The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - UVA Sports: Summertime Stories To Follow; UVA Football Notebook - News, Notes & Tidbits

Episode Date: June 25, 2024

The Jerry & Jerry Show headlines: UVA Sports: Summertime Stories To Follow UVA Football Notebook – News, Notes & Tidbits Grade The UVA Football Recruiting Class? Transfer Portal Impacts UVA Baseball How Can UVA Baseball Improve For Next Year? UVA Basketball – Things To Follow This Summer Where Will Firepower Come On UVA Hoops? Where Does UVA Stand With NIL? 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 joining us on the Jerry and Jerry Show, a program about Virginia, ACC, and college sports in particular that features a man who needs very little introduction, the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer, Jerry Hootie Ratcliffe. Whether on press row, whether at the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame, a golf course near you, Hootie has become a household name, and I thoroughly enjoy chatting with him every Tuesday morning about topics that are passions of mine, UVA, sports in particular. Before we get into the nittyA sports in particular before we get into

the nitty-gritty before we unleash the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer why don't we highlight our glue guy every team has a glue guy and our team's glue guy is Judah B Whitcower a man that keeps the engine running in the right direction who are some glue and this is a good question for Hootie Judah why don't we go to the studio camera in the two-shot. Some of the best glue guys that you can remember from Virginia sports. Good morning, my friend. There have been a lot of great glue guys out there.

There have been, and one of them is still around from the mid-'90s, and that's our good friend Jason Wilford who was the ultimate glue guy back on the Jeff Jones team that went to the Elite Eight in 95 and was a hair breadth from going to the Final Four. Had they been a little healthier or had they not run out of gas I think they would have made it to the Final Four and who knows what happens when that occurs. And Jason was, I mean, everybody referred to him as the glue guy.

And I think he certainly lived up to that reputation. What constitutes in your Hall of Fame notebook a glue guy? He's just a guy who doesn't have to be flashy. He doesn't have to be a superstar, but he has to be solid. He has to be a leader. He can be a quiet leader, lead by example, but he holds the team together when adversity strikes and knows how to overcome problems. He's a good locker room guy, not just on the court, but overall in the program. And that can apply to any sport, pretty much. Glue guys of today's era that you'd highlight, perhaps from the basketball team.

From this era? Yeah. Wow. Let me think about it a little bit. Who would you call the glue guy from the 2019 National Championship? Hmm. Maybe Mamadi? Kihei?

I guess Kihei was a freshman on that team. Yeah, Kihei was a freshman on that team Kihei was a freshman so it would be hard to expect I think Todd Jerome was one of those guys even though he did have flash to his game and all that but he was a guy that wasn't afraid to get in the other players

faces and tell them what needed to be told good locker room guy good on the room guy, good on the court guy, good leader. Probably natural leader since his dad was a coach and picked up a lot of that from him, I think.

But I would say that he might have been the glue guy of that team. I had to think about it a little bit more, but certainly he was a key member of that basketball team. One of our favorite viewers and listeners, Renee Pettiford, says Hootie is right. Ty Jerome was the glue guy on that 2018. She follows Virginia basketball like a hawk. She follows it

extremely closely. If you're looking at today's roster, it's a completely reimagined roster. Yeah, it really is. Who's the glue guy on this basketball team? And we will ask the question, where's the firepower going to come from? We'll talk football. We'll talk the storylines to follow in the summertime. And yes, we'll even talk name, image, and likeness. Who's the glue guy in the roster for basketball today? I would probably say Isaac McNeely. He's solid in every aspect of what you would expect from a player in today's game. Not only is he a good performer, but I think he's a leader. I think he can tell people things that not everybody can say to another player. I think he can do it either forcefully or gently,

depending on how it needs to be expressed. And I think he's just a guy who fights, never gives up, and sets good examples and good on and off the court. Just a solid kid overall. Questions are coming in. Do you think this basketball team will be preseason ranked in the AP poll? And the follow-up to that is, is this a contender for a 2024-2025 ACC title? Well, it's hard to put those kind of expectations on a team that

is completely brand new. Completely brand new. That's a good expression. I don't know if they will be ranked in the top 25 preseason. They probably should be. Last year, I'm not sure

that they should have been when they were. That team hadn't really proved anything and really never lived up to all of its expectations because the offense was so inefficient. But I think this team certainly is worthy of a top 25 recognition. And even though this team hasn't proven anything either, they do have guys that have played important roles on other Power 5 or Power 4 now conferences

and proven that they can compete at this level of basketball. This basketball team, do you say better in the preseason or the summertime than last year's basketball team? Now, you do have the benefit of hindsight with how this last year's basketball team ended up performing. But on paper, at this point of the year, would you say this team is better? I would. And, you know, we did have high expectations for last year.

Very high. The offense just never really came together. Maybe a couple of times, but it wasn't consistent and it wasn't efficient. And some of the guys, frankly, just didn't have good years, and they came up way short of expectations, not only ours, but probably their own. And you can't have a couple of guys to fall short like that and compete for the way that Virginia's standards are.

