Welcome to the Friday Feedback, which is still incredulous that it’s about to say what it’s about to say: I’m going to watch a Dana Holgorsen football game and am most interested in how his team will run the football.

It’s crazy, really. I just don’t have a lot if interest, during this particular edition of spring football, about the quarterback competition, and you should ascertain something from the battle by knowing this: I’m told Clint Trickett will be at the game on an official visit. (Apparently Bruce Feldman knows this, too. He put this out as I was F Doubling.)

If he picks WVU over USF, he’s eligible to play/start this fall. And then next fall. That must be an interesting development for William Crest, who we learned this morning committed last week to the Class of 2014. I think it’s fair to say the quarterback situation at WVU is of interest.

But WVU has three running backs it really likes and a fourth it’s getting to know. Jacky Marcellus might be a slot receiver, or he might be a running back, but he arrives in the summer. The other four players are already on campus this spring. That’s where the Mountaineers have their greatest quality and quantity of depth on offense. I didn’t see that coming.

Here’s the twist that grabs me by the ear. You have an offensive line coach hired away from Stanford, which would seem to be allergic to WVU’s offense, but Ron Crook is nevertheless meshing with the Mountaineers and making them better.

“They’re just tough and they grind you down,” Dawson said. “I think there are certain segments of the game where if you don’t have that toughness, you’re going to get beat. Short-yardage situations, when you’re running the clock out at the end of the game, you’ve just got to be able to run the ball effectively when the other team knows you’re going to run the football.”

Dawson said that’s been “one of our biggest problems for a while,” and that Crook’s addition should help fix that. If the first 13 practices were any indication, the players seem to believe the change will happen in 2013.

“Some of it is just downhill, try-and-stop-us football, like how it used to be,” junior Andrew Buie said. “I feel that’s how your running game should be. You shouldn’t have to disguise it, make it for the whole world where, ‘We may be throwing the ball, but we may run the ball.’

“It’s, ‘All right, we’re going to run the ball. Line up and stop it.’ I feel like that’s the mentality we’re starting to take on.”

But wait! Set your eyes on pass-catchers, too. Specifically, K.J. Myers, who is basically, and almost by default, WVU’s most accomplished outside receiver. He’s also the Most Interesting Mountaineer in the Locker Room.

“You know how people are judged or stereotyped often due to physicality or somebody’s ethnicity or something like that with them?” Myers said. “Growing up, I always wanted to break that. I wanted to be with this group of people and be able to do this and be with that group of friends and be able to do that. I never wanted to limit myself to anything.”

It can be a lot to juggle, but that’s fine. Myers likes to juggle. And draw. And sing. He is a curious, self-cultured sophomore with hobbies based on an array of interests and inspired by interactions with a range of people.

“I’m fairly different,” he said.

He is someone who taught himself to play chess when he was in high school because he’d heard it was hard and he wanted to test his intelligence; someone who played a drum set and carried the quads for the band at pep rallies and during basketball games when he was in middle school; someone who has an interesting adoration.

“I grew up skate boarding,” he said. “That was my passion. I just loved it. I still love it. Skate boarding is fun. It’s free. You can go out every day and just skate and free your mind.”

Onto the Feedback. As always, comments appear as posted. And here’s an additional reminder about this afternoon’s book signing from 4-6 p.m. at the Fishbowl in Suncrest. Buy a book ($20) get a Fishbowl draft ($0). People are already gathered outside …

Dave said:

a $20 draft and a book? You need to hook up with Oliver Luck.a $20 draft and a book? You need to hook up with Oliver Luck.

Dave!

Peter Griffin said:

Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh …. Wonderlic.

Shallow and pedantic. 

Spatial Angel said:

I predict the final score of Tavon’s career…

Tavon Austin-70

Wonderlic-33

I hadn’t realized how much I missed that meme.

Morris Claiborne said:

They say it’s an IQ test. I came to the combine for football. I looked at the test, and wasn’t any questions about football. I didn’t see no point in the test. I’m not in school anymore. I didn’t complete it.

Pretty good at football, though I wonder if WVU would have tackled him in 2012 if it knew his IQ.

The 25314 said:

Tavon might be the stupidest SOB alive…but he sure is fast.

Aaron Dobson is a very promising receiver prospect. He’s generally regarded as a second- or third-round pick. What if he got, like, a 47 on his Wonderlic? Would he be a first-round pick now? I doubt that.

