And there go the squeaky wheels

   So the squeaky wheels on the message boards are jumping all over the idea of a 2-5 defense this morning, calling it foolish.

   In this morning's story on ODU's latest recruiting class, the idea of a 2-5 defense was thrown out there. And the wolves jumped on that red meat and ripped it apart.

   Of course, individuals hiding behind anonymous call signs on message boards sling barbs all the time. There is no accountability (one of the reasons I post my weekly national poll ballot is to be held accountable, or transparent, as we like to call it in the business).

   Football is an ever-evolving game, folks. And smart minds evolve rather than remain stagnant. I remember, very clearly, when the message boarders on the CAAZone howled at Deron Mayo coming in to play defensive end at 5-foot-11 and 212 pounds. If you are reading this, were you one of the people who howled at that idea? Fess up time, you probably were.

   Bottom line: ODU played a 4-3 defense this season and it didn't work. Yes, ODU went 10-3, but it certainly wasn't because the defense was a wall of granite.

   So now comes the idea of a 2-5. Does that mean the defense lines up with just two players on the defensive front and five linebackers 3 to 5 yards off the line of scrimmage? Hardly.

   Hey, James Madison is already playing a very similar defense, they just don't call it a 2-5. When I look o0ut onto the field at James Madison's defense, I see nine guys who can really run to the ball.

   Here's the advantage: A 2-5 would have the ability to clog up the middle (I like the idea of Chris Burnette and, say, Dominique Guinn-Bailey in those slots for the Monarchs) and would leave two linebacker/defensive ends on one end of the line of scrimmage and two on the other end. Which player is going to rush? Who does the tackle pick up? Where's the pressure coming from? Maybe it's an all-out blitz.

   And maybe, while those tackles are worrying about having to identify four linebackers on the edge, a safety sneaks in on a blitz.

   Offenses have evolved to the spread, the pistol and the one-back. The field has become very large. Smash-mouth isn't the game played by most. Pin-ball football is the game that's played. And I, for one, would rather be trying to chase down a running back with a big-skill linebacker than I would a lumbering defensive end who is built like a defensive tackle.

   Heck, a 2-5 can be disguised to look like a 6-1. And as long as there are seven players in the so-called "box," what does it matter?

   So to all those who are calling the concept foolish, I say this: the world is round. Deal with it. Or are you going to be the one in the Spanish court calling Columbus a fool?

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But what do I know?

   Now that National Signing Day is behind us:

   I like Old Dominion's recruiting class this season. The first four classes all had a bit of necessity to them born out of being a new program. There was desperation in the first class, a bunch of junior college players in the second class, athleticism in the third class and one really good quarterback (Taylor Heinicke) along with some depth in the fourth class.

   All four of those classes were well-planned attempts to get ODU to a level of competition that would make them good enough to make the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs, which the Monarchs did this past season.

   This year's recruiting class, however, looked at ODU's weakness -- defense -- and did something about it.

   There are at least five players in this recruiting class that the Monarchs couldn't have come close to signing had they been available four years ago. All five are Football Bowl Subdivision talents. 

   Look, every year it is understood that coaches around the country are going to step to a podium on National Signing Day and gush about their recruiting classes. It they signed 12 players, they might as be the 12 apostles, because said team is about to be blessed. If they signed 16, they might as well be the knights of the round table, led by Arthur, Percivale and Lancelot.

   Gushing about recruits is as much a ritual of early February as Groundhog's Day.

   Blah, blah, blah.

   But ... this is legit talent the Monarchs have signed. Galen Evans, Andrew Everettt, Malique Johnson, David Washington and Larry Alston III are prime talent. They could have ended up at BCS programs and at the very least a FBS program (and maybe they did; maybe ODU has grand plans of jumping to the highest division, but that blog is for another day).

    Let's get something straight. There's a lot of hot wind blowing in the press releases. Overzealous fans will take a look at a line in a press release like the one running with Malique Johnson's and they will twist the words. It says that the other schools considered by Johnson were "Penn State, Marshall, Northern Illinois, Towson, Villanova, Liberty, Howard, Bryant, Robert Morris, St. Francis (Pa.), Indiana State, Maryland, Maine, Virginia, Bucknell, Delaware, Wagner."