Kevin Yancey is watching in Waynesboro. He says, good morning, J-cubed. I like that. Judah Wickhauer is in the mix right there with J-cubed. Kevin Yancey, I may cherry pick that from you, my friend, for future programs. I want to talk about summertime stories to follow. Storylines in the summer. Slower time of year.

It allows professionals like you to catch your breath. This guy grinds once the start of training camp opens for football all the way through now. I mean, let's cut to the chase. It's into June with this baseball team. Going to Omaha, three of the last four years,

the winningest program since O'Connor's taken over here in Charlottesville. Summertime storylines to follow, Hootie. Well, you know, all the new basketball players are here now working out. They've already started practicing, and they are allowed to do some practices together. I'm not sure what the modern NCAA rule is on that, but they are allowed to work out with the coaches to some degree. So Tony Bennett's already getting a close-up look

at how these guys can work together and get an idea of what their skill set is, even though I'm sure he had a pretty good picture of that in his mind to begin with. And the recruiting trails are heating up in all the sports. Football just got three commitments within a two-day span. And basketball, Tony and his staff are out looking at 25 and 26 players. Including Derek Dixon, which I read on jerryrockliff.com. Exactly. They were all over him this past weekend, every game he played for his Gonzaga,

with his Gonzaga teammates. And so they're scouring the countryside looking for talent. And meanwhile, you know, camps will be going on. Football players, some of them I imagine imagine here doing their summer workouts strength and conditioning um everything's kind of uh on pause right now the baseball and other sports some of those sports transfer portals are open uh and uh of course the paris o Paris Olympics coming up with lots of wahoos represented there particularly in swimming what an incredible week for UVA swimming got five women I think which I think it's a quarter of the Olympic team it's amazing

and and the kid from cruiser yeah amazing as well and the you know the women's national olympic swim coach todd de sorbo's uva coach uh emma navarro and daniel collins from uva tennis over on the u.s women's olympic tennis team. So lots of Wahoos going to be strolling around in Paris. Virginia senior Gretchen Walsh will be there. She'll be joined at the Paris Games by her sister, Alex. That's amazing. I mean, think about this. The parents of the Walsh girls, they have two kids in the Olympics representing America. That's mind-boggling. It's absolutely mind-boggling.

UVA teammate Emma Weber will also be there, and former Cavaliers Kate Douglas and Paige Madden in the Paris Olympics. That's July 27th to August 4th. So we're, call it a month away, from watching Wahoos on the national stage, Judy. International. International stage. Yeah, international. Thank you. Yeah, I mean and I expect them

to do great things. I think they're going to bring some gold medals home for sure. I mean, Alex Walsh, Douglas and Madden all won medals in the 2022, or excuse me, the 2020 Tokyo Games. Yeah, I mean, it's just, I mean, who would have ever thought that Virginia's women's swimming program 10 years ago would be at these heights? I mean, it's, they're a dynasty.

And it just carries on past the NCAAs. Now they're going to, they could make world history, really. I mean, Gretchen already broke the world record last week. Who knows she could do it again or break another world record. All kinds of national and UVA

and other records were set by her and some of the other swimmers during the Olympic trials. So it should be fun to watch. Gretchen Walsh set a world record in the 100 butterfly. And I'll tell you what, you got Douglas the swimmer who is, what you win, three events, three different events in the Olympic trials, the team trials. This Paris Olympics will be orange and blue well represented. You talk about tennis, tennis is a sport near and dear to my heart. Two Virginia athletes in the Olympics with tennis as well, Hootie. You've highlighted that, touched on that. Maybe we touch on that a bit more.

Yeah, I mean, it's both. Both of those players are. Have are enjoying great careers right now. I mean, Daniel Collins is coming toward the close of hers, I think. Emma Navarro is just really getting started. They come from diverse backgrounds. I mean, Daniel Collins is not your typical country club girl with going to national clubs to groom her game through her early years.

She grew up in a very modest background and worked hard for every ounce of success she's had. And, man, she's had a great year. I mean, she's won some tournaments. She's been in the finals of some others. Just been really hard to beat. She's fun to watch because

they call her the animal or something like that. Her name still resonates at the board set around the tennis courts. I can imagine. They talk every time I hear Danielle Collins' name comes up and you're talking a 30-year-old tennis player. She started her career at Florida, finished her career at the University of Virginia.

She's got nearly $9 million in prize money on the pro tour of the WTA. When they talk about her, when I hear them talking about her, they talk about how tenacious. That's her brand. Tenacious. That's her brand tenacious that's her brand uh a bulldog will run through you training partners sparring partners teammates she knows one speed and that's aggressive yeah i mean she grew up hungry and it's never stopped uh i'd love to get her on a podcast sometime in the future but uh and i've tried it's it's hard to reach her on a podcast sometime in the future, but I've tried.

It's hard to reach her, it really is. And then Emma Navarro, I mean, she grew up with a very wealthy family in South Carolina, Charleston, I believe. And I think she might have a younger sister who plays, I believe. But anyway, she's only been a pro a couple of years and has had some mild success already. And the fact that she made the Olympic team is very impressive. Her father, Ben Navarro, a billionaire, owns a bank, massively involved in tennis. Mr. Owns a bank. Massively involved in tennis. Mr. Navarro is. He's a hotel year.

