The end goal here is projected standings for each division of the SEC, but we don’t want to just jump to the finish line on the question. Instead, we’ll walk through the schedule for each team and make an educated guess as to the outcome of each game. That gives us each team’s projected record (and also any necessary head-to-head tiebreakers) from which we then determine projected division standings.
Regular readers will recognize the Expected Win Total Machine below. It doesn’t ask for wins and losses, but instead your level of confidence for a win in the form of some number out of 100. Think of it as a percentage (but don’t include a percentage symbol in your answer or the machine will complain). For instance, if you feel really good about Tennessee beating Bowling Green in the season opener, you’ll put something like 90 or 95 in the Bowling Green input field. If you feel really bad about Tennessee’s chances against Alabama, you’ll put something like 5 or 10 next to that game. When you’re finished, hit the submit button, and the machine will spit your projected win total back at you. It will also log your game-by-game entries into our system so we can come up with community numbers we’ll use for the preseason content.
We’ll compile that data into a fan expected win total and include that number in the preseason content. We’ll also convert it into expected wins and losses and use it to come up with projected records for each SEC team and standings for each division.
This is a Vols community, so we’re going to start with Tennessee just to get our feet wet. Here’s how it’s going to work:
Let’s get started. Here’s the link to the first form. We will add the other teams periodically over the next week or so.
First up is our Preseason College Football Power Rankings. We don’t usually publish these in any form, but use them primarily as a building block for much of the rest of the publication. Previews, projected records and standings, the stock watch, and other content depend to some degree on the Power Rankings.
The Power Rankings are compiled first using a formula, and then subjected to human overrides, which is where we (and you) come in.
Here’s the first draft, the formula-only results. It’s a baseline, and now it’s up to us to tell it where it’s wrong.
1
Alabama
2
Clemson
3
Oklahoma
4
Georgia
5
Ohio State
6
Texas A&M
7
Florida
8
Oregon
9
Wisconsin
10
North Carolina
11
Cincinnati
12
Notre Dame
13
Texas
14
USC
15
Iowa
16
Iowa State
17
Penn State
18
Washington
19
BYU
20
Miami (Florida)
21
Indiana
22
Arizona State
23
Utah
24
Auburn
25
Oklahoma State
26
Coastal Carolina
27
Northwestern
28
Virginia Tech
29
Michigan
30
Mississippi
31
Louisiana-Lafayette
32
Nebraska
33
Minnesota
34
UCF
35
Appalachian State
36
LSU
37
West Virginia
38
TCU
39
Louisville
40
Liberty
41
Pittsburgh
42
UCLA
43
Maryland
44
Purdue
45
SMU
46
Tennessee
47
Buffalo
48
Kentucky
49
North Carolina State
50
Arkansas
51
Memphis
52
Boise State
53
Mississippi State
54
UAB
55
Tulsa
56
Virginia
57
San Jose State
58
Tulane
59
Ball State
60
Baylor
61
Missouri
62
Stanford
63
Michigan State
64
San Diego State
65
Houston
66
Washington State
67
Colorado
68
Georgia Tech
69
Marshall
70
Kansas State
71
Western Michigan
72
Army
73
Toledo
74
Nevada
75
Troy
76
Boston College
77
California
78
Florida State
79
Georgia Southern
80
Wake Forest
81
Texas Tech
82
Oregon State
83
Air Force
84
South Carolina
85
Central Michigan
86
Ohio
87
Georgia State
88
Fresno State
89
Wyoming
90
UTSA
91
Illinois
92
Colorado State
93
Florida Atlantic
94
East Carolina
95
Western Kentucky
96
Rutgers
97
Navy
98
Arizona
99
Rice
100
Southern Mississippi
101
Duke
102
Kent State
103
Syracuse
104
Arkansas State
105
South Florida
106
Miami (Ohio)
107
Eastern Michigan
108
North Texas
109
Hawaii
110
Vanderbilt
111
Florida International
112
Temple
113
Northern Illinois
114
Kansas
115
Charlotte
116
Texas State
117
South Alabama
118
UNLV
119
Louisiana Tech
120
New Mexico
121
Middle Tennessee
122
Akron
123
Bowling Green
124
Louisiana-Monroe
125
Utah State
126
Massachusetts
127
UTEP
128
Old Dominion
129
New Mexico State
130
Connecticut
Don’t let us over-influence you, but here are some of the teams we’re thinking may be ranked too high:
Texas A&M
Florida
Oregon
Wisconsin
Texas
BYU!
