I said some time ago that I wouldn't bother ripping apart the new playoff ideas until they'd settled on a final one - no point in getting worked up over what were obviously leaks of less than half the info. More economical to blow my stack over something that exists, instead of repeatedly blowing my stack over what might exist.
So they've finally decided on the format and it's so milquetoast I don't really even have a chance to blow my stack. So I saved a lot of effort, really. Proud of myself. And that's saying something coming from me, Mr. GTFO-And-Off-My-Lawn, you rotten kids and your playoffs. So we have a committee, and they'll play the semifinals at like the Orange Bowl and the Sugar Bowl or something, and then sell the championship game to the highest bidder, and the participants will be decided by a committee just as with most other sports. Just please say you'll play both the semis on New Year's Day or thereabouts and I'll be a little more placated. As it is I hate playing the championship on like January 9. Whose dumbass idea was it to play the game on a Monday?
Things I don't like:
-- That it looks like the Rose Bowl, which will be one of the rotating hosts, will slip further into the future and away from tradition. This is coming from a guy who thinks that Miami and Oklahoma winning the game in successive years was an unforgivable besmirchment of the game and tradition in general, so maybe you don't care as much.
-- Not enough emphasis on conference champions. There is a mushy requirement for the committee to give preference to conference champions, but the shitstorm that will ensue when an SEC runner up is picked over a one-loss conference champ is highly predictable, and is the likeliest route to playoff expansion.
This latter point is not because of my getoffmylawnitude - rather, it's because it doesn't do enough to drive Notre Dame into a conference. And when I say "into a conference" I mean "into the ACC." Notre Dame's AD Jack Swarbrick got an equal seat at the table in the discussions - 11 conference commissioners and Swarbrick. (And do you think anyone was really listening to the WAC?) That in itself is a legit reason to harbor a small distrust of the process, and ensured that Notre Dame will likely get to continue having its cake and eating it too. Latest on them is that the Big 12 is actually their most likely destination, because the Big 12 will happily let them stay football-independent on the condition that they schedule a bunch of Big 12 teams each year. If the ACC wants to lure Notre Dame they will have to emphasize the cultural fit - and worse, likely have to kowtow on the revenue-sharing issue, and create some kind of uneven distribution, which as the Big 12 proved creates its own set of problems.
So I'd have to say that the idea of Notre Dame to the ACC is more or less on life support. The conference is not going to waver on its stand of being in for everything or nothing, and it shouldn't. Uneven revenue sharing is dicey. I mean, you offer it to ND as their carrot and you know Florida State is gonna want that action too. With the uproar over FSU and Clemson basically settled down, it looks like the ACC is a 14-team conference for the near and even medium future.
************************************************************
-- This weekend it broke that LB Caleb Taylor will transfer to ODU. In case you're thinking it opens up another spot in the class of '13, it doesn't - it's just part of the attrition that's going to happen in order to free up the spots we're already filling.
-- Tomorrow appears to be D-Day as far as the Teresa Sullivan presidency is concerned. Prediction: the BOV votes 8-7 to reinstate Sullivan, and we have to wait until Governor McDonnell makes public his decision on Helen Dragas's reappointment before we know whether Sullivan will come back. As usual, this stuff is like the Supreme Court: anyone who claims to know anything is probably lying.
If reinstated, Sullivan will essentially be bulletproof, but I also think this incident decreases the likelihood her contract will be renewed when it's actually up, which I think is three years from now.
-- It has been a huge weekend for commitments, both to us and to other schools. There are now 14 commitments, which means the class is close to being closed out. On Wednesday there will be the standard update, but also an assessment of the remainder of the recruiting season.
Showing posts with label taylor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label taylor. Show all posts
Monday, June 25, 2012
Monday, March 19, 2012
weekend review
I was thinking of just posting a big picture of a fart, and that would've summed up my feelings about the weekend very nicely thank you, but maybe that would've been a cop out. If we're going to puff out our chests like we usually get to do on spring weekends, we gotta face the music when things go badly.
I don't need to break down the basketball, though. It's obvious to anyone what happened there: the basketball gods decided it wasn't going to happen, and that was that, and that decision was probably made back in February. There's no other way to explain the freak series of injuries that hit this team; I don't know who suffered more broken bones, UVA or the rest of the country, but either way it's close. The fates were not aligned for UVA this month, in everything from the actual on-floor competition to the race for accolades. It is not our month when Bernard James kicks Joe Harris ON HIS BROKEN HAND and James is the one who garners media sympathy.
(This is the section you should only read if you like throwing up in your mouth and having your screw-you-o-meter pegged, but Carolina fans are amusingly broken up over Kendall Marshall's injury. As if North Carolina is the team getting all the rotten luck this year. I hope it's a year's worth of rotten luck that's just beginning. Kendall Marshall doesn't specifically deserve to get hurt, but Carolina fans deserve to watch it happen, and if Creighton was going after John Henson, so much the better; Henson is a douchecanoe. I hope some Ohio Bobcat comes out next weekend with a sledgehammer painted with the words "John Henson's Wrist." Then maybe he'll learn the difference between a foul and a "foul." If Creighton was hammering the Tar Heel players all game, it's probably because they assumed they'd be called for a foul whether they did or not, like certain other Carolina opponents, so they might as well get their money's worth. What, me still bitter over that game at the JPJ? Noooooo.)
I'd like to offer some kind of appraisal as to what the team will look like next year and how it will fare, but I just have no idea. Here's what we lose:
- Mike Scott
- Sammy Zeglinski
- Mike Scott
- the ghost of Assane Sene
- Mike Scott
And here's the arriving cavalry:
- Teven Jones
- Evan Nolte
- Justin Anderson
- Mike Tobey
- Malcolm Brogdon's foot
- Joe Harris's left hand
A nominal starting lineup would be Evans, Brogdon, Harris, Mitchell, and Tobey. Maybe. It'll be a weirdly put-together team. A lot of tweener types, and quite a few who fit the mold of a 3 and not enough that fit the mold of a 2 or a 4. No bigs whatsoever besides Tobey, so it's sink or swim with him - hope his defense is up to Tony Bennett's standards or we'll never put anyone out there taller than 6'8". Defending opposing bigs will be a question of hoping Akil Mitchell and Darion Atkins are up to the task, or else relying on a freshman who needs to become best friends with the weight room.
********************************************************
Baseball isn't having a great weekend either, and it ain't over yet. Two losses to Florida State mean that tonight is the last chance to salvage anything from the series. It was the world's first chance to get a glimpse of UVA baseball without buying a ticket to Davenport Field, and what they saw didn't impress.
Saturday's and Sunday's games were full of the kind of mistakes that set coaches' blood on fire. Mainly Saturday. The games were lost because of 1) the mistakes and 2) FSU pouncing ruthlessly on the opportunities because they're a top-ten team and that's what top-ten teams do. Sunday's story was a fantastic outing by Branden Kline - who returned to the starting rotation after a weekend off it - wasted by one bad inning of walks and HBPs. And pitching coach Karl Kuhn was probably already blowing a stack after the four HBPs (and seven walks) issued on Saturday. The next poor pitcher that plunks a Seminole batter probably rides the plane back to Charlottesville tied to a wing.
Pile that on top of the bad fielding effort and poor approach at the plate (FSU reliever Hunter Scantling threw about forty sliders and yet our batters continually looked surprised to see the slider....though it is a little strange to see a huge, hulking pitcher big enough to play defensive end for the Raiders pitching like Jamie Moyer.) Nate Irving probably also came in for a little slice of the coaches' wrath for two lazy efforts resulting in passed balls. Freshman catcher : baseball :: freshman point guard : basketball. He'll learn.
Perhaps most troubling: a commenter's suggestion that Chris Taylor might need to be moved off of shortstop. Taylor is a veteran player and the Hero of Irvine, but.... man, eight errors is kind of hard to argue with. He's also 2-for-19 in ACC play. (.253 on the season, but he's been padding his stats against JMU and Marist.) Might it be a better lineup to have Stephen Bruno at short and Reed Gragnani at third, with Colin Harrington and Mitchell Shifflett in the outfield? Maybe, but if that's even on Brian O'Connor's mind, it won't happen for a couple more weeks. A possible shorter-term solution: move Taylor to second and Keith Werman to short.
Still, O'Connor is not a knee-jerk type. Patience is a hallmark of his, if you've earned it. (Which Taylor has.) He's not stubborn either, but he'll probably always be much slower to make a move than fans will be to suggest it. Will Roberts tossed a perfect game last year and it still took two more weekends before he was moved to Sundays.
Tonight, Whit Mayberry takes the mound, and we'll see if the Hoos can put together nine innings and salvage a game in Tallahassee. Heck, I'd settle for innings that don't take five minutes to get through our half and twenty to get through theirs.
