary is more a matter of Fuente giving Burden a shot but saving some payroll in the process. If Burden lights it up in recruiting and coaches up the running backs, I expect him to be given a raise to the base position coach salary in short order.
I kind of look at it this way. Fuente's first priority was retaining Bud. When that was accomplished, Bud vouched for Wiles and Gray. (Whether he vouched for Brown is unknown, and a whole other conversation.) Fuente obviously trusted Bud's judgement and offered Wiles and Gray positions at the full position coach salary, based on Bud's trust in them. Again, what they made before under Frank is irrelevant. This is Fuente's ship now, and they're working the job that Fuente offered them, at the salary Fuente offers his position coaches. But with Burden being an offensive coach, that's Fuente's area. He didn't feel comfortable offering Zohn the full salary he pays position coaches, so he offered him a position at a lower salary. There was no Bud Foster type figure to vouch for Burden; it doesn't matter what the outgoing OC has to say about a position coach.
I don't like that Zohn is making less than his peers for the same job, but I understand the logic. I just hope performance (under Fuente) is rewarded and Zohn is bumped up to full salary.
Again, I don't mind Fuente's staff coming in got big raises, but that shouldn't have come at the expense of staff being asked to remain.
I think that's a misguided way of looking at the situation. You're painting a picture where Fuente literally took money away from Gray and Wiles to pay his other coaches. That did not happen.
Basically, when Fuente got hired, he had to decide who he wanted to offer a position under him, and also what his position coaches and coordinators were going to be paid. He settled on a salary of $260K for position coaches. And at that point, nobody currently on staff had a job with Fuente. He started fresh. He decided to retain Bud Foster at his contractual salary, then he decided to offer positions to Wiles, Gray and, eventually, Burden (at a reduced salary), in addition to Vice, Shibest, Cornelson and Scott.
These were very much new hires, regardless of whether the coaches worked for Beamer at VT or Fuente at Memphis last season. None of these coaches were due anything the moment Justin Fuente accepted the VT position. What they made at last season under whoever their employer was is irrelevant. They were offered positions at the salary Fuente was offering for that position, and everyone accepted.
This is a critical distinction. Fuente isn't "new management," he's the new CEO.
A change in management is a poor analogy here. Corporate restructuring would be more apt. Like I said, the same bank might be cutting the checks, but aside from that, we are a completely different organization than we were in 2015.
Hundreds of companies have a position entitled "Vice President of Operations." What two different people with that same title do at two different companies might vary wildly, as might their salary. And if a company restructures, the title might be kept, but the function and salary be completely different.
It doesn't matter how many years any of these coaches have been at VT. This is everyone's first year at VT under Justin Fuente. Nobody gets credit for prior work under a different coach. Fuente pays his position coaches $260K. Take it or leave it. Wiles and Gray took it.
Don't consider it a pay cut. Consider it a completely different job. The jobs that Zohn Burden, Torrian Gray and Charlie Wiles had last season no longer exist. They have each accepted new jobs under Justin Fuente, and have accepted the pay that those jobs offer. Burden's new job pays more than his old one did, Gray's and Wiles' pay less.
While their checks might still be cut from the same bank, their employer has very much changed.
He has no interest in discourse. He's said the same thing about five different places in this thread, despite the fact that other posters, myself included, have critiqued his argument. He won't respond when someone gives a rebuttal to his argument, but he'll post that exact same argument elsewhere in this thread. He's actively avoiding discourse. His contribution to this conversation has been way more noise than signal.
I honestly believe this has become a byproduct of Wiles refusal to rotate if he isn't 100% certain a player can play Wiles' style of football with technical proficiency. If you know you aren't going to get benched, why put your ass on the line every play? I think Wiles might be becoming the new Billy Hite of this program. One thing I hope happens is, if the front four start slouching, Fuente comes to Wiles and says, "So who are you starting instead this week?" If the coach won't put pressure on the players, the HC should put pressure on the position coach.
Least humble humblebrag ever.
Beat #4 Virginia, turn around and get dismantled by Duke at Cameron? Yes, I'll take that.
That's what...
Never mind. Too easy.