Kevin said:

Reports like this make me wonder how seriously the athletes take these tests and how seriously the people that make the draft decisions actually take the scores. Looks like it is a lot like your Junior High/Middle school GPA. The student may care and somebody may make an assumption about the student based on it, but doesn’t matter much beyond that. Either way, you’ll be given a chance to prove yourself later in life in your profession.

I also wonder if we will start to see athletes refuse to take the test because there doesn’t seem to be much good that comes from it, but you can get a bad score and deal with what comes with that.

Well, they’re actually doing more testing these days. And can you imagine how the screaming heads would handle the story the first time a player or his agent decided not to take the test? What I find odd is that people who aren’t at the combine aren’t tested and thus they indirectly benefit. You’re still drafting those players, often in the first round. Is their intelligence not questioned?

Dave said:

Will the timetable be tighter the second time around? How different can the re-bids be from the originals? It’s not like WVRC is suddenly more equipped to also deal with the stadium advertisements, coaches TV shows, game TV broadcasts, etc.

I know it won’t, but, logically, it seems this would be a pretty simple and quick process after the long, drawn out dress rehearsal.

Bingo. It’s pouring out the overcooked pasta and boiling a new batch.

Jeff in Akron said:

I have to believe that Luck has enough clout, as long as the IMG deal is for the same basic money per year, IMG still gets the deal. The length of the deal may change, or reduce, okay. After all, the violations were procedure in nature. So, Jim is now in charge of oversight, the same guy that didn’t interview any other individuals for the AD position.

I could have it wrong, if IMG doesn’t get the contract and the money is not the same as IMG bid the AG will get another call to assist, again. To me, while it may seem on the surface to benefit the companies that lost the bid, it actually sets a finite number for the bidding to start. In the end, it could actually work in favor of WVU and it’s athletic department. A company that lost in the initial bid could sweeten their bid in order to win this time. Of course, the opposite is true too, IMG could decide they bid too much. Based on comparative deals (Kansas $7.3-mill, Ok. St. $6.4-mill – 2010 numbers), I don’t believe that will happen.

If this was actually an endgame to hurt WVU, it seems poorly thought out, though I’ve been wrong before.

IMG College seems pretty confident it will again get the bid. The danger here is that the runner-up, say, a Learfield, has seem the “winning” numbers bandied about now. The runner-up offer can now be adjusted to meet the exceed the IMG numbers that have been publicized. That might complicate things. As for IMG’s past and future offers, remember that $9 million figure is a rough average, meaning it would be higher in years 10, 11 and 12 than in the first three years.

hershey112 said:

So what if these less qualified people come in and totally botch this decision? What happens then?

I write the greatest column of all time.

WVMANIAC said:

So I guess the headline is that Oliver Luck isn’t serving on the committee for Tier 3, I don’t think that as big of news as Mr. Parsons and Mr. Szul not serving on that committee either……

Which tells me that WV Radio will rebid and still lose……

Correct, but one name is bigger than the others. And it doesn’t reconcile a possible rift in the athletic department. Also, WVRC said previously it would not re-bid.

rekterx said:

But is anyone actually embarassed by all of this? Does anyone think that Jim Clements read Ollie the riot act after all of this? Will somebody’s head roll?

My guess is that John Raese actually believes that he has embarassed some people and that he is pleased with himself.

Will the Domnion Post have a big article about how WVU didn’t even need to go through this process, efficiently and appropriately, or ineffeciently and awkwardly, to award this contract to IMG? In other words, despite whatever merit there may have been in some of John Raese’s histrionics, will the DP clearly report that Raeses rant was much ado about nothing.

I think I know who should be embarassed.

I’m not going to speak for the Dominion Post or Mr. Raese, but I’m trying to answer all the questions myself. Unfortunately, Procurement is not interested in answering them and said all of my questions can be answered by the attorney general’s report. I totally disagree with that, but that should answer your question about embarrassment. WVU’s university relations department has been very helpful. I will say that. But saying, on Procurement’s behalf, “Hey, it happened,” is not a sufficient answer when asked how and why this happened.

The 25314 said:

Is a committee vote required? Luck should be able to make the decision for his deptartment as long as its vetted by the BOG and President. Why would his subordinates even have a vote equal to his?

