If Beamer wants a championship, Foster has to recruit better
by french60wasp on Jan 4, 2011 3:50 PM EST
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I woke up this morning bitter and frustrated with the Virginia Tech football program. I wasn’t angry that the Hokies were beaten by Stanford. I felt like, short of playing Auburn or Oregon that Stanford presented the worst possible match up to Virginia Tech. I wasn’t even upset that the Hokies were not even competitive in the second half. I was frustrated because the game became a microcosm revisiting every weakness that the Hokies have exhibited both this season and over the last decade and Frank Beamer appears to be incapable or unwilling to make the changes necessary for the program to be a yearly challenger for the National Championship instead of a yearly challenger for the ACC title who will almost always lose against top 5 caliber programs.
The first and foremost challenge is recruiting. In order to be a truly dominant program, you must be able to control the line of scrimmage with your defensive front seven. Virginia Tech rose to prominence running a wide-tackle six defense, which allowed the Hokies to control the line of scrimmage with lesser talent but exposed the secondary to sophisticated passing attacks. Bud Foster changed his scheme to a more standards 4-3 look, and while Virginia Tech has become a much more difficult team to throw against, they do not get to the quarterback with as much frequency and the quality of the run defense has slipped. Why?
First and foremost, Virginia Tech does not recruit top end defensive line talent, especially at defensive tackle. Since 2002, the Hokies have recruited ZERO five star and X four star defensive linemen (Jonathan Lewis, Chris Ellis, Stephen Friday, Jason Worilds, John Graves, Zach McCray, Nick Acree). Macho Harris was the only five star Hokie defensive recruit over the 2002-2010 time frame. The 2009 class only had two defensive tackles period, David Wang (who is now playing guard) and DeAndre Rhodes (who isn’t on the team.) Meanwhile, the Hokies are in desperate need for linebacker depth, yet have lost out on Curtis Grant, the top high school player in Virginia, and have also been beaten out by UNC for other linebacker prospects. Currently, the Hokies do not have one single Rivals Top 100 Commitment, with only Stephone Anthony as even a possibility at this point. With the glaring weakness at outside linebacker and rover, coupled with a lack of defensive tackle depth (unless Nick Acree wakes up tomorrow and has changed from a specemin to a football player), this is an embarressment.
Virginia Tech isn’t the easiest place to recruit, and Virginia, while a very good football state, doesn’t produce many five star quality defensive linemen. Nevertheless, Bud Foster has to figure out a way to return to the dominance of the wide-tackle six era and the best way to do that is by figuring out how to get these top players to come to Blacksburg. The two high profile TV losses to Boise and Stanford coupled with the embarrassing loss to JMU really damaged the program’s credibility, despite the 11 win season and crushing defeats of UNC, FSU, and Miami.
Most Virginia Tech fans will tell you that the biggest hurdle to the top of the college football landscape is Bryan Stinespring. I think this requires more examination. First, Stinespring must be given credit for the massive influx of talent on the offensive side of the ball. He has recruited much better than Bud Foster since 2002, with 2 five star players and 18 four star players. Also, many VT offensive players have become good NFL players.
That being said, last night again proved why Stinespring has to go. First and foremost, either he has been unable to develop a consistent offensive line or he isn’t capable of improving the talent he has at the position. Second, his design in the passing game is atrocious. Every play is a 5 or 7 step drop. Routes are not sharp and besides the sprint right, throw back deep left play to Danny Coale, receivers rarely run combo routes to get open. There is no screen or draw game of which to speak, and these problems have been consistent throughout Stinespring’s tenure regardless of the talent pool available. With Ralph Friedgen looming in the wings, Frank Beamer must decide if loyalty to Stinespring and his recruiting prowess outweigh the potential impact of a big time offensive mind like Fridgen joining the staff.
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Biggest qualm with Stiney's play-calling
He is befuddled against the blitz. He hardly utilizes screens and draws (like you said), despite having talent this year like David Wilson, Danny Coale and Dyrell Roberts who are textbook screen receivers. I could go on forever, but I’ll drop my thoughts on that right now. And I blame Newsome for O-line struggles, not Stiney.
From my early days listening to Bill Roth depict a dazzling Michael Vick dance around the field to glory until now, it has been more than a pleasure to be a Hokie fan. Since 1998, there has only been one game played in Lane Stadium I did not attend (stupid chicken pox), and I dread the day where I am not fortunate enough to be in the stands week after week.
