Letters… we get letters… we get stacks and stacks of letters…
Question from Mayhem Booster:
QFTMB: Which sports deity was more responsible for the miracle we witnessed Saturday, Pinman or Vocockyteps?
Hail Pinman!
Goodssee Vockyteps!
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: Hail Pinman.
PatrickSawyer: Vocockyteps. Pinman is a deity that values order. The pins are always reset the same way. Certain pin actions are the most probably routes to success. Vocockyteps is inherently chaotic. He was born from Franziatic ooze with his form twisting and writhing.
Cole
Sullivan: Jared Curtis may just have plot armor, or it could be the Ghost of Pavias Past come to will us to victory once more. Or maybe Lea shined his dome extra today and the NC State QB was blinded by its beautiful glory. Or yeah, Vocockyteps.
Andrew VU ‘04: I’ve got to agree with Patrick. Vocockyteps, lord of chaos, allowed his clawed fickle finger of fate to favor us for once. Why did he favor us, this time? I would argue Vocockyteps doesn’t even check what the 20 sided die lands on after he rolls it, though it is always possible that Clark Lea threw a virgin into a volcano.
Question from Jessecuster44:
I attended VU beginning in 1989. I’m used to seeing VU lose in all sorts or crazy/horrible ways. Yesterday, despite a callow performance from QB1, umpteen bazillion holding penalties and a secondary that could generously be called a sieve, VU wins in a crazy way. (horrible for NC State)
Have I unknowingly crossed into an alternate universe? If not, when will NC State start accusing Tim Corbin of tampering in this game?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: That might have legitimately been the dumbest thing I have ever seen a Vanderbilt opponent do. The “witness confesses to a crime that the police don’t even suspect him of doing” of football plays.
PatrickSawyer: It was certainly new and bizarre to be on the right side of one of THOSE finishes. The more I watch the play the more proud I am of so many players executing a role that was made up on the spot by running a FG block. Seriously. That was called as FG block with the instructions to keep the QB narrow to hopefully get the safety before time ran out. The play turning into a sack-fumble TD was a happy little accident.
Also, Miles Capers is the strip sack GOD considering he forced the game-sealing one against Alabama in 2024 and popped the ball free from freshman Mason Lewis’s sack against NC State.
I hope it makes their unvaxed blood boil. They would hate to know they pasteurized their own blood instead of leaving it raw, I’m sure.
Cole Sullivan: NC “State Shit” simply outclasses “Same Old Vandy” in terms of curse power (not to be confused with Desert Power, which is how UNLV beat us that one time). Those Wolfpackers really need to make a vaccine to protect against this awful luck… oh wait!
Andrew VU ‘04: You know those weirdos who think we’re living in a simulation, or that everyone died during Covid and what’s happened since is just time slowed down in the infinite flash of a dying mind? I’m not saying they’re right… but…
Question(s) from Jersey Dore & Paleozoa1:
What performance-enhancing drug (or drug cocktail) did coaches give the O line at halftime?
The only evidence we were even playing offensive linemen in the first half was the five holding penalties. The chemically enhanced second-half O line managed a cromulent-if-unspectacular performance with no flags.
&
Why so few running plays on offense? Just situational, or is there an offensive line issue?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: Uh, yeah, there’s an offensive line issue. Was that really a question?
PatrickSawyer: Frankly, I am not sure the offensive line was any better in the second half. Most of the first half holds were not major factors on the plays they negated. If anything, the OL just stopped committing unnecessary infractions and did not turn minor LOS losses into detrimental penalties. It mostly worked. The ball carriers and Curtis were elusive enough in almost every case.
Cole Sullivan: Lea always experiments heavy to start the season. The “Start of the Season” ended at halftime: we had the best version of this team out on the field and I think we are going to see that set of Jimmies and Joes out there going forward. As annoying as it is, I actually think I like the way Lea has really been playing around with things these first 3 games, and I think it will pay off in the games to come.
