The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Richmond at Virginia, 6 PM, 8/31, ACCN; Hoo Will Be Wahoos Starting Quarterback?

Episode Date: August 20, 2024

The Jerry & Jerry Show headlines: Richmond at Virginia, 6 PM, 8/31, ACCN Hoo Will Be Wahoos Starting Quarterback? Hootie’s Golden Nuggets: News & Notes UVA Restricting Access To The Hill In Scott Stadium Alabama Pays General Manager $825K Per Year Does UVA Football Need A General Manager? Around The ACC: What To Watch & Why? Former UVA Star Joe Harris Retires From NBA Read Viewer & Listener Comments Live On-Air Jerry Ratcliffe & Jerry Miller were live on The Jerry & Jerry Show! The Jerry & Jerry Show airs live Tuesday from 10:15 am – 11:15 pm on The I Love CVille Network. Watch and listen to The Jerry & Jerry Show on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, iTunes, Apple Podcast, YouTube, Spotify, Fountain, Amazon Music, Audible and iLoveCVille.com.

Good Tuesday morning, guys. My name is Jerry Miller, and thank you kindly for watching the Jerry and Jerry Show. It's great to be with you on a glorious, gorgeous, and crisp Tuesday morning, less than two miles from Scott Stadium, less than two miles from where the Richmond Spiders will visit a football stadium that is looking for victories and a start to the season that is something that they can build upon. Virginia football hosts the Richmond Spiders, ladies and gentlemen, in less than two weeks here in Charlottesville, Virginia, and we have quite a bit to cover. That's a six o'clock kickoff on the 31st of August on the ACC Network.

We'll ask the question, who's going to be the starting quarterback? We'll ask the question, how improved is the offensive line? We'll ask the question, how do players on this roster play with edge and a little bit of anger to get Tony Elliott what he needs, some victories and a sniff, sniff, sniff of a bull berth. We'll talk Joe Harris retiring from the National Basketball Association. We'll talk Virginia's brass restricting access to the Hill. And how about the Crimson Tide of Alabama paying a general manager $825,000 per year?

You heard me correctly. The GM position has now infiltrated college football. Judah Wittkower, executive producer and director of the program. He's behind the camera. If you can go to the studio camera and, Judah, wave your hands in the air like you just don't care to your fans right there. He's the MVP. He's the MVP. If he's the MVP, Hootie Ratcliffe is our

Hall of Famer. In fact, he is a Hall of Famer, the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer. My friend, a little crisp in the air this Tuesday morning. It was. It felt like football season. I know Tony Elliott is hoping that there's a few more hot days because he told us the other day he knows September is going to be hot at times, so he'd like to have a few more hot days for practice to get his team acclimated to that. They didn't get a lot of really hot days in training camp, I don't think. Maybe a few, but it's been a little cooler in August than usual. Absolutely has. It's been cooler in August, but it's been sizzling hot under center with this quarterback position.

Two guys that could start for a lot of programs. You got fantastic coverage on JerryRackliff.com on a QB battle that is raging on, as you put it. Well, we've been keeping close tabs on that because it's, you know, the quarterback position has become

so important. I mean, it always has been, but even more so today than ever before. If you don't have a really good quarterback, it's almost like you don't have a chance. And Virginia has, I think, two pretty good quarterbacks. And, you know, we wondered about how the competition was going to be before training camp started. And Tony Elliott told us it would be an open competition, and it has been. And those guys have been getting equal reps with the first and second team offenses throughout camp. And that continues through the end of this week

where they're finishing up their evaluations of Anthony Calandria and Tony Musket for the job. I asked him yesterday, I said, you know, I probably get asked this 30 times a week, when are you going to name your starting quarterback? I think I asked you two or three times a week myself. Probably. And, you know, he said, well, he wants to name a starter in time to give whoever it's going to be a week of preparation as starter for Richmond. So I suspect that he'll probably name a starter.

We probably won't know it, but he'll probably let them know it and the team know it. I'm guessing Thursday or Friday of this week. And he'll probably announce it to the rest of the world on Tuesday at his game week press conference. Viewers and listeners, if you have questions for the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer, anything ACC related, anything UVA related, put it on any social media you're watching upon and I will relay those questions live on air. Calandria or Musket, Musket or Calandria, two very different styles of quarterback. Musket's

got to prove to the world that he can stay healthy. Calandket's got to prove to the world that he can stay healthy. Calandria's got to prove to the world that he can take care of the football. Calandria's got runway, a second year. Musket, his final season in college football, and maybe he goes into coaching, but professional football, not in Musket's future. Calandria, a little on the shorter side, but a guy who's capable of making plays in the pocket,

outside the pocket, on the run. He just needs a little time to throw the rock around, break down the competition for us, Hootie. Yeah, well, you know, I think you have a good finger on the whole thing. I'm guessing that they're probably going to go with Musket because he's a proven commodity. He won the starting job last year, kept it throughout the season even though he was injured twice. When he did play, he was usually pretty effective.