********************************************************
Thank God for lacrosse, and we almost weren't even able to say that, as the team fell behind 6-1 to Ohio State after the first quarter. Fortunately, the next three quarters were 10-3, Good Guys. Ohio State is in the rearview mirror, hopefully permanently; the Buckeyes play the kind of stalloriffic brand of lacrosse that makes people think a shot clock is a good idea. It's fairly hideous. According to people who were there (the only way to see the game otherwise was to fork money over to Ohio State, which I wasn't going to do) OSU went into stall mode in the second quarter, hoping to milk their five-lead for three-fourths of the game. They did this to Denver, too, causing notorious stallmaster Bill Tierney to whine about stalling.
There's no need to play teams like that, honestly. Buckeye fans are getting a little tired of a coach that hasn't been able to get OSU over the hump, so maybe that particular brand of lacrosse isn't long for Columbus, Ohio, but if UVA is going to make trips out to the Midwest, how about making Ann Arbor the next destination? Or, replace the OSU home-and-home we just finished up with one with, say, Georgetown - a much more local destination and, to my mind, a more interesting game.
Next week is a game that I think will determine the #1 seed in the tournament: Johns Hopkins. My favorite rivalry game in any sport not involving an ACC team. (I still think that once Syracuse becomes the ACC's fifth team, the conference should make an exception to its all-or-nothing policy and see if perhaps Hopkins is interested in making it six, for lax only. They probably wouldn't be, but it'd be worth a try.)
I don't need to break down the basketball, though. It's obvious to anyone what happened there: the basketball gods decided it wasn't going to happen, and that was that, and that decision was probably made back in February. There's no other way to explain the freak series of injuries that hit this team; I don't know who suffered more broken bones, UVA or the rest of the country, but either way it's close. The fates were not aligned for UVA this month, in everything from the actual on-floor competition to the race for accolades. It is not our month when Bernard James kicks Joe Harris ON HIS BROKEN HAND and James is the one who garners media sympathy.
(This is the section you should only read if you like throwing up in your mouth and having your screw-you-o-meter pegged, but Carolina fans are amusingly broken up over Kendall Marshall's injury. As if North Carolina is the team getting all the rotten luck this year. I hope it's a year's worth of rotten luck that's just beginning. Kendall Marshall doesn't specifically deserve to get hurt, but Carolina fans deserve to watch it happen, and if Creighton was going after John Henson, so much the better; Henson is a douchecanoe. I hope some Ohio Bobcat comes out next weekend with a sledgehammer painted with the words "John Henson's Wrist." Then maybe he'll learn the difference between a foul and a "foul." If Creighton was hammering the Tar Heel players all game, it's probably because they assumed they'd be called for a foul whether they did or not, like certain other Carolina opponents, so they might as well get their money's worth. What, me still bitter over that game at the JPJ? Noooooo.)
I'd like to offer some kind of appraisal as to what the team will look like next year and how it will fare, but I just have no idea. Here's what we lose:
- Mike Scott
- Sammy Zeglinski
- Mike Scott
- the ghost of Assane Sene
- Mike Scott
And here's the arriving cavalry:
- Teven Jones
- Evan Nolte
- Justin Anderson
- Mike Tobey
- Malcolm Brogdon's foot
- Joe Harris's left hand
A nominal starting lineup would be Evans, Brogdon, Harris, Mitchell, and Tobey. Maybe. It'll be a weirdly put-together team. A lot of tweener types, and quite a few who fit the mold of a 3 and not enough that fit the mold of a 2 or a 4. No bigs whatsoever besides Tobey, so it's sink or swim with him - hope his defense is up to Tony Bennett's standards or we'll never put anyone out there taller than 6'8". Defending opposing bigs will be a question of hoping Akil Mitchell and Darion Atkins are up to the task, or else relying on a freshman who needs to become best friends with the weight room.
********************************************************
Baseball isn't having a great weekend either, and it ain't over yet. Two losses to Florida State mean that tonight is the last chance to salvage anything from the series. It was the world's first chance to get a glimpse of UVA baseball without buying a ticket to Davenport Field, and what they saw didn't impress.
Saturday's and Sunday's games were full of the kind of mistakes that set coaches' blood on fire. Mainly Saturday. The games were lost because of 1) the mistakes and 2) FSU pouncing ruthlessly on the opportunities because they're a top-ten team and that's what top-ten teams do. Sunday's story was a fantastic outing by Branden Kline - who returned to the starting rotation after a weekend off it - wasted by one bad inning of walks and HBPs. And pitching coach Karl Kuhn was probably already blowing a stack after the four HBPs (and seven walks) issued on Saturday. The next poor pitcher that plunks a Seminole batter probably rides the plane back to Charlottesville tied to a wing.
Pile that on top of the bad fielding effort and poor approach at the plate (FSU reliever Hunter Scantling threw about forty sliders and yet our batters continually looked surprised to see the slider....though it is a little strange to see a huge, hulking pitcher big enough to play defensive end for the Raiders pitching like Jamie Moyer.) Nate Irving probably also came in for a little slice of the coaches' wrath for two lazy efforts resulting in passed balls. Freshman catcher : baseball :: freshman point guard : basketball. He'll learn.
Perhaps most troubling: a commenter's suggestion that Chris Taylor might need to be moved off of shortstop. Taylor is a veteran player and the Hero of Irvine, but.... man, eight errors is kind of hard to argue with. He's also 2-for-19 in ACC play. (.253 on the season, but he's been padding his stats against JMU and Marist.) Might it be a better lineup to have Stephen Bruno at short and Reed Gragnani at third, with Colin Harrington and Mitchell Shifflett in the outfield? Maybe, but if that's even on Brian O'Connor's mind, it won't happen for a couple more weeks. A possible shorter-term solution: move Taylor to second and Keith Werman to short.
Still, O'Connor is not a knee-jerk type. Patience is a hallmark of his, if you've earned it. (Which Taylor has.) He's not stubborn either, but he'll probably always be much slower to make a move than fans will be to suggest it. Will Roberts tossed a perfect game last year and it still took two more weekends before he was moved to Sundays.
Tonight, Whit Mayberry takes the mound, and we'll see if the Hoos can put together nine innings and salvage a game in Tallahassee. Heck, I'd settle for innings that don't take five minutes to get through our half and twenty to get through theirs.
********************************************************
Thank God for lacrosse, and we almost weren't even able to say that, as the team fell behind 6-1 to Ohio State after the first quarter. Fortunately, the next three quarters were 10-3, Good Guys. Ohio State is in the rearview mirror, hopefully permanently; the Buckeyes play the kind of stalloriffic brand of lacrosse that makes people think a shot clock is a good idea. It's fairly hideous. According to people who were there (the only way to see the game otherwise was to fork money over to Ohio State, which I wasn't going to do) OSU went into stall mode in the second quarter, hoping to milk their five-lead for three-fourths of the game. They did this to Denver, too, causing notorious stallmaster Bill Tierney to whine about stalling.
There's no need to play teams like that, honestly. Buckeye fans are getting a little tired of a coach that hasn't been able to get OSU over the hump, so maybe that particular brand of lacrosse isn't long for Columbus, Ohio, but if UVA is going to make trips out to the Midwest, how about making Ann Arbor the next destination? Or, replace the OSU home-and-home we just finished up with one with, say, Georgetown - a much more local destination and, to my mind, a more interesting game.
Next week is a game that I think will determine the #1 seed in the tournament: Johns Hopkins. My favorite rivalry game in any sport not involving an ACC team. (I still think that once Syracuse becomes the ACC's fifth team, the conference should make an exception to its all-or-nothing policy and see if perhaps Hopkins is interested in making it six, for lax only. They probably wouldn't be, but it'd be worth a try.)