Andrew VU ‘04: I saw a graphic on Orion Irving vs. Beau Johnson (I think it was Beau Johnson, but I’m at work and not going to check), and let’s just say that 2026 has not been a good year for athletes named “Orion.” Long story short, I think (again, not going to check), we were much better when Johnson was at tackle and Irving was at guard. All reporting seems to indicate that’s what Clark Lea is doing in practice this week, and Kevo Wilson will not be on the bench. Of course, this is all from memory and I might be getting something wrong. Hopefully Tom, Patrick, or the person inside the Mascot Head can confirm/fix my inane ramblings.
Question from Dore Fan in Dallas:
In 2024 the Dores inexplicably lost to Georgia State before inexplicably beating Alabama. The Alabama win seemingly propelled them to 6 wins and a bowl appearance. Given the inconsistency to date that this year’s team has shown to date, do you think that yesterday’s inexplicable win can propel them to 6 wins and a bowl game this year?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: Arkansas is ass, so there’s that. I still see a path to six wins if they can win two of Auburn, Kentucky, and Mississippi State. I do not like how narrow that path appears, though. (We’ll reevaluate Tennessee after this weekend. I have my suspicions they’re fraudulent, because they have wins over Furman and Kennesaw State in which they weren’t able to post the embarrassing scores they normally post against teams like that, and winning at Georgia Tech appears to be a nothingburger this season.)
PatrickSawyer: Kentucky looking impressive against Texas A&M (who is almost always fraudulent, just not THIS early), and the genuinely entertaining Florida-Auburn game do concern me. Kamario Taylor for Mississippi State looks like a one-man army even if the team around him leaves a lot to be desired. The path to 6 wins is still open. It will require Curtis and the pass catchers to mature and gel quickly while the OL needs to find another level, both in pass protection and run blocking. The defense needs to play full games of consistent execution instead of being spotty.
Cole Sullivan: We will win every game. We will go to Atlanta. Why are y’all doubting? We are the team you saw in the second half, and only trending upwards.
Andrew VU ‘04: I mean, 6 is still our ceiling this year, no? So having that go into the win column instead of the loss column means we have to win three SEC games (I can squint and see us doing that, but it won’t be easy) instead of four SEC games, which would require Vocockyteps’ 20 sided die to land on the same number it did in the last second of the QAnoNC State game at least one more time.
Question from WestEndMayhem:
Going for punch outs instead of tackling- great idea, or best idea?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: I mean, I don’t mind it when it’s either knocking the ball out or you lose the game.
PatrickSawyer: Situationally? Great. 90% of the time? Terrible. It is worth noting that Lewis, who had the first contact on Bailey, did not go for the strip. He was focused on getting the QB down for the safety quickly enough to force another play.
Cole Sullivan: Playing Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out on my dadd old NES was one of my favorite things to do as a kid. You had to know exactly when to time your uppercut, but when you nailed it just right, it would end the bout then and there.
Andrew VU ‘04: Haha. It certainly worked out for us in the last second against the Wolfpaxxine deniers. I still think it’s better to go for the tackle in nearly all situations, and only best to Peanut Punch when chasing a WR from behind, when the ballcarrier is already in the grasp of another defender, or when you have precious little time late in a game and need a miracle.
Question from VUAllday:
What’s with the penalties? I’ll take holding occasionally if it keeps my QB from getting killed, but damn! Is there any relief to be found from all the flags?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: See, I don’t really mind these penalties because after watching seven years of Derek Mason football, I’ll take a few holding penalties. It’s the penalties resulting from guys not lining up in the right place, delay of game, and having two guys with the same number on the field at the same time that I couldn’t stand. That dumb shit is on coaching. This is probably more or less a talent issue.
PatrickSawyer: Most of the penalties have been of the “trying to do too much” variety, including the holds. Players get beat, either at the OL or in coverage, and panic. Then they commit a penalty that ruins the play, regardless of whether their mistake was detrimental. In the second half, the OL stopped doing that for the most part and miraculously nothing imploded. Prevent panic. And fix the reasons the player felt panicked when you can.