Had some good numbers. Had a great game against North Carolina, upsetting then 10th-ranked and undefeated Carolina. Threw, I don't know, threw for a ton of yards in that game and a couple of touchdowns, if not three touchdowns, but he was very good. He played hurt. He showed a lot of grit. Even with a bum shoulder that needed surgery after the season,

he wasn't afraid to run the ball and put his body at risk for the team, and he earned a lot of respect from his teammates. He and Calandria have a really good relationship. They've both built their bodies in the offseason, so maybe they can take a little bit more punishment. They've both added strength and muscle and some weight. Calandria, of course, smashed all the freshman passing records which nobody saw that coming

we saw in the spring game that he could throw the ball but it's hard to really tell from a spring game because you're going up against your own defense somebody that you face every day in practice so to see him do it against other teams last year was very impressive.

Again, we all know that he has that gunslinger mentality, sort of that Brett Favre flair, which got him in trouble at times. Saw that against Maryland? Yeah, he's a playmaker. And, you know, they've charted every play that these guys make in practice. And they analyze game film from practice to see who's making good decisions, who's accurate. Every move these guys make is under a magnifying glass because they want to make sure they get it right.

They don't want to take that flare away from Calandria's game. They just want him to get it under control, manage it better to where the risk-reward doesn't turn out to be that much risk. And the report is that both guys have improved in that area and are making better decisions. So I think it'll be a tough decision. But I don't know.

Who knows? We could end up seeing both guys play in the first game. He didn't rule that out. And, in fact, he's the one who brought it up. And then we asked him about it, and he kind of shied away from it then. But some of that could be on whether the game is close or not. If it's close and one guy is effective, I don't see them making a change. But if it's not a close game, I think both quarterbacks will play.

Who knows, they might play both quarterbacks anyway, just to get both guys some action in the first game. I read on jerryratcliffe.com, taking care of the football at the start of training camp was an issue. Offensive coordinator Des Kitchens even highlighted this to the media. Good Lord, he said, there was picks and turnovers

all over the place. But then he said as camp progressed, the fellows took care of the football a little bit more. I will say this. If Musket is turnover prone, that really narrows the competition because Calandria does have more playmaking ability. Against a team like Richmond, just one man's opinion,

talk show host's opinion, to get conversation going, you're a heavy favorite. You should win fairly big. Why not play both, give both of them live action, and see if you can have more data points to pull from as you head into the meat of the schedule? I think that would be the case if that scenario does come about. And Virginia should win that game.

There's no question about it in my mind. They've handled all the FCS teams that they've played for the most part and it shouldn't you know i'm not throwing shade on richmond but virginia i think virginia should be pretty decent and and it shouldn't be a real close game. Although, opening games, anything can happen because, you know, teams are, it's the first game, it's a little rust, little jitters,

et cetera. A lot, we see a lot of upsets the first couple of weeks of the season because some teams just aren't ready to play. But,

I don't think that'll be the case. But, if it's not a close game, they should play both quarterbacks and give them both some time in live game action against another opponent. And I believe that'll happen. I agree with you. Richmond Spiders, guys, 31st August, 6 p.m., ACC Network, Scott Stadium.

Other storylines and trends you want to follow in this game. Clearly offensive line under the microscope. Folks, don't talk offensive line unless the offensive line is bad. When the offensive line is not in the news cycle, the offensive line is performing well. It's almost like government. What do we want from our local government? Boring government and in the background, government that we can expect to do consistent policy.

Same thing with the offensive line. Yeah, no question about it. And they're being very careful with any guys that are injured. Mikael Boley, the big left offensive tackle, showed up at practice yesterday. He wasn't wearing a boot for the first time in a couple weeks. I think they'll bring him along slowly and gingerly. And Brian Stevens is, I think, back. He's been a little banged up too.

And they just want to make sure they can get those guys healthy for the season. They know what they can do, so they don't have to prove anything it's just a matter of trying to get that offensive line healthy and then one piece for the season opener and that's what you want you want a healthy offensive line they've been building some depth because some of those guys have missed time. And it's a good thing. You don't rotate offensive linemen nearly as much as you do defensive linemen. But it's good to have some experienced depth behind them in case somebody gets banged up in a game and has to come out.

This offensive line is going to have to open some holes from the running game. If it's able to do that, the running game will take pressure off the quarterback play. I think Tony Elliott is a defensive guy, and he wants to control time of possession with the running game and win the game defensively and by running the rock here. What do you see with the rushing attack? What do you see with the rushing attack? What do you see with the tailbacks setting the stage early and really flexing their muscles against the Spiders? Well, we keep asking about the running game,

and all the coaches seem to be very positive about the strides they've made during the spring and the summer workouts, conditioning workouts, and here in training camp. I'm anxious to see Kobe Pace. And, you know, we've heard that he's running the ball well. We haven't seen true Kobe Pace yet. No, we really haven't. We've seen flashes.

Yeah. And, you know, Keith Gaithers, their offensive, their, excuse me, their running back coach, he said he thought Kobe Pace was as good as any running back in the ACC. I praise. He talked about some of the success he had when he was the starting running back at Clemson. He had some pretty good games down there before he got injured. Again, I agree with you. We haven't seen the true Kobe pace yet. I'm anxious to see that guy.