Friday, June 24, 2011
game preview: South Carolina
TV: ESPN
History against the Gamecocks: 27-36
Last matchup: USC 7, UVA 1; 6/21/11; Omaha, NE (College World Series)
Last game: UVA 8, Cal 1 (6/23); USC 7, UVA 1 (6/21)
Blogs of the enemy: Garnet and Black Attack, Leftover Hot Dog
South Carolina possible lineup:
C: Robert Beary (.290-3-35)
1B: Christian Walker (.358-10-62)
2B: Scott Wingo (.345-4-28)
3B: Adrian Morales (.288-3-40)
SS: Peter Mooney (.276-3-36)
LF: Jake Williams (.274-2-38)
CF: Jackie Bradley, Jr., (.264-6-27)
RF: Evan Marzilli (.297-3-31)
DH: Brady Thomas (.313-4-40)
Pitching probables:
LHP Danny Hultzen (12-3, 1.41, 157 K's) vs. LHP Michael Roth (13-3, 0.97, 103 K's)
South Carolina's bullpen:
RHP John Taylor (7-1, 1.17, 63 K's)
LHP Steven Neff (3-1, 2.45, 29 K's)
RHP Jose Mata (3-0, 1.76, 16 K's)
LHP Tyler Webb (3-1, 3.21, 28 K's)
RHP Matt Price (6-3, 2.12, 68 K's, 18 sv)
Last night's game was, well, it was kinda like Tuesday's game in reverse. Like South Carolina on Tuesday, UVA did enough to win on their own but used mistakes by the opposition to make the score uglier. No matter how "loose" Cal was as claimed by the ESPN commentators (all....week....long) they didn't play like it on the field. The Golden Bears helped the Hoos' cause tremendously by throwing 55-foot curveballs, heaving force-out balls into right field, hitting three batters (ok, two different ones, with Chris Taylor being victimized twice), and misplaying a number of batted balls, the sun probably being a factor in this last set of mistakes. UVA ruthlessly took advantage of Cal's miscues. Some led directly to UVA runs (center fielder Matthews's three-base error on Kenny Swab's single that turned it into an unofficial inside-the-park home run; wild pitches) and others took runs off the board for Cal (leadoff hitter Anthony Booker sliding past second base after initially stealing successfully; the next batter doubled.) A season to remember for Cal fans, but not that game.
Tyler Wilson pitched magnificently, of course. He kept the Cal batters off balance for 7 2/3 innings, inducing a ton of harmless infield (and many foul) popups. Cody Winiarski finished off the GBs with little trouble. UVA will need that kind of performance again today from Danny Hultzen.
All UVA fans, regardless of interest in baseball, should really be tuning in tonight, for what will possibly (but hopefully not) be Danny Hultzen's last appearance in a Virginia uniform. There shouldn't be any doubt Hultzen is the most dominant pitcher in UVA history; I don't think I'll get much argument when I say he's simply the best baseball player in UVA history too. Truthfully, Hultzen has established himself as one of the best athletes in UVA history, period; right up there with Ralph Sampson and Ed Moses.
And this is a fitting stage for an athlete of his caliber. Omaha, the College World Series, in an elimination game against the defending national champs and their ace pitcher, Michael Roth. The odds are stacked against him. Hultzen will need better run support from his teammates than they gave Will Roberts on Tuesday, but if there's any pitcher in the land that can win a 1-0 game, you know who it is. If the Hoos lose this game, it by no means tarnishes Hultzen's legacy, but winning this one would be a hell of a way to shine it up a little. But this is the guy you want on the mound. Period.
There's a tough uphill road to climb, but step 1 of 3 is out of the way. If the Hoos lose tonight, they'll still have achieved the best finish in school history. If they win, then it's on to a winner-take-all on Saturday. Cross your fingers.
Monday, June 13, 2011
i said OMAHA!
Holy shit.
It's times like these I wish I were Bill Simmons. Not for the fantastic pile of shekels he must be sitting on; or the fact that he gets to live inside the velvet rope in Hollywood; or the fact that he can do both without having to take shelter from the paparazzi storm; or the fact that he got that way for being a sports fan with a talent for the pen.
OK, actually all that would be pretty cool. But.
No, I just wish I had that talent with the pen sometimes. Like right now, after seeing Chris Taylor bring to real life the dreams of every eleven-year-old kid in the country who ever picked up a bat. If Bill Simmons were a UVA fan he'd do that pop-culture-sports weave thing he does and the magnitude of the moment would get even bigger somehow because it'd be just like some movie from 1987 and you'd all nod your heads and forward the link and I'd get paaaaaiiiid. Eventually. There's some steps between "write good" and "profit" but Step 1 can be awfully elusive.**
Then again, who needs it? The narrative, I mean. The moment speaks for itself. You'll watch baseball the rest of your life and maybe the only time you'll ever see that kind of thing happen again is when your kid is throwing the ball to himself in the backyard. And then it'll only be ghost runners. Bases loaded, two outs, down by one - maybe not a full count but if you're that picky about your drama then you hate life - Chris Taylor lived the dream and we got to see it play out. That's baseball drama, it doesn't get bigger than that. Fuck LeBron, man - Nike should've saved their Witnesses ad campaign for a moment like that.
Course, to have that much drama, you need a worthy opponent. I sort of hate to say it because it sounds condescending - when you're bleeding to death with a sword in your gut, "you died well" is of small consolation - but in many ways you couldn't ask for a better opponent. Irvine isn't the most talented team in the land, and it's fun to make Irvine Baseball jokes about the announcers (at least this year the commentators were lavishing praise upon both teams, and boy were they lavishing) but you had to admit they were right. Irvine does play an exhausting brand of baseball and they do it exceedingly well. Classy coach and a team with guts and fight all the way to the end - it's hard not to feel a bit bad to see a team like that lose that way. There are other teams I'd rather rip the hearts out of. UVA is the more talented team but Irvine knows every trick in the book to close that gap in a hurry.
So here's the part that's gonna read like an Oscar acceptance speech (eat your heart out, Simmons) but hats off to Chris Taylor for obvious reasons, Kenny Swab for a huge homer to erase the memories of his centerfield error yesterday, Reed Gragnani for that huge pinch-hit walk, Taylor and Keith Werman for teaming up on a zillion double plays especially the one that held Irvine to one run in the ninth, Will Roberts for a gem, Tyler Wilson for another gem, Danny Hultzen for another gem with his worst stuff of the season (that's why he's the #2 pick!), Branden Kline for the guts to put a lot of adversity behind him and make some clutch-ass pitches, Jared King for some big-league hits at big-league times, and especially the coaching staff for keeping a level head, making all the right calls, trusting their players, and working with a steady hand at all times. And oh hell, all the rest'a'you lugs I didn't mention. Have yourself another dogpile. If anyone's earned one it's this baseball team. After the greatest ninth inning in UVA baseball history, Omaha beckons.
**HOWEVA, up until a week or so ago I did have something Simmons didn't: my own canvas with the freedom to be as, um, colorful as I want. Seriously - this Grantland thing he's started really boils down to just one major difference between it and the ESPN space Simmons has: freedom to use swear words and potty language. You can see why I like this independent thing. Bill Simmons has parlayed sports fandom into the dreamiest of dreamy dream jobs and he still felt constrained enough to want to start up a whole new operation just so he could put "fucking" in front of the occasional adjective.
It's times like these I wish I were Bill Simmons. Not for the fantastic pile of shekels he must be sitting on; or the fact that he gets to live inside the velvet rope in Hollywood; or the fact that he can do both without having to take shelter from the paparazzi storm; or the fact that he got that way for being a sports fan with a talent for the pen.
OK, actually all that would be pretty cool. But.
No, I just wish I had that talent with the pen sometimes. Like right now, after seeing Chris Taylor bring to real life the dreams of every eleven-year-old kid in the country who ever picked up a bat. If Bill Simmons were a UVA fan he'd do that pop-culture-sports weave thing he does and the magnitude of the moment would get even bigger somehow because it'd be just like some movie from 1987 and you'd all nod your heads and forward the link and I'd get paaaaaiiiid. Eventually. There's some steps between "write good" and "profit" but Step 1 can be awfully elusive.**
Then again, who needs it? The narrative, I mean. The moment speaks for itself. You'll watch baseball the rest of your life and maybe the only time you'll ever see that kind of thing happen again is when your kid is throwing the ball to himself in the backyard. And then it'll only be ghost runners. Bases loaded, two outs, down by one - maybe not a full count but if you're that picky about your drama then you hate life - Chris Taylor lived the dream and we got to see it play out. That's baseball drama, it doesn't get bigger than that. Fuck LeBron, man - Nike should've saved their Witnesses ad campaign for a moment like that.
Course, to have that much drama, you need a worthy opponent. I sort of hate to say it because it sounds condescending - when you're bleeding to death with a sword in your gut, "you died well" is of small consolation - but in many ways you couldn't ask for a better opponent. Irvine isn't the most talented team in the land, and it's fun to make Irvine Baseball jokes about the announcers (at least this year the commentators were lavishing praise upon both teams, and boy were they lavishing) but you had to admit they were right. Irvine does play an exhausting brand of baseball and they do it exceedingly well. Classy coach and a team with guts and fight all the way to the end - it's hard not to feel a bit bad to see a team like that lose that way. There are other teams I'd rather rip the hearts out of. UVA is the more talented team but Irvine knows every trick in the book to close that gap in a hurry.