Northwestern!
And here’s a list of teams that are currently looking too low to us:
Long-time readers know that our Tennessee football preseason publication has gone through manychangesoverthecourseofthe12editionsit’s been available. It’s had different names, different publishers, and different looks. It’s been on newsstands and not on newsstands. It’s been released in mid-July for the sake of accuracy and in mid-May for the sake of speed. It’s been packaged alone and with t-shirts or decals. It’s introduced four new head coaches and counting. Will Shelton and I have been involved in every edition, but that may be the lone constant (unless you’re one of those people who will point out that there are other constants, like the fact that every edition includes both words and pictures.)
It’s difficult to pinpoint exactly where and when the train jumped the tracks for Tennessee Football, but this particular period — beginning with the sudden cessation of spring practice a year ago due to the pandemic, this offseason right here right now, and the prospect of a 2021 season with so many unknowns and unknowables — has to be one of the most difficult and weirdest periods of change in the storied history of a proud Tennessee football program.
As Inky Johnson says in that video up there, change is hard at first, messy in the middle, and beautiful in the end. We just didn’t know the process was going to take so long.
A 2021 fall already branded as a Season of Change seems like the perfect time to consider mixing things up a bit ourselves. Rather than just hitting repeat on the past, we’re going to look at everything with fresh eyes this year. The timing of the release date of the preseason publication may change. Publication format and distribution — whether we continue to pre-print for newsstands or go all-in on digital — will probably change. Some of the content may change. The constant will remain so: Will and I are still going to write and publish this thing this year. We and you will find out together what that looks like.
One thing we do already know is that we want to involve you — yes, you — in the creation of the content for the preseason publication. We want your input on our power rankings, predicted records and standings, stock watch, all-conference teams, Top 25, and whatever else makes sense. We’ll be the guide because we’ve been down this road many times before and we know the pitfalls. But we’ve never walked it with you, and this year, we’d like to invite you along. We wish we would have thought of it sooner.
In this episode, Will and I tackle all things Josh Heupel: Will all that offense translate to the SEC? Do they know defense is a thing, too? Did they rush the hire? All of that, plus a look at the 2021 football schedule and a wary eye on Twitter rage.
We all want to win. And we’d like to win as fast as possible, please.
The most important word in that sentence is win. You don’t do that, nothing else will matter. But I do believe the healthiest word in that sentence is possible.
The depths of last Monday’s press conference and the looming shadow of violations made the whiplash all the more attractive when Tennessee hired Danny White. This is a great hire! Maybe he’ll get us out of this fast!
And it seems like the Vols gave that a real go. James Franklin is one of the best coaches in the country, and Tennessee seems to have made a run at him. He said no. I get how being associated, even loosely, with someone like Franklin can also raise expectations.
But the reality of who Tennessee is right now – the reality of what is possible at the moment – meant the Vols were always most likely to hire from a less proven tier.
Tennessee’s situation still feels most like exile. And not because they hired Josh Heupel today, but because of everything that led up to today, which is now everything Heupel and White (Josh and Danny?) will take responsibility for moving forward.
Patience was the best play last Monday, it swiftly faced temptation during this coaching search, and patience remains the best play today. Do not believe the prophets when they tell you this could’ve all been over soon. You do what you want, but I wouldn’t recommend spending any more energy on Lane Kiffin, other than wanting to beat him by a million when we play Ole Miss in the fall.
Heupel is what was possible, and perhaps the best of what was possible. Maybe if we don’t hire UCF’s AD, we don’t get a coach with as good a resume as his. The fact that White trusted him to work together again is good news to me. Either way, patience is still the best way out of exile. But this way, we might have a little more fun along the way.