He is a tennis champion. He's a tennis aficionado. Navarro, Emma, is, as Hootie said, starting her career 23 years old. This is someone I've seen play not only at the University of Virginia, but at the Borsad Women's Tournament. She is nearly $2 million in prize money, and both Navarro and Collins will represent the University of Virginia in the Paris Olympics.

So impressive. Truly is. I mean, Virginia's had a lot of Olympians over the years in swimming, some in track and field. I don't know that they've ever had any tennis players before, but it's nice to see that expanding. But, yeah, it's been cool watching some of these people. I think rowing, they've had some gold medalists, I believe, in rowing.

And I'll always remember Paul Ehring, the 800-meter guy from Kenya, who I got to know pretty well when he was here and he was uh he was amazing to watch who was the besides Ralph we know Ralph larger than life the most larger than life athlete you've covered to University of Virginia huh I mean Ralph Sampson in Charlottesville was like the Beatles the Backstreet Boys justin timberlake no question um well you know uh sean and herman moore were quite fascinating to watch and cover because they led the nation and as a passing com duo that that year 89 and 90 they were nearly unstoppable. Terry Kirby, Thomas Jones, Chris Slade to some degree on the defensive side of the football. Can you throw Chris Long in that mix?

Chris Long, Jim Dombrowski, even though he was an offensive lineman, he's in the College Football Hall of Fame. Quite a few guys. Aaron Brooks, Don Makowski were pretty dominant for their time. Both went on to become great NFL players. Makowski, what, with the Packers and the Colts? Yeah, he's in the Packers hall of fame. Brooks started with the saints. Yeah.

A dual threat quarterback before maybe dual threat quarterback was the thing. He was probably, he probably was Michael Vick before Michael Vick. He didn't like to run the football. Uh, and he admitted that, but, uh,

had he been more of a runner, I think he would have put up Michael Vick-type numbers in college. But he became a guy that wasn't afraid to run it. But he ended up throwing for an incredible amount of yards with the Saints. Viewers and listeners, let us know your thoughts. We'll relay them live on air. This is a very good one that's come in. First, we'll get to this comment from

Waynesboro. Not sure where he's from, but how about the 16-year-old sprinter qualifying for Paris from America? That's a fantastic story to follow, Mr. Yancey. This is a good one for Hootie Ratcliffe. What's the storyline you're following the closest when it comes to Virginia football? Then William Brown, I got you on deck with your comment, my friend. Well, you know, there's really not much going on in football right now. That won't heat up until early August when training camp starts, but there'll be numerous storylines at that point. I think whether Virginia's defense can return to its form from two years ago, last year was a big disappointment. They had a lot of injuries.

As we know, the program is not to the point where it can afford a lot of injuries because there isn't a lot of depth. But some of the players they have on that side of the ball are outstanding. They have two of the top-rated defensive backs by power, pro football focus, which means they should have one of the better secondaries in the ACC for sure. They've got a lot of experience up front.

They have a couple of budding stars. They have a couple of transfers. Offensively, I think the quarterback race is going to be an interesting dynamic. I think that's the first storyline to follow. How does he manage that? He's got two starters. He has two starters. Is it platoon? Is it one guy?

His job? One guy's the clear-cut backup? I don't think it'll be a platoon situation. No. I think somebody will win the job in training camp and keep it unless they're injured or just not having a very good game.

And he knows he has somebody else who can come in and get the job done. So it'll be interesting to see how that works in training camp as to whether Musket, who owned the job last year, only lost his job because of injury but got it back, then lost it again because of injury. Whether that's still going to be the case or if it's an open competition and the best man wins, which could go to either guy.

It'll be interesting to see how far the youngster has come with a year under his belt of experience and now a second spring and a full summer to work with his receivers. And the offensive line is certainly going to be a big story. They return pretty much everybody, but they still have to prove that they can protect those two quarterbacks and punch holes in the defense, and I think that's going to make or break this team this season,

whether the offensive line can get the job done. 100%. 100%. I think he hit it perfectly. Storyline the fans care about, because it's the position, is who's your quarterback. This quarterback spot is going to drive the team in a lot of ways. You've got a guy that's experienced, that's a game manager,

that likes to be the self-proclaimed point guard of the offense. And then you've got a rising second year, Calandria, that's got a Brett Favre mentality, a gunslinger that does things out of the pocket. He's special. He's magical. But with that comes mistakes, comes risk. A lot of high risk, high reward, but mistakes are part of that. I think with this football team, maybe you see Calandria in the two slot because you know what you have with his counterpart.

Maybe you're looking for low risk as you manage this game. You run the football. Elliott wants to cement the run, establish the run. He's a run-first type of coach. If the offensive line can create holes, maybe you see this team have a smash-mouth, rutting identity. But if the losses start mounting up, I would not be surprised if Elliott starts working

in that position and putting Calandri in the mix to see what kind of upside he can bring. Well, we know that he can move the football, and we know that he can put points on the board, and that's what modern college football is all about. It's almost, it's very challenging to win a game today without scoring 30 points, and sometimes that's not enough, as we've seen time and time again, but certainly Calandria has those capabilities.