   The ODU zealot will run to message boards and proclaim that ODU beat out Penn State, Maryland and Virginia to get this kid. The question at hand: Will you believe that? Because I'm here to say I didn't tall off the turnip truck and I'm not necessarily buying that. Sure, he talked to those schools at some point, but it might have ended right there.

   But I am buying that ODU outrecruited a handful of pretty good schools to get the kid and the kid can play. I've watched his film. He's good.

   It's all about perception and this I've learned to trust: ODU's coaching staff is looking for players that fit their scheme. They observe film to see if a kid moves the way they like him to move. They don't necessarily trust the stopwatch. Sometimes they show up at a kid's basketball game. He's out of pads, but he's still being asked to be athletic. Sometimes they show up at a wrestling match with the same mindset. And it's worked at ODU: records of 9-2, 8-3 and 10-3 says it's worked very well.

   So take it for what it's worth: I think this is a really good recruiting class. But, really, what do I know? In the preseason, I said the Monarchs were going to finish 8-5 this season and make it to the second round of the NCAA playoffs. I missed by two games on my prediction. I undershot their record. Proves I don't know much about this game called football.

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Diggs flipped

   Reggie Diggs flipped.

   It happens. And with Diggs, it was the Old Dominion Monarchs who were trying to get Diggs to flip in the first place.

   Maybe flip-flopped is a better description. Diggs, a wide receiver from Surry County, was committed to Richmond up until this past weekend. Then he changed his mind and decided to play wide receiver at ODU. Then on Wednesday he changed his mind again and decided to stick with his original decision to go to Richmond.

   It's just part of the game.

   More recruiting news as the day plays out.

 

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You picked a fine time on this one, NCAA

I’m not a gambling man. Sure, I’ve played a little poker with friends, had my share of Nassau bets on the golf course and participated in the annual NCAA men’s basketball tournament pool.

I’m certain I’ll even buy a blind-draw square at my neighbors’ Super Bowl party next week.

But in the grand scheme of things, I’m not a gambling man.

Here’s one bet I’d make, though. I’d bet that if Bobby Wilder and Wood Selig were in the position they were in that led to the NCAA slapping each on the wrist with a $1,000 fine, they’d do it again.

On the eve of Old Dominion’s second-round playoff game at Georgia Southern, Wilder had a decision to make.

A dozen times during the 2011 season, Wilder gathered his team on the eves of its games and went over a list of items that would be important to the next day’s game, centering on special teams play.

But the NCAA wanted Wilder at a meeting on the Friday night before the game. The reason? Because the meeting is “mandatory.” And exactly what do they go over at the meeting? Well, they go over things like how long a timeout will be in the third quarter. I kid you not. There’s nothing that goes on at the meeting that a head coach cannot review in an email.

Wilder had already sat through one of these meetings prior to ODU’s first-round game against Norfolk State. And that meeting was a waste of both Wilder’s and Norfolk State coach Pete Adrian’s time.

So on the second go-around Wilder passed, with good reason. Scratch that, with great reason.

Statesboro, Ga., is a small town, small enough that you can’t fly into it at a reasonable cost. I can attest to that personally. My choices to cover the game were to fly to Atlanta and drive two hours, drive to Augusta, Ga., and drive 75 minutes, or fly to Savannah, Ga., and drive an hour to get to the Georgia Southern campus. The choices were so bad that driving the entire trip from Norfolk was considered.

I elected to fly to Augusta, because the price was right. ODU elected to fly to Savannah, which the Monarchs had done two years prior when they played at Savannah State. The Monarchs knew the turf there. They also knew it was an hour’s drive to Savannah. And when it came time to go to the meeting, Wilder passed.

Selig, meanwhile, was doing his best to ride the excitement of ODU football’s first trip to the NCAAs, and can you blame him? The NCAA had provided the team with a charter flight to Savannah and the football team and support staff didn’t fill the flight. So Selig invited some of ODU’s deep-pocketed fans to join the Monarchs on the flight and began working toward the future of the program, for to build a program one needs funds.

When it came time to go to the meeting, Selig passed. He stayed behind and continued to entertain his guests on the trip.

So why would I bet that Wilder and Selig would do it again? Because in responding to the NCAA’s fines, Selig said this: “We felt our time was better served institutionally.” Those three hours it would have taken to go to the meeting, sit through the meeting and return from the meeting were too valuable.