And they don't have the deepest running back room in the world in terms of experience. Xavier Brown has been banged up a lot in the program, but he's apparently back now and somewhat healthy. Jack Greasy, which I'm writing something about later today, has been impressive in training camp. He had a 34-yard touchdown run in the scrimmage Saturday, and he's getting a lot of the tough yards. Of course, he comes from great football heritage.

I was going to say that. It's going to be interesting to see if this offensive line can do its job and if these backs can help them control the game because if your offensive line and your running game does its job, your offense can do pretty much anything it wants to. Renee Pettifer watching the program. She says she loves our shirts. Thank you, Renee.

Thanks, Renee. Watching the program. She wants us to talk Kyle Guy basketball and March Madness. We'll certainly talk basketball on the Jerry and Jerry Show. In particular, the Joe Harris retirement from the association goes down as one of the top field goal, three-point field goal shooting percentage marks in NBA history. Yeah.

The marksman Joe Harris. First, we've got to talk some football. Other comments coming in, put them in the feed. We'll relay them live on air. Tight end play is something we haven't covered much here an escape valve for quarterbacks that may behind maybe behind shaky offensive lines time will tell talk to us about the tight ends well they they have they're deeper there than they have been in a couple years uh it was good that they got sackackett Wood back for an extra season. I talked to him the other day.

I'll be doing something on him. Lynchberger, he had decided last February he wanted to come back and give it another shot and got an exemption from the NCAA. And he just gives them some more firepower at that position. They've got three or four guys there now, at least. Dakota Twitty, who used to be a wide receiver, has moved over to tight end. Hootie's on point, man. You can tell he's been at training camp.

Oh, yeah. And, you know, they have a transfer that came in as well. I think the fact, you know, they're deep enough now there that they can play two or even three tight ends at the same time if they want to, which gives your offense a little more flexibility in what it can do. do and uh you know talking to tony elliott a couple weeks ago about having effective tight ends in his offense what it does and he said well if we have that guy who can line up on either side of the line and both uh receive and block and he likes that pro-style format. Yes, he does. I mean, the former... And Des Kitchens does too. Yeah.

I mean, he ran a pro-style offense at Clemson. We've wondered aloud, is the pro-style offense the best setup for a Virginia football team that's not the deepest on every position? But if you can get a two tight end look, you're looking like a pro football team in a lot of ways with your lineup.

Yeah. And even if you can... Even if you got and even if you're just playing one tight end and he can play a lineup on either side and he can block and receive, you don't have to change things as much. It gives you a little more flexibility in what you're doing, and that helps the receivers and everybody else so um i think the tight end is going to be a position of strength for the first time in a couple years position of strength for the first time since the bronco era yeah yeah uh bronco brought in a couple of decent transfer

tight ends and one of which is in the NFL today. It used to be tight end U here. It did. For quite a while, there was a lot of good tight ends, led by, of course, Mr. Miller. Mr. Heath Miller, now the football coach at St. Ann's Belfield. Big money. Interesting storyline, maybe some fodder for the media news cycle.

Patrick Estes, one-time tight end at UVA football, more of a blocking tight end, played professional football in the National Football League, most notably with the San Francisco 49ers. You're a Niners fan, aren't you? I am indeed. As he converted from tight end to offensive line, Patrick Estes ran for sheriff here locally, did not win. Now the athletics director at the Covenant School where Jonas Sanker played.

Oh, cool. I didn't know that. He's the AD at the Covenant School, and Heath Miller is the football coach at St. Ann's Belfield Academy. Two tight ends who I believe, if memory serves correct, played at the same time at UVA. I think so. Yeah, right down the street from each other.

That's amazing. It is amazing. Small world. Charlottesville gets its hooks in you as it did with you and me. That's true. And keeps us around here. Yep. This football team, we've talked offense. I've mentioned Sanker, mentioned the Covenant School.

Seven-on-seven kid from high school. Now looking like one of the best defensive players in the conference. Where do you want to go with Sanker? I mean, he's just been an amazing story. Like you said, seven-on-seven football, you don't see a lot of that in the state of Virginia. And he clearly was a standout at Covenant School. And, you know, I would imagine it took a lot for him to get really noticed by a Division I school,

even one in your own hometown, because, you know, I would imagine 7-on-7 doesn't get a whole lot of attention from college scouts, but he was able to overcome that. Can you imagine him playing 7-on-seven football? No, I can't. I really can't. I'm going to hear a man among boys. Yeah.