He threw for an amazing amount of yardage last year as a rookie. Didn't really know what he was doing, but learned by the seat of his pants. And Musket is old reliable. I mean, Musket's boy, is he 23 now? I mean, he's a grad student. Yeah, he doesn't make mistakes. He doesn't beat himself. He's tough. He's gritty. He's what you want in a quarterback. He's a grad student. Yeah, he doesn't make mistakes. He doesn't beat himself. He's tough.

He's gritty. He's what you want in a quarterback. He's a leader. His teammates respect him. Not that they don't, Calandria, they do him too. But both those guys have proven that they can win. They just need to refine their games a little bit and get more help.

Why'd you shoot down the platoon, quarterback by committee? I just don't think that that works real well. I think it's a position where you need a guy in there and who can get into a rhythm and feel the game. The old saying is if you have more than one starter,

you don't have a starter, something like to that effect. I think there's some truth to that. It has rarely worked out well. I just think that it's more cohesive for the entire offense if you've got the same guy in there for most of the game. It certainly doesn't mean you can't switch if one guy is having an off day or something. But I think it's a better method toward winning football. If you look at most of the teams that are successful, they've got one guy in there and

again, he doesn't come out unless he's injured or just having a really bad day. What's your gut tell you the starter will be in week one? Wow. I think it depends on how they treat training camp. If it's an open competition or if it's just back to the norm where Muscat was the starter last year with the exception of when he was injured. And if that carries over to the fall or not, I don't know. We haven't posed that question, I don't think,

but Tony Elliott probably should have in the spring, but we didn't. And I don't know. I think if it's an open competition, it's going to come down to the wire. Both these guys are gritty and they're going to fight. They both have their own strengths, which are somewhat different. So if it comes down to an open competition, I don't think we may not find out until the last week of training camp. How would you characterize this team going into camp

as far as it sees itself and as far as media sees the team? Oh, I think the overall media probably sees this team as not the way that the team sees itself. I think this team has a lot of confidence in itself and believes that it can win. The media wants to see it prove that it can win

before it will believe that they can compete. Not really compete, but they've got to learn how to win. We keep saying that, and it's something I learned covering George Welsh years ago. The first couple years he was talking about how this team, this program doesn't know how to win. And they had to learn how.

And that's when you eliminate the silly mistakes that beat yourself. And that's what kept this team out of a bowl game last year and kept them under expectations was making needless mistakes that made the coaches want to pull their hair out because some of them were forced errors and some of them were just needless. A lot of penalties, a lot of turnovers. Didn't get a lot of turnovers. Had trouble scoring in the red zone if I recall

didn't really establish a running game that they could rely on too many interceptions things like that they just kept shooting themselves in the foot they probably should have won at least two or three more games than what they did. Easily. At least. They lost six

games by a combined 17 points. Yeah. This team, a lot of folks, I mean, we realize, a lot of folks realize this, but this team very well could have been a bowl team. This very well could have been a team that finished with a 500 record.

Could have been. You'd be playing in one of the cold weather bowls, but that's okay. You've got to start somewhere. That would have been a major success for those guys. Would have been a completely different storyline going into the year with Tony Elliott's job.

Tony Elliott might have been coach of the year. That's what I'm saying. Made a bowl game last year. And they weren't that far away. They showed that they could compete with some of the better teams in the league. They had Louisville beat on the road. They beat Carolina on the road, which was undefeated and ranked number 10 in the nation. And they kind of gave other teams a blueprint on how to beat Carolina because the Tar Heels were never the same.

They were average after that. Yeah, they were never the same after that. Same with the quarterback play. Yes. They could have beaten NC State, who was obviously a bowl team. Could have beaten Boston College. They competed well against most of the teams they played against. They just kept making mistakes

that killed them. Comments coming in. Chad Wood, a diehard Virginia fan watching the program. What you love about Calandria is what you dislike about Calandria. Turn down the turnovers and he will be fine. However, risk taking is what makes him so fun to watch. And he highlights the schedule does not

do this football team any favors. Hootie's been very quick to highlight this schedule. I think some of the language you use, I don't understand the schedule. I don't. And, you know, some of it was probably made before Tony Elliott got here, and some of it maybe even before Bronco got here. But my philosophy, and I've covered football so closely for all of my career,

it's one of my passions, and you can't help but notice that programs that have fallen to Virginia's level of the cellar or near the cellar in the ACC and in other leagues, but particularly in the ACC, if you'll notice, the way you rebuild a program is not going out and taking on the giants of the college football world, like opening up at Tennessee last year, for example. That was absurd.

You knew you were going to get killed. Yeah, you got some money out of it, but you knew you were going to get killed. That was going to strip what confidence maybe you had going into the season. You had your starting quarterback injured. In the first game. In the first game, early in the first game, if I recall. You do like Wake Forest did. You do like Duke did.