So here's the part that's gonna read like an Oscar acceptance speech (eat your heart out, Simmons) but hats off to Chris Taylor for obvious reasons, Kenny Swab for a huge homer to erase the memories of his centerfield error yesterday, Reed Gragnani for that huge pinch-hit walk, Taylor and Keith Werman for teaming up on a zillion double plays especially the one that held Irvine to one run in the ninth, Will Roberts for a gem, Tyler Wilson for another gem, Danny Hultzen for another gem with his worst stuff of the season (that's why he's the #2 pick!), Branden Kline for the guts to put a lot of adversity behind him and make some clutch-ass pitches, Jared King for some big-league hits at big-league times, and especially the coaching staff for keeping a level head, making all the right calls, trusting their players, and working with a steady hand at all times. And oh hell, all the rest'a'you lugs I didn't mention. Have yourself another dogpile. If anyone's earned one it's this baseball team. After the greatest ninth inning in UVA baseball history, Omaha beckons.
**HOWEVA, up until a week or so ago I did have something Simmons didn't: my own canvas with the freedom to be as, um, colorful as I want. Seriously - this Grantland thing he's started really boils down to just one major difference between it and the ESPN space Simmons has: freedom to use swear words and potty language. You can see why I like this independent thing. Bill Simmons has parlayed sports fandom into the dreamiest of dreamy dream jobs and he still felt constrained enough to want to start up a whole new operation just so he could put "fucking" in front of the occasional adjective.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
seriously the best weekend review ever
That was awesome and nobody can tell me different. The best way to respond to an ACC championship by the baseball team is to one-up that sucker the next day and win a national title. I doubted it could happen even up to the day before the Denver game. You doubted it could happen. Don't lie, you did. 19 goals to Duke will do that to you.
There's so much to be said about the fifth national title in UVA lacrosse history that it's hard to know which should come first. How about we start with Dom Starsia, since his is the evaluation I seem to have screwed up the most? Contrary to the idea that his career is tailing off, Coach Starsia pulled off what might well be his best season of coaching ever. He changed up his whole philosophy. This year he couldn't out-athlete the competition like he likes to do, so he shuffled players around, implemented a zone defense, and he and his crew of assistants got together and figured out how to change the offense from a one-man-at-a-time show to a working machine. This season I've harped on the unsustainability of having more than half your goals be unassisted; Inside Lacrosse points out that in the four tournament games, 74% of UVA's goals had an assist attached to them. This is more fun to watch by far, more successful, and ultimately the result of a focus by the coaching staff to make a concerted change in the way the offense attacks the net. You could brush that off and claim it was forced upon them by the removal of the Brattons from the equation, but you and I both know that not every coach is savvy enough to know he needs to radically switch gears and talented enough to make it work.
And on top of it, Starsia, as evidenced by his interviews and the things the mike caught him saying to his team ("now go shake their hands, they deserve it") is as classy an individual as any that we have coaching here.
So there's one kind of leadership for you. Then you have the players, especially captain Bray Malphrus, that got their teammates together and demanded accountability. Malphrus is one of the team's captains, along with John Haldy, Adam Ghitelman, and Steele Stanwick. Would this team be here without the leadership they brought? I'd venture to say no. The season would've ended early, probably in the first round, the team would have an unheard of six losses, and the only narrative would be about how the whole thing fell apart after last year's drama. The laid-back Haldy is the perfect foil for the fiery and hyper-competitive Malphrus, and the combination was precisely the medicine this team needed after last year's troubles and another heartbreaking loss to nemesis Duke. Malphrus plans to kick terrorist ass in the military after graduation and I'd say he'll do very, very well in the military environs. Next year's team will have little trouble filling in the gaps on the field left when these seniors depart (and that's meant as a compliment to the rest of the team, not a knock on the seniors) but they'll need to make a very concerted effort to fill the leadership gaps.
If there's one on-field hole to fill next year, it'll be in net. It seems like Ghitelman's been in there forever, and he took some real lumps early on from disapproving fans. But he leaves UVA as the NCAA's third-winningest goalie of all time with 50 victories. In a way I'm especially happy to see Ghitelman get this trophy because it'd be a shame to be that good for four years and come away empty-handed in the trophy department.
Other things I think:
- Steele Stanwick was held almost completely off the scoresheet, but with 20 points in the previous three games, he's made the Tewaaraton voting awfully interesting. There's a school of thought that says no Final Four = no Tewaaraton for you, and Stanwick was the only candidate on the field in Baltimore. That he got there by wildly outplaying the previous prohibitive favorite, Cornell's Rob Pannell, makes it even tougher to vote against him. The trophy will be awarded Thursday. If Stanwick doesn't win it won't be a travesty of justice, but if he does it won't be a shock any more.
- Crystal ball time: In February you learn that UVA will make it to the championship game in Baltimore. (That would've saved a lot of gnashing of teeth in April.) In that game:
- I didn't hear any major horror stories from people in the overwhelmingly pro-Terp crowd in Baltimore. John Tillman seems like a stand-up guy and the Maryland team doesn't seem to act too bad. Admittedly the Terps probably had at least as good a reason for neutral fans to root for them as we did, maybe better. And it was cool to have an all-ACC final. Still, it never hurts to have the occasional reminder that Maryland fans can be the shittiest dickbags this earth has ever seen.
- I'll have a whole separate post on 2012 lax in the not-far-off future. National championships have a way of brightening the future.
*********************************************
It wasn't too bad a redemption story for the baseball team, either, erasing all memory of that final-week sweep by Carolina by winning the ACC title. And not the cheap way, either: a 4-0 weekend. Because of tiebreakers, the Hoos had locked up a spot in the title game against FSU before the Saturday rematch against Carolina, so, as predicted, Danny Hultzen was held back til Sunday and Cody Winiarski pitched against UNC. And won anyway.
Then UVA picked up a 7-2 victory against FSU in a very decidedly non-UVA fashion: by smacking home runs. All seven runs came that way. This caused the FSU Rivals site to go all George Washington on us, mixed in with a little just-a-couple-plays-away Pete Hughes action: their description of the game was, "Three bad pitches." Seminole starter Hunter Scantling echoed the "two bad pitches" line, except what he actually said was "one bad pitch" instead, which I guess means that when John Barr was hit by a pitch to put him on base ahead of Proscia's jack, that was a good pitch.
Proscia was the tournament MVP, by the way, on account of hitting that home run that would turn out to be a game-winner, and going 7-for-16 on the weekend. Kenny Swab and Chris Taylor also made the all-tournament team, and Tyler Wilson was left off for reasons I can only assume involve it not being fair that UVA would have so many players on the team. UNC's Patrick Johnson made it instead, for doing the exact same thing Wilson did (mow down Wake Forest) except without the part where Wilson also burned through Florida State in relief. In the championship game. So that makes sense.
So the Hoos get the autobid to the NCAA tournament, I guess, but the #1 seed label means they probably didn't need it. (Y'know....probably.) They'll see some familiar faces in the Charlottesville regional: East Carolina, an OOC opponent the last two years; St. John's, which comes to Davenport for regional play for the second year in a row; and Navy, which actually isn't all that familiar but wutever. You might think that our old buddy Tim Weiser finally did us a solid by giving us the #1 seed, but you'd be wrong: assuming UVA makes it out of its own regional, Weiser handed the Hoos Pac-10 champ UCLA and their rotation of doom (with potential #1 pick Gerrit Cole) as a likely opponent. THANKS DOOD
The baseball win gives UVA five ACC champeenships for the year, which ties us with Maryland for the season's most with five. Our five: men's tennis, rowing, baseball, and men's and women's swimming and diving. This is as good a time as any to brag about Virginia's ACC dominance. In the years since ACC expansion (so, starting with the 2004-2005 season), here's the rundown of schools and their ACC championships:
- In each of the last seven years, only one of them saw another ACC school pick up more championships than Virginia.
- That year was 2006-2007, when UVA had three. That's the lowest total in any of the seven seasons, but every other school has had at least one year of just two or fewer.
- UVA has otherwise picked up at least five in each season.
- UVA's six ACC championships in 2008-2009 and 2007-2008 would be the highest single-season total for any school in the expansion age - nobody else has ever had more than five - but....
- UVA broke that record in 2009-2010 with seven ACC titles.
*********************************************
Busy week coming up, what with overdue recruiting board updates, and I also can't wait for the customary introduction to our latest basketball recruit, Justin Anderson. Justin Anderson is the five-star we stole from Maryland, and I'll probably never get tired of using that phrase and may eventually just abbreviate it TFSWSFM because that is just so damn catchy.
But it's even more important that you know this: June 8 is the official Blog Birthday, marking three years of service to the Wahoo community. That's a week from tomorrow. Around these parts we celebrate birthdays by giving out presents, not receiving them, and that means the 3rd annual Cavalier of the Year Award. In the near future, I'll unveil the 12 nominees that I think are most deserving of recognition as the top Virginia athlete of the year. Over the course of a couple weeks, I'll profile each and tell you why they're on the list, and then you the fans will have the privilege of voting on the winner. There's no awards ceremony, trophy presentation, or scholarship donation in the name of the winner (yet - the 20th annual award will be a black-tie affair, you just wait and see.) For now, just a goofy Photoshop. But the voting is fun.
