Welcome. What is up?

You are looking LIVE!!!!!! at The Blacksburg Bureau here on Lee Street. Got the Internet all set up, which means more frequent blog posts for the dozens of you diligent souls who are loyal enough to a) spend 15 minutes trying to find this blog and b) spend 30 more trying to make sense of the tripe within.

Let’s start today by answering reader Fred’s question. A quick reset on that ...

Darryl: As we all know, college football doesn’t have preseason games. That said, how much hitting does Tech do during practice? Will they have any full-scale, everybody-is-free-game-except-for-the-QB scrimmages?

Fred, Tech does a fair amount of hitting during practices (see: Corey Gordon colliding with Nick Marshman last week). All of the Hokies’ scrimmages are as you describe, including this Saturday’s at Lane. It’s the last scrimmage of the preseason that is open to fans and media mongrels.

*

DON’T TAKE THESE TO VEGAS WITH YOU

While watching ESPN at PK’s yesterday, I saw their college football “experts” picking games for the upcoming season. Though I’m not one to imitate The World-Wide Leader In Using A Sports Highlight Show To Promote Crummy Disney Movies, I’ll go ahead and make some predictions of my own. Disclaimer: I don’t like doing these things, and I don’t pretend to be an all-knowing expert on this team. I just do my best to tell you guys what’s going on.

That said, here’s how I see the season unfolding. (Remember, these probably aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. And since they’re being printed on something more worthless than a piece of paper—my Jurassic, piece-of-garbage Dell company laptop—just take them for what they are: educated guesswork.)

vs. East Carolina ... W
at LSU ... L
vs. Ohio ... W
vs. William and Mary ... W
vs. North Carolina ... W
at Clemson ... W
at Duke ... W
Boston College ... W
at Georgia Tech ... W
vs. Florida State ... W
vs. Miami ... L
at Virginia ... W

So Tech goes 10-2 in the regular season, 7-1 in the ACC. The Hokies head to lovely Jacksonville, Fla., for the ACC title game. Let’s go ahead and say they win that over Florida State. Then they’re off to the Orange Bowl, though I won’t even begin to pick who they’ll play in that game, or the outcome.

OK, gang, what say you? Am I delusional and/or ignorant, incapable and/or mentally twisted? Curious to hear your thoughts/arguments/missives.

*

QUICK HITS

Tech announced yesterday that redshirt freshman linebacker Matt Wright is back with the team after dealing with what the school called “a medical reason.“ This is minor news. Don’t expect Wright to see significant time on defense this season. Special teams, more likely. The Hokies are still waiting on cornerback Roland Minor, who is awaiting summer school grades.

*

CANDID CAM MARTIN (OK, SORRY, THAT WAS BAD)

To accompany today’s story on Corey Gordon, here’s some stuff on new starting whip Cam Martin, a redshirt sophomore ...

- Martin was a free safety in high school and during his first two years at Tech. Coaches moved him to whip when his weight jumped from 185 pounds to 215. “They saw what Brenden Hill did at linebacker, and we’re pretty much the same size. So they figured I could do the same thing,“ Martin said. 

- Martin dealt with a bunch of injuries last season: hernia surgery, a sore foot, a torn labrum in his left shoulder. “It was a rough year last year, but I feel good right now,“ he said.

- Martin on being moved to the No. 1 whip by his position coach, Jim Cavanaugh: “During the spring, I was bounced from two to three almost every other day, so I don’t really pay any attention to coach Cav’s depth chart, because it can change any other day.“

- And here are Cavanaugh’s thoughts on Martin: “He’s used to reading offenses. He’s used to making very quick decisions, as a free safety has to make calls about formation sets and stuff. Now, when you move up closer to the line, where things happen to really fast, he’s in position to work that, to do that and to make good decisions, quick decisions, because he’s used to doing that.“

*

LOOK-A-LIKES

You didn’t think we could last an entire blog post without mentioning fellow beat writer and Washington Post Earl of Excess Adam Kilgore, did you?

I found Kilgore’s Virginia Tech doppelganger the other day. It’s long snapper Scott King. He’s almost exactly the same size as Kilgore and probably in almost as sterling physical condition.

*

TAILWINDS

We’ll leave you with three links—one for reading, one for watching, one for listening ...

1. Reading (for background on Tech’s first big opponent of the season)

2. Watching (for a reminder that sharp-witted writing actually once existed on network TV)

3. Listening (for some great blogging music, and my favorite band of the moment)

Posted by Darryl Slater in • Virginia Tech Extra
Permalink