You do like NC State did. You start playing. You find the worst teams in Division I-A or FCS, and you play them routinely until you get over the hump and you win six games a year and you go to a lousy bowl game but it's still a bowl game and that's what attracts players and it helps elevate your recruiting and it gives you more visibility it gives you more practice time time. It gives your team confidence. You don't have to go out and take on the better teams out there when it's not necessary. If you win all of your four non-conference games, you only have to win two conference games to be bowl eligible.

Those programs have used that map to make their programs winners. And look at how many bowl games that Duke and Wake Forest have been in lately, and NC State as well. They're well past that, but that's how they got things turned around when they fell on hard times. I think that's the way you do it. I don't understand why you go out and you purposely try to find difficult teams to play when it's not necessary at this time and place.

This team, matchups that are beyond challenging. You're at Death Valley. You have to play your conference games, obviously. that are beyond challenging. You're at Death Valley. You have to play your conference. You've got to play Clemson. Notre Dame and South Bend. Folks, get ready for SMU to be in this conference. SMU is going to come out and make a statement. And SMU has all the money in the world,

all the money in the world to build a big-time football program. They've got Louisville. That's a conference matchup. Richmond to start the season. And as Hootie has highlighted on this talk show, these first four, call them five games, Richmond at Scott Stadium, Wake Forest and Winston-Salem, Maryland and Charlottesville, Coastal Carolina and South Carolina at Conway, Boston College. You may have to go four and one, at least three and two in the first five,

if you're going to sniff a bowl game, perhaps save the head coach's job. I don't think his job is in jeopardy unless they lay an egg. But, yeah, I mean, you're going to have to win early. And if you do and you eliminate those mistakes and you learn how to win and you do win three or four games, you might be able to pull off a couple of upsets later in the season down the road and beat teams that people don't think you're going to beat. You've got to get off to a decent start.

I don't know why they renewed the rivalry with Maryland at this point. Maybe down the road it would be a wiser thing, but I think you should replace them with an easy win. Coastal Carolina is certainly no gimme. Particularly on the road.

I would be playing four gimme's if I could as non-conference teams. Notre Dame, obviously that's part of the contract with the ACC, so you don't have any choice. But if I didn't have to play anybody good right now, I wouldn't. I would play the worst teams I could find out there

and get some wins and build some confidence. Comments coming in, this one from YouTube. Wahoo 89 is the handle. Will Jack Recy get more playing time this year? It seems like every time he touches the ball, he gets positive yardage. It's certainly possible. It's not like they have a lot of established running backs back there. Kobe Pace is clearly the favorite to start. He started at Clemson. He didn't have the

season people expected last year and part of that probably fell on the offensive line because again there's nowhere to run at times. But other than Kobe, there's not a lot of other guys with experience. So I would think playing time was wide open for a second guy. And if he gets the job done in training camp, I would expect him to get a chance. 100%. I expect him to get a chance as well.

You want to talk about the recruiting class? We could do that, yeah. Those comments are coming in on the recruiting class. Yeah, they've... And Trey Barham, watch it on LinkedIn. We appreciate you watching the show, Trey. They have 15 commitments as we speak, unless they've gotten somebody today that we're not aware of at this point.

But three commitments in the past couple of days. On Sunday, they got Davin Chandler, a 6'2 safety from Berlin, Maryland. Committed after his visit, he's another three-star. Just about all their guys are three-stars, which is fine. He's the number 54 safety in the class nationally and the number 19 overall prospect out of the state of Maryland. Decent set of schools were after him. West Virginia, Boston College, Air Force, South Florida, Army, East Carolina. He played both ways in high school,

defensive back and wide receiver, plus he was a punt returner. The other kid that was I think the fifth, maybe, yeah, the fifth in-state commitment, which is important. It's important. The second, I think, from Matoka, which is good. Get some guys out of that

Richmond area where there's been some really good football players developed in recent years. Montino Williams, big corner, 6'3", 207 pounds. It's nice to have big corners. From Chesterfield's Matoka, also a three-star.

His list of schools were fairly impressive as well. He picked Virginia over Pitt, Minnesota, JMU, Coastal Carolina, Old Dominion, East Carolina. As a junior, he had four interceptions, five passes broken up, 36 solo tackles, rushed for nearly 1,000 yards and 10 touchdowns, and had 22 receptions for 375 yards. So both these guys are very athletic and can play. Yesterday, we're still trying to learn more about this commitment. He's somewhat of an enigma in that he's a three-star, but he chose Virginia over Georgia, which is right

in his backyard. Right. He's from, I'm not sure how you pronounce this. Maybe one of the readers can correct me, or you may know yourself. I don't know if it's Dekula, Georgia, or Dakula, Georgia, or some other pronunciation. You got me, Hootie. I don't know. And I'm not sure how to pronounce his first name.

It's S-I-C-H-A-N. So I don't know if it's Sikhan or Sishan. I'm not really sure. His last name is John. So Sikhan John, perhaps. 6'2", almost 6'3", 300-pound defensive lineman. The number 107 defensive lineman in the nation. 98 by 247.