It's a great day to be a Hokie!
Oh man, oh man, oh MAN
I tell you, offensively you hit the nail on the head Josh. I know our offensive line looked like Veal tied to a steak last night, but any line would fail to look good if the OC couldn’t figure out what the defense was doing or how to stop it. Screens are night in the BS playbook, and the sad thing is they would have absolutely worked last night. Throw a screen or two so that Tyrod can get the ball off without being nailed (which he still might have gotten, but he would have gotten the ball OFF) and then one time after they guessed right on the screen and were about to stuff it, throw it and have a receiver go deep on a streak and throw it to that guy or back to Tyrod so that we’d have a WIDE OPEN guy downfield for a TD. I’m just tired of Stinespring’s answer to the blitz being “Let’s go deep!” That’s where the 8 sacks came from!
thank you
no, you, chicagomaroon just hit the nail on the head! i have been tired of people talking all week about how Stanford beat up taylor and was just so much better! i don’t care if you have tim tebow, andrew luck, peyton manning or tom brady – if you don’t have some quick slants, screens or something short open to dump to, you’re quarterback is going to get sacked over and over! maybe it was the play calling, or maybe they were there and TT just didn’t dump to them… but it didn’t seem they had those routes available
I agree, VT needs Freidgen
VT’s crux has always been the offensive line. Why wasn’t TT redshirted? Beamer said the offensive line wasn’t good enough. The biggest reason Stanford dominated the 2nd half of the game was their O-line stepped up and VTs O-line crumbled. VT needs to recruit and coach better in this department. Bring in Freidgen!
Freidgen has a pretty good history of getting OL to go to Maryland and move on into the NFL. Well, better than VT’s history. Besides Duane Brown and Jake Grove, VTs history of OL development is pretty futile. We’ll see if Ed Wang can hang around in the NFL. But perhaps more importantly, Freidgen is one hell of an OC and is an instant upgrade over Stinespring and Newsome.
D-Line is a different issue, and I disagree, VT has a good D-line, or at least a sufficient D-line in a rebuilding year (only Graves returned as a starter). They just went against the BEST O-line in college football. Stanford gave up SIX sacks all year, that is just crazy. Yea, recruiting on the D-line pretty much sucked from 2007-2009, but it looks pretty good in 2010 and 2011. If Nick Acree, Zack McCray, Corey Marshall, and Kris Harley pan out, the D-Line should be pretty good in the up comming years. There are also a lot of 3 stars, and VT has a way of making the most out of many 3 star recruits (or walk-ons…). The D-Line will be 2-deep next year, trickle in these potential stars, and I see no reason to worry about the D-Line.
by Chazz Micheal Michealzz on Jan 5, 2011 2:07 PM EST reply actions
I’m worried about Harley being too big for DE and not big enough for DT. And I’m worried about Acree turning into a football player… you have to more than look the part. But certainly hope I’m worrying over nothing on both counts.
Agreed. Both Harley and and Corey Marshall are both tweeners, and Marshall supposedly was a stretch as a four star. Acree, well, we can only hope. Supposedly Tech is a player for a big time DT out of DC that is a big kid like Acree. Having two massive DT’s who can play would totally change the complexion of the defense.
And, I say all this about the D-line even though I am a huge fan of Antoine Hopkins. I know the coaches always talk about concern about his motor. I think he is an NFL 3 technique and by the end of the season, he was drawing the double teams and John Graves was being blocked 1 on 1. He was dominant when blocked one on one. The problem is, who plays the other slot, and can the DE’s be good against the run without giving up pass rush?
Viva El Guapo
by french60wasp on Jan 11, 2011 11:02 AM EST up reply actions
Blame Sean Glennon
Tyrod was redshirted his sophomore year, but it got taken off soon after the loss to ECU in Charlotte.
Also
Beamer burned his redshirt in the blowout loss to LSU during his freshman year. TT got us the only touchdown of that game too.
rankings aren't everything
We’ve had some superb defensive talent over the last several years. Quite a number of 1st team all-Americans. So what if they weren’t ranked as 5 stars? Not saying I’d mind more 5 star recruits, as long as they have their heads screwed on right, but I’m not going to make a big deal about it as long as Foster continues to make such good use of the talent he does bring in.
