With one year under his belt, Brent Pry enters his second season as the head whistle in Blacksburg with plenty of pressure on his shoulders.

Eight losses and a bowl-less December later, there’s no doubt that the honeymoon period is over for Pry and his staff. Virginia Tech needs to generate some positive results in 2023, and that process began this winter.

Pry made a flurry of roster moves to try and fill holes on his roster that were already there, plus some extras that showed up after the season. He spent much of his time on one position in particular, but let’s take a holistic approach and examine each of the position groups on offense.

Earlier this offseason, the Nationals were caught in the middle of a contract dispute with veteran center fielder Victor Robles. There was an impassioned debate within the fan community regarding whether there was any logical reason to keep Robles.

Although I was in favor of retaining him at an affordable rate (which Washington ended up doing), the larger point – no pun intended – is that it won’t matter after the upcoming season.

Over the weekend, Jessica Camerato of MLB.com interviewed minor league outfield prospects James Wood and Robert Hassell III. Hassell is likely to cement himself in the big leagues beginning in 2024, if not sooner, and Wood has been discussed as a future face of the franchise.

Up to now, Both Hassell and Wood have spent their entire professional careers in center field. That in itself is a luxury, but they’re far from the only minor leaguers of note who can stake that claim.

Wednesday was a big day for teams across Major League Baseball, including the Washington Nationals, as pitchers and catchers reported to camps in Florida and Arizona, and Spring Training rosters were revealed.

Many of the names the Nationals have included and omitted from their spring roster raise some eyebrows – as does some devastating news about star pitcher Stephen Strasburg.

Refresher on the 40-Man Roster

Back in December, the MLB conducted the Rule 5 draft, which ultimately meant two things: a handful of minor leagues were added to the big league roster, and the Nationals drafted a player (right-handed pitcher Thad Ward) from another organization.

All of those players, including Ward, will automatically be invited to big league Spring Training. Unless they’re recovering from a significant injury, all 40 of those players should be reporting to West Palm Beach, FL shortly – if they haven’t already.

I swear that I’ve been here before. In fact, I know I have.

On Jan. 24 of last year, I penned a column booking the unofficial end of Virginia Tech’s basketball season. Virginia Tech had just lost to ACC doormat Boston College in the sleepy confines of Chestnut Hill and at 10-8 overall with just two ACC wins, the Hokies were dead in the water.

We know how that turned out.

But now that Virginia Tech is in a similar situation, do I feel differently about the Hokies’ ability to get this thing turned around?

Sadly, I do not.

The Hokies’ maddening defeat to Boston College — why is it always these guys? — on Wednesday night came at a crushing time. Fresh off an upset win over the top-10 Cavaliers, Virginia Tech should’ve rolled back into Cassell Coliseum and blown the doors off a Golden Eagles’ team that is still below .500 on the season.

Instead, Virginia Tech shot just 41.9 percent from the floor, 31.3 percent from behind the arc and missed seven free throws. Tech’s defense was just as subpar, as Boston College shot nearly 50 percent from the floor and made half of their three-pointers.

Many aspects of Major League Baseball are archaic.

It took a pandemic for the league to realize that fans enjoy teams scoring more runs, as opposed to pitchers trying to hit.

Moving players to where batters hit the ball more frequently is considered “new-age thinking” — and as soon as it began to impede the fabric of the beloved game, the league outlawed it.

So what’s this whole realignment thing about? How could a sport so deeply rooted in tradition rid itself of the rivalries that led to its popularity? And why are the hometown Washington Nationals thrown into this seemingly patchworked Mid-Atlantic division?

Imagine being a sportswriter at Monday night’s National Championship, struggling to come up with a unique angle to Georgia’s dismantling of Texas Christian in front of a national audience.

There’s really only one angle, and that’s Georgia is now the premier college football program in the country? Right?

I’m not here to argue that point, but what I took away Monday night is just how wide the talent gap is between the haves and the have-nots. In case it wasn’t clear to us before, it should be clear now — nobody beats the top programs in the country except for themselves.

Immediately after kickoff on Monday night, Texas Christian looked outmatched. The Horned Frogs were too slow, too weak and not talented enough. Georgia was too much for them in every phase of the game.