The 2017 team went 4-0 in one possession games. The 2018 team went 1-1 – best way to win close games is not to play them – with the lone loss to LSU in the Fiesta Bowl after McKenzie Milton got hurt. The 2019 team went 1-3. But play for play, UCF improved from 2017 to 2018 to 2019.
And offensively:
Team
Year
Offensive SP+
Mizzou
2016
54th
Mizzou
2017
24th
UCF
2018
11th
UCF
2019
14th
UCF
2020
12th
Tennessee’s previous hires, you’ll remember, came to us as:
Defensive coordinator, Alabama
23-14 at Cincinnati, 27-13 Central Michigan
17-20 at Louisiana Tech
Fired after going 5-15 with the Raiders; Offensive coordinator, USC
Offensive coordinator, Tennessee
If you’d like to debate the resumes of Butch Jones vs Josh Heupel, we can. In the above SP+ piece, we noted how Jones was a proven winner but didn’t improve what he inherited. It’s impossible, of course, to improve on the number of losses Heupel inherited from Scott Frost’s final year. But in SP+, he succeeded. I’ve never met him, but I wonder if there’s a part of anyone who might’ve followed Frost after 2017 that might want to make their own name in a different situation, to prove themselves outside of that shadow. If so, the desire to prove yourself is a good fit at a program looking to do the same.
You can make a respectable argument that Josh Heupel is the most proven collegiate head coach the Vols have hired since Johnny Majors. Heupel wouldn’t have been the only candidate to check that box, and being better than everything since Phillip Fulmer isn’t the ultimate goal. But at a time when this job might be harder than ever, it is where you start. It’s what is possible today.
Words matter. Danny White is right about that. What we say, what we tweet, what we put out there…it all matters. I don’t know if Josh Heupel will win at Tennessee or not. But even and especially in exile, seek the welfare of the city.
We can do that honestly. When Jeremy Pruitt was hired, we appreciated the eye towards the ceiling and said, “In the short-term, Pruitt is as good as Tennessee and Fulmer had any right to do after this crazy set of days.” When Butch Jones was hired, we noted how he was the lowest vote getter on our fan poll but thought fans would embrace him given time (and initially, he recruited his way into a big ol’ hug by March). When Derek Dooley was hired, I wrote about basketball.
But in each case, and now this one, I still believe the way we communicate matters. The healthiest way to do that for Tennessee is to embrace the reality of our situation, what was possible in this hire today, and what this hire might make possible from here.
For now, patience. Let’s see where it goes. And whatever it’s worth, even at the end of all these years of coaching searches, I find myself excited about those possibilities.
I don’t know who Tennessee is going to hire. We’ve had enough experience at this to know there are no guarantees, which makes it less sensible to passionately push for one candidate over another. And hey, the powers that be at Tennessee – which now includes new athletic director Danny White – may have already made some moves, and eliminated half of this list or vetted guys who aren’t even on it. Either way, I’m hopeful this exercise can be of use to us in being better at evaluating what makes a good coach and, in particular, how we define success at Tennessee.
I continue to be drawn to this chart, which we used in a piece I wrote a couple days before the Texas A&M game, when the conversation on Jeremy Pruitt was only about wins and losses and not recruiting violations:
Thoughts about hiring coaches:
– Never hire a coach who didn't improve their prev. program (top left is empty) – Improving a program may not be repeatable (bottom right is as crowded as top right)
[Improvement] = [Avg. SP+ under coach] – [Program's 3-Year SP+ Avg. Before Coach] pic.twitter.com/bv6QhIhUGO
As we said a month ago: For every coach who turned mid-to-low-major success into major success – Matt Campbell, James Franklin, Dan Mullen – there are coaches who aced level one but struggled with level two: Scott Frost, Justin Fuente, Charlie Strong. You never know.
The chart also helps understand the value of Bill Connelly’s SP+ in measuring the outcome of each play instead of each game. It’s one of our favorite metrics for that reason, and the way it can help you see the differences between similar records.