104th prospect in the recruiting-rich state of Georgia. He also had offers from Maryland, Boston College, Louisville, Tulane, Appalachian State, and Georgia Southern, Georgia State. He had visited Virginia three times, including this past weekend, and decided to commit afterwards. It's been hard to find out information about him at this point. We're trying to get a hold of his coach. Couldn't get a hold of him last night.

But we're told he has good hands for getting off blocks. He's starting to mature physically. At 6'3", 300 pounds, he could become a monster. Strong lower body, which is a good frame for stuffing the run. He squats 635 pounds, and that's a 30-inch vertical, so he's pretty athletic for his size. But that's three decent

players, three-star guys who were offered by other pretty good schools. They're certainly climbing up some of the recruiting rankings. The last I looked, I think they were around number 40. That was before this influx of players,

I believe, so it could be higher now. And that's a major improvement over last year when we were in the 80s by some of the services. But, yeah, they're showing some signs of life in recruiting. And waking up in the state of Virginia a little bit, which is major. I think five in-state recruits, I think there were totals of two or three years where Broncos staff couldn't sign a combined five in-state recruits. So that shows that they're making some inroads back within the Commonwealth. Especially after the debacle in Scott Stadium against the Virginia Tech Hokies, where we all

feared that this was going to have significant and long-lasting in-state recruiting impacts. True. Mr. Chad Wood pushes back slightly and wants your thoughts on Coach Elliott's security, even if he does not make a bowl. You feel he's secure in that scenario? Yeah, I think if they lay an egg and they only win two games if they win three games it's going to be pushing. I think they're going to do better than that, honestly. They have 85% of their offensive productivity returning,

which is in the top five in the nation. They've just got to, again, they've got to cut out mistakes. But if he comes out and totally flops, yeah, he could be gone. But I think otherwise. I don't think Virginia's going to fire a coach after three years unless it's just an obvious disaster. But I think if he wins four games, possibly five games, I think he's very secure.

I think it shows signs of progress and signs of developing. He now has the football operations center, the Hardy, after Robert Hardy and his wife Molly. The rector of the Board of Visitors, owner of Caswick Hall, among others. They have that building now to showcase, which should help attract a higher level of recruit. Randy Clark in Gilbert, Arizona is asking about that. He says, have you toured the new operations facility?

I have toured it. I toured it. It was right during the Super Regionals, so we didn't get a chance to write a lot about it at the time. I did write one story about it, and this week I'll be doing a little bit more thorough story, particularly about the weight room, and I'll be giving a little virtual tour of some of the videos and photographs I took. My son put a nice piece together on that, and so we'll be showing that on our website which

essentially shows you every room in the building with from the weight room to the training room the sports medicine room recovery room players lounge where they eat a little tribute to the three tragically slain players that was very important to Tony Ellie to have that included to the locker room which is mind-blowing James Bond quality Jerry yet to have you can use your eye eye scan to get into the building. State of the art stuff. Team meeting rooms. Position meeting rooms.

The coach's offices weren't complete at that point so we didn't get to go in there. A really solid building. I mean, it doesn't have some of the bells and whistles that perhaps the Oregons and the Clemsons and some of those schools have, but it's very functional. It has everything a player needs. It's all under one roof.

They can eat, study, sleep, hang out together, bond, recover from injury, et cetera, all under one ceiling. And that's pretty nice. I think the players were blown away when they went in, and I'm sure some of these recruits coming in are getting blown away as well. Comments are coming in quickly here. Chad Wood says, thank you for that answer on Coach Elliott. Hootie, this one's come in. Does the new facility stack up with the perennial powers? I think in terms of efficiency, it certainly does.

Again, it doesn't have some of the thing I got a personal tour of the Oregon building when I was out there a few years ago and that was the and may still be the Taj Mahal of all the football buildings in the country it was the first one and nobody knows really how much money they spent.

I spent time with the assistant AD that day after my tour, and we talked about the building extensively, and I asked him because a lot of people knows that Phil Knight and Nike money was behind that. And I asked him, I said, well, there's rumors of how much money you guys spent on this building. He says, I don't know and I don't want to know. I know they went

to the extreme. They ordered furniture and floors and wood from exotic places around the planet to enhance that building. They left no stone unturned. It's fabulous. It blew my mind when I walked in it. Clemson has all kinds of things like a barbershop and a putt-putt course and a slide, I think, that the players slide from one floor to the other,

like a sliding board or something like that. But, you know, and I think Dabo said that, yeah, it's bells and whistles, but it also gives the players a chance to bond together where they might not otherwise. So I could see the purpose behind that. Some of these other buildings cost a lot more, obviously, but I think Virginia got a lot of bang for its buck. And while it might not be the Taj Mahal of college football, it certainly is a very, very, very efficient building.

It's beautifully designed. When you walk into it, you can't help but be impressed because they've got everything that a player needs. The weight room is, we talked to the coach there, and he's been at all the weight rooms that count in the country, I think. And he said this can go up against any weight room in the country. It's certainly better than some NFL operations. That's amazing. Because I've been in a couple of those, and this is better.