And he's been outstanding. He's one of the highest guys in the country on the draft board at that position. So what an amazing story that would be, seven-on-seven. I mean, I know it's big out in Texas and some other places, but not really that big a thing in the state of Virginia. So what a story that would be, going from that to playing in the NFL. Viewers and listeners, let us know your thoughts. Put them in the feed. We've got comments coming in here. This is one that's

come up on a previous show. You guys have said on previous shows, if you have two quarterbacks, you don't have one quarterback. Now we're talking about two quarterbacks playing against Richmond. Please offer some insight here. Some schools have made that work over time and generally most of the time it i don't think it's a good thing and i don't know if he's talking about rotating quarterbacks or not i've seen some people try to do that and i don't think that ever works but uh you will see some schools, even successful football schools,

may use two quarterbacks in the same game just to get the other guys some experience, live action in case they do need him, or in case the other guy stalls out and can't move the team. So I don't think we'll see a situation where they'll be rotating series or anything like that, but I think if the opportunity arises, I think both quarterbacks will see some action in that game. Certainly, if it's a game that they're winning, I think it's probably not a bad

idea because you want everybody ready for one of the biggest games of the season the following week on the road at Wake Forest where you're going to have to put up some points most likely to win because Wake Forest... They score. Even though they may be a little down this year. I'm not hearing a lot of great things out of Winston-Salem, but they've been one of the highest scoring teams in the ACC the last three, four, five years. And if it gets into a track meet down there for some reason,

Virginia's going to have to have somebody that can move the chains. One of the viewers and listeners that watches the Jerry and Jerry show, Derek Jones, sends us e-mails from time to time about our shows. He highlighted on yesterday's show he had no idea that last week's show, excuse me, that Sean Moore committed initially to Virginia Tech football. He wanted us to talk a little bit about that. If you haven't seen the Sean Moore interview that Hootie set up on the Jerry and Jerry show, it's on jerryracliff.com.

Go to his website. Watch the Sean Moore interview. What did you make of that? Sean Moore committed to Virginia Tech. Yeah, we're still getting tons of hits on that show on the website. So if you haven't seen it and you're a Virginia fan. It's damn good. Particularly from that era, you'll you'll enjoy it i i was uh i think i i had heard him tell that story once

before then again i've known him since 1980 you've known him for a while five yeah uh so um but yeah once if you look back on it it's probably not that surprising that he did that because he grew up in Martinsville, which isn't that far from Blacksburg. His family, I think he said routinely, went to Virginia Tech to watch football games. Oh, he said he was at Virginia Tech every Saturday. Yeah, pretty much every week growing up. He had a cousin that played there? Yeah.

And, you know, Bill Dooley had some pretty good success at Virginia Tech when he was there. I've covered some of that myself. And, you know, I could see at that time why that would be a lure to him. And Bill Dooley and Tom Fletcher, who Sean pointed out, I know Tom Fletcher or knew Tom Fletcher very well. He and I have known each other since I've been in the business. He's followed my career and I followed his. And he was a really good guy. I could see how those two would be effective recruiters to a young kid like Sean at that time.

So the real story there was how Danny Wilmer and some of those other guys convinced him to decommit, which probably wasn't as big a thing back then. It was kind of a silent commit at that time. But it would be a much bigger deal today, obviously, with social media and everything and all the emphasis put on recruiting. Back in those days, recruiting news wasn't, people were hungry for it, but they couldn't get it. When I first came to Charlottesville, I made that a priority,

and our sports section was football and basketball recruiting, and it helped grow our readership tremendously. You sent me, I work for this fine man at the Daily Progress, you sent me down to Phoebus. I sat on a couch with no springs that had a hole in one of the cushions in an office the size of my coat closet sitting across from Bill D. Bill D. To get 15 minutes with Antoine Womack, the punishing tailback,

that team with Thomas Jones for a two-headed monster backfield. Antoine Womack was a tough cookie. Yes, he was. He was a tough cookie. He was a big dude. He was a big dude. I remember Antoine Womack driving around grounds because I was a student at the time in a very nice Cadillac around grounds. You didn't mess with Antoine Womack, not on the corner,

not around classrooms, not on the football field. I walked down the stairs one time of the Biltmore, Antoine Womack was coming up the stairs I was coming down. It was a very narrow hallway, mistakenly rubbed shoulders with Antoine Womack, gave a look that would kill and I just scurried down the stairs like a school girl or a scared rat running down the stairs right there Antoine Womack um but it it's to the point that you made with the recruiting um at that time it was uh people were starving for it and outside of the progress and maybe some runoff times with Doug Dowdy no one was really doing it. No, nobody.

And, you know, that reminded me of, you know, that was the reason that the one time, I think, that George Wilson and Joe Paterno had friction in their friendship because, you know, George had been on the same assistant coaching staff at Penn State. And then when Joe was elevated to head coach, he made George his backfield coach. And they became godfathers of each other's children, incredibly tight families, great friends, until the Antoine Womack recruitment came up. And I think Womack actually committed to Penn State. He did.

Danny Wilmer talked him out of it. That's right. And Paterno and whoever was, I can't remember the guy's name, but Paterno's assistant who recruited that area for Penn State accused Danny Wilmer in Virginia of cheating, turned him into the NCAA and said that Virginia bought him a car. And Danny told me that the guy was full of baloney and that Womack's preacher had gotten him a car, but it wasn't a Cadillac. Okay, because he was driving around in a navy blue Cadillac.

Now, where the Cadillac came from, I don't know. But anyways, that caused a lot of friction between George Welsh and Joe Paterno, and they finally made up and became friends again. But that was an interesting satellite during that recruitment. Womack's career, again, flashes of brilliance, but I don't think perhaps lived up to the recruiting billing, had a year where he was not with the football program, then returned to the football program after a year of hiatus.