For instance, you’ll notice Jeff Brohm out in front in the top right quadrant for his work at Western Kentucky and Purdue, even though Purdue is 19-25 under his watch. That’s in part because Purdue was 9-39 in Darrell Hazell’s four years preceding him. But it’s also how those games were lost and won: Hazell’s teams lost 23 games by at least three possessions in his four years. Brohm’s teams have lost seven in his four years.
Here’s the transition from Hazell to Brohm at Purdue using the chart’s metric: average SP+ of the previous coach’s final three seasons and the average SP+ of the current coach:
Jeff Brohm, Purdue
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Hazell
2014
3-9
-6.2
2015
2-10
-7.4
2016
3-9
-11
-8.2
Brohm
2017
7-6
5.8
2018
6-7
6.5
2019
4-8
-0.7
2020
2-4
6.1
4.4 (+12.6)
I’m not advocating Tennessee hire Jeff Brohm; we’ve already been down that road once. Maybe fans at Purdue are now asking if he can get them from Point B to Point C. He’s just an example of how growing a program can look.
(You’ll also note in that chart that Hugh Freeze is all over the top right quadrant, for what he’s done from Arkansas State to Ole Miss and now Liberty. Freeze is clearly a great coach on Saturdays. Of course, 27 of those wins at Ole Miss were vacated, and everything suggests Freeze will not be a candidate at Tennessee while the Vols are under their own investigation. So we’ll simply acknowledge all of that here and move on.)
'This isn’t the place to try somebody out. This time, we’re going to find proven winners.'
In interview w/ @knoxnews, UT System President Randy Boyd and Chancellor Donde Plowman outline qualities they're seeking in next AD and football coach.
Randy Boyd’s comments suggest the Vols will not hire an assistant coach (so I’m unsure what this means for viewing Kevin Steele as the safety net), and want a proven winner. One thing to note here, as we’ve had experience with it: “proven winner” should mean more than, “won games after inheriting a good situation.” We played that game with Butch Jones, who you’ll notice in the top left quadrant after following Brian Kelly twice:
Butch Jones, Cincinnati
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Kelly
2007
10-3
17.5
2008
11-3
8.6
2009
12-0
18.2
14.8
Jones
2010
4-8
2.5
2011
10-3
12.8
2012
9-3
11.1
8.8 (-6.0)
It wasn’t just that Jones was weighed down by his 4-8 transition year. The best he accomplished at Cincinnati was significantly lower than the ceiling he inherited.
What will Tennessee’s new coach inherit? Here’s the Vols in SP+ since Phillip Fulmer’s last three years:
While Jeremy Pruitt’s final season wasn’t as bad as Butch Jones’ final season, Tennessee’s inability to even approach the peaks under Jones or late-stage Fulmer stand out. And, of course, the new guy seems likely to inherit some violations and a depleted roster through the transfer portal, though those losses could be somewhat offset by gains the same way.
In short, this has been going the wrong way for a long time. Who is best suited to get it moving forward?
If we’re looking for “proven winners”, here’s a good template to start with:
Gus Malzahn, Auburn
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Chizik
2010
14-0
26.5
2011
8-5
9
2012
3-9
4.8
13.4
Malzahn
2013
12-2
25.2
2014
8-5
24.2
2015
7-6
14.6
2016
8-5
15.3
2017
10-4
24.7
2018
8-5
23.6
2019
9-4
21
2020
6-4
11.4
20 (+6.6)
Malzahn, of course, gets some of that 2010 action as well; the 2020 team also has the Citrus Bowl loss to Northwestern on its resume that Malzahn wasn’t part of. One thing I like about SP+ here: you’ll note there’s not much that separates the 2013 almost-national-champions from the 8-5 finish the following year. The latter group wrecked #15 LSU by 34 and beat #4 Ole Miss, but lost to four Top 17 teams plus #25 Texas A&M by three. Malzahn’s teams did what I think you can realistically ask for, non-Bama division in this league: be in the hunt. The Tigers went to Atlanta ranked #2 in 2017, and spent time in the Top 10 in every one of Malzahn’s seasons.