Cole Sullivan: I would answer this but first I gotta back up 10 yards. Not fun, can’t stand it, let’s do better. I can’t imagine the coaches don’t feel the same way.
Andrew VU ‘04: Yeah, this is the one area I am putting on the coaches (okay, I’m also putting play-calling on the coaches, but hopefully that will get better the more Beck/Marry/Kill lean into Curtis’s strengths), and giving them a D or F thus far. There’s no excuse for the amount of penalties we’re getting, especially as we’re not needing to hold out of desperation because a Jalen Carter or Jeffrey Simmons type beast is wreaking havoc on us. In other words, there will be certain players on certain SEC teams who will just be flat out dominators, and we might need to grab a jersey from time to time to keep Curtis from being killed. But against Austin Peay? Delaware? And to a lesser extent, QAnoNC State??? Ridiculous. Needs to be cleaned up, as we cannot consistently play behind the 8 ball against conference foes.
Question from Jeturn:
How does the Het-O-Meter handle this game? For most of the game it was wet and then it suddenly became the surface of Mercury dry. Does it average out the two extremes or is it permanently broken?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: The Het-O-Meter’s blood alcohol content is off the charts.
PatrickSawyer: A miracle win over a bad NC State does not totally dry the Het-O-Meter. Were are still probably damp. The win is nice, but the desperate nature makes winning in the SEC seem dubious.
Cole Sullivan: Think of it more like plasma. A liquid and a solid but really a goo and not wet at all because it’s a trillion-zillion degrees but not actually because it’s also blob. That make sense?
Andrew VU ‘04: Vocockyteps smashed the Het-O-Meter so as to drink it’s precious goo during the final second against NC State. It is currently under repair.
Question from Ofermod:
WHAT.
(Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll get to the rest of the w/h queries by the end of the season, up to and including “Whargarrrble!?”)
Ahem.
Was this the platonic ideal of “best first career start” from a long-term development stance? Hear me out: Curtis gets to prove (to himself) that he can lead a comeback, gets to rely on the rest of the team to make a vital stop or two, gets to make an awful mistake that costs the game, and then wins anyway via bullshit. Learns confidence, trust, humility, and faith in Pinman, all in one fell swoop. Or am I just coping and trying to come to terms with whatever that was?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: I mean, I pretty much expected that Curtis would cost us a game or two with a mistake this season, and so it’s great that it didn’t actually cause us to lose the game this time.
What remains to be seen is whether Vertigo, God of Insanity will expect repayment one-for-one or tenfold.
PatrickSawyer: I said as much on the way out of the stadium. In hindsight, I am glad he got to make the “game breaking” interception without actually losing and putting more pressure on himself. Sure, we could all have the “best first career start” being a 300+ yard passing night with no turnovers and 3+ TDs, but this might the be the realistic Platonic ideal, if that makes any sense.
Cole Sullivan: Any win would have been an ideal first career start, and we got a win. Winning is The Thing. Don’t forget that. Lea knows that, and I hope Curtis felt that in those few minutes between “so over” and “so back” at the end of the QAnoNC State game. Those few minutes should be enough bulletin board material for any coach to make a point, especially one as dorkily talkative as Lea.
Andrew VU ‘04: I honestly thought the (bear with me) moral victory of throwing that pick after leading us so close to a come back win would have been the perfect ending, development-wise. Hopefully, he still learns the lesson even though we won. Kids brains tend not to do that, though.
Question from JimVU:
Defense is obviously a problem but there were a lot of high scoring games Saturday. Where is the biggest hole? Secondary? Line? And how far behind other SEC teams are we on D?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: I haven’t really seen the defense as a big problem, or at least not the biggest problem this season. I mean, by the standards of Vanderbilt defenses, anyway.