I think he got hurt in his very first game at Wisconsin. I was up there for that game in the Algrove area. Then had a little discipline situation. Yeah. Then returned and was not, you know. He was not the next great UVA NFL running back. Right. Although he did play, I think.

He did play well. In the NFL. He did play in the NFL as well. All right, we'll get to this football team here. Special teams, Hootie. It's got to be better than last year. Yeah, I think it will be. And they've rightly put a lot more emphasis on it in the offseason.

I think I mentioned this a few weeks ago, but I'm not sure. But anyways, Keith Gaither, who is also the special teams coordinator, is getting more help this year. Tony Elliott made it a thing for all the coaching staff pretty much to get involved in special teams. So every special team is getting tons of attention and you know some of the analysts and all those people who are now allowed i think to coach on the field are giving input now too so there's those teams are getting heavily coached and the players are making a point of pride to be on special teams. And Keith Gaither said, frankly, that during the offseason when Virginia's coaching staff visited various NFL staffs to gain knowledge, etc., that a whole new world of special teams knowledge was opened up to him.

He had never been a special teams coordinator before or even coach, I don't think, until he came here. And so I guess he was kind of trying to drink out of a fire hose to absorb all that knowledge because that's a lot of responsibility. You kick off team, kick off return team, punt team, extra point team, field goal team, et cetera. Especially for a team looking for an identity, especially for a team with such slim margin of error.

Yeah, and so I think he said he learned some things from NFL special teams coaches that he didn't even know existed. So I think it was a great education for him, and it should help in a lot of ways. And I know they put a lot of emphasis on it. And, you know, Tony mentioned the other day, he said, you know, we had two punts blocked last year,

and I think they both led to touchdowns for the opponents and one-score ballgames that were deciding factors. And they had some kickoff returns on them that were big plays and momentum changers too. So it's been a huge point of emphasis in training camp. Football, guys, less than two weeks away. We talked quarterbacks. We talked the offensive line.

We talked the tailbacks. We talked the tight ends. We talked defense. We talked special teams. We've got to talk wide receiver. A significant position of strength, the wide receiving core. It really is. And Des Kitchens told us that there's probably seven or eight guys,

receivers that he trusts to go in and play. And that's a big difference over last year when they had a lot of passing yards. But, you know, most of it was distributed and involved to two people, Malachi Fields and Malik Washington. This year, I think it's going to be hard to find enough balls to go around all those guys, which is a great thing because, as we mentioned before, they kept waiting on that third receiver to emerge last year and take a little pressure off Washington and Fields.

The guy never really emerged, and the tight ends really were ineffective. I think the tight ends have made a total of 12 or 19 catches last year. That's nothing. No. That will be significantly changed this season. And, you know, you even have freshman Cam Courtney, who proved himself in the spring and is one of those seven or eight guys that's definitely going to see action early on. That guy has unlimited potential, I think.

So there's tons of people, tons of receivers that they're going to be able to go to, and that's a good thing for Muscat and Calandria. This team, guys, has got to start strong. You've highlighted this on jerryracliff.com and on the Jerry and Jerry Show. You make hay early in the schedule. Do you want to highlight other teams that you're going to be following in conference play, other teams to look out for,

other teams on the schedule that are worth attention or make you nervous? I mean, there's a bunch on the back end. Oh, the entire back end is just insane. I mean, we've all said that the first six games are winnable. Richmond, Wake Forest, Maryland, Coastal Carolina, Boston College, and Louisville. winnable um richmond wake forest maryland coastal carolina boston college and louisville uh after that the back end is you you go to clemson i mean that speaks for itself clemson will be 35 point favorites at least carolina comes here that that you know carolina's breaking in a new quarterback and carolina doesn't

historically play well here they've only won once or twice here and since 1986 right so uh you know virginia has a lot of confidence against them then you go to pit which we're not quite sure how good pit's going to be but it is a pit it's a road game. Virginia hasn't played well. It used to be Hines Field. I think they've changed the name of it now to something else. You go to Notre Dame, I mean, not many people win in South Bend, and Notre Dame's supposed to be pretty good this year. Then SMU comes to town. SMU's got something to play for. The Ponies.

I think the Ponies are going to be one of the surprises of the ACC. I would agree. It's going to be interesting to see how they negotiate a new conference themselves, playing in a different environment against teams they don't know anything about. And then you go to Blacksburg, and we all know the history there. They haven't won there since 1998. So, you know, they've got to do some damage early on, and they should, because you've got Richmond, you've got Wake Forest,

who's picked in the lower echelon of the ACC. I don't think they're as loaded on offenses as they have been. Maryland isn't picked very high in the Big Ten. Then you go to Coastal Carolina, and even though they've been dangerous, I think if Virginia takes care of business, I think they should be able to survive that. Then you've got back-to-back home games against Boston College and Louisville, teams that Virginia should have beaten or could have beaten last year on the road,

and you've got them both here. BC has a new coach in Bill O'Brien, the former NFL coach, and Louisville has had a lot of transition in personnel. They lost a lot of people, but they brought in a lot of new people through the transfer portal. So who knows what they're going to be like. But, you know, you win four of those six at least least you set yourself up for at least a chance to do something and build a little momentum toward the latter half of your schedule. Football, guys, this team early in the season is going to be the key

for the Virginia football team. We see the comments coming in here. Can Chris Tyree be the next Malik Washington? That's tough. I don't even want to put the pressure on him. How do we put the pressure on? I mean, can Chris Tyree, is Chris Tyree a better athlete than Malik Washington? Perhaps.