Danny White’s hiring history doesn’t necessarily suggest a retread, but Malzahn’s history at Auburn would be in line with the kind of success we’d hope for from a good fit at Tennessee.
Let’s look at Danny White’s hires:
Lance Leipold, Buffalo
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Quinn
2012
4-8
-16.3
2013
8-5
-9
2014
5-6
-7.7
-11
Leipold
2015
5-7
-10.3
2016
2-10
-18.8
2017
6-6
-11.2
2018
10-4
-1.1
2019
8-5
-2
2020
6-1
5.3
-6.4 (+4.6)
Leipold came to Buffalo from Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he won the Division III championship six times in eight years. At Buffalo, the rebuild was the long game: his second team was one of the worst in college football, and his third was no better than his first. But since then, the Bulls have entered uncharted territory for their program: a pair of division titles, their first in ten years, and a Top 25 finish this season.
Scott Frost & Josh Heupel, UCF
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
O’Leary
2013
12-1
12.3
2014
9-4
5.7
2015
0-12
-15.5
0.8
Frost
2016
6-7
-2.2
2017
13-0
14.1
6 (+5.2)
Heupel
2018
12-1
16.5
2019
10-3
19.1
2020
6-4
10.9
15.5 (+9.5)
The wild swing in 2015 throws some of the balance off here, to be sure. It’s also interesting to note that Heupel’s first team in 2018, which went undefeated before losing to LSU in the Fiesta Bowl, ranked higher than Frost’s final team in 2017, which went undefeated and beat Auburn in the Peach Bowl. And play-for-play, the best of the bunch was Heupel’s 2019 team, which lost at Pittsburgh by one, at Cincinnati by three, and at Tulsa by three. Along the way they busted up Lane Kiffin’s 11-3 FAU team 48-14, and beat Stanford 45-27. Should the Vols end up going with Heupel, we’ll make that point a lot. This year’s team beat Georgia Tech 49-21 in the opener, lost to Tulsa by eight and at Memphis by one, then lost to Cincinnati 36-33 and BYU in the bowl game.
So we know Danny White has experience with out-of-the-box hires; none of those three had previous FBS head coaching experience. We’ll see how that translates on the bigger stage in Knoxville.
On our podcast before White was hired, we started with these two names:
Coastal isn’t the best fit for this experiment: for one, they just joined the FBS level in 2017, then Chadwell took over for an interim season that same year, so there’s only Moglia’s 2018 campaign to compare it to. Nevertheless, Chadwell’s team improved not only this season, but in 2019 as well, even though the record didn’t show it. Chadwell might be the next big thing, it’s just a much smaller sample size.
Again, no guarantees once you get to level two, but these are all guys who’ve aced level one.
If the Vols go (or are forced to go) more of the obvious rebuild route:
Bill Clark, UAB
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Callaway
2011
3-9
-19.2
McGee
2012
3-9
-11.1
2013
2-10
-20.8
-17
Clark
2014
6-6
-4.2
2017
8-5
-15.5
2018
11-3
-0.3
2019
9-5
-1.4
2020
6-3
6.7
-2.9 (+14.1)
Clark, as you know, presided over the return of UAB’s program after it was shut down in 2015. His first team obviously carried some of that weight, but they were masterful in close games and earned bowl eligibility. It’s been all climb from there, including just a 24-20 loss to Louisiana, a double overtime loss to Louisiana Tech, and a 31-14 defeat to Miami this year. If the Vols hire Clark, perhaps it would help solidify the scope of this rebuild in all of our minds.
