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Now, to tackle the 'hoos. I look forward to the series, but I do worry a bit about how good the lol's actually are. It'll take some damn fine pitching to keep our bats quiet, but we've seen it can be done. I know you'll start a thread later, but I'm fired up already and a couple of beers in. Waaaaay before the game starts.

You have to remember that at one point, Sands had in his long-term plan to get enrollment to around 50,000! It was the state of Virginia that stepped in, on behalf of the smaller colleges & universities who are struggling with enrollment and staffing, to cap enrollment around 30,000. That is our current situation. We'd LOVE to accept lots more students, but the state currently won't let us.

For me, it is the ever increasing attrition that is natural to being nearly 76 years old. I used to think about all of the people I knew who had died, now it would take half the morning to get them all remembered. Some died old, some young, some expectedly, some not so much, and a surprising number of folks that just couldn't take this cold, cruel world another minute. It's the price of life and living, right?

Nick was one of the good ones who really helped this site excel when you wanted to do anything except talk about VT, which we've needed the past 10 years.

If there was a post about sci-fi, you knew he was going to chime in. And boy did that make for some fun times in the doldrums of summer.

Damn, I am sad to hear about this. Wish his family the best going forward. He will be missed.

Yeah, there were a bundle of mostly military but some non-military friends in their 30s. A bit of a pause, now I expect to see more that they are reaching 60's.

Well this explains why Whit wasn't fired last year. New President is probably going to bring his or her own AD with them, and a big part of the AD hire is an understanding that they don't control football anymore.

Actually makes it quite easy to quickly pivot football into being its own entity within athletics if you're replacing the head of the department and splitting that away as part of the job description. And I wouldn't be shocked if this becomes the norm across universities going forward.

Also, I don't think its a coincidence at all that Sands put out that statement last week and then announces his intention to quit this week. He aired his grievances before taking his ball and going home because he knew he wouldn't be around to answer for what he said.

Academically, I have no idea where this will take us, he was essentially brought in to get us AAU status and he failed at doing that. Athletics had some blips, but largely sucked under him. Academics were propped up by a ballooning student population but not really pushing the envelope anywhere in particular. There's a good foundation for the next President to come in and build from, but we still have a ways to go to be where we want to be as a university.

At least maybe we'll get rid of this fucking stupid ass academic logo and just do the smart thing and unite the whole university under the athletic branding we are internationally known for.

Hate to tell ya...

Wow, people weren't kidding when they said James Franklin gets what James Franklin wants, eh?
/s

I feel like it's either very surprising or very unsurprising that he bouncing right after dropping his OpEd about college athletics spending. As in either he's throwing his hands up like 'fuck this' or everyone's like 'you wrote this? you ain't it, bye falicia'

Am I wrong?

JMMF will be here as long as the funds/support are there. A large part of why Sands is stepping down earlier than expected is because all those factors were heard about being aligned (Pres to AD to Football/other sports), didn't really happen like they were suppose to after Franklin was hired. The people with influence are making those happen. We can't really afford to sit around to wait for Sands and Babcock to coast off into retirement on their own. Change is needed now. Hopefully this new pres will be good on the academic side while also finally getting everything structured properly on the athletic side as well

This sucks. Wishing his family and friends all the best in this trying time.

I don't know why but in the past year, I've heard of so many people, many of them "young" and in my age group, passing away. I don't know if this is a normal part of getting older or not but it's scary and disheartening.

yes, we did!!!

great news