There's so much to be said about the fifth national title in UVA lacrosse history that it's hard to know which should come first. How about we start with Dom Starsia, since his is the evaluation I seem to have screwed up the most? Contrary to the idea that his career is tailing off, Coach Starsia pulled off what might well be his best season of coaching ever. He changed up his whole philosophy. This year he couldn't out-athlete the competition like he likes to do, so he shuffled players around, implemented a zone defense, and he and his crew of assistants got together and figured out how to change the offense from a one-man-at-a-time show to a working machine. This season I've harped on the unsustainability of having more than half your goals be unassisted; Inside Lacrosse points out that in the four tournament games, 74% of UVA's goals had an assist attached to them. This is more fun to watch by far, more successful, and ultimately the result of a focus by the coaching staff to make a concerted change in the way the offense attacks the net. You could brush that off and claim it was forced upon them by the removal of the Brattons from the equation, but you and I both know that not every coach is savvy enough to know he needs to radically switch gears and talented enough to make it work.
And on top of it, Starsia, as evidenced by his interviews and the things the mike caught him saying to his team ("now go shake their hands, they deserve it") is as classy an individual as any that we have coaching here.
So there's one kind of leadership for you. Then you have the players, especially captain Bray Malphrus, that got their teammates together and demanded accountability. Malphrus is one of the team's captains, along with John Haldy, Adam Ghitelman, and Steele Stanwick. Would this team be here without the leadership they brought? I'd venture to say no. The season would've ended early, probably in the first round, the team would have an unheard of six losses, and the only narrative would be about how the whole thing fell apart after last year's drama. The laid-back Haldy is the perfect foil for the fiery and hyper-competitive Malphrus, and the combination was precisely the medicine this team needed after last year's troubles and another heartbreaking loss to nemesis Duke. Malphrus plans to kick terrorist ass in the military after graduation and I'd say he'll do very, very well in the military environs. Next year's team will have little trouble filling in the gaps on the field left when these seniors depart (and that's meant as a compliment to the rest of the team, not a knock on the seniors) but they'll need to make a very concerted effort to fill the leadership gaps.
If there's one on-field hole to fill next year, it'll be in net. It seems like Ghitelman's been in there forever, and he took some real lumps early on from disapproving fans. But he leaves UVA as the NCAA's third-winningest goalie of all time with 50 victories. In a way I'm especially happy to see Ghitelman get this trophy because it'd be a shame to be that good for four years and come away empty-handed in the trophy department.
Other things I think:
- Steele Stanwick was held almost completely off the scoresheet, but with 20 points in the previous three games, he's made the Tewaaraton voting awfully interesting. There's a school of thought that says no Final Four = no Tewaaraton for you, and Stanwick was the only candidate on the field in Baltimore. That he got there by wildly outplaying the previous prohibitive favorite, Cornell's Rob Pannell, makes it even tougher to vote against him. The trophy will be awarded Thursday. If Stanwick doesn't win it won't be a travesty of justice, but if he does it won't be a shock any more.
- Crystal ball time: In February you learn that UVA will make it to the championship game in Baltimore. (That would've saved a lot of gnashing of teeth in April.) In that game:
- You'll see zero goals from Rhamel Bratton, Shamel Bratton, Steele Stanwick, or Chris Bocklet, and the only goal scorers at all will be Colin Briggs, Matt White, and Nick O'Reilly,
- UVA will lose the faceoff battle 12-7,
- UVA will also lose the groundballs battle and be outshot,
- Top defender Matt Lovejoy will be out from shoulder surgery,
- UVA will be shut out in the first quarter
- I didn't hear any major horror stories from people in the overwhelmingly pro-Terp crowd in Baltimore. John Tillman seems like a stand-up guy and the Maryland team doesn't seem to act too bad. Admittedly the Terps probably had at least as good a reason for neutral fans to root for them as we did, maybe better. And it was cool to have an all-ACC final. Still, it never hurts to have the occasional reminder that Maryland fans can be the shittiest dickbags this earth has ever seen.
- I'll have a whole separate post on 2012 lax in the not-far-off future. National championships have a way of brightening the future.
*********************************************
It wasn't too bad a redemption story for the baseball team, either, erasing all memory of that final-week sweep by Carolina by winning the ACC title. And not the cheap way, either: a 4-0 weekend. Because of tiebreakers, the Hoos had locked up a spot in the title game against FSU before the Saturday rematch against Carolina, so, as predicted, Danny Hultzen was held back til Sunday and Cody Winiarski pitched against UNC. And won anyway.
Then UVA picked up a 7-2 victory against FSU in a very decidedly non-UVA fashion: by smacking home runs. All seven runs came that way. This caused the FSU Rivals site to go all George Washington on us, mixed in with a little just-a-couple-plays-away Pete Hughes action: their description of the game was, "Three bad pitches." Seminole starter Hunter Scantling echoed the "two bad pitches" line, except what he actually said was "one bad pitch" instead, which I guess means that when John Barr was hit by a pitch to put him on base ahead of Proscia's jack, that was a good pitch.
Proscia was the tournament MVP, by the way, on account of hitting that home run that would turn out to be a game-winner, and going 7-for-16 on the weekend. Kenny Swab and Chris Taylor also made the all-tournament team, and Tyler Wilson was left off for reasons I can only assume involve it not being fair that UVA would have so many players on the team. UNC's Patrick Johnson made it instead, for doing the exact same thing Wilson did (mow down Wake Forest) except without the part where Wilson also burned through Florida State in relief. In the championship game. So that makes sense.
So the Hoos get the autobid to the NCAA tournament, I guess, but the #1 seed label means they probably didn't need it. (Y'know....probably.) They'll see some familiar faces in the Charlottesville regional: East Carolina, an OOC opponent the last two years; St. John's, which comes to Davenport for regional play for the second year in a row; and Navy, which actually isn't all that familiar but wutever. You might think that our old buddy Tim Weiser finally did us a solid by giving us the #1 seed, but you'd be wrong: assuming UVA makes it out of its own regional, Weiser handed the Hoos Pac-10 champ UCLA and their rotation of doom (with potential #1 pick Gerrit Cole) as a likely opponent. THANKS DOOD
The baseball win gives UVA five ACC champeenships for the year, which ties us with Maryland for the season's most with five. Our five: men's tennis, rowing, baseball, and men's and women's swimming and diving. This is as good a time as any to brag about Virginia's ACC dominance. In the years since ACC expansion (so, starting with the 2004-2005 season), here's the rundown of schools and their ACC championships:
- Virginia - 37
- FSU - 26
- Duke - 25
- UNC - 21
- Maryland - 16
- Ga. Tech - 14
- Va. Tech - 11
- Clemson - 8
- NC State - 6
- Miami - 5
- Wake Forest - 5
- Boston College - 1
- 6 each: Men's swimming & diving; men's tennis; rowing
- 4: Women's swimming & diving
- 3 each: Men's cross country; women's lacrosse
- 2 each: Baseball; men's lacrosse; men's soccer
- 1 each: Men's outdoor track & field; women's soccer; wrestling
- In each of the last seven years, only one of them saw another ACC school pick up more championships than Virginia.
- That year was 2006-2007, when UVA had three. That's the lowest total in any of the seven seasons, but every other school has had at least one year of just two or fewer.
- UVA has otherwise picked up at least five in each season.
- UVA's six ACC championships in 2008-2009 and 2007-2008 would be the highest single-season total for any school in the expansion age - nobody else has ever had more than five - but....
- UVA broke that record in 2009-2010 with seven ACC titles.
*********************************************
Busy week coming up, what with overdue recruiting board updates, and I also can't wait for the customary introduction to our latest basketball recruit, Justin Anderson. Justin Anderson is the five-star we stole from Maryland, and I'll probably never get tired of using that phrase and may eventually just abbreviate it TFSWSFM because that is just so damn catchy.
But it's even more important that you know this: June 8 is the official Blog Birthday, marking three years of service to the Wahoo community. That's a week from tomorrow. Around these parts we celebrate birthdays by giving out presents, not receiving them, and that means the 3rd annual Cavalier of the Year Award. In the near future, I'll unveil the 12 nominees that I think are most deserving of recognition as the top Virginia athlete of the year. Over the course of a couple weeks, I'll profile each and tell you why they're on the list, and then you the fans will have the privilege of voting on the winner. There's no awards ceremony, trophy presentation, or scholarship donation in the name of the winner (yet - the 20th annual award will be a black-tie affair, you just wait and see.) For now, just a goofy Photoshop. But the voting is fun.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
27
Dave Matthews once sang that "two's a perfect number." I didn't agree then and I don't now; two doesn't even get you out of the top of the first. Ask Maryland what you can do with those two outs. Perfection requires twenty-seven. (And in the rarest of instances, twenty-eight.)
