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This is true for most pyramid schemes.
That's what my PSU friends say: we're going to have stressful off-seasons.
But... whatever. If we eventually can't meet whatever demands he's putting on us and he bolts for wealthier pastures, at least (hopefully!) he'll have been around long enough to drag us into the modern era and built a nice attractive seat for the next head coach to occupy.
https://www.on3.com/teams/alabama-crimson-tide/news/kalen-deboer-shuts-d...
And there's never been any link. There's never been any conversation. There's never been any interest either way.
--Kalen Deboer on the Penn State question
He is!
Merry Christmas all fellow Hokies!
Beat you to it Smitty 🤣🤪😉
He has a lot of control on personnel. So yes, he shares some of the blame for drafting Kenny Pickett, the QB that every single person on this message board knew would suck.
Not to mention, there is no confidence among fans (myself included) that he would know what to do with a good QB if he had one. They last had an above average offense in 2017 with Todd Haley and that was 3 OCs and 6 QBs ago. Arthur Smith was at least an external hire; because usually when he fires an OC or DC, he just promotes an internal assistant who studied under the guy he just fired.
I know we all laughed initially at the NDA's signed during the hiring process, but after hearing about PSU's disaster with BYU's coach it probably was a good idea.
Penn St fans cling desperately to the notion that they didn't massively fuck up in forcing Franklin out.
I don't necessarily think firing Franklin was wrong. I just think they botched the replacing of him
And the more I think of it the more I get a feeling that Franklin might be here for the long haul.
Very unlikely IMO. Franklin wears on people. And at some point VT won't be able to keep up with Sec/B10 schools.
The feeling around Pittsburgh is that Tomlin is getting the players he wants. He's just making bad choices.
I think besides the NIL, playing time, etc. that Franklin is just naturally charismatic.
Barely even had PCs....and calling them 'portable' was generous/sarcasm- was size of a desktop tower , had a 4" amber on black monitor, and weighed 15-20 lbs!
Other intangibles?
Full home stadiums even though our team was not good?
Heavy ESPN and various youtube coverage?
Wanted to play for VT but the team wasn't good?
New girlfriend goes to VT?
He already has a hard enough time beating teams from Ohio
100% agree.
We cannot be over-expecting here. We have a great start but, that is all. I want the "cupcake" first so it can be used as a training tool.
Anybody have a guess as to how Franklin is flipping some of these kids? (Ones from schools other than Penn State) He theoretically had the NIL money at PSU to get them to play there if he wanted, right? Is it early playing time on a thin roster at Tech? Not that I'm unhappy or anything, just so interesting he's been able to get kids from schools other than PSU to flip seems impressive in such a short time!
With all the good quality true freshmen - emphasis on true freshmen - coming in, the need to bring in scores of new players from the portal, the need to bring in a new coaching staff and teach people a new system to the players - few of which have likely ever played together before - and having to wash off the stench that VT football has been the last several years and bring in a winning attitude ...
Yes, I would be quite happy with 6-6 or 7-5 coupled with a bowl win to get to 7-6 or 8-5. That is a major turn-around from this past season. Then you have all of those true freshman able to start contributing and the team in place having learned the system from the new coaches to take a step further in 2027 and get to 9 or 10 wins and a ranking.
Would I like more? Of course. But I'd absolutely be happy with the scenario above.
Even if they could all start and be good contributors on a P4 squad on day 1, it still isn't a full team. We still don't know who we'll keep from this year, how competitive the coaches could make them, what holes we would still need to close/fix, or even who the coaches will be. Were a long way off from a competitive team even with this recruiting class, even if we had one the same size that were all 5 star players - it's still only some positions and about a fifth to quarter of a full team.
Excited to see Dillon Campbell and Colin Gaj in Vegas and to see if Sonny can keep his momentum up at the patriot open
7 wins ensures the continuation of the positive momentum, mainly because it should surpass expectations. I'm "happy" that Franklin is leading the team and we may look more like some of those P2 schools. If we somehow lay an egg with 6 or fewer wins, that doesn't mean we can't recover, but the growth curve would look substantially different than Franklin putting up an 8-10 win season and demonstrating to regional recruits and talking heads that Hokie Football is back! "Money where your mouth is" so to speak. He crushed it in ESD, I think he's going to do some damage in the portal too. New River Happy Valley
No way man. There's likely to be a crap ton of roster turnover, and there is something to be said for guys having been able to play together previously - it's how in the NCAA basketball tournament, teams of seniors, who won't play professionally, beat teams of mostly freshmen who will all likely be nba draft picks that year. I'd rather give the guys a couple games playing together to gel before we play a decent opponent.
If we had a good roster already and a new coach was keeping them, it might be a different story, but I really would take it in this case.
agree. the next 3 games are enough of a challenge with ODU, Maryland, and JMU.
If we hit the portal hard, we could be favored in all 3 or at least ODU & JMU (assuming Chesney takes most of the roster), but they'll definitely be challenges. So we should take an easier win where we can get it.
If .500 is a small miracle, with 3 of the 6 wins needed for that are VMI, JMU, and ODU, then I'm not sure we should be fielding a team.
I only see two, maybe three, early contributors from this recruiting class. But, again, this all depends on the portal. If he does as good as Pry did I think 6 wins should be the expectation. It is criminal what Pry did with this team in 2024 & 2025. I'm not saying we are a talented team. What I am saying is we shouldn't have been as bad as we've been.
Potential is the key word.... Thanks to the portal one bad year of experience, or one really good year of personal performance, could see any of these new commits immediately hit the portal after (if not during) the Fall. Getting them to sign is just step one... developing (a colossal failure with Pry) and keeping them on the team (culture, also an apparent colossal failure with Pry, and *cough* NIL) are critical to turning this around.
As mentioned, we need the ladies to hew toward their averages, but also need to keep in mind that that has been against preseason teams. I worry about our chances in the ACC with the shooting I've been seeing. Early days, though, I know.
People forget that this recruiting class are freshman, they still need to learn to play Div1 college football.
It's great potential but, only potential.
And also, if his exits from Vandy and PSU are any indication, when/if he does bolt, we can look forward to losing a lot of recruits/portal transfers!