Is he faster than Malik Washington? Yes. Yes, he is. But Malik Washington had one of the best pass-catching years in college football history. He truly did. With all the attention on him. Yeah, it still amazes me to look back and try to figure out how he did that. He was great at getting it.

He was always open. He was great at running routes and getting it open. He was great at running routes and getting open and he was so great in yards after the catch because as we pointed out many times, even though he was a small guy, he was only 5'9", he ran like a running back. Well, Chris Tyree was a running back until he made the transition to wide receiver at Notre Dame last year. He didn't put up that kind of numbers.

Of course, he didn't have to at Notre Dame. And he may not put up those kind of numbers. That was such a rare season that Malik Washington had. We can make a legitimate argument that Chris Tyree not putting up those kind of numbers is best for Virginia football. Yeah, because that means other guys are involved. And that's putting more pressure on the defense. And that's what Tony Elliott wants to do.

It's great to have Tyree, who's a threat to take it to the house every time he lays his hands on the ball. And again, once he catches it, he knows what to do with it with his running back background. He's the kind of guy that can line up anywhere on the field, and I wouldn't be surprised if they put him in the backfield and let him have some touches. Certainly, there's some jet sweep possibilities out of

that as well. But he's going to be a dangerous weapon for Virginia. I don't expect him to have 101 catches or whatever it was that Malik had, which was just mind-blowing. But as you said, I think that's a good thing for Virginia. You don't want him to attract all the attention. You can use him as a decoy at NAMS and help get the other guys involved. Do you expect some kind of slash or athlete role for Tyree?

Returning punts, returning kicks? I think he'll definitely return kickoffs. Go routes, backfield. Yeah, I think so. A guy like that, I think you'd be crazy not to give him as many touches as possible. Like I said, you may not want him to have that many catches, so you probably want him to touch the ball in other ways as getting runs in or returning kickoffs. I think he'll definitely return kickoffs.

He's fearless. And just talking to Malcolm Green the other day, he said, if you're on the opposing team's kickoff team, you're kicking it to a guy who has no fear. And you've probably never run into somebody that has his speed and his experience at returning kickoffs and, again, has no fear. And so he's dangerous. If he gets by that first guy, you're in jeopardy if you're on the kickoff team. This football team, guys, has got talent on the roster. I've made the comment. Who's made the comment?

Could go 4-1. You can go 5-0 to start. Could. Could. Could is the key word. I've gotten some emails from the viewers and listeners saying they're shocked that we're saying 4-1, 5-0. We're saying could. Yeah, I mean, I'm not predicting that's going to happen.

But it's possible. Certainly a possibility. Yeah. Possibility. I think, again, I think that's, and it's, people say, well, it's not fair to say this, that the biggest game of the season could be the second game of the season. I think the biggest game of the season is the second game. But it is. Yeah.

That's a game you almost have to win if you want to be successful. Yeah, I think I concur 100% with what you said. We want to talk Alabama. The news is on ESPN and the national outlets that it has a general manager position

that is garnering $825,000 a year in pay. The Alabama Crimson Tide, of course, the creme de la creme. Courtney Morgan, a new precedent setting with a contract with the Crimson Tide. He was recruited by South Carolina. He's going to earn $825,000 annually, a three-year contract. This guy comes to Alabama in a package deal with the head football

coach from Washington, the 2024 national runner-up. Kalen DeBoer comes from Washington, brings his GM. The GM's role at Alabama is to help facilitate recruiting, optimize the program, and decision making. Obviously, Virginia fans are wondering, does UVA have a general manager? Does UVA need a general manager? Is this the future of college football, this general manager position? That's a good question, and I think it's something that college football is feeling out. There are several programs around the country that have hired gms and a couple that have had them for a couple years i'm kind of surprised that the salary

is not higher than that really because some coordinators make double or even triple that for that kind of responsibility you know i don't know how i know how that was defined i don't know how clearly defined or how much power a gm has in college football as opposed to the nfl a general manager and nfl has tremendous power i don't i don't think that some of these GMs in the college game have that much clout. I think the head coach is still the head coach and runs the program. These guys are almost there to facilitate Optimizing the program. Yeah, to optimize the program and help where help is needed.

It's going to be interesting to see how this develops over time. I think a lot of people are in the wait and see mode to see if these things are effective or not. It may end up causing more problems than it does cures to some programs. And it could be some animosity between the head coach and the gm uh certainly there is in the nfl this this one a package deal from washington um i'm sure it came with deborah's blessing yeah deborah's blessing right you ever see a general manager position at with uva football i don't know that's a good question i I don't see it to that degree to where they're described as a GM and helping have that much power in the near future,

unless something goes amiss in the future or even near future. But I don't know. It's going to be interesting to see how this goes. I think there might be a team or two in the ACC that have general managers. I'm not sure. But it seems like I've read somewhere that somebody has one, if not a couple of teams. I think everybody's in the wait-and-see mode, but I don't know.