Some would say ODU’s leaders didn’t do the right thing. Others would say they absolutely did the right thing. The line of demarcation most likely falls on whether a person wears ODU blue or not.

It was not as if ODU wasn’t represented at the eve-of-game meeting. The Monarchs had ample representation, they just didn’t have the representation the NCAA asked for.

I look at how the news media – and I am guilty of this, too – played the story. It was sensationalized. Look at what we did at The Pilot: We put Selig and Wilder on $1,000 bills and flagged it at the top of the next day’s sports page.

As with Wilder and Selig missing the meeting, timing had a lot to do with the play of the story. It was a slow news day. I wrote it for what I thought it was worth and passed it on to the editors. And like the hungry dogs in the movie “A Christmas Story,” they smelled the turkey on the table and went for it, bones and all.

That didn’t surprise me. I received texts throughout the day from a variety of people, one going on about how the story had made the Associated Press.

And why did it make the Associated Press wires? Because the NCAA flopped a three-paragraph release in the laps of the AP and the AP loves it when news landed in its collective lap and it doesn’t have to work too hard for a “story.”

It’s my best guess that ODU’s lament is that this was released less than a week before national signing day. The Monarchs have commitments from some really big fish in this football recruiting class and, as with all classes like that for an FCS program, ODU’s coaching staff is just trying to hold on as the vultures circle, hoping to persuade a recruit to change his mind and go elsewhere at the last minute.

Meanwhile, the lyrics of that old Don Henley classic “Dirty Laundry,” a song that turns 30 this year, keeps playing in my head: Kick ’em when they’re up, kick ’em when they’re down, kick ’em when they’re stiff, kick ’em all around.

In the end, this is nothing more than a parking ticket you or I would elect to pay if we were late for a meeting and didn’t have time to feed the meter.

Maybe late for a meeting is a bad choice of words.

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ODU's McClam, King to play Saturday in FCS Senior Scout Bowl

   Old Dominion's Eddie McClam and Chad King will play in Saturday's FCS Senior Scout Bowl in Myrtle Beach.

   The game kicks off at Doug Shaw Stadium at 1 p.m.

   Norfolk State kicker Ryan Estep is also participating in the game. All three will be playing for the South squad.  

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Hot coals after the fire

   Sooner or later, it was bound to happen.

   Bobby Wilder on Wednesday announced the departure of Andy Rondeau, the program's defensive coordinator.

   Wilder said Rondeau would not be returning to the program for the 2012 season, which started about four days ago with the conclusion of the 2011 season.

   In a program with national championship aspirations, there was bound to come a point where schemes and approaches and personalities would be graded and someone or something wasn't going to make the grade.

   So it ended up being Rondeau.

   Now what?

   Now for the shakeup, and it could be widespread.

   Bill Dee has been installed as "interim" defensive coordinator, but don't believe that interim tag for a minute. In the state university system, most jobs carry an "interim" tag like this because it is state law that the job be advertised and opened to the general public. There will be other candidates for the job, but ultimately when Wilder is the guy who is going to make the hire, he may already have made it.

   I knew something was up when I stopped by Tuesday for an 8 a.m. sitdown with Wilder and Dee was in Wilder's office until 8:20. It is unlike Wilder to get off schedule.

   So I think Dee will ultimately be the guy for a lot of reasons. The players like his firey approach and there's no doubt he can coach. You don't win four state titles without being able to teach this game.

   Heck, I knew he could coach long ago, when I was a high school writer and had to write the occasional story about Dee's Phoebus Phantoms because they were about to play a Southside team in the playoffs. Dee was gruff with me back then, and I appreciated it as his style. Everybody's got a style.

   Now the big question: What will he be teaching and what will ODU's style be?

   It could be a 3-4 alignment for next season. The Monarchs definitely need to shake things up defensively and create an identity for that unit.

   The offensive unit already has an identity. True freshman quarterback Taylor Heinicke might as well be dubbed "The Bus Driver," because he spent the season taking defenses to school. But he and his offense is too high octane to be linked to a school bus.

   I'll work on that nickname for Heinicke and get back to you.

   The defense, however, has to create a personality before anybody even begins to think of a nickname.

   Right now, Swiss Cheese comes to mind, because there were a lot of holes in that defense this year. And that's not good.