I’m trying to answer that, because every manual I’ve read doesn’t mention anything. The answer given to me is that there’s no real guideline, which opens a whole other bag of nails.

JP said:

This whole kerfuffle could be headlined Much Ado About Nothing

Disagree on that. I won’t go to dramatic extremes, but there is some ado about some things here.

SheikYbuti said:

A Comedy of Errors

More accurate, but I don’t think that should apply to everyone, either.

RFLeer said:

Two things. One, John Raese comes out of this looking like a self-serving jerk, digging up muck and using his family’s business to throw the dirt on WVU because he probably feels like they are giving him the shaft. Some people probably agree with him, particularly the faction that doesn’t like Luck for one of a growing list of reasons. But I suspect most WVU fans feel like he is just upset because he doesn’t have one of his business’s most valuable assets anymore.

Second, if WVU just does what it was supposed to do during an already drawn out process, his claims would not have been made, or would have been meritless. At the end of the day, WVU has a duty to follow the process it chooses to use for this type of contract, and it should be able to do so without these problems, particularly with regard to the recusals. Payne and Alvarez had a clear conflict of interest, and even if they didn’t do anything intentionally wrong, as BOG members they need to be smarter and avoid this type of stuff when they can/need to.

Bottom line, yes Raese is probably being a self-serving crybaby when he complains about the process in the DP, WV Radio, etc. But, WVU isn’t free of fault in any sense, and if people blow off these type of procedural issues in this case, they have no right to complain if a similar flawed process leads to blatantly awful results or more serious conflict of interest. issues.

Your words, but I can agree with the premise. Said this from the beginning, but Raese’s claims shouldn’t have been dismissed simply because of his competing interest. And in the end, he was spot on with many claims. Debate the tactics all you want, but it’s hard to debate the principles.   

Pepe Lopez said:

Muy bien Miguel. Donde esta la verdad? Donde esta el bano? Yo quiero tequila!

Did you steal the fishbowl or did they let you borrow one?

I’ll address these in order. The truth is out there. The bathroom is around the corner. You won’t find tequila in my office. And the Fishbowl mug was a wedding gift from the deputy mayor. I’m serious about all of this.

SheikYbuti said:

¡El juego de la primavera se televisará!

Si, es en quatro canales de West Virginia Media.

rekterx said:

I watched this last night and I’m still trying to decide between drinking a beer or remodeling the house.

I was not aware these were mutually exclusive. Might explain the orange walls.

wvu304 said:

Week after week, as the camera drifts further to the right, we will eventually see Mike’s left eye, and 18 more bottles of booze.

And the studio audience.

Dann White said:

Mike,

I am impressed. I have never really seen a a full photo of your face before, let alone hear you speak before. I’ll reserve comment on the face, but the monologue was great. I sincerely believe you have a lot more potential as a talking head than the Syracuse-taught Mr. Carridi did we he arrived on the scene, and he is (was) no slouch.
I used to have a number of friends I spoke with on the phone quite often , but rarely saw in person. I used to look forward to visiting their home – just so I would have some perspective of what their surroundings were while we spoke. From now on when I read the blog, I will picture all of the drinking paraphernalia over your left shoulder, and hear the crisp self-assured voice delivering the latest on WVU sports.
When you finally secure that spot on ESPN, I will proudly tell everyone that I knew you when (sort-of) and counted you among my friends. I do, by the way, way to go on the Video Blog.

Dann

/ Ctrl + c
// Ctrl + V
/// Wmails Daily Mail global list

I love you, Doug! said:

Mike: Do we get the feeling Josh Lambert is a significant upgrade from Bitancurt? (Yeah, yeah, I know…*everyone* would be an upgrade. But dude won a couple important games, though. Just inconsistent.)

I can’t answer that without guessing. I do think he has a longer leg and elevates the ball better, but what, on April 19, does that mean?

Mack said:

I can’t believe a web site (even if it were a WVU fan blog) kept track of Keaton Miles freshman and sophomore minutes.

I can’t believe you can’t believe that. I’d tell you it’s available for every player on every team, but I worry about your well-being.

overtheSEC said:

Yeah, Mack. WVU resources/stats/breakdowns are readily available on the internet. Here’s an infographic on the ball handling play of Browne and Hinds this season. http://i.imgur.com/HH7Hc.gif

Enjoy the weekend!