It's a good question as to whether Virginia would consider doing that or not or if they'll have their hand forced if a coach isn't being as effective as the AD would want them to be. That's how I see it happening, is having their hands forced to have a general manager, and then this position general manager creates some insulation for the athletics director. Should the football team struggle,

the general manager has to do the hiring and firing of the head coach, and if things don't go well, there's insulation for the AD with the general manager being the fall guy or the fall gal. That's like we see with the National Football League, for example. I'm curious to see how it plays out, whether this new GM role not only does the recruiting, but the transfer portal and name, image, and likeness as that becomes such a key part of college football. Time will tell. One thing that we're certainly following is this football team and some new policy that comes out of the athletics director's office.

Single game ticket holders restricted access to the hill. If you have a ticket for one football game, you cannot go on the Hill anymore at Scott Stadium. That's interesting. I think you said that the reason behind that was Virginia Tech fans flooded the field last year. Yeah. That's an interesting policy. I assume that the hill is usually full of UVA students and high school kids and even elementary school kids, but you don't see that many adults usually on the hill, I don't think. It'll be interesting to see how that works. If you're an adult, I don't know why you'd want to be on the hill in the first place.

It's a pretty wild, rowdy scene down here at times. It's probably a good policy because I don't think there's going to be any opponents rushing the field at Virginia this year because usually most schools don't bring that many fans in the first place. So I don't know if it was necessary this year or not, but I guess it's policy that they'll keep for the future. So when I've been attending football games at Scott Stadium all my life, growing up that's where my brother and I chose to watch much of the games. Certainly as students, we watch many of the games there with fraternity brothers and sorority sisters. Fans up at arms about this.

One way to keep access to the Hill, win football games. Don't let Virginia Tech drop you by 38 points last game of the season and watch a third of Scott Stadium rush the field through the hill and stomp on the 50-yard line. Win football games. That's got to at some point become a rivalry again. You can't let your in-state opponent dominate you like that, the way Virginia Tech has in this series. You just can't do that.

You just can't. Very few places does that happen. And Virginia's got to make this, they've got to show people that they can win in this series again. Before we get to Joe Harris and the Kyle Guy topics that people want us to get to, any other golden nuggets ACC-wise that you want to highlight? We talked the ponies of SMU being a team to watch. We know Virginia Tech is pretty loaded.

They return a lot of talent. Florida State and Clemson looks like the top of the conference, the class of the league. Anything else you want to dot or cross? A lot of people are really high on Miami because of their quarterback, but I'm still not totally sold that the Hurricanes are going to be as good as how many every year they start out with these high expectations and they never live up to

them it'll be interesting to see if how that goes i'm sure there's a lot of pressure on that program because now that florida state has turned its fortunes around people in miami are saying why why aren't we doing this if florida state can do it, why can't we do it? We used to be better than Florida State. So I think there's a lot of focus on what's going on, on Cristobal down there, whether he can get the job done. Miami, always talent, but never the results and consistency that Hurricane fans would like.

I think there'll be some pressure on Mack Brown this year too. I think there's tremendous pressure on Mack Brown. I think there was a handful of coaches that have some warm seats right now. I think there was some quiet action down there last year and

he was able to survive. People pointing to him being out of touch with today's football. People pointing to age. People pointing to bowl berths and postseason results, despite having a boatload of professional talent on the roster. Yeah, there's been high expectations down there. I don't know if it was totally warranted or not.

I mean, his last two starting quarterbacks are drafted high in the NFL. Yeah, no question about it. He's had some good receivers and some great running backs. The defense has not been very good. Right. Throughout his second return to Chapel Hill, the offensive line has struggled, and that's been a big part of why the offense hasn't been quite as effective. Second return to Chapel Hill, the offensive line has struggled,

and that's been a big part of why the offense hasn't been quite as effective. But I think there's probably a lot of pressure on him this year to produce, and he's going to have to do it without the kind of quarterback he's been used to. We'll close the Jerry and Jerry show with basketball. Joe Harris, 10-year career, retires from the NBA. Yeah, kind of saw that maybe coming because his playing time and everything was really diminished this past year out of Detroit. I don't know.

He's had some problems, I think, with his ankle or something the last couple of two or three years. I guess at some point he kind of wear down a little bit. He's been in the league for 10 years, which means he's going to get a nice NBA pension. But while he was in the league, especially with the Nets, he was a tremendous three-point shooter. Retires as one of the top four or five three-point accuracy shooters in NBA history.

In history, folks. Which is incredible if you stop and think about it and you look at some of the other people on that list. And we all saw that when he won the three-point shooting contest, beat Steph Curry. I mean, that speaks for itself. What was that, 2019 or 20 when he did that? And was highly effective for the Brooklyn Nets for several seasons there.

