Well, that didn’t take long.  Justin Fuente announced redshirt-freshman quarterback Josh Jackson as Virginia Tech’s starter during media availability on Monday, ending the “controversy” quite a bit earlier than it came to a close last season.

Today is August 14.  Last year, Fuente announced Jerod Evans as Virginia Tech’s starter on August 25.  That’s an 11-day difference.  Consider the fact that two-a-days don’t exist anymore, and the NCAA requires teams to take a few days off during the course of the preseason, it didn’t take nearly as many practices for Fuente to decide on a starter as it did last season.

I thought the announcement would come later than it did, though I figured the coaching staff would have a pretty good idea of who they would go with before they made the announcement.  Last year Jackson came out of nowhere to challenge Evans for the job, but in the end Fuente and Brad Cornelsen just felt a little bit more comfortable with a redshirt-junior than a true-freshman.

I was never particularly worried about the quarterback competition.  I figured that if Jackson almost beat out a guy who broke a bunch of Virginia Tech passing records last year, then he’s probably at least a pretty decent option in his own right.  And if either Hendon Hooker or AJ Bush had managed to beat him out, that must mean they are pretty good.  My opinion hasn’t changed.  I’m still more worried about the supporting cast than I am the quarterback.

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