So, yeah, I think it may not be up on the top ten in terms of money spent and lavishness, but in terms of efficiency, it certainly is in the top ten. Comments coming in quickly here. Viewers and listeners, we appreciate your comments. Bill Dunn, the old strength coach at UVA, is being highlighted on the feed. I knew Bill Dunn well. As a guy that kept the players always strong and constantly in shape. Bill Dunn and John Gamble. I still hear from John

Gamble from time to time. Unfortunately, Bill Dunn passed years ago, but fascinating stories about both of those guys. And back when I used to travel with the team back in the day, a lot of times I would be sitting between those two on an airplane. And when they served the meals, both those guys were eyeing my food as soon as it hit my plate. And I didn't eat a lot, and I'm a very slow eater, and they gobbled their food down very quickly and uh i'll never forget them looking at me and say you're gonna you're gonna finish that you're like yes but uh anyways uh i have so many great stories particularly Gamble, because he was a heavyweight powerlifter on the national scale. And I'll never forget Bill Dunn going over and watching him work out. This is when they were trying to build muscle on Ralph.

And Ralph at that time could do some curls that some of the football players couldn't do. He was pretty strong. People didn't realize it. But Bill Dunn said, here, feel John Gamble's shoulders. Feel his arms and stuff. I don't feel particularly comfortable feeling another guy's arms, but I did. And it was like feeling a rock with a very thin layer of

something over it skin but uh it was like a solid rock and i'll never forget uh talking to him i think he was in houston one night before uh um uh the national competition. He was defending his national heavyweight powerlifting championship, and he had to make weight. I think he had to be, I want to say 275 pounds. I'm not sure. This has been a long time ago. But he had to somehow lose three pounds that night. And it was like 7 o'clock at night, and he had to lose the three pounds overnight.

And he wasn't eating. He was, I think, drinking as much water as he could. And I said, John, how in the world are you going to do this? He had like 0% body fat. How are you going to lose three pounds? I know. He had his room turned up to like 110 degrees. He had the shower on hot, letting the steam envelop the entire room.

And apparently he sat in that all night long and made his weight and he ended up winning the championship I had a little ditty in Sports Illustrated about him doing that but that I wrote but fascinating

guys but getting back to the point, football players spend more time with the strength coaches than they do their own position coaches, and certainly more than the head coach. So they develop really strong relationships with strength coaches, and it's very important that they get along. Players loved Bill Dunn and John Gamble, and even when John went on to the Miami Dolphins,

I went to see him a few times. The Dolphins players loved him as well. So it's a very, very important dynamic of any football program. That's why I love this show right there, what you just did. The institutional memory of Hootie Ratcliffe cannot be duplicated. And to show you his strength, down at Duke one year, George Wells did not have much affection for the Duke program because of Steve Spurrier, but even after Spurrier was gone, you had to walk from Wallace Wade Stadium the visiting team had to

walk more than a hundred yards through a practice field to get to their dressing room at before the game at halftime and after the games and this particular year Virginia had beaten Duke handily and got out. The media got out. We got out of the press box and got down to the locker rooms. And the locker room doors were locked and chained. And they couldn't get in and they couldn't get anybody from Duke to come and open the doors. And so John Gamble with his incredible strength kept pulling

the door until he opened it. No way. Yes way. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it. He ripped that door open with his bare hands. And that just shows you the power of how strong that guy was. It was unbelievable. Unbelievable. Unbelievable.

Hootie Ratcliffe, throw this to you here. Hour flies by with this man. Basketball and the firepower. A question came in before the show for you. Different topic off football. We'll get to the viewers and listeners. Where's the firepower of the scoring going to come from? Well, we'll see.

I think McNeely is probably going to be somebody they rely heavily on, even more so this year than in the past. I think it'll be fun to watch to see what changes he's made in his game. Last year he tried to add a little bit to his repertoire in the fact that he would do the pump fakes. Any three-point shooter worth his salt is going to add a good pump fake to where he can draw guys up and either get fouled or get them up in the air and drive past them and get a closer shot.

And he worked on that some last year, and it was effective. It was effective, yeah. I expect it to be better this year. Me too. I think his three-point shooting is only going to get better. At some points last year, he led the nation. I think he'll have the luxury of having a little bit of pressure taken off of him this year because I don't think there's going to be the guys on the floor that other teams are going to leave unguarded.

Which we saw last year. There were times on offense they were playing 3v5. Exactly. I don't think that's going to be the case this year. I think guys like Christian Bliss will make them pay. They were playing 3v5. Exactly. I don't think that's going to be the case this year. I think guys like Christian Bliss will make them pay. I think T.J. Powers is primed to break out. I think T.J. Powers will be effective inside. The Duke transfer.

I think Buchanan will be a more effective inside scorer. I think Buchanan, speaking of the weight room. The kid from San Diego State, whose name escapes me at the moment, I think he's going to add some firepower on that front line. I think Worley and Day-Day Ames are going to be, they're not going to be people that light up the scoreboard, although I think they're going to have games where they will. I'm very excited about Day Day Aims.

Elijah Sanders. Elijah Sanders. I think he's going to be better than people expect. Me too. And I'm really interested to see what this Sharma kid is all about. Canadian National Player of the Year, sharpshooter, had great numbers. It'll be fun to see what he can do.