A perfect game always brings its own numbers with it. Baseball's numerically oriented like that. Will Roberts's perfection is no different. Like "one," as in the first perfect game ever thrown by a UVA pitcher. Or eight, the eighth nine-inning perfect game in NCAA history, or if you prefer, the number of shutouts now thrown by UVA pitchers this year, a previously unheard of statistic made possible by a combination of new, less bouncy bats and having cyborgs for pitchers. This perfect game happened to come with a special round number of its own: 2000, the number of wins in UVA history.
Still, it all comes back to 27. Baseball is the best sport partly because the numbers always tell the story. 27 up, 27 down means the same thing, every time. You don't get that in things like football or basketball, sports that are less binary, less digital, more flowing and analog. There's no equivalent achievement. You can score 50 points in basketball but there's nothing necessarily perfect about that. You can run for so many yards in a football game but there's nothing necessarily perfect about it. You still get tackled every time. But 27 is 27. 27 batters at the plate, and not one of them succeeded in the fundamental mission of baseball. There's something sublime about that.
Roberts helped himself along gorgeously. In a strange way it's perversely unfair that the back-slapping and hubbub over the perfect game overshadows a pitching performance that was - incredible as it sounds - even better than the phrase "perfect game" implies. Of the 27 batters, Roberts struck out 10, leaving just 17 chances for his fielders to screw up. And of those 17, 14 of them were putouts by the first baseman John Hicks; that is to say, ground balls. Keith Werman handled seven of them at second base (including the final out), the ideal location for a grounder. The baseball gods demand at least one lucky element to a perfect game, and Roberts got his when a hard ground bounced square off his shin and right in front of him for the easy toss to first. Roberts only saw three balls go into the air, and two of them fell into Werman's glove at second. With 10 strikeouts, 14 grounders, and two popups to second, that leaves just one ball for the outfield. (That flyout was hit by the same guy who rocketed the grounder off Roberts's leg.) Will Roberts did not stumble and luck his way into a perfect game.
Stuff:
- Werman's role in this should not go overlooked. The kid's got major glove chops. Werman's hitting a measly .213 and the lineup could be improved by putting Stephen Bruno (when he returns from what's become a succession of injuries) back at short and shuffling Chris Taylor to second, but there's a reason O'Connor doesn't do that and it has everything to do with Werman's outstanding glove. He made a couple non-routine plays to preserve the perfecto.
- I hear North Korea is looking for a new sports information director. Maybe the George Washington guys should apply for the job. I get that these official-site writeups are, first and foremost, about showcasing your own team's deeds and doings. It leads to occasionally comic moments, like Maryland omitting the score from the headline of a game writeup against Virginia because the score was 27-4 and that's embarrassing. But even then the score was in the first paragraph, and the next two talked about UVA. When the actual media has taken to pointing and laughing at your Baghdad Bobbery, that's how you know you've taken it a little too far. Next time, try the first paragraph instead of the seventh. There'll still be room to talk about the brilliant exploits of your mighty pitchers courageously working their way out of a bases-loaded jam for creation of great fortress of juche.
- Speaking of actual media: yes, top play on Sportscenter this morning. And a headline on MLB.com. UVA is not yet considered an elite program along the lines of an LSU or a Fullerton, but this is one step toward getting there.
A perfect game always brings its own numbers with it. Baseball's numerically oriented like that. Will Roberts's perfection is no different. Like "one," as in the first perfect game ever thrown by a UVA pitcher. Or eight, the eighth nine-inning perfect game in NCAA history, or if you prefer, the number of shutouts now thrown by UVA pitchers this year, a previously unheard of statistic made possible by a combination of new, less bouncy bats and having cyborgs for pitchers. This perfect game happened to come with a special round number of its own: 2000, the number of wins in UVA history.
Still, it all comes back to 27. Baseball is the best sport partly because the numbers always tell the story. 27 up, 27 down means the same thing, every time. You don't get that in things like football or basketball, sports that are less binary, less digital, more flowing and analog. There's no equivalent achievement. You can score 50 points in basketball but there's nothing necessarily perfect about that. You can run for so many yards in a football game but there's nothing necessarily perfect about it. You still get tackled every time. But 27 is 27. 27 batters at the plate, and not one of them succeeded in the fundamental mission of baseball. There's something sublime about that.
Roberts helped himself along gorgeously. In a strange way it's perversely unfair that the back-slapping and hubbub over the perfect game overshadows a pitching performance that was - incredible as it sounds - even better than the phrase "perfect game" implies. Of the 27 batters, Roberts struck out 10, leaving just 17 chances for his fielders to screw up. And of those 17, 14 of them were putouts by the first baseman John Hicks; that is to say, ground balls. Keith Werman handled seven of them at second base (including the final out), the ideal location for a grounder. The baseball gods demand at least one lucky element to a perfect game, and Roberts got his when a hard ground bounced square off his shin and right in front of him for the easy toss to first. Roberts only saw three balls go into the air, and two of them fell into Werman's glove at second. With 10 strikeouts, 14 grounders, and two popups to second, that leaves just one ball for the outfield. (That flyout was hit by the same guy who rocketed the grounder off Roberts's leg.) Will Roberts did not stumble and luck his way into a perfect game.
Stuff:
- Werman's role in this should not go overlooked. The kid's got major glove chops. Werman's hitting a measly .213 and the lineup could be improved by putting Stephen Bruno (when he returns from what's become a succession of injuries) back at short and shuffling Chris Taylor to second, but there's a reason O'Connor doesn't do that and it has everything to do with Werman's outstanding glove. He made a couple non-routine plays to preserve the perfecto.
- I hear North Korea is looking for a new sports information director. Maybe the George Washington guys should apply for the job. I get that these official-site writeups are, first and foremost, about showcasing your own team's deeds and doings. It leads to occasionally comic moments, like Maryland omitting the score from the headline of a game writeup against Virginia because the score was 27-4 and that's embarrassing. But even then the score was in the first paragraph, and the next two talked about UVA. When the actual media has taken to pointing and laughing at your Baghdad Bobbery, that's how you know you've taken it a little too far. Next time, try the first paragraph instead of the seventh. There'll still be room to talk about the brilliant exploits of your mighty pitchers courageously working their way out of a bases-loaded jam for creation of great fortress of juche.
- Speaking of actual media: yes, top play on Sportscenter this morning. And a headline on MLB.com. UVA is not yet considered an elite program along the lines of an LSU or a Fullerton, but this is one step toward getting there.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
the recruit: Daquan Romero
Name: Daquan Romero
Position: LB/DE
Hometown: Hampton
School: Phoebus
Height: 6'0"
Weight: 210
ESPN: 77; three stars; #99 DE
Rivals: 5.6; three stars; VA #18
Scout: three stars; #95 DE
Other offers: North Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland
This is why it's nice to recruit against schools that are under investigation for hammerable offenses. Daquan Romero (counterintuitively pronounced Day-quan) said that wasn't the reason for his November switch from UNC to UVA, but it had to factor in - just as it probably did for Demetrious Nicholson as well.
Routinely churning out players like Romero is why Phoebus is a powerhouse. In three varsity seasons Romero only lost one game at Phoebus, and all three of those years were state championships. Romero's not even a Ronald Curry or Percy Harvin-level player, but he's surrounded by talent, like his past and future teammate, Caleb Taylor, another UVA signee.
The difference between this team and the last: here, they'll compete for playing time. Romero played defensive end for Phoebus, but he's actually a little smaller than Taylor and will likely be a linebacker at UVA, which clears up a little bit of the DE logjam that the recruiting board shows. (For now the depth chart, when I fix it, will show an LB logjam instead, with five players there. But it's no guarantee they'll all be linebackers, and anyway there are three LBs and two DEs on the field.) ESPN calls him a tweener, which I suppose is fair given his size, but I question the sanity of the evaluator. According to them he's a much better pass-rusher from a two-point stance (i.e. no hands on the ground, like a linebacker) than a three-point stance (like a traditional DE) but he should bulk up and stay at DE regardless. OK then.
Strangeness aside, the services are in agreement as to his value, and it falls right about in line with his offer list, which is the usual local suspects. It's a little surprising he didn't gather a couple more, but his UNC commitment came in the spring, and all his accolades came at the end of the fall. Accolades like being named first-team all-state by the Virginia AP, as well as the Peninsula District DPOY. (And second-team all-Peninsula for his work at TE; Romero caught the game-winning TD against Hampton in the state playoffs.)
In essence, Romero's no superstar, but he's the kind of salt-of-the-earth talent that the 757 has on its assembly-line, and that Virginia Tech has been building its program on. He, Taylor, and D.J. Hill are the top three possibilities at linebacker in the next wave of LBs that I've mentioned fairly often will get their chances as redshirt sophomores in 2013. Romero's also an early enrollee - has been planning it since his days as a UNC commit and worked on it all semester in the fall - and it's good, as an aside, to note the increased flexibility in the admissions department to take a guy in January who commits barely six, seven weeks prior to enrolling. He won't change the program by himself, but routinely recruiting players with his profile will.
