National Championships - 8
Conference Championships - 37
Overall Record - 1096-208
Winning Pct - .840
Playoff Record - 87-38 .696
Bowl Record - 19-8 .704
4 Current Teams - Virginia (Rockne), William and Mary (Bryant), Tennessee (Stagg), and Georgia (Warner)
The Man:
Lou: Let�s start off with a couple of really easy questions: Name? Age?
Andynomore: Andy Boynton, 27
Lou: Where are you from/where do you live now?
Andy: I was born in Charleston WV, lived in Houston Texas until I was ten, and I've been around Richmond VA for the rest of the time.
Lou: Married, single, kids?
Andy: I've got a girlfriend
Lou: What do you do for work?
Andy: I work as a research and development chemist for an industrial water treatment company.
Lou: Where did you go to school?
Andy: The College of William and Mary.
Lou: Moment (or moments) that you think best typify your generation?
Andy: My generation eh? I don't feel all that attached to a generation, but I'd say 9-11 is the defining moment for most people in the past twenty years.
Lou: You know, it is probably better if we stay away from anything remotely political. Let's get back to you. What are some of your favorite Non-WiS related activities?
Andy: I love listening to music, reading, and watching movies.
Lou: Favorite Band? Book? Movie?
Andy: Favorite anything for me is really hard. Recently I've listened to a lot of old Failure and new stuff from the Shins. Favorite movie of this year that no one saw, A Scanner Darkly. I've read a lot of books recently. I like Philip K Dick a lot (thus, A Scanner Darkly) and I recently finished the most incredible science fiction/fantasy novels I've picked up in a long time; The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe.
Lou: Ok, so I understand in having things labeled as "favorite," but for lack of a better term, just take it as things you have really liked recently or are memorable for you. How about video games? Current, past or both.
Andy: I just got Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess. I've been a fan of that franchise since the SNES game. Resident Evil 1 & 4 for the gamecube, various Mario Kart games. Basically, I'm enjoying my new Wii and don't care nearly as much about paying 4 or 500 bucks like most gamers.
Lou: How about some of your favorite foods?
Andy: That's an interesting question. I'm a picky eater, but the things I do like, I love. I love chocolate, coffee, and bourbon. I usually drink about a liter of coffee daily, except on the weekends. I ate Thai on new years eve and enjoy grilling a lot.
Lou: Favorite sports figures?
Andy: Tom Glavine. LT, for helping me dominate my fantasy football league this year. Peyton Manning, since day one in Knoxville. Hakeem the Dream, when I was 6 and he was Akeem.
Lou: What do you think of Glavine on the Mets?
Andy: I think it really sucks. I was hoping he would return to the Braves this year but the team is cash strapped and didn't seem to make a formal offer. It's like the Braves are playing HBD with an 80 million dollar payroll. I don't really blame them for avoiding spending on this years crappy free agents, but at the same time staying pat is not the way to go either.
Lou: I am a life-long Cubs fan, believe me I understand the over-spending. How about your favorite sports teams?
Andy: Atlanta Braves. Washington Hogs (wish they would just change their name). Houston Astros.
Lou: Last year was a mess, can the Braves pull it back together this season?
Andy: I doubt the Braves will pull it back together this year. Releasing Giles was silly and if they deal LaRoche that will end up badly as well. Every Braves fan should take this summer to say goodbye to Andruw. He'll get huge money next season.
Lou: Why do you wish that Washington would change their names to Hogs?
Andy: I think Redskins is a blatantly racist name. I do have misgivings about the name Braves as well, but less so. The Tribe, less than that. I try to be consistent, even if it doesn't work.
Lou: Back to memorable favorites: sports moment (non-WiS related)?
Andy: Game six of the 1995 World Series. Glavine was amazing. Tee Martin to Peerless Price, the year after Peyton graduated.
Lou: You have mentioned Tennessee a couple of times, other than Manning, what connections to UT do you have?
Andy: My dad got his graduate degree from UT and his doctorate from UGA. I grew up watching SEC football, though I prefer UT.
Lou: How did you find out about the WIS website?
Andy: Bill Simmons, same as so many people. Now I think he's just a caricature of himself.
Lou: How did you come up with your user name?
Andy: I couldn't think of anything better. I'm a fan of the band Faith No More and when I needed a hotmail account or something I just took out faith and put my name there.
The Coach:
Lou: Do you play any other WIS games? Which ones?
Andy: I love HBD, and have played sim baseball a lot. I used to play frequently in the sim baseball GM leagues, so HBD was a natural for me.
Lou: Do you have any other WIS IDs that you use?
Andy: I have one in storage "argh", but I don't use it anymore.
Lou: What are your most memorable GD moments?
Andy: Coming back on cravedogg to win the Stagg D-IAA NC with the College of William and Mary. I was shocked when I saw the outcome. 19-0 for your alma mater is a great feeling. Two NC in Stagg with UT is pretty sweet as well.
Lou: To help out new users coming in or existing users moving up, what you look for when applying for new teams?
Andy: I used to look for the best team available when I was in the lower levels and starting out. The best balance of core talent as well as even recruiting classes. It's never good for me to enter my first season with more than 13 or 14 open scholarships or with two OL. Now I'm school oriented. I've been at W&M in Bryant for ten seasons or so, UT, UGA, and UVA for a while. I'm not moving until they make me.
Lou: How do you decide when it is time to move onto a new team?
Andy: I can barely remember! Actually, I usually just moved up when I could. I always liked D-IAA or D-IA the best.
Lou: How long do you keep track of your teams after you leave them?
Andy: I always take a look at my teams, though less so in D-III. I never spent much time there so I never really left a mark. It's hard to watch teams you leave behind. W&M in Stagg has really fallen on hard times, relatively speaking. The best case scenario is probably Winona State in Rockne; they've made some good playoff runs.