Six foot five. Keyshawn Sharma from Canada. They got a lot of talent on this roster. I'm very excited about Day Day Aims. I am too. And I think Christian Bliss is going to be fun to watch. And I think Tane Murray is going to be a lot more dangerous this year. He showed signs down the stretch last year that he can be a guy that from time to time can score 8 to 14 points and at key moments and and with the other guys that he's

going to be surrounded by i i think this team they're probably not going to have a lot of guys that um i don't know what the proper terminology is, but they're not going to have a lot of guys that are going to fill it up every night, but they're going to have guys who are stable and efficient, and that's all you need. You don't have to have three guys that score 20 points a night. I think they're going to certainly have that many nights and maybe even more but uh but i just think this is going to be a highly efficient offense that's going to

be hard to guard because there's going to be a lot of guys who can attack you and you can't leave anybody unguarded any uh nil commentary you want to get out there to close? Has it improved? I mean, I'm seeing it left and right on the feed prior to the show, during the show. Folks wondering, do we have a chance to compete in a critical off-gridiron, off-hardwood component? Yeah, and I think they are competing. I think the priority is keeping what you've got. I think they've done a really good job of retaining players in football and basketball.

You're not going to compete against some schools like Texas who, if you saw the tweet recently where they bought a fleet of Lamborghinis and set them outside the Texas stadium. I thought initially when I saw that tweet it was for Flash, but it was for the players. Yeah, it's for their use. Yeah, they got Lamborghinis for the players. Yes. It's unbelievable. You're not going to see that over at the McHugh Center or the Hardy Center or JPJ.

You're not going to see that. So if you're thinking that, forget about it. If a guy's coming here solely for a paycheck. This isn't the school for that. Forget about it. Yeah. Tony Bennett's not interested. Tony Bennett's not interested. Tony Elliott's not

interested. The university's not interested. They're not going to get into bidding wars for players. You forget about that mentality. They certainly are going to have attractive packages that will enhance guys.

I don't know what the deal is. Somebody told me that they don't have that for incoming freshmen. I don't know that that's true. I'm trying to find out. But I think the main thing is that they're doing a good job of retaining the talent that they have accumulated with NIL packages. And I think they can compete. If a kid comes in and the first question out of his mouth is, how much can you pay me, that's an immediate turnoff.

I'm not sure that they think that that guy's a right fit for their program. Are you going to lose some talent that way? Yeah. Do you really want that kind of guy in your program? It could be a locker room problem. A major problem. Certainly some guys are getting paid decent amounts. We're trying to find out more about that as we go. It's not like the Virginia broadcasts how much the NIL packages are.

I'd love to know those numbers. We're trying to find out more about that and we will I'm sure as the summer progresses but can they compete for players to a degree? Again, they're not going to go out and

get into bidding wars for players. They've let some guys go in the recruiting process because of that and frankly lost some guys because of that. But, again, they say they're doing it the right way. They may have to adjust that as we go. I don't know. It's not like a wide-open

thing where information is available to the media or the public. We're trying to find out more about it as we go. Jerry Ratcliffe, guys. Virginia Sports Hall of Famer. JerryRatcliffe.com, the website.

I am on his website every single day. I cannot wait for August and for training camp. I'm ready for football. My favorite sport is generally whatever is in season that time. Football is near and dear to my heart. I grew up going to Scott Stadium with my father and my family. My friend, it's a joy to sit across from you. I love the stories. I love the history. I love the current events. I love the recruiting. I love the notebook, Hootie's Golden Nuggets.

I love scatter shooting. Scatter shooting column is my favorite. I've been reading the Jerry Ratcliffe scatter shooting column now for, this is crazy, you ready for this? For 22 years. That does blow my mind. I've been reading scatter shooting since I walked in as a student at the University of Virginia to this man's newsroom at the Daily Progress. First person I met was Molly Akil, the secretary. Molly was terrific. She's a phenomenal human being. Love seeing her.

Hope she's doing well wherever she is. She's married to a fantastic gentleman named Wayne Crawford. They bought an RV, and they routinely RV and enjoy life. Oh, that's awesome. I'm glad to hear that. She's doing great. Second person I met was this man, Hootie Ratcliffe, and the rest is history. I love our interaction, and not just our interaction, but the interaction with our viewers.

Our viewers are great questions. They're a very intelligent audience. Yeah, very intelligent audience. Mr. MVP, Mr. Consistency. He is the glue man. Judah Wickhauer behind the camera. We love Judah Wickhauer. Props to you, Mr. Consistency He is the glue man Judah Wickhauer behind the camera We love Judah Wickhauer, props to you Judah The Jerry and Jerry Show wherever you get

Your social media and podcasting content And we very much encourage you to visit JerryRackliff.com Just a fantastic source of information The I Love Seville Show is up in one hour And five minutes Our guest Bo Carrington A Duke lacrosse player

That is now a developer and business person in the Charlottesville area. So long, everybody, and thank you for joining us. That was awesome. Thank you.