OL, on the other hand, seems to be a constant issue. As far back as I can remember, we always seem to be lacking the kind of OL recruits you need to be a NC contender. So it’s not new with Newsome. But he can’t be feeling comfortable right now.
And why oh why do we not use screens?!? Or much PA? Or more option? This was not an inexperienced offense where you have to whittle the playbook down to a few simple plays.
I don't think Stinespring or Newsome know how to design and run a screen
If I remember correctly, VT tried one screen in the 2nd half of the Stanford game and it failed miserably. The O-line looked lost, the running back (I think Evans?) didn’t get into position, and TT had to throw it away. Screens are not the easiest play in the playbook, but they’re not Mike Martz difficult. If VT wants to run a pro-style offense, they need to run the most essential play in the NFL. Screens, when run well, kill the D-line pressure, especially on 3rd and long.
by Chazz Micheal Michealzz on Jan 7, 2011 12:51 PM EST up reply actions
Regarding Foster developing talent defensively, the guys he has developed into All American types were almost all defensive backs (although Jason Worilds should have been considered.) Foster has not had one defensive tackle become an effective starter in the NFL. Not one. I don’t think they can reach that next level, regardless of who is running the offense, without a disruptive defensive line prescence.
That being said, the 2010 version of the Hokies held up on the interior. I don’t know how many people noticed, but Antoine Hopkins had a much better year than John Graves. By the end of the season, Hopkins was drawing the double teams that Graves drew earlier in the year. While most of the problems stopping the run stemmed from linebackers not filling gaps properly, Stephen Friday was a HUGE liability up front against the run and didn’t help the linebackers scraping to flow to his side.
This season is a huge benchmark for Bud Foster. He gets most of the roster back, and I am absolutely convinced that James Gayle and Zach McCray will be major upgrades over Friday. Defensive Tackle is suddenly really thin, with only the Hopkins brothers proven to be players that Foster trusts to play. McCray and Acree are the two recruits that have to pan out. They MUST pan out. At linebacker, I don’t think Foster can go to a traditional 4-3 with two OLB’s because both Rivers and Bruce Taylor will be back and both can be liabilities in pass coverage and are more suited to the mike and backer techniques. Tyler (who was night and day from the Wake Forrest game where he really struggled to the FSU and Stanford games) provides depth. That leaves the whip again as the big question mark. Do they consider playing Edwards, who has talent, to whip. Does Gouvia-Winslow get another look (too skinny to play the run and too awkward in pass coverage)? Can Nick Dew step in as a redshirt frosh and and play the whip?
I have zero worries about the secondary. I am convinced that Antone Exum will be a star. Fuller and Hill can battle at corner, and Whitley is rock solid as a safety.
Nevertheless, you win up front.
Viva El Guapo
O-Line, O-Line, O-Line
I have to agree with your comments on the defense, but Foster does have the ability to take mediocre recruits and turn them into a great defense. The NC will never be in our grasp until we can recruit those “big hog molly’s” up front on the O-Line. It’s been speed and athelets too long, I am ready to see an O-Line that can block somebody for a change. We have a nack for finding some damn good running backs and QB’s that can run for their lives. Imagine, if that talent actually had a hole to go through or time to drop back in the pocket and pick a defense apart – we probably could do enough on defense to keep us in it and win some shootouts.
I say lets recruit some SEC calibur O-Line guys and let the defense (and the great mind behind it) work itself out. Until this year has anyone ever doubted that when the D takes the field good things are gonna happen?
again, Bud Foster is off interviewing for the Pitt job instead of meeting Stephone Anthony, even though he is not only the DC, but also the linebacker coach. Grant didn’t get one in home visit, even though Beamer went and met with Ryan Williams in his home during the recruiting process.
To win national championships, it is more imporatant to be a good recruiter than be an X’s and O’s guy, but you have to have both. See Mack Brown (awful in-game and x’s and o’s coach) and Will Muschamp.
Viva El Guapo
Ask yourself this
If Virginia Tech was too let go of Bryan Stinespring, who would pick him up? JMU? I love Beamer’s loyalty and it is something that is not common these days in sports, but there is a time when change is needed. This doesn’t mean he has to leave the staff, he is a good recruiter and I think he is a good coach, just not a creative offensive mind or play caller. GO HOKIES!!!
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