Stanford speaks

Joshua Stanford

Joshua Stanford attended Tuesday’s media session.

On what the Hokies have to do at wide receiver (I walked over during the middle of his answer, so it’s not complete): “We’re a bunch of young guys and we don’t have the experience that a lot of people do.  We do have to focus on consistency and focus on the little things.  The pressure’s on, but I think we’ve responded pretty well.”

On doing updowns and pushups after dropped passes: “We all stay after practice to catch, and even before training camp, after workouts when we were lifting weights we would go out there and catch.  A lot of us receivers, we put a lot of work into it.  We’re thinking a lot out there.  We just have to focus and concentrate and be relaxed out there.  The speed of the game, the new offense, the reads, stuff like that.  I feel like as a group we just have to relax.”

On whether he feels pressure because the WR spot is a question mark: “It’s pressure, but if you prepare there’s opportunity.  It’s a young group, but it’s a big opportunity with Alabama first and then a long season.”

On how he’s gotten better since the spring: “That’s an ongoing, everyday thing.  You can have really good days, and then followed by an alright day or a bad day.  Then you could have three good days and a bad day.  I try to take everything one day at a time, and just try to focus on the next practice, the next play, the next period.  I just try to be good for right now.  You only get one moment at a time.  I can only play one play at a time.”

On whether he’s the kind of guy who will let one bad practice upset him, even if he’s had three good prior ones: “Yeah, it does.  Even in practice, one little error will frustrate me.  But I just try to keep a cool head and keep poised.  I’m really hard on myself, so I try to not let certain things bother me.  Trust my technique,trust my fundamentals, take coaching, and just move forward.”

On how Logan Thomas is different from last August to this August: “Ummm…he’s being coached a lot better.  His footwork, his accuracy, everything, by far.  I feel like all the quarterbacks have improved, even the guys down the depth chart that you guys (the media) don’t see as much.  I feel like there’s been quarterback improvement at all levels, including Logan Thomas.  Everyone, from the top guy to the fifth string guy.

26 Responses You are logged in as Test

  1. West Coach Guy coaches anyone who pays his fee. I suspect he coaches all of them pretty much the same. How many of his pupils do NOT make All-America?!? LT may not have been a good candidate for WCG’s coaching. Maybe we’ll find out this season.

  2. Coaches aside, Stanford seems to be intellegent, insightful and to have a real desire to improve. Best of luck to him.

  3. Whether true or not, if players feel that they are coached better, then they will play better. That’s the power of positive environment and the optimism that results.

  4. The coaches that left were not bad coaches. The new coaches are obviously emphasizing technique more with the offense. Our win loss record may not be much different this year but with the emphasis on fundamentals I feel sure we are going to play better this year.

    1. I somewhat agree, previous coaches were not “bad” coaches, just misplaced in some cases and lacked intensity in others.

    2. I would disagree. Newsome to Grimes is night and day. Different universes. Loeffler over OCain by a frickin mile. Or 1,000 miles. And maybe Sherm and Moorehead are a coin flip at this point, but I have a pretty good feeling about Aaron’s future in coaching.

    3. I guess it depends on the definition of bad. To a lot of us, they did not impress. In fact, they emphasized neither offense scheme or technique, nor fundamentals.

  5. Trying to look at the bright side of it, I’m glad the players feel that they have better coaching this year.

  6. “Ummm…he’s being coached a lot better.” That’s about the 3rd or 4th time a player has explicitly mentioned coaching as the reason for improvement. No Freudian slips, but outright saying it. I know this adds nothing to the discourse beyond what we already knew, but it’s still fascinating to see players outright admitting it.

    1. Probably true but if we had a new coach I would not publicly say that we were being coached worse, or even the same. Good grief.

    2. The only thing that gives me a littke scare about those statements is guys deflecting the blame of under performing last yr off of themselves. It is good to believe in your coaches..but it is also good to take the blame for not doing enough. Accountabilty starts with yourself….he didnt play last yr, but enough of blaming the coaches…they don’t play. No excuses to hide behind this yr with coaches that everyone is hyping up

      1. Those guys were Freshmen. It’s not as if an upperclassman made the remark…nobody is blaming a freshman for mistakes or not performing anyway.

        Depends on how you look at it….You COULD look at it as they are putting MORE on themselves. If you are in a spot where it is “your time”, you have really good coaching, and you don’t perform, there is nobody to blame but yourself (a sentiment with which I happen to agree)!

        More likely, it’s an enthusiastic young player who likes his is excited and likes his coach..nothing more. That is plenty IMO!

        1. Where’s the edit feature when you need it? Last paragraph… one to many “likes his”……….

  7. That final paragraph… ‘ummm…hes being coached a lot better.’ Talk about telling it like it is. Now for results on the field…

    1. hmmmm…..He came back from qb camp with some West Coast QB guru and was a total wreck. Hard to reteach in such a short time. I think O’Cain was a very good coach and this messed up everything he had done previously.. That and trying to run every play ever invented where no one knew what they were doing…. Lefty has had him locked since day one–it makes a difference I think.

      1. So you’re saying 1 week in the West Coast by a guru is too much that O’Cain can’t “fix” in an entire offseason plus season? And if LT thought the WC guru was so bad why does he still stay in contact with him?

        1. And the WC guy has coached a bunch of NFL and college Qbs who all swear by him. The truth is probably something like – The WC guy worked with LT for a week, worked on a few things and gave LT things to keep working on and O’Cain told him to do something else and he ended up somewhere in the middle, had new WRs, and no running game, lost some confidence and his play suffered.

          1. Yeah, I’ve never gotten the whole “he’s played qb for many years in hs and college, but that spring break with a guru in San Diego made him bad” argument. He was “bad” in 2012 because Coale, Boykin, Coles, and especially Wilson were not on the field. He was playing running back with the option to pass behind a questionable o-line and had one reliable receiver. If our dl hit Brynn Renner 15+ times, it might affect his accuracy. With running plays, everyone hit Logan 15+ times.

        2. can’t deal with it during summer technically, don’t know what LT thinks of guru now from a qb thing…..though may still like him. Don’t burn bridges.
          Think lots of reasons LT tanked, but it sure was dramatic and obvious to me.
          Hope it has been “fixed.”

          1. it sounds like you are searching for reasons not to blame the old staff, when Stanfords meaning and the continued similar comments from other players make it fairly clear that the problem was not the wc qb guru.

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