Lou: I agree about Winona. I was part of that dynasty after you left. When you change teams, or between the teams you already have, do you look to run all their teams the same way, or do you run each one differently?
Andy: I run them mostly the same way. I'd say I'm a very balanced coach. I always try to address my team's weakness. I always want to have the best running game, passing game, run d, pass d, etc etc. I don't think that formations matter as much as talent, so I do my best to stock my team with the best talent available.
Lou: When taking over a team for the first season, do you have any kind of plan in place? (i.e. Are you going to be there for a set number of years or look to recruit a certain way?) What would you suggest to new players taking over teams or players moving up divisions?
Andy: I don't really have plans. I have a method to my madness and certainly a method to my thinking, but I do my business intuitively rather than point by point. I've got enough experience that when I take over a new team I do the same things every time. Take a look at the talent, put in the offense I feel the most comfortable with and go from there. I never really planned to be at a team a certain amount of time, just to reach the next goal. The next goal was usually moving up. The only time I've moved on from a team that was my goal was moving from W&M to D-IA. Both times I've left williamsburg after I've made it to the NC game.
I suggest the same thing to people when they take over new teams or move up divisions; learn the area you're recruiting in, the people you're recruiting around, and the division's style. D-IA is completely different from the lower divisions. D-IAA is as dangerous as D-IA. You've got to look around you in the division and be aware of the D-IA teams. I always try to keep my eyes open and cover my bases. So many people complain when changes come or coaches take advantage of them. I think you should expect it.
Lou: I think we have all heard these complaints. Once the recruits arrive "on-campus," what kind of split do you like to have on team vs. individual practice time?
Andy: I've gone between 100-80 to 60-120, but I find that a happy medium is usually better. The interesting thing about reading the Scott-plague chat was Scott's comment that he didn't like to apply practice to something he couldn't see. I think that one of his secrets can be found reading between those lines. Myself, I think that if you've got a veteran team with high core numbers for their division, well, team practice can make a big difference.
Lou: How do you decide what aggressiveness setting to use?
Andy: I don't change my aggressiveness settings much for defense. For offense I try to get a feel for how the other team is playing. If I'm passing a lot out of Trips and I'm not completing many balls while being aggressive, I'll move to a balanced or conservative attack based on the response of the matchup. To be honest, I don't have a great feel for aggressiveness settings. My gameplanning strategies rely a lot on creating formation mismatches and going with the best formation for the down and distance.
Lou: You have had so much success, what keeps you coming back to GD season after season?
Andy: Right now, I'm not sure! I really like the community and since 3 out of my 4 teams are in D-IA, I still get decent rewards points. I play in three tough conferences so that keeps it interesting. I also feel like D-IA requires the least time commitment for me, so that's beneficial. I'd like to continue playing until they make more updates, but I'm not sure when that will be or how long I can keep going.
Lou: I know about the tough conference. I would put our Rockne ACC up against any conference in terms of career GD wins. To finish off, I have a couple of hypothetical questions for you. You�re made GD commissioner (developer) for one day, what changes do you make?
Andy: One of the ideas I always liked was a veterans committee to test changes. I don't fault the programmers in the game like so many do, but I think experienced users could help with some of the bugs and their feelings about changes. I would add more variation in play results, which include more runs for negative yards etc. Fix the depth charts to add more positions. I know a lot of people believe the rankings or recruit distribution is tweaked often. While I have no idea if this is true or not, I would make sure incremental changes were posted to ensure transparency. I would also have better stats and better play by play annotation (effectiveness % and substitutions, fumbles, kick returns, etc etc).
One of the things I think about most in the game is how to make the results of the game more varied. How to make it so that a balanced box team could be successful or a team could run out of shotgun. I really think there are too few offensive and defensive strategies in the game besides fooling your opponent, making less mistakes while passing all the time or running all the time. I wish we had finesse teams and smash mouth teams that are slow as molasses. When you play sim baseball and they release an engine within weeks or months someone complains about cookie cutters. I feel like GD is very similar, except inverse, that new ideas become the exception and old ideas are still the rule. Anyone can feel free to contradict that thought, because it's just my gut feeling. I think one way to get different teams is to lower the recruit levels in D-IA (how many 90/90/70 Oline and Dlines do we have to see?) and give more variation in recruit types. I want to make players like possession receivers the norm rather than every guy being a stud. I can sum this up in a couple of words: maybe I should go back to D-II or D-III.
Lou: If you have to drop all your teams but one, which do you keep and why?
Andy: That's a real tough one. Probably UT in Stagg. Stagg is my most successful world and I like that group of coaches the most. UVA would be a close second, with W&M third because of the rewards issues.
Lou: Last question: One game, national championship: Who is the ONE coach you least want to face? Why?
Andy: Good question. Recently my biggest problem has been with paranoid0. We were in the same conference for eight seasons and I think I managed two or three wins the entire stretch, often playing in the CC. He's one of the top recruiters in the game and while I think I do a good job in that aspect, I'm not as good as he is. His talent advantage seemed to mitigate any skill I had in gameplanning, so I'd want to avoid Perry. I don't think I've been dominated by any of the other top coaches, though if they feel differently they can feel free to post it.
Lou: When I was starting out in GD, Andy was the coach at Winona State in Rockne, the school which I attended at the time. I site-mailed him, and he was very instrumental in helping me to better understand the workings of the game. Though that contact was brief, it helped me tremendously, not only that, but with that understanding, I have worked my way up to the ACC in Rockne, where my Georgia Tech school gets to stare up at UVA every season. So for the help and for taking the time to answer a few questions for the rest of us, thanks Andy.