Let’s get this one on the board too:
Lane Kiffin
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Fulmer
2006
9-4
18.9
2007
10-4
20.2
2008
5-7
12
17
Kiffin
2009
7-6
16.2
16.2 (-0.8)
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Carroll
2007
11-2
32
2008
12-1
37
2009
9-4
16.6
28.5
Kiffin
2010
8-5
15.2
2011
9-4
24.7
2012
7-6
21.9
2013
10-4
22.5
21.1 (-7.4)
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Partridge
2014
3-9
-10.4
2015
3-9
-9.8
2016
3-9
-14.1
-11.4
Kiffin
2017
11-3
5.1
2018
5-7
-0.8
2019
11-3
7.5
3.9 (+15.3)
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Luke
2017
6-6
11.6
2018
5-7
9.8
2019
4-8
2.9
8.1
Kiffin
2020
5-5
8.3
8.3 (+0.2)
If Kiffin actually did return to the Vols, it would be his fifth head coaching stop, six counting the Raiders. His work at Florida Atlantic was impressive, no doubt, immediately improving the Owls and earning a second 11-3 record two years later. Pete Carroll was always going to be a tough act to follow, and that’s been true for Kiffin, Sarkisian, and Helton. The job at Ole Miss (and Tennessee) is too small a sample size to know yet: in both cases, definitely better than the previous year he inherited, but not enough data to consider it an improvement on the program overall. You’d love to have seen what he did at UT or Ole Miss in year two before entrusting your program to him.
I think Kiffin would be a good hire, but it would be foolish to consider him the only good hire, or an outright better choice than many of the names above.
Sometimes you can fall a little harder than you should for a coach just because they have power five experience. Consider:
Tom Herman, Texas
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Strong
2014
6-7
9
2015
5-7
3.7
2016
5-7
10.6
7.8
Herman
2017
7-6
10.6
2018
10-4
11.3
2019
8-5
12
2020
7-3
13.5
11.9 (+4.1)
Herman certainly had a big year in 2018. But overall, each of his teams weren’t significantly better than Charlie Strong’s first and last Texas squads. They did make small steps of progress in SP+ each year, but Herman also fell into the Butch Jones close game trap, and the best way to win close games remains not to play them. A +4 change in SP+ is similar to what Lance Leipold has at Buffalo, but the difference is how much his program has grown from year one until now. Herman’s, also similar to Jones at UT, never moved as fast as the powers that be at Texas probably felt it should have.
Finally, if the Vols go as big at head coach as they went at athletic director, here are the two names we thought would never consider this job:
Matt Campbell, Iowa State
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Rhoads
2013
3-9
-3.8
2014
2-10
-7.9
2015
3-9
-0.3
-4
Campbell
2016
3-9
0.7
2017
8-5
7.5
2018
8-5
7.9
2019
7-6
12.6
2020
9-3
18.7
9.5 (+13.5)
This is Point A to Point B to Point C. The record may have suggested treading water from year three to year four, but in 2019 Iowa State lost to #19 Iowa by one, at Baylor by two, Oklahoma State by seven, and at Oklahoma by one. This year they lost to Billy Napier’s Rajun Cajuns in the opener, 31-14…then beat Oklahoma, Texas, TCU, Baylor, lost to #6 Oklahoma State by three, and blew out the rest of the conference. They almost won the Big 12 title game, then beat Oregon by 17 in the Fiesta Bowl. Tennessee has never been as bad as where Iowa State was at the end of Paul Rhoads’ tenure, but they also haven’t been as good as Iowa State was this year since 2015, and before then not since Fulmer.
Luke Fickell, Cincinnati
Coach
Year
Record
SP+
Avg SP+
Tuberville
2014
9-4
6.9
2015
7-6
5.3
2016
4-8
-3.6
2.9
Fickell
2017
4-8
-6.4
2018
11-2
5.4
2019
11-3
9.1
2020
9-1
19.9
7 (+4.1)
Fickell’s first year did not go well. Since then, Cincinnati has been a rocket ship. This year they beat Army by two touchdowns, won 42-13 at #16 SMU, beat Memphis 49-10, and almost got Georgia in the Peach Bowl. The overall growth isn’t as strong because of where the program still was two years before he arrived, and the way he struggled in year one. But if you group 2015-17 together and compare it to 2018-20, Fickell’s average SP+ jump is 13.1, on par with the best of the other major progress you can find on our list:
Coach
Avg SP+ Jump
Napier
14.7
Clark
14.1
Campbell
13.5
Chadwell
12
Heupel
9.5
Kiffin avg.
7.3
Malzahn
6.6
Leipold
4.6
Fickell
4.1
Herman
4.1
Again, those few caveats:
Chadwell’s numbers are based on the smallest, weirdest data, with Coastal just joining FBS four years ago, and him serving as an interim that first year.