Position: LB/DE
Hometown: Hampton
School: Phoebus
Height: 6'0"
Weight: 210
ESPN: 77; three stars; #99 DE
Rivals: 5.6; three stars; VA #18
Scout: three stars; #95 DE
Other offers: North Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland
This is why it's nice to recruit against schools that are under investigation for hammerable offenses. Daquan Romero (counterintuitively pronounced Day-quan) said that wasn't the reason for his November switch from UNC to UVA, but it had to factor in - just as it probably did for Demetrious Nicholson as well.
Routinely churning out players like Romero is why Phoebus is a powerhouse. In three varsity seasons Romero only lost one game at Phoebus, and all three of those years were state championships. Romero's not even a Ronald Curry or Percy Harvin-level player, but he's surrounded by talent, like his past and future teammate, Caleb Taylor, another UVA signee.
The difference between this team and the last: here, they'll compete for playing time. Romero played defensive end for Phoebus, but he's actually a little smaller than Taylor and will likely be a linebacker at UVA, which clears up a little bit of the DE logjam that the recruiting board shows. (For now the depth chart, when I fix it, will show an LB logjam instead, with five players there. But it's no guarantee they'll all be linebackers, and anyway there are three LBs and two DEs on the field.) ESPN calls him a tweener, which I suppose is fair given his size, but I question the sanity of the evaluator. According to them he's a much better pass-rusher from a two-point stance (i.e. no hands on the ground, like a linebacker) than a three-point stance (like a traditional DE) but he should bulk up and stay at DE regardless. OK then.
Strangeness aside, the services are in agreement as to his value, and it falls right about in line with his offer list, which is the usual local suspects. It's a little surprising he didn't gather a couple more, but his UNC commitment came in the spring, and all his accolades came at the end of the fall. Accolades like being named first-team all-state by the Virginia AP, as well as the Peninsula District DPOY. (And second-team all-Peninsula for his work at TE; Romero caught the game-winning TD against Hampton in the state playoffs.)
In essence, Romero's no superstar, but he's the kind of salt-of-the-earth talent that the 757 has on its assembly-line, and that Virginia Tech has been building its program on. He, Taylor, and D.J. Hill are the top three possibilities at linebacker in the next wave of LBs that I've mentioned fairly often will get their chances as redshirt sophomores in 2013. Romero's also an early enrollee - has been planning it since his days as a UNC commit and worked on it all semester in the fall - and it's good, as an aside, to note the increased flexibility in the admissions department to take a guy in January who commits barely six, seven weeks prior to enrolling. He won't change the program by himself, but routinely recruiting players with his profile will.
Monday, December 6, 2010
weekend review
YeahYeah yyyyyyyeahhhhhhh.......I'd forgotten how sweet it was to beat VT in something that people pay attention to. The Radford game is tomorrow, and I this is what I wrote about it back in October: "There's the distinct possibility that this game will be needed to break a losing streak as long as six games." Instead it's likely to extend a winning streak. Coming off of two road games against theoretically better teams, how's that for a turnaround of expectations?
Expectations are what we're supposed to be keeping in check right now, but you know how hard that can be. Now there's talk of being 12-3 going into the ACC storm, starting with North Carolina. What fun, a big winning streak!
Of the teams that lie ahead, most are certainly the kind on which winning streaks are easily built. The competition gets a lot easier for the next month, but there's still three of those 50/50 type games ahead, and may I remind you we use five freshman and still rely on Mu Farrakhan's roll-of-the-dice method of shooting jumpers? I'll concede that there's the distinct possibility of seven more wins in a row, but I won't let myself expect it.
That's because if we really, really get honest with ourselves, beating VT said a lot more about VT than UVA. OK, yes, I love going into their gym and getting the job done, and Mike Scott is officially a double-double machine and an absolute rock of consistency. What we've really proven is that Tech is not a tournament team, nor are they as good as their preseason expectations. (The same can probably be said about two-thirds of the ACC, so not being part of that unfortunate group bodes very well for our chances.) Our own team is still feeling its way around the court, learning how to win. Maybe they're fast learners. Myself, I'm simply going to enjoy having something to lord over Tech again, and enjoy the ride too, without worrying too soon about where it's going.
*****************************************
With good news on the basketball court and good news on the recruiting trail it's been an uplifting kind of week. The recruiting board has another orange name, O-lineman Jay Whitmire. Heavily offered, that one. A big deal for Mike London. That gives us the requisite four linemen, a number you pretty much aim for in just about every class so as to build depth where it's most needed. Whitmire looks like the best of the bunch. Changes to the board, then:
- Moved OT Jay Whitmire from blue to orange.
- In response, moved OT Donovan Smith from yellow to red. It's an open secret that Smith likes Penn State mucho, and I'm sure the coaches would take his commitment if he called tomorrow, but they're likely focusing their efforts elsewhere.
- Added WR Brandon Reddish to yellow.
*****************************************
All three teams with UVA recruits won in the VHSL playoffs this weekend:
- Hermitage 42, Bayside 27
- Phoebus 21, Dinwiddie 13
- Stone Bridge 21, Osbourn 0
Hermitage plays Battlefield for the Division 6 title, and undefeated Phoebus goes against undefeated Stone Bridge in Division 5. Both games are at Scott Stadium, awesomely enough.
Phoebus may be playing without Caleb Taylor, who sustained a "leg injury" during the game. Taylor would almost certainly have redshirted next season anyway, but a long-term injury recovery would etch that in stone.
*****************************************
Poll study results are also up. Relatively strong bias number this week. Last time there was one this high was for the rankings of the week of 10/23, an eventful week with Wisconsin dropping Iowa, Missouri upsetting Oklahoma, and then-#5 Auburn beating #6 LSU. (Keep in mind that if you're used to seeing the numbers higher than this, it's because I was screwing up the whole time, and found and fixed my mistake last week. That made the final bias number higher than it should have been.) This week's poll is another one in which assumptions were heavily shaken, with Boise falling to Nevada. Hypothesis: I think it's possible this is because voters see the poll results week after week and shift their votes toward the mean a little bit (as in: "hey, maybe I'm overrating so-and-so, they don't end up as high in the poll, I'll knock them back a spot or two"), until something somewhat earthshattering happens and they're forced to think for themselves. Does this actually happen? No idea. It may be something I can test in the final analysis.
Expectations are what we're supposed to be keeping in check right now, but you know how hard that can be. Now there's talk of being 12-3 going into the ACC storm, starting with North Carolina. What fun, a big winning streak!
Of the teams that lie ahead, most are certainly the kind on which winning streaks are easily built. The competition gets a lot easier for the next month, but there's still three of those 50/50 type games ahead, and may I remind you we use five freshman and still rely on Mu Farrakhan's roll-of-the-dice method of shooting jumpers? I'll concede that there's the distinct possibility of seven more wins in a row, but I won't let myself expect it.
That's because if we really, really get honest with ourselves, beating VT said a lot more about VT than UVA. OK, yes, I love going into their gym and getting the job done, and Mike Scott is officially a double-double machine and an absolute rock of consistency. What we've really proven is that Tech is not a tournament team, nor are they as good as their preseason expectations. (The same can probably be said about two-thirds of the ACC, so not being part of that unfortunate group bodes very well for our chances.) Our own team is still feeling its way around the court, learning how to win. Maybe they're fast learners. Myself, I'm simply going to enjoy having something to lord over Tech again, and enjoy the ride too, without worrying too soon about where it's going.
*****************************************
With good news on the basketball court and good news on the recruiting trail it's been an uplifting kind of week. The recruiting board has another orange name, O-lineman Jay Whitmire. Heavily offered, that one. A big deal for Mike London. That gives us the requisite four linemen, a number you pretty much aim for in just about every class so as to build depth where it's most needed. Whitmire looks like the best of the bunch. Changes to the board, then:
- Moved OT Jay Whitmire from blue to orange.
- In response, moved OT Donovan Smith from yellow to red. It's an open secret that Smith likes Penn State mucho, and I'm sure the coaches would take his commitment if he called tomorrow, but they're likely focusing their efforts elsewhere.
- Added WR Brandon Reddish to yellow.
*****************************************
All three teams with UVA recruits won in the VHSL playoffs this weekend:
- Hermitage 42, Bayside 27
- Phoebus 21, Dinwiddie 13
- Stone Bridge 21, Osbourn 0
Hermitage plays Battlefield for the Division 6 title, and undefeated Phoebus goes against undefeated Stone Bridge in Division 5. Both games are at Scott Stadium, awesomely enough.
