Vad Lee Update

[PatrickinGa]

His receivers did make him look well today...

 

[Declinometer]

Vad Lee = not TO material (nothing more, nothing less)

 

[ATL1]

Vad Lee = not TO material (nothing more, nothing less)

I do believe this offense runs TO plays.

 

[Longestday]

Was Vad running the 1s or the 2s on a lower tiered team? I wish him the best, but I don't think the spring scrimmage proves he was great and GT is bad.

Vad was good, not great in our offense. He would have been better had the OL been better/not beat up. Most any other QB would hate to pass behind the 2013 OL.

 

[daBuzz]

Vad Lee = not TO material (nothing more, nothing less)

The coach who recruited him and gave him over 95% of the snaps as the starter last year obviously disagrees with you. That same guy who gets paid over $2 million per year to coach the team and has been married to the TO since his days as an OC at Georgia Southern.

 

[Techster]

Was Vad running the 1s or the 2s on a lower tiered team? I wish him the best, but I don't think the spring scrimmage proves he was great and GT is bad.

Vad was good, not great in our offense. He would have been better had the OL been better/not beat up. Most any other QB would hate to pass behind the 2013 OL.

I don't think anyone is saying because Vad had a good spring game at JMU that makes GT bad. The OP was just an FYI for those interested in what a former SA is doing...a guy, by all accounts, gave his all and was a model SA while still here. That's it, and that's all...didn't realize information sharing could be so divisive. A lot of people have sour feelings about Vad leaving, and it's starting to show.

 

[Techster]

The coach who recruited him and gave him over 95% of the snaps as the starter last year obviously disagrees with you. That same guy who gets paid over $2 million per year to coach the team and has been married to the TO since his days as an OC at Georgia Southern.

That's what bugs me the most. People who keep saying "Vad didn't fit our offense" don't realize they're subconciously saying CPJ made a mistake by not only recruiting him, but playing him the vast majority of snaps. So which is it?

Vad had a good year for a first time starter...not a great year. He would have improved immensely had he stayed and developed like all the other QBs we've had in our system. People we're expecting the world of him (and I'm guilty of it), and when he didn't deliver they turned on him. Not that it's surprising, it's pretty typical of any fanbase.

 

[Mack]

I hope Vad has a great career and all of that but I really hope we can move on and focus on our team in 2014...not what could have or should have been, etc.

We will when season starts....but for now he is still a hot topic.Many are right we dont know what happened and in few more months we will not worry too much about Vad..

 

[Mack]

That's what bugs me the most. People who keep saying "Vad didn't fit our offense" don't realize they're subconciously saying CPJ made a mistake by not only recruiting him, but playing him the vast majority of snaps. So which is it?

Vad had a good year for a first time starter...not a great year. He would have improved immensely had he stayed and developed like all the other QBs we've had in our system. People we're expecting the world of him (and I'm guilty of it), and when he didn't deliver they turned on him. Not that it's surprising, it's pretty typical of any fanbase.

Well Vad did better than expected for a first time starater last year.I have said it many times I always thought he didnt like or fit in the option offense but he did have a arm and hoped we would get more completions.I did watch him several times and he was in the game and tried to fire up the team.He would have gotten better if he has stayed but how much is anybody's guess.One good thing is he didnt throw us under the bus.....hope he does well

 

[Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau]

I hope Vad has a great career and all of that but I really hope we can move on and focus on our team in 2014...not what could have or should have been, etc.

I think most of us have moved on. It still is puzzling why he chose Georgia Tech in the first place. And why it took so long for him to come to what seems like an clear cut decision.

 

[Mack]

I think most of us have moved on. It still is puzzling why he chose Georgia Tech in the first place. And why it took so long for him to come to what seems like an clear cut decision.

My thoughts exactly my friend.....he was a spread qb in HS and looked very comfortable in the passing pocket from the film clips I saw...he never ran the option from under center according to folks who saw him play regularly and the PJ option was a forgeing offense to him......

 

[Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau]

My thoughts exactly my friend.....he was a spread qb in HS and looked very comfortable in the passing pocket from the film clips I saw...he never ran the option from under center according to folks who saw him play regularly and the PJ option was a forgeing offense to him......

I don't know Madison's schedule for this year, but for the past few years they are in another world compared to playing in the ACC. Vad will see much less talent across the line of scrimmage playing William & Mary and UNCC. But he will have lesser athletes around him, too. He should enjoy the experience. I think he clearly was not having fun anymore a Tech.

 

[Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau]

That's what bugs me the most. People who keep saying "Vad didn't fit our offense" don't realize they're subconciously saying CPJ made a mistake by not only recruiting him, but playing him the vast majority of snaps. So which is it?

Vad had a good year for a first time starter...not a great year. He would have improved immensely had he stayed and developed like all the other QBs we've had in our system. People we're expecting the world of him (and I'm guilty of it), and when he didn't deliver they turned on him. Not that it's surprising, it's pretty typical of any fanbase.

Is our quarterback coach--the guy from Cal Poly--is he considered to be doing a good job?

 

[InsideLB]

IMO Vad was a very promising recruit for the offense who just didn't pan out for mental reasons. To his credit he came here, gave it a try, and decided he couldn't commit to it.

There seemed to be several reasons he didn't like it:

First, he struggled running the base offense. Maybe he would have improved his option reads with more reps but we'll never know. He's a guy who was used to lining up in the gun and adlibbing/playing a finesse game that was fine for HS where his moves and speed were overwhelming. He wasn't used to struggling or having to work at something really hard to get good at it. And given his other reasons he didn't like it (see below) I can see why he didn't stick around to try and get better at it.

