Interesting Take on Kevin Newsome

Virginia Tech missed out on quarterback prospect Kevin Newsome, who signed with Penn State. Many Hokie fans were furious that Tech wasn't able to sign Newsome, who had indicated he wanted to come to Blacksburg.

However, there is at least one person who isn't sold on Newsome's quarterbacking skills. ESPN's Tom Luginbill mentions this in his list of schools with top incoming talent that will participate in spring practice.

He lists Penn State and talks specifically about Newsome. Because the column is pay material, I can't give you a direct quote. Basically he said Newsome needs a lot of work if he's going to play quarterback at the college level and that he would be better suited at linebacker or safety.

Newsome's a great talent, but I think Hokie fans may have overreacted over him not picking Virginia Tech. There are few guys who are can't miss guys and at least according to Luginbill, Newsome isn't one of them.

Recruiting as a science is as exact as meteorology. Getting worked up over whether or not an 18 year old chooses your school is futile. For everyone who says he's the next Michael Vick there's at least one person who says he's overrated and will never contribute. Newsome's probably somewhere in the middle.

Hosley to Flower at Tech

LOI Day has come and gone. The Hokies pulled in 20 commitments, including one they didn't expect. Cornerback Jayron Hosley signed with the Hokies after committing to South Florida previously. Hosley is from Delray Beach, Fla., and went to the same high school as the legendary (in my mind) Brandon Flowers. Flowers was an All-American corner at Tech and is now with the Kansas City Chiefs.

Hosley is the same height and about the same weight Flowers was when Flowers arrived at Virginia Tech in 2004. Here's hoping Hosley turns into the same shut-down hitting machine Flowers was in the three seasons he played for the Hokies.

We have now come to my favorite part of recruiting season: The part where it's over. We can now resume talking about players that will actually have an impact for the team next season and where the Hokies need to improve. Hell, we can also talk about basketball if we're feeling frisky.

The fact is recruiting season gives more fuel to the fire that college sports are corrupt and ruining America's yutes. So, let's move on. Nothing more to see here. Well, other than maybe these links:

Kyle Tucker has returned: KT returns from his grueling schedule of drinking mai tais and sleeping with models on top of piles of money to bring us some LOI Day blogging, including inside info on the Hosley commitment.

Pharaoh, let my recruits go: VHT offensive lineman Morgan Moses is a 'Hoo. This is the part where Hokie fans dismiss Moses for academics and character issues because a recruit they wanted signed with a rival (WTF is wrong with me? I'm being a real ass hole today.).

But we still ruled in-state: Despite the Moses miss, we still pulled in a lot of the best the Commonwealth had to offer according to the TSL guys.

Nubian!: Peak makes Orson's All-Name Team. He's no Euclid Cummings, though.

Rivals Rankings: The recruiting Gods have us No. 23 in the country, No. 4 in the conference. Not too bad.

One down, three to go: Slowly but surely, we're getting healthy for the playoffs, which are a mere three months away.

LOI Day Survival Kit

No surprises so far for the Hokies on signing day. The key names have all faxed in their LOIs. Tech has hauled in a decent crop of players who, with minimal exception, won't see the playing field for another two years, if at all. So we can stop obsessing over them. Unless of course you're bored at work like I am. In which case you can check out these links to pass the time.

Live Video: VTPhreak4evr is nice enough to stream ESPN's round-the-clock coverage of the signing bonanza.

To Catch a Recruiting Predator: You didn't think this many old men could obsess over 18 year-olds without Chris Hansen getting involved, did you?

ESPN Recruiting Guide: At least the esteemed Heather Dinich gave us "best gameday atmosphere" in the ACC.

HokieSports.com Ticker: OMG! DW faxed in his LOI!

HokieSports Recruit Profiles: See all the stats your favorite recruit posted against inferior competition.

TechSideline Message Board: It's like alcoholics anonymous, but with more booze and less crying (that last part's probably not true).

Why I Consider Myself a Hokie, Recruiting and More ESPHeather Stupidity

[rant]

Monday night I went to the Oklahoma-Tennessee women's basketball game in Oklahoma City to witness Pat Summitt's 1,000th career win. Needless to say, it didn't happen and it was two hours of my life I'll never get back. It was the first women's hoops game I've ever gone to out of my own free will and will be the last for a while.

If you like turnovers, missed free throws and questionable officiating, women's hoops is the sport for you!

As some of you may know, I'm a Hokie fan, but a graduate of the University of Oklahoma. I don't consider myself a Sooner and I rarely go to OU games, even though I live within walking distance of Owen Field. Well, Monday I was reminded why I'm a Hokie.

Despite the fact their women's team just had one of its biggest wins in program history (on ESPN Big Monday, no less) and had just beaten the team that most casual fans associate most with the sport, OU fans could do nothing but bitch and moan while leaving Ford Center after the game.

Why? Because Courtney Paris fouled out, ending her string of 112 consecutive double-doubles. I won't get into why I think Paris is the most overrated player in the history of any college sport. It would waste your time and I would be admitting I pay any attention at all to women's hoops.

However, because the streak ended and because OU fans felt Paris had been hosed by the officials on all five of her fouls and had been fouled every time she missed an open layup (which was a lot on Monday), they booed relentlessly after the game and walking out of the Ford Center, it felt almost as if OU had lost. God, I had OU fans.

That's why I'm a Hokie. I like to believe Virginia Tech fans would have handled the situation a lot better instead of being the unbelievable pricks most Sooner fans are.

[/rant]

Recruiting news

David Glenn on Hokie Recruiting: ACC Sports Journal has a must-read breakdown of how Tech did building its recruiting class, where it went right and where it went wrong. If you're still on the "Fire Stiney" bandwagon, you'll want to ignore the part under the Top Recruiter sub-head, but there's a lot of great information here.

Great class, but...: VT Fan thinks we have another solid recruiting class. But the gorilla in the room is that it's bereft of a quarterback.

Jagodzinski'd: Kudos to Georgia Tech for pulling an offer from a recruit who committed then made an official visit to Auburn. My question is could Virginia Tech get away with doing this? How would our fans react if Beamer made a similar move?

ESPHeather gets deleted from my RSS reader

For her sake, I hope ESPN made her write this crap. This article annoys me mainly because I don't follow recruiting and really don't care.

The level of talent you bring into a program doesn't matter if it doesn't develop or gel (FSU) and you shouldn't get credit as a great recruiter if you take average talent and turn it into a winner (Wake Forest). It's all nonsense. Recruiting only exists to give us something to care about that gets us to Spring Football.

Arguing about who is the best recruiter in the conference is a worthless endeavor.

Newsome to Penn State

VHT QB Kevin Newsome announced today he will be attending Penn State. It looked for a while like Newsome was going to come to VT, but he didn't want to sit behind Tyrod Taylor for two years. That and Joe Paterno finally got to him.

Cue the crazy old guy:


UPDATE: BCO has a good breakdown of Newsome and the future of our QB situation.