PatrickSawyer: Sub packages and calls are my primary complaints. We are subbing too often and semi-frequently get caught with players still scrambling when the other team snaps the ball. I do not think the defense has bad enough personnel to necessitate the extreme amount of substituations (2 or 3 every play) the coaching staff uses. Clark Lea, before 2025, talked about letting the defense play fast and loose. They need to work towards that ideal, which they never have accomplished. Expect this desire to fall on noise-canceled head phones.
Cole Sullivan: I actually think we’re doing the best with what we’ve got. Maybe there’s more we could squeeze out, but Lea actually is a good defensive coach and I think he knows he has to plan around our lack of developed talent in the backfield, which is why we give up the 8-yard plays on third so often (the other option is giving up a 50-yard touchdown) by leaving room. It sucks, but it may be the best we got right now.
Andrew VU ‘04: Need more speed in the secondary and more thump in the interior D-Line.
Question from VU Aspen:
Curtis is big and has rocket arm. He has limited receivers and no OL. Will he survive the SEC his first season?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: Yeah, probably. Among the problems he has right now, holding on to the ball too long does not appear to be one of them, and those are the guys I really get worried about. Not necessarily the guys who try to run defenders over, but getting sacked as a stationary target is easily the most likely way for a quarterback to get hurt.
PatrickSawyer: My bigger concern about “surviving” is how tall he runs and how willing he is to try to run over opposing defenders. A little discretion would do him good.
Cole Sullivan: He needs to hold the ball better. He dropped it straight up for no reason. That pissed me off more than anything else I saw Saturday. There is so much he could do to survive but I would rather the ball survive possessions without being turned over. And I hope I can survive this new logo, too, change it back already.
Andrew VU ‘04: Just going to go ahead and add “please and thank you” to everyone’s answers here. Hail Pinman. Cover Curtis from head to toe in bubble wrap (please and thank you).
Question from VU1970:
So Clark Lea calls a punt block defense on a play where the other team isn’t punting, nobody on the Wolfpack team or staff sees it coming, and the QB — executing the play he was told to run, runs right into the teeth of it. Is that what happened? In other words, their QB isn’t entirely to blame for making them, in the words of their fanbase, “the laughing stock of the nation.”
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: He was, evidently, trying to run out the clock before going down, but Vanderbilt’s defense got to him before the clock ran out.
What I don’t know is whether he was told to run out the clock or if he decided to run it out on his own. Because, frankly, taking a knee in the end zone with three seconds left would have left Vandy to try to return a free kick following a safety, and that’s actually probably less likely than what actually happened.
PatrickSawyer: One additional point beyond correcting “punt block” to “field goal block.” NC State was out of timeouts, so taking another delay of game to discuss Vanderbilt’s odd formation would have put the ball at the 2 and made the original play of “take a safety with only a second half” almost impossible. Vanderbilt’s irregular call almost certainly did create uncertainty.
Cole Sullivan: NC State has been and will always be the laughingstock of the nation to me. And to a lot of the nation. I do feel for their loyal quarterback who ended up on the wrong side of a once in a million event. He doesn’t deserve the hate I assume he got from that vile fanbase.
Andrew VU ‘04: I honestly was paying so little attention on that last play, as I was resigned to a loss after the pick. You’re right, though… they went with a weird special teams type play they had never practiced, I guess. Lea put them in position to punt block.
Question from Mauberly:
Who’s looking dumber – Doeren or Kiffin?
Answers from AoG:
Tom Stephenson: Kiffin. Doeren just looks like a guy who should have been fired a couple of years ago, but is somehow still employed. Kiffin, on the other hand, looks like he might’ve punted on the best chance he’ll ever have to win a national championship for reasons that probably only make sense to Lane Kiffin.
PatrickSawyer: Doeren. At least Kiffin is getting paid a ridiculous sum of money to show up for work, win or lose.
Cole Sullivan: Have you seen Kiffin’s face? Dumb.
Andrew VU ‘04: blah