Kiffin’s numbers are the average of his four jobs; his individual numbers range from 15.3 at Florida Atlantic to -7.4 at USC, with small, incomplete improvements in one year at UT and Ole Miss.
Leipold’s progress is slowest and steadiest, and continued to gain momentum into year six.
Fickell’s numbers are weighed down by a terrible first year and Tuberville still being good two years before he left.
I have no idea who Tennessee will hire. But I do think it’s more than fair to say anyone from this list would be an upgrade, and many of them – at least in SP+ – the most “proven” winner Tennessee hired in a long time.
Joel and Will wade through the wreckage of Monday’s press conference announcing several for-cause terminations, including that of Jeremy Pruitt, and Phillip Fulmer’s retirement.
The common denominator in conversations I’ve had with friends and family today: will we have the patience for what comes next?
Is there any other way to be?
I guess that’s always been the allure of Gruden, Freeze, Pearl’s return, and other Tennessee fairy tales: the corresponding myth of the quick fix. They’ll solve it right away!
But there is no right away here, in part because we’re not sure how deep the hole will go or which athletic director is going shopping for ladders.
Back when we were only discussing firing Jeremy Pruitt for on-field results, one of the most compelling arguments for change was the idea that the realistic candidate pool might actually work in Tennessee’s favor this time. Even when you take Hugh Freeze off the table, that list of names is still only short Steve Sarkisian at this point. The Vols didn’t miss out on any of those guys because they waited too long.
The question now becomes, how many of those guys would still say yes to this job?
In looking at all the hot boards this afternoon, it’s funny how, at least for me, my first impression is still stubbornly attached to who Tennessee was more than a dozen years ago: “This looks like our basketball hot boards!” Coastal Carolina. Louisiana. Charlotte. UAB. Buffalo. Those old false narratives – we’re Tennessee, we should aim higher and pay more – hold on with surprising strength considering their age. In reality, Tennessee’s last four hires came as fired NFL coach, Louisiana Tech, Cincinnati, and assistant at Alabama. The guy before that, another chapter coming to its end today, was an assistant at Tennessee.
For instance, if Tennessee hired Billy Napier – 28-11 overall with the Rajun Cajuns and 21-4 the last two years – he’d be the most proven candidate as a collegiate head coach the Vols hired since Johnny Majors. Butch Jones was 23-14 at Cincinnati, but only after following Brian Kelly, who went 34-6. Napier followed Mark Hudspeth, whose last three years at Louisiana went 4-8, 6-7, and 5-7.
But would Billy Napier say yes to this job right now? Would Gus Malzahn or Tom Herman?
How much of what we assume to be the list – current coaches from the Sun Belt, Conference USA, and the MAC, but all of them actually more proven winners and program builders on their own merits as head coaches than anyone we’ve hired recently – would say yes to being the head coach at Tennessee in 2021?
I love a good historical comparison, but I’m not sure there is one for where Tennessee is right now.
We also know Tennessee is one of the seven teams in the “top half” of the SEC that seem capable of recruiting at a championship level, but the Vols are seventh of those seven already, trying to beat Florida/Georgia/Bama at a lesser version of their own game. The window was open for Butch Jones but his Vols couldn’t get through, and even though Jeremy Pruitt appears to have closed the gap from purely a talent standpoint, the window of opportunity is much smaller now thanks to the success of Kirby Smart and Dan Mullen in the division.
So yeah, it’s hard to win here right now. Maybe it’s harder now than ever. And it’s about to get harder.
What do we do with all that?
For now: patience. It’s the best available choice. Maybe the only one.
You’re a grown up, of course. You can do what you want. We’re ten months into a pandemic, we know good and well people don’t have to be anything, especially patient. Patience is hard.
But failing to learn it well usually ends up worse.