And that’s frustrating, because Texas Christian carried more than the Hypnotoad banner into that game. They were representing the little guy.

I made the mistake of flying with Southwest Airlines to see family the day after Christmas.

It nipped me in the bud to historic proportions. Nearly 70 percent of their flights were cancelled that day, and lines to collect baggage from those cancelled flights were hours long.

Fortunately, my flight was cancelled quickly enough for it to be spat straight back out. In no more than an hour, my family’s flight from DC to Providence was pushed from 11:05 am to 11:35, to 12:45 and then canceled - moments before we tried to order an overpriced meal outside our terminal.

Naturally, my method of coping was to try comparing my experience with Southwest to some other relevant component of my life.

Since I don’t feel that negativity about my job, my mind quickly shifted to sports.

As bad of a football season as Virginia Tech had in 2022, it at least ended with a victory.

Harken back to a few weeks ago when the Hokies upset future Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze and the Liberty Flames in Lynchburg. The upset wasn’t historic, but it at least felt meaningful at the time.

With the Commonwealth Clash canceled and no bowl game to look forward to, however, Tech has moved on from 2022 already. Players have entered the portal and are pursuing other opportunities while the Hokies eagerly look for young men to take their spots.

It’s almost like the win didn’t matter, which is a shame.

But before burying this dreadful season in a shallow, unmarked grave in the swamps of Back Bay, I think it’s appropriate to take a step back and take inventory of Virginia Tech’s 2022 season with an eye toward the future.

On a morning when I thought we’d be getting ready to watch Virginia and Virginia Tech play football, I find myself instead thinking of a time back in 2007.

It was a day when the television trucks had finally left Blacksburg after round-the-clock coverage of the shootings on the Virginia Tech campus. The dead had been buried. The memorials had been planned. The who, what, when and where’s of the situation had been fleshed out.

No one, however, ever answered the why. And because of that, as people were saying it’s time to move on and start healing, many of us didn’t.

Those next couple of months, I recall, is when it really got tough. The lives of both young and old were gone, including the shooter. The warning signs that went unheeded were identified. Each day bought more information, but all the data did was add to the grief and recognition that this was a senseless tragedy that could have possibly been averted.

I found myself postponing chances on several occasions to go back to the campus after that. Visiting Virginia Tech for decades had been like going to visit an old friend. The times were always fun, the memories were warm, and it reminded me of younger days when you could have fun in the safety of the cocoon of a college campus, far, far away from the pressures of going to work, paying a mortgage and being an adult.

In case you hadn’t realized it, the Washington Nationals are a rebuilding franchise.

As a result, they’ve made roster moves over the last couple days to free up roster space for younger players as during next month’s Winter Meetings, the MLB will conduct its Rule 5 draft.

The Nationals will have the No. 1 pick.

Usually an annual tradition, the Rule 5 draft was skipped last season amidst the league’s labor negotiations – the same travesty that resulted in a condensed Spring Training and late start to the regular season. Since the Nationals haven’t selected a player in the Rule 5 draft since 2010 (likely a result of them being playoff contenders for most of the time since, so every roster space was precious), perhaps a crash course on what the Rule 5 draft is might be in order.

Virginia Tech’s loss to the Yellow Jackets last Saturday was emotional for me.

As it turned out, I wasn’t the only one.

As I lamented another deflating defeat, I stayed in the stands and tried to come to terms with what just happened. Virginia Tech had blown another two-score lead and for the second consecutive week, the Hokies lost by a single point.

I was surprisingly shocked. I never thought Virginia Tech would fall to 2-7 in my lifetime.

Also seemingly stunned was sixth-year defensive end TyJuan Garbutt. He sat on the ground on the sideline after the game, watching Georgia Tech celebrate a come-from-behind win. Garbutt looked exhausted in every possible way — physically, mentally and emotionally. People on the sideline did their best to lift him up, but Garbutt had reached the end of his rope.

Fourth-year player Josh Fuga wasn’t far from Garbutt, except Fuga’s emotions ranged from angry to inconsolable. Multiple people tended to Fuga, but the emotions flowed nonetheless.