Mailbag 1/13

Boxers? Briefs?

Not entirely sure why I was asked this, but whatever. I'm starting to get used to answering out-there questions like this. Gives me a good laugh.

Since you're so curious, I wear either boxers or boxer-briefs.

No question, just wanted to say nice cover photo.

Thanks!

Actually I do have questions.....will we win more than 3 ACC games this season?

At this rate, probably not.

Is it baseball season yet?

Almost. It needs to start sooner though.

Any idea what Bobinski's expectations are for basketball? This season, and overall.

I know what they aren't and that's what we're doing right now. It's been pretty abysmal in our own conference. I doubt M-Bob stands for it too much longer after coming from a basketball-centric school at Xavier.

Is CBG genuinely on the hot seat?

In my opinion, yes. I also liked your follow-up to your own question, so I'll add that here below.

Gotta believe M-Bob, being a basketball guy, will want to "make his mark" on our basketball program, and especially now that football seems to be on the up-and-up, he can focus more attention to doing better things for basketball. In my mind, that may also mean getting a new coach.

CBG has pretty much been a disaster since he got here. I can't say for certain how short his leash is, but I can't imagine it's very long. He's lucky to get another season in my opinion.

Who do you see being the weekend starters for the baseball team?

I think Jonathan King and Cole Pitts will both be back in the rotation. Joining those two could be a variety of people. Ben Parr, Zac Ryan and Ben Schniederjans could all potentially be that third starter. The other two will help midweek and out of the bullpen.

Do you see any freshmen making an impact?

Definitely. The one with the best chance is Kel Johnson. His power will be a great addition to the middle of Tech's lineup. He'll be at either first or in the outfield.

Historically, what is Tech's best couple of sports?

Jabbajacket said it - All of them.

Who would be on your short list for a new coach if that's the direction?

I'm always willing to bring Bobby Cremins back, but really just as a general rule of thumb, I prefer to have the up-and-comers as head coaches. That might just be me, but whatever. Maybe it's the gambler down inside of me.

Michael White of Louisiana Tech is probably one of the guys I like the most.

Did AOT just return because he just sobered up after the Orange Bowl?

People have recovered from the drunkenness of that night?

What are your hated teams compared to hated fan base rankings?

This is an interesting question. I'll start with my most hated teams.

1. Philadelphia Phillies - Can't stand them. As a Braves fan, they are my most hated team.

2. uga - What's the good word?

3. New Orleans Saints - Can't stand them a bit. They'll make an appearance on the other list too.

4. Washington Nationals - Two words: Bryce Harper (aka the most overrated player in baseball)

5. Miami Hurricanes - People always say they're good when they're never actually that good.

And now my most hated fan bases.

1. Saints - Other than just a few that I know (including our very own Tyler Duke), most Saints fans I meet are overly obnoxious

2. Seattle Seahawks - Before a few years ago, a lot of their fans weren't even fans. They just jumped on the bandwagon and have become some of the most obnoxious.

3. Nationals - See above with the Seahawks

4. uga - I have pretty mixed feelings here. I've seen plenty on both ends of the spectrum.

5.  Hurricanes - see reasoning for Miami above

Which football season will be perhaps the best since 1990? 2015 or 2016?

I'm going to go with 2016. We should have pretty solid experience all the way around and have a chance to be really good. Plus JT as a senior will be a force to be reckoned with. Here's my way way too early look at the potential 2016 depth chart.

QB: Thomas

AB: Dennis Andrews and JJ Green, along with Qua Searcy and some of the ABs from this class

BB: Quaide, Lands-Davis, and Leggett

WR: Harland Howell and Jeune/Messick

LT: Will Bryan

LG: Shamire Devine

C: Andrew Marshall

RG: Gary Brown

RT: Trey Klock

DE: KeShun Freeman and Tyler Merriweather

DT: Kyle Cerge-Henderson, Hunt-Days, and Brentavious Glanton

LB: Tre Jackson, PJ Davis

CB: Step and Dante Wigley, also have the Austins

S: Corey Griffin, Jalen Johnson

This team will be absolutely loaded in 2016. That offensive line in and of itself is enough to scare anybody.

If Georgia Tech football and/or basketball hosted a Tinder day, how would that go?

What's the ratio of men to women at Georgia Tech again? I think it's either like seven to three or six to four. Even when you add in the sidewalk fans and alumni, that number isn't going to change a whole lot. So, there'd be a lot of guys and not nearly as many girls.

I'll let logic help you figure it out.

Which college football teams would host the most and least successful Tinder days?

I feel like it would be solely dependent upon the gender ratio of the school. Personally, I don't feel like any Tech school would host very successful ones.

As for who would be successful, Ole Miss has some very beautiful women. Pretty much any school with a large quantity of beautiful women proportioned correctly would have a successful Tinder day.

Since I have not followed much of anything on the interwebs since last year, what has been the excuse-making, alibi-giving, homer-spinning by the fans and the media over the total collapse of the SEC West in the bowl season?

For those who don't remember, the SEC West went 2-5 during the bowl season. Not only that, but those two wins came from the lowest ranking teams in the SEC West: Texas A&M and Arkansas.

So, naturally, people are going to make excuses.

The most common ones I've seen are that the team didn't want to be there for whatever reason or they thought they should be in the playoff or.....

Can we make a weekly post next year that highlights sad uga fans shown on tv?

I feel like this is something that MagnaCarterGT could have a lot of fun with. I'll let him decide if that's something he'd be interested in doing.

Is Roman Reigns a lock to win the Royal Rumble and ascend to the World Championship at Wrestlemania?

OK guys, I'm going to be honest, here. I've never really watched a lot of WWE. It's never really been my cup of tea. So instead of someone who doesn't really know what they're talking about (like the rest of this post), I asked our resident WWE expert and Fearless Leader, Joey Weaver to step in and answer this one.

Hard to say anything's a lock when dealing with a production known for rewriting entire episodes within hours of showtime. That said he does look to be the next big star in the making. As for the time frame, it's anyone's guess. This year's Wrestlemania has been long rumored to be a prime opportunity for him to ascend to the top of the business. Either way, it's really cool to see a former Georgia Tech football player achieve stardom in a non-football realm. Love you, Joe.

Thanks Joey!

EDIT: We had a late submission to the mailbag that will be added below.

As Ken Sugiura says in this article, sometimes the difference in a good season and a bad season is a handful of plays. I think many times this is the case. Every year there are close games that could go either way. If in any one year, most of these games go your way it can be a great year. Along this same line, it seemed like GT benefited from receiving the ball first in the second half in many games. Like the Orange Bowl where the game was close at half time, GT received, scored, got a stop, scored again, and all of a sudden we were up two scores. I feel like the vast majority of the games had GT receiving the ball in the second half. Was this actually the case? Did that first possession of the second half change the course of a lot of games? If so then a 50/50 coin flip might be as significant a contributor to success anything else.

I feel like it's a combination of the halftime adjustments that our coaching staff has been able to make and then being able to come out at the beginning of the second half and be able to make a play at the beginning of the second half to retake the momentum. A great example of this is in the Orange Bowl. MSU had a pretty big momentum shift with the Hail Mary pass at the end of the half. Tech got the ball to begin the second half and Synjyn Days broke off a huge touchdown run and Tech didn't really look back.

As for close games, I think it's important to realize that Tech lost their three games by a grand total of 14 points. That's why turnovers and shifts in momentum are so important.

Thanks for submitting questions everybody!