You know, somebody asked me about this in a radio show I was on somewhere in the state yesterday, if he might consider coming back and being on Virginia's coaching staff. I don't know. You know, his dad was a coach, a successful high school coach out in Washington. This was a key recruit for Tony Bennett when he transitioned from Washington to UVA. Huge. Bringing Joe Harris with him to Charlottesville showed Harris's commitment to Coach Bennett, his belief in Coach Bennett. And in a lot of ways ways Joe Harris was a springboard to build on for coach Bennett in in a program that's the was the doormat the the doormat of the conference in a lot of ways

what do you have a two-time all ACC performer yeah Joe Harrison ACC tournament MVP yeah regular season champion tournament champion didn't he push him to was it the elite eight where they lost to Michigan State I believe Joe Harrisison square garden yeah um this was as important a recruit for coach bennett as as any he's brought to charlottesville no question i mean he he had to get things turned around and he needed somebody he could rely on to do it and i mean joe harris was was the perfect guy to come along. He was an all-American kind of kid, all-American good looks. Female population at UVA swooned over him for four years. You're talking about the top prep player in Washington at the time.

Yeah, could shoot the eyes out of it. I mean, Tony recruited seven guys in that class and by the next year, four or five of them were gone. I think Joe and Akil Mitchell maybe were the only two that hung around. And Akil Mitchell, defensive player of the year if memory serves. Yeah, he sure was. And the conference. Akil, I spent the day with Akil and his family down in Charlotte. And, you know, the summer before he came here,

we were doing a special series on all those guys. We called them the six shooters, although they ended up adding a seventh. But Akil at that time thought he was going to be a high scoring power forward or even a stretch forward. But his offense never really suited the college game. So he did something really intelligent. He focused on becoming a guy who could rebound and play defense and protect the rim. It ended up giving him a chance to play overseas for quite a while and

make a career out of basketball. Joe Harris was the right guy at the right time, kind of like Sean Moore was the right guy at the right time for George Welsh in helping Virginia advance the program. They needed a guy like him. One thing I liked about Joe Harris, who to this day is as good a guy as you'll ever run into. He's just a down-to-earth, really good guy. He took it upon himself to learn the history

of Virginia basketball. He wasn't just a guy coming in here to play and get his diploma and move on. He really cared about Virginia basketball, and you could talk to him about Virginia's history, and he would reference to it himself. He knew about who all the great players were and the great coaches and what Virginia had done in its past. It meant something to him, and I think it still does. Well said. Joe Harris, 10 years in the NBA, retired as one of the most accurate three-point

shooters in league history. He could light it up. 36 points against Duke that one year. I remember that. Joey Buckets. I remember that. Joey Buckets. I remember Joey Buckets. That's right, the moniker. I'm very curious, as Hootie pointed out, the future of Joe Harris, and does it include coaching at all? We'll love to see a roster with Tony Bennett of former star players. They're starting to load up. They really are.

I mean, Isaiah Wilkins, was he a defensive player of the year? Yep. He's the defensive player of the year? Yeah. He's the defensive player of the year. Kyle Guy. Kyle Guy was the MVP of the Final Four. MVP of the Final Four, All-American. All-American. Yeah.

All-ACC. Yeah, All-ACC. So time will tell. Follow that. And, of course, we've got Jay Willie. Jay Willie, who was the glue man. The glue guy. Yeah. Of a deep, turny run.

Final Eight. Yeah. Could have been, turny run. Final eight? Yeah. Could have been close to final four. Very close. Yeah, very close. Hootie Ratcliffe, the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer. What do you have in the hopper at jerryratcliffe.com? Tons of football.

I know. You're loaded right now, aren't you? I've got so many player interviews. I could write two a day for the next two weeks and still not get them all done. So there will be a lot of player features scattered out over the next two weeks. Hope to catch up with Laura Coughlin, Virginia's 31-year-old sudden superstar on the LPGA Tour. She's won two of her last three events. This is the Scottish Open? She's won the

Women's Scottish Open. She has six top ten finishes on the LPGA Tour this year. She's really become a great putter. Virginia golf is... She comes back to Charlottesville and works with First Tee Kids every year. Right. She has a

real affinity for Charlottesville. Her husband, John Pond, played football at Virginia. We'll be doing that. We'll be keeping our eye on the recruiting, basketball recruiting. Got another guy yesterday listed Virginia among his final nine. He's going to visit here September 28th. J.J. Mandaquit, point guard, one of the top six point guards in the country. Honolulu.

Honolulu kid playing in Utah. So we'll be looking at it all, keeping track of the fall sports, but a heavy emphasis on football. I love it. JerryRackliff.com. I'll say love it. JerryRackliff.com. I'll say it again, JerryRackliff.com for anything UVA athletic related. The show is archived wherever you get your podcasting and social media content. Check it out on JerryRackliff.com.

Judah Wittkower, the glue man behind the camera, or J. Willie, Judah Wittkower. My name is Jerry Miller, and this is the Jerry and Jerry Show. Ladies and gentlemen, 11 days from the start of college football here in Charlottesville. So long, everybody. Thank you.