Vanderbilt Commodores 2024 Season Preview | Clark Lea Hot Seat, New QB Diego Pavia & more!

all right finishing up our SEC preview with the one you've all been waiting for the Vanderbilt commodor heading into 2024 their fourth season under Clark Lee uh head coach rough year man they went 2- 10 uh in 2023 they actually in 2022 looked pretty positive right they went five- seven that last year but 2- 10 was the worst record in the power five uh in 2023 so been a rough stretch for vandero they haven't made a bowl game in Five Seasons now uh they have a tough schedule and many glaring holes in this roster I will say we'll get into the St in your breakdown of him they have a dynamic new quarterback in Diego Pavia from New Mexico State he had 1, 158 rushing yards which was fourth in the country for quarterbacks as well the weakness of this team is basically everything else there is not a lot else to be now I will say they have uh their linebacker unit in secondary basically one guy is solid and and we'll talk about him in a little bit too but man there there's a reason why they were the worst Power five team last year at 2- 10 the sixth worst offense in the power five second worst defense in the power five in terms of EPA per play they need Improvement everywhere on this team so D I mentioned before Diego Pavia exciting new quarterback they have uh from New Mexico State tell me more about him and what the Commodore fans should be expecting out of him in 2024 yeah I think he's he's a true dual threat and he's a leader like you watch his style of play even though he's only six foot and 200 pounds the way he runs the ball and as tough as he runs the ball you know he was fourth among all FBS quarterbacks in rushing yards last year and he broke 48 46 excuse me missed tackles last year um look he got New Mexico State their first 10- win season since 1960 this guy's just tough as Nails um nearly 3,000 passing yards to go along with over a thousand rushing yards and you watch him and you go he's a really good athlete for his size he's really tough for his size I believe he was a 96 percentile a athlete it's just you know they're going to be a team that run and stop the run but it is going to start with Pavia and Pavia the biggest reason that New Mexico state had such a good year last year 10 wins Conference USA title game appearance big upset at Auburn that was big time I mean if you base this offense around his rushing ability you stand a chance and he doesn't have the biggest arm in the world but he can threaten you up the seams coming off of play action and things like that so they're going to stand a chance and I think another guy that he's going to be throwing to another guy that comes with him from New Mexico state is Eli Stowers okay interesting player a former fourstar quarterback recruit to Texas A&M transfers to New Mexico state gets beat out for the quarterback job by Pavia moves to tight end this year and actually has a pretty good year he had a 71.8 grade and a 76.4 receiving grade that was top 20 among all tight ends last year and because of his kind of athleticism and former abilities as a dual threat quarterback and and it translates Max he was a 100 percentile athlete last year he broke the scale so if there's two guys that you're going to base this offense off of it's that's the former agie from New Mexico State it's Diego Pavia and it's Eli Stow who I think could become an interesting name at tight end next year not a guy we've talked about a lot but he could move up the boards if that athleticism stays in the SEC and that's real absolutely man I'm a huge fan of both of them I'm excited to see what they can do for that offense but their start player is easily CJ Taylor the linebacker safety whatever you want to call him man um He's listed as a linebacker in our great in our database because he played mostly in the Box for them but he 61 2011 PBS he's basically a safety for this defense whatever you want to call him though man he is a 84.9 coverage grade over the last two years which is third among SEC safeties he had 10 pressures which were the most among SEC safeties uh as well in 2023 uh he was third among SEC safeties with a 61 or excuse me third among SEC linebackers with a 61.8 passer rating allowed um also had a couple of interceptions despite missing three games of the leg injury as well so he actually was one of our top 10 linebackers in the country heading into 2024 which is saying a lot for a Vanderbilt player I like CJ Taylor a lot man it's kind of a hybrid linebacker safety for them um on that defense and I think he's pretty clearly Vanderbilt's best player they have uh heading into 2024 all right bottom line time now Dawn their win total for FanDuel is two and a half because they went 2 and 10 last year what should we expect out of Vander this year is there anything to be optimistic about or you think they're still going to be one of the worst teams in the power power four now it's tough I mean it's always tough when you're playing towards the bottom of that conference when and there's just so many every week you know they see the brunt of The Gauntlet and Georgia and the tennesses of the world and teams like that um I mean it's tough obviously they're going to be underdogs when it comes to making a bowl game now again I think Pavia is a leader they can get behind for sure and if he can if he can kind of not take too many hits and things like that he's got a tough run style but this is you know the the SEC is a little bit different than Conference USA right I mean look it's obviously hard I think the formula is similar to what we talked about with Arkansas run the ball stop the run do that for as long as you can in these games and you keep yourself in it um but yeah that's that's what it's going to be based on is what they've brought in in the transfer portal to try to add some talent in there yeah it's tough I think I think Clark Lee is is really on the hot seat right now obviously has not gone well for him at Vanderbilt 9 and 27 record uh in his three years there but um yeah I think is if they go five and seven that might be good enough to stay off you know another year but other than that man I think it could be a rough year for them next year and they they have a tough schedule right they always play a tough schedule in the SEC but they got Virginia Tech as one of their non-con games this year that's a really really good team they're playing uh they got Missouri they got Alabama they got Kentucky they got Texas they got uh LSU they got Tennessee like it's just it's going to be tough for them to make a bowl game next year I don't think a bowl game is really realistic for them um but they have a chance to uh to win more than two games I think for sure I think they play alorn State they play play Georgia State they play ball state that those are three games they could win next year and there's there's other there's other SEC teams that they could potentially beat as well um but uh yeah I just with Clark Lee very firmly on the hot seat what what would you say is the minimum record for him to keep his job right now do you think I mean I mean you would like to see you'd probably like to see five four would be I mean you want to see progress right A lot of it is about progress as a program but you'd probably like to see something that that surprises you a little bit right and I think five wins probably implies that there's two upsets in there and you you would like to see that but a lot of it you know when it comes to teams like that it's an eye test and a progress thing as a whole but it's always it's always a tough situation playing end coaching there yeah it really is so it's tough to win a vandero and obviously they've struggled there in recent years but that's what we got for our preview of the Vanderbilt commodor and we wrap up our preview of the Southeastern Conference again we're doing this for every single one of the power four conferences in addition to Notre Dame Oregon State and Washington State we didn't forget about those guys either and and also some group of five stuff don't don't don't worry about that either so we'll do some of that too but subscribe to the channel we got plenty plenty more coming 56 more in total uh that we're doing actually 54 more in total we're doing uh for the 2024 colge ball season so make sure you subscribe to the channel so you don't miss any single one of them [Music]