Phoebus may be playing without Caleb Taylor, who sustained a "leg injury" during the game. Taylor would almost certainly have redshirted next season anyway, but a long-term injury recovery would etch that in stone.
*****************************************
Poll study results are also up. Relatively strong bias number this week. Last time there was one this high was for the rankings of the week of 10/23, an eventful week with Wisconsin dropping Iowa, Missouri upsetting Oklahoma, and then-#5 Auburn beating #6 LSU. (Keep in mind that if you're used to seeing the numbers higher than this, it's because I was screwing up the whole time, and found and fixed my mistake last week. That made the final bias number higher than it should have been.) This week's poll is another one in which assumptions were heavily shaken, with Boise falling to Nevada. Hypothesis: I think it's possible this is because voters see the poll results week after week and shift their votes toward the mean a little bit (as in: "hey, maybe I'm overrating so-and-so, they don't end up as high in the poll, I'll knock them back a spot or two"), until something somewhat earthshattering happens and they're forced to think for themselves. Does this actually happen? No idea. It may be something I can test in the final analysis.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
the recruit: Caleb Taylor
Name: Caleb Taylor
Position: LB
Hometown: Hampton
School: Phoebus
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 225
ESPN: 75; three stars; #37 ILB
Rivals: 5.5; three stars; VA #24
Scout: three stars, #24 MLB
Other offers: West Virginia, Maryland, Louisville
Despite some questionable fanhood choices growing up, Caleb Taylor was leaning Charlottesville's way almost from the moment he was offered. Taylor missed almost his entire junior year with a serious knee injury, so a potential recruiting showdown with VT never materialized: Tech, careful with their limited scholarships, wanted Taylor to go to camp before they offered, and Taylor was half in UVA's clutches at least since April. When his commitment came the timing was a little strange since it came a few days after a series of June events and visits, but it was one of the least surprising UVA commits ever.
Taylor gets very consistent evaluations from the scouting services. He looks like a middle linebacker all the way (I still have to get used to saying "middle" instead of "inside") - he's stocky and a little slow. Not much for pass coverage. But ESPN cites his "good first-step quickness and short-area closing burst" and it shows on their highlight film, and also in his outstanding broad jump. They also call him "undersized," which here basically means "short" - at 225-sometimes-230 pounds he's already big enough for the college game. Steve Greer is 225 and Aaron Taliaferro is 230. Taylor isn't undersized. If he pans out his reputation will be that of an outstanding run-stopper.
His high school career is easily followed and despite the knee injury, there's a lot of success to talk about: Phoebus is a powerhouse for whom an undefeated season would mean a Virginia state record win streak. They killed Churchland, which is not at all a bad team. They've allowed something like ten points all season, and Taylor pairs up with UNC commit Daquan Romero to lead the defense.
There's early playing time in Taylor's future the way things look right now. (That is to say, no Curtis Grant. That could change things.) Just one linebacker graduates this year (backup Sam backer Darnell Carter) so Taylor's redshirt year will be spent looking up at a stacked depth chart. But the current rotation of Taliaferro and Greer shows no signs whatsoever of ending any time soon, not until Taliaferro graduates which would happen after Taylor's first year. After that, barring some moves there isn't much at MLB, so in Taylor's redshirt freshman year, his appearance on the two-deep behind Greer would be no surprise at all. The starting job could be Taylor's as soon as his redshirt sophomore year. Not a bad situation.
**********************************
Some other quick stuff to get to. Depth chart is updated for the VMI game. Not many changes: the two-deep sees only one, with the removal of Tim Smith for injury purposes. Dominique Wallace is also gone. Penny thoughts: Smith would be missed if all the stuff I said in preseason were turning out true, but the passing game has been OK so far. Kris Burd and Dontrelle Inman have been very productive. In the short-term, no worries, as the offense has marched along mostly without the explosiveness he ought to bring. Which is a good case for getting that medical redshirt if need be. In the longer term, this season, it might be something that defenses can adjust to and keep Burd and Inman off the stat sheet.
As for Wallace, personally I'm bummed because I thought he'd be one of the most fun tailbacks to watch as he developed. Depth-chart-wise it's no biggy. There haven't been enough carries to go around anyway.
UNC is slowly getting word on the eligibility status of its players from the NCAA, and probably has plans to appeal every single case when they come back. What that means for UVA is that starting safety Deunta Williams will definitely (barring injury or meteor strikes) be in uniform for the game against UNC, and CB Kendric Burney will not. Unless the appeal is upheld, which actually I can probably see happening.
Lastly, you'll want to head over to BC Interruption, which scored a coup with their interview of the ACC's Associate Comissioner for Communications and Football Operations, Michael Kelly. Teaser question:
Position: LB
Hometown: Hampton
School: Phoebus
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 225
ESPN: 75; three stars; #37 ILB
Rivals: 5.5; three stars; VA #24
Scout: three stars, #24 MLB
Other offers: West Virginia, Maryland, Louisville
Despite some questionable fanhood choices growing up, Caleb Taylor was leaning Charlottesville's way almost from the moment he was offered. Taylor missed almost his entire junior year with a serious knee injury, so a potential recruiting showdown with VT never materialized: Tech, careful with their limited scholarships, wanted Taylor to go to camp before they offered, and Taylor was half in UVA's clutches at least since April. When his commitment came the timing was a little strange since it came a few days after a series of June events and visits, but it was one of the least surprising UVA commits ever.
Taylor gets very consistent evaluations from the scouting services. He looks like a middle linebacker all the way (I still have to get used to saying "middle" instead of "inside") - he's stocky and a little slow. Not much for pass coverage. But ESPN cites his "good first-step quickness and short-area closing burst" and it shows on their highlight film, and also in his outstanding broad jump. They also call him "undersized," which here basically means "short" - at 225-sometimes-230 pounds he's already big enough for the college game. Steve Greer is 225 and Aaron Taliaferro is 230. Taylor isn't undersized. If he pans out his reputation will be that of an outstanding run-stopper.
His high school career is easily followed and despite the knee injury, there's a lot of success to talk about: Phoebus is a powerhouse for whom an undefeated season would mean a Virginia state record win streak. They killed Churchland, which is not at all a bad team. They've allowed something like ten points all season, and Taylor pairs up with UNC commit Daquan Romero to lead the defense.
There's early playing time in Taylor's future the way things look right now. (That is to say, no Curtis Grant. That could change things.) Just one linebacker graduates this year (backup Sam backer Darnell Carter) so Taylor's redshirt year will be spent looking up at a stacked depth chart. But the current rotation of Taliaferro and Greer shows no signs whatsoever of ending any time soon, not until Taliaferro graduates which would happen after Taylor's first year. After that, barring some moves there isn't much at MLB, so in Taylor's redshirt freshman year, his appearance on the two-deep behind Greer would be no surprise at all. The starting job could be Taylor's as soon as his redshirt sophomore year. Not a bad situation.
**********************************
Some other quick stuff to get to. Depth chart is updated for the VMI game. Not many changes: the two-deep sees only one, with the removal of Tim Smith for injury purposes. Dominique Wallace is also gone. Penny thoughts: Smith would be missed if all the stuff I said in preseason were turning out true, but the passing game has been OK so far. Kris Burd and Dontrelle Inman have been very productive. In the short-term, no worries, as the offense has marched along mostly without the explosiveness he ought to bring. Which is a good case for getting that medical redshirt if need be. In the longer term, this season, it might be something that defenses can adjust to and keep Burd and Inman off the stat sheet.
As for Wallace, personally I'm bummed because I thought he'd be one of the most fun tailbacks to watch as he developed. Depth-chart-wise it's no biggy. There haven't been enough carries to go around anyway.
UNC is slowly getting word on the eligibility status of its players from the NCAA, and probably has plans to appeal every single case when they come back. What that means for UVA is that starting safety Deunta Williams will definitely (barring injury or meteor strikes) be in uniform for the game against UNC, and CB Kendric Burney will not. Unless the appeal is upheld, which actually I can probably see happening.
Lastly, you'll want to head over to BC Interruption, which scored a coup with their interview of the ACC's Associate Comissioner for Communications and Football Operations, Michael Kelly. Teaser question:
BCI: As we approach 2015 -- the last year of the current ACC schedule -- will there be any consideration to realigning the ACC's two divisions? Have there been any conversations about other possible tweaks to the schedule, such as moving to a nine-game conference schedule or adopting a scheduling format different than the current 5+2+1 setup?The rest is just as enlightening - I don't know about you but I'd be very interested in seeing a nine-game conference schedule and I'm a touch disappointed it's not really a topic of conversation. Other discussion topics include the ACC's ever-frustrating penchant for being the last conference to post its schedule, every year. Go read.
Kelly: There have been some blue sky conversations about all of these possible concepts, but nothing indicating any imminent interest of making changes at this time.
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