   So where do the Monarchs start?

   They may start by coming to an understanding that at the Football Championship Subdivision level defenses don't have to be cookie cutter. As creative and experimental as the Monarchs have been on the offensive side, maybe they should think outside the box on the defensive side as well.

   The "box" -- or what's between the tackles on the defensive side of the ball -- being the key.

   ODU needs to be fast to the ball, and that might mean three pieces of granite and eight guys who can really run. No doubt, the defense will start with nose guard Chris Burnette next season and build around him. Burnette, when healthy, is as good as they get.

   After that, the Monarchs will need two aggressive and athletic defensive ends, if they go with the 3-4 concept. And I smell a lot of nickel and dime packages, meaning five and six defensive backs on the field at once.

   "I think what was our weakness this year, the defensive secondary, will be our strength next year," Wilder said earlier in the week, before any of the staff moves came down.

   So Wilder has made a move no coach wants to make but all coaches worth their salt eventually must. It was, no doubt, a hard decision for a number of reasons. Rondeau was there with him from the start, when the coaching staff was working out of a makeshift office that had been a conference room.

   What's done is done. Now it's time for ODU's program to move forward.

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Wilder's Age of Wisdom

   I try to make Bobby Wilder laugh from time to time. Sometimes I do it by playing the fool, sometimes by telling an elaborate and richly embellished story.

   Sometimes, he laughs because I go the route of the academician.

   As he likes to say, aim high.

   So with a dozen or so people asking about his new 10-year contract Monday during a press conference, I waited out the masses to ask a pointed question.

   I wasn’t going for the laugh this time, but he laughed at me anyway. 

   With tape recorder in hand and pen and pad at the ready, with the straightest face I could muster, I asked: “Do you think you have entered Dante’s Age of Wisdom?”

   I was referring, of course, to Dante Alighieri, the poet, author and philosopher whose life spanned 56 years in the 13th and 14th centuries. And that should answer, once and for all, the question whether or not all I read is box scores.

   Wilder nearly doubled over with laughter.

   Hey, I can play the part of court jester if it gets me a good blog.

   Once he stopped laughing – and it took a while – he focused in on what I was really asking.

   Dante believed man enters the Age of Wisdom at 45.

   Bobby is 47.

   Some call that over the hill. And maybe at this age we can’t throw that tight spiral we once did or make the hand-held watch stop at a desired time.

   Bouncing forward a few centuries, I’ll steal now from country singer Toby Keith, who put it this way: “I ain’t as good as I once was, but I’m as good once, as I ever was.”

   That’s a bit easier to break down than Dante’s The Divine Comedy. But the message is simple: There comes an age where we know we can get it done when we must. And we have a wonderful handle on how to best get it done.

   “I’ve always believed there is a 40-year window of work for most individuals,” athletic director Wood Selig said. “The first 10 years, you learn what you are about and what you are doing. The 20 years in the middle, you are at your productive best. The last 10, there are those who are just finishing out the run at that point.”

   I asked Selig if he thought that in the age where “40 is the new 30” that maybe the bell curve was a bit wider.

   “Yes, possibly,” Selig said. “Maybe that 40-year path should be about 50 now and maybe that middle area should be more like 25 years.” So Selig knew where I was going. And eventually, so did Bobby.

   Dante’s Age of Wisdom begins when an individual gets a firm grip on his philosophies and his goals.

   “I am definitely at the point in my life where I know exactly what I want,” Wilder said. “No. 1, I want my family to be happy and I want my children to be happy. We are very happy and feel very grateful to be working here at Old Dominion and living in this community. No. 2, I want to be the best head coach I can be and that starts with the development of the young people who are in this program in terms of who they are as people, who they are as students.

   “It also involves competing and winning at the highest level we can here in the FCS, meaning I want this program to be competing in the playoffs for a national title and for the CAA championship every year.”

   Maybe I enlightened Bobby some with our banter. Maybe when a player or even a student assistant walks in with The Divine Comedy as required reading, he’ll tell them to really pay attention, that there are centuries-old lessons to be learned in the text.

   And I don’t mean in the text from your BFF telling you they are ROFL at Radford’s blog today.