Another reason was he didn't like the contact and was complaining about being beat up. First time I'd ever heard a PJ QB talk about that. Nesbitt craved contact and had a defensive player's mindset. Washington enjoyed running the ball a lot and while he wasn't out there trucking people the hits didn't seem to bother him. IMO Vad just didn't have a the toughness to get the tough yards that are essential to running our offense. He turned out to not be a QB you can call on for a lot of designed QB runs.

Finally, because he was struggling running the base and didn't like the contact of designed QB runs, he concluded he wanted to get back to being in the gun and mostly throwing or handing off.

In the end you can either credit Vad for seeing it wasn't going to work or fault him for not committing to make it work. Maybe it was a little bit of both in reality. Leaving was a tough decision and he struggled with it himself so it's going to be hard for us armchair QBs to say what the right move was. I don't think it was a mistake to recruit him though. He was a very reasonable recruit who mentally ended up not fitting either by choice or by underlying nature, or both.

 

[potatohead]

Sorry, I can't let that stand. That's a lie.

He said that he had second thoughts about the future of the offense. He DID NOT say that he signed off after that game. And if he had said that, then Paul Johnson is the monumentally stupidest coach of all time if he continued to give him 95% of the snaps, knowing his QB had "signed off".

The kid has moved on. But he also gave us his best effort on the field. At the end of the season, he considered his future (I know...how DARE he consider what's best for him? I know right?) and decided to move on. He has said nothing but good things about GT, as far as I'm aware. However, if I were him and I read words like yours on a message board somewhere, it would make me want to reconsider that decision.

If a quote from a message board would make you reconsider quitting with dignity, then that's on you. If you're the type of man that can walk away from something like that and not talk **** unless someone says something that offends you, well, that an indictment of you and what type of person you are. By the way, I think Vad Lee handled it as well as could be expected.

You're out of your mind if you think he didn't intend on transferring halfway through the season. Any one with a lick of sense wouldn't believe that he made that decision after the bowl game. It's pretty damning with his comments about the Duke game and it was clear throughout the season he checked out. As far as CPJ being the stupidest coach of all time, well I don't think he is the stupidest...


Things don't work out, I get it, but no sense in sugar coating what happened. All talk. I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on how and why the #NoPretender motto started...

 

[Techster]

Is our quarterback coach--the guy from Cal Poly--is he considered to be doing a good job?

If you go by the opinions of everyone on our QB last year...no.

Really, it's probably a little too early to tell. We'll see how much JT and Byerly get up to speed when head into the meat of schedule, and how MJ develops. This will be Cooke's 2nd year with us so the transition period is over.

Personally, I would love to see CPJ getting back with the QBs. He did it last spring, and I thought the results looked good. Of course, we were playing against our own guys.

 

[AE 87]

My take:
1. I didn't think Tevin was an all-world QB, but I didn't think he was the biggest problem in 2011 and 2012. He was making his reads decently and threw the ball decently. He seemed to suffer from a lot of dropped passes and the slightly more than occasional what the what pass. I thought those calling for the back-up to play were over-reacting.
2. In 2012, I liked what I saw from Vad, but I also saw that he wasn't asked to run a lot of true triple. I wasn't calling for him to replace TW, but I was optimistic about 2013.
3. In 2013, I agree that Vad had a decent year for a first-year starter. However, I was really disappointed in how he ran the base offense. It's one thing if you don't pick-up line stunts etc, but there were times when the read looked like a flashing light, and he missed it.
4. Vad spent his off-season with the QB coach who worked with some of the top QBs in the nation. There's no doubt that he heard a lot of grief about the offense, and took it to heart.
5. During the season, I did say that it didn't look like Vad was trusting the system. I said that based on how quickly he seemed to bail from the "play" and try to create something with his feet and athleticism. Obviously, there are times when a QB must do that, but it seemed to me that he was doing it too quickly and too often.
6. Still, I never called for JT to start, and I don't remember anyone else calling for JT to start over Vad. The idea that people who are saying that our QB play was not great last year are also saying that his play was awful for a first year starter is some weird George Orwell rewriting history stuff. Vad in 2013 was not as good a QB as TW in 2011, but TW had more time in the system.
7. When leaving, Vad said, "the triple option was just not my thing" or something like that. He also said that he thought he was going to be passing more, as if the passing more was ever going to be from something other than the triple-option base. To me, those words support the notion that he didn't buy in to the offense.
8. That doesn't mean he wasn't trying or wasn't our best QB last year, but it does mean, to me, that he wasn't as good as he could have been. It also means there's a limit to what a coach can accomplish with him. It is true for everybody: if you don't want to do what you are doing, you're going to struggle doing it to your best ability.

 

[Squints]

7. When leaving, Vad said, "the triple option was just not my thing" or something like that. He also said that he thought he was going to be passing more, as if the passing more was ever going to be from something other than the triple-option base. To me, those words support the notion that he didn't buy in to the offense.

One quote that got me was in the radio interview he did. He said something to the effect of "I was told we'd do more passing once we became proficient at the running aspect of the offense. I felt I did that." That showed a real disconnect to me because anyone who watched the games could tell that wasn't the case.

 

[QuickKick]

I would hope he would do fairly well in JMU's spring game. That said I wish him well and thanks for the link.

 

[HHPshack]

One play defined the Vad era for me. Clemson, he could have easily put his shoulder down and gain a first down.....he STOPPED. Afraid of contact! Seems like a good kid but not a good fit for the TO.