VT will owe him $10 million on the buyout right now. It would have been $7.5 million if they waited until December 15th. That’s two more games for him to coach. So why do this now? I guess it’s worth the $2.5 million to let everyone know that VT is looking for a new coach especially with openings at Southern Cal, Louisiana State, Washington, Texas Christian, Texas Tech, Washington State and soon to be openings (we think) at Florida and Miami. So spend the extra 2.5 mil to advertise the opening and don’t sweat the extra money that Fuente is owed.
From your article:
By making the move now, the Hokies will owe an $8.75 million buyout to Fuente after it was negotiated down from $10 million. Had they waited until Dec. 15, the buyout would have decreased to $7.5 million.
So they paid half the difference, or 1.25 mill, to make both parties happy. It’s still a big chunk of change to spend on 4 weeks.
This signals a competitive coaching search, which might mean we’re keeping Manny until the off season at least. It’s really impossible to guess without knowing anything about the new AD.
Ah! I went back and checked the story. They changed it. It had said they would owe $10 million right now. And now it says it’s negotiated to $8.5 million. But yes, in what’s going to be a very competitive market this off-season Virginia Tech is putting their hat in the ring now rather than in a few weeks. Wow, just look at the schools looking for coaches. You just know we’ll join UF in a search as well and Lord knows who else pulls the trigger on coaches at year’s end?
No matter the case, this should make for an interesting game on Saturday.
This was expected and I mentioned it in a thread a few weeks back.
After his results at Memphis, pretty much everyone on the old board including Shadow and myself wished Miami had hired him before VT swooped in and hired him. Richt just sort of happened a few weeks later when UGA unexpectedly fired him after a 10 win season.
Hiring coaches is a total crap shoot. Just look at all the hot seat coaches who only a few years back were all that.
Yep. When Florida and UCLA were coach searching a few years ago it was Chip Kelly who was the big prize that year. UCLA “won” the sweepstakes and UF hired Dan Mullen. How are those two looking right now? 
Now you sound like Storm.
Winning requires everyone being great and buying in. It starts at the very top to get elite talent in the building. Then those employees have to recruit elite players (70-80% of the impact), keep them focused and working hard to develop their talents to the max.
Since Storm believes it is almost 100% talent, is Mario better or worse than Manny at recruiting? It sure looks like Mario has maximized the Oregon talent which isn’t a ton better than Miami in terms of blue chippers. Does Mario have the ability to recruit and land great staff members?
All of this means nothing if the BOT and Frenk don’t provide an additional $10m/yr to win. Yes, I’m guessing Miami is $10m/yr under budget for staff. That could actually be $15-30m under but $10m likely gets us above the ACC coastal schools that don’t focus on football as much as power programs.
Talent certainly matters but so does coaching especially in close games. Manny totally blew the FSU game by making lousy decisions.
How much is a perennial top 10 ranked football team worth to UM in incremental revenue? My guess would be a lot.
STORM IS RIGHT AND ANYONE THAT TRUELY UNDERSTANDS SPORTS KNOWS THAT…
STORM CAN GIVE YOU PLAYERS WINNING WITH BAD COACHES BUT NO GOOD COACHES WIN WITH BAD PLAYERS…
REALITY…
THIS IS THE COMPLETE JACKASSERY THAT HAPPENS HERE…
HE MADE NO CALLS ON 4TH DOWN THAT EFFECTED THE GAME?
THIS FROM A CLOWN THAT CALLS SOMEONE REPLAY BUT DOESN’T ACTUALLY WATCH THE GAMES…