   My somewhat off-point question netted this final answer from Wilder:

   “I believe in the theory that every day I need to get better and find a way to get better. Our coaches and players ask themselves each day, ‘What more can I do?’ to make this football team better.

   “I don’t think I’m good enough. I don’t think I’m good enough right now or did a good enough job coaching this football team over the weekend because we won’t win the national championship this year.”

   Bobby Wilder has entered Dante’s Age of Wisdom. He just didn’t know it until today.

   And you thought the big news was about him agreeing to a 10-year contract?

   How wrong you were.

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Monarchs will get home at 9

   A note to the faithful readers of this blog: After fielding a lot of questions about this, here's the answer.

   ODU's team will return to Foreman Field on team busses from the Norfolk airport at approximately 9 p.m. ODU coach Bobby Wilder just texted me that he expects to team to get home between 9 and 9:30 p.m.

   So if there's a welcoming party planned, that's the time.

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This and that on eve of Georgia Southern game

   On the eve of ODU's biggest road game ever. That's right, ever. And it will be their biggest challenge. ODU has not played in front of a crazed crowd like the one the Monarchs will see Saturday at Georgia Southern's Paulson Stadium.

   When ODU went to Delaware, the Blue Hens had just adopted a priority points system for their fanbase and there was a mini-mutiny going with led to the smalled crowd in 30 years.

   When they went to Rhode Island, the entire state of Rhode Island went to the beach front. It was Oct. 1 and it was 82 degrees that day. It was the last good day for tanning, and fans weren't going to waste it on a football game. I think there were nine students at the game.

   When they went to Villanova ... it's been a rough year for Villanova, which had become accustomed to national title contenders and was having a tough time getting out of the league's basement. Homecoming couldn't even save the crowd that day.

   And when they went to William and Mary, the Tribe was already out of playoff contention. The stands might have been full, but only one team was playing for something and it wasn't the Indians (oops, I said it, I hope the NCAA doesn't get mad; honestly, does the Griffins work for you?).

   So this will really be the first hard road crowd ODU has played in front of.

   * Running back Lorenzo Smith didn't make the trip (concussion). Neither did wide receiver Jakwail Bailey (concussion). Nor is defensive back Aaron Evans on the trip (sprained knee).

   Who is on the trip? Well, two true freshmen defensive backs, A.J. Bordley and Brandon Bacchus, are on the trip. But for the uneducated fans, don't get your hair fried Einstein-style. If they don't play in the game, then they don't lose their red-shirt years.

   Also on the trip: quarterback Tyler Clark, a true freshman from Grassfield High in Chesapeake. Clark is long and lean and strikes an imposing figure on the sidelines, but the real reason he's making the trip is because he's really good with the clipboard on the sidelines. Give him an assignment, something to chart and look for on the field, and he'll do it as well as anyone. And that's valuable on the road.

   * Flew into Augusta, Ga., and boy are my arms tired (ha-ha).

   * I will be appearing as a guest on the Georgia Southern radio pre-game show tomorrow morning. It's something I do from time to time, talking on the opposing team's radio programs in the pre-game. I asked what station the show was on and learned a lesson of what big-time southern college football can be about. It's on a NETWORK of 21 radio stations.

   * I'm not saying that ODU's players are loose and in a relaxed mood, but on Friday during their walk-through the wide receivers were having a contest to see who could catch the most footballs at once. I think Reid Evans won with seven footballs in his hands at once.

   * Should ODU win and Maine beat Appalachian State, Foreman Field could rock one more time this season next weekend.

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Digging deep

   This just in: A.J. Bordley and Brandon Bacchus are making the trip to Statesboro, Ga.

   And for many fans of ODU football, the response to that is ... Who?

   Bordley is a true freshman from First Colonial High in Virginia Beach. Bacchus is a true freshman from Kecoughtan High in Hampton.

   Both are defensive backs.

   And both are insurance for this weekend, for it looks like ODU may have lost yet another defensive back on Thursday. This time, it's Markell Wilkins, who has developed the same stomach flu that ran through the men's basketball team earlier this week.

   It's so crazy now -- remember that Nick Mayers is being moved from wide receiver to defensive back this week -- that coach Bobby Wilder is considering playing safety Paul Morant at one of the cornerback positions if need be.

   ODU will go through its walk-through practice Friday at 10:15. It'll be interesting to see what's new at that practice.

 

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