When the Vols lost to Arkansas, I wrote about transitioning our metaphor from wilderness to exile, assuming the Vols wouldn’t fire Jeremy Pruitt no matter what happened the rest of this season because of the pandemic. Turns out, there are things that will make them fire him, and those things make exile much more likely, which means I believe even more in what we said then: we’re going to be here for a season. The biblical sense, not the Fall 2021 sense. This is where we live right now. And a stiff neck will not get you out any faster.
In exile, you live your life. With purpose. Build houses and live in them. Increase, do not decrease. Seek the welfare of the city.
And do not listen to the prophets who tell you this will all be over soon. Do not listen when anyone tells you so-and-so is a sure thing; we should all know better by now that’s a lie. Be careful when giving your time and energies to those whose business interests are in keeping you agitated.
How do we live in exile? Purpose. Patience.
Seek the welfare of the city. Words matter. How we communicate matters. It all matters. And I think patience will matter most in the midst of this season. Patience, paradoxically, is the healthiest way out of exile.
Alabama opened as a 7-point favorite over Ohio State, and on the morning of the game, the line is now 8.5. What does the GRT Statsy Preview Machine have to say about that?
Scoring Offense and Scoring Defense for both teams
Alabama’s Scoring Offense this year: 48.2 Ohio State’s Scoring Offense this year: 43.4 Alabama’s Scoring Defense this year: 19 Ohio State’s Scoring Defense this year: 22
From the perspective of Alabama
The Ohio State scoring defense of 22 is most similar to the following prior Alabama opponents:
Texas A&M 21.7
Georgia 20
And Alabama’s offense cares not one bit: The Tide scored 52 points against Texas A&M and 41 points against Georgia, an astounding 223% of what those teams did against it entire slate of competition this season. That makes the estimated points for Alabama against Ohio State 49.1. Sheesh.
But . . . the Ohio State scoring offense of 43.4 is most similar to the following prior Alabama opponents:
Florida 39.8
Mississippi 39.2
Florida got 46 against Alabama, and Mississippi got 48, so the defense can be vulnerable. Combined, that’s 119% of normal, and it puts the estimated points for Ohio State against Alabama at 51.7. Well.
Estimated score: Alabama 49.1, Ohio State 51.7
From the perspective of Ohio State
The Alabama scoring defense of 19 is most similar to the following prior Ohio State opponents:
Clemson 20.2
Indiana 20.3
Ohio State scored 49 points against Clemson and 42 against Indiana, which is an equally-astounding 225% of normal for those teams. It puts the estimated points for Ohio State against Alabama at 42.8.
The Alabama scoring offense of 48.2 is most similar to the following prior Ohio State opponents:
Clemson 43.5
Penn State 29.8
Ohio State allowed only 28 points to Clemson and 25 to Penn State, 72% of what those teams usually did this season. That Penn State comp is actually the second-best comp, but it’s really not even close. But because it’s the (second-)best we have, we’ll use it. Estimated points for Alabama against Ohio State: 34.7.
Estimated score: Ohio State 42.8, Alabama 34.7
SPM Final Estimates
Combining the results from both perspectives, here’s what we get:
SPM Final estimated score: Alabama 41.9, Ohio State 47.3
SPM Final estimated spread: Ohio State -5.4
Difference between the SPM and the Vegas opening spread: 12.4
It’s odd for this to happen, but according to the Machine, this is a Category 3 game, meaning it feels good about that prediction. But read on.
Eyeball adjustments
Yikes, that just feels wrong, doesn’t it? I don’t think I’ll use the word “shocked,” but I was really, really surprised by that. So I ran the thing again, this time with all games as comps, rather than just the two “best” comps. In fact, I didn’t stop there; I ran the thing for 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 comps. The Machine picked Alabama in every single one of those scenarios, most by right around the Vegas opening line of 7 points. I will note, for whatever it’s worth, that it also never got above the current line of 8.5.
So the question is, is there something wrong with those two “best” comps, or is it actually on to something?
The primary difference between those two comps and all of the others is that the Alabama defense got torched, giving up 48 points to Ole Miss early in the season but also giving up 46 points to Florida late. Nobody else got over 24 points the entire season. They held Notre Dame to only 14 in the most recent game. The Irish offense averages 33 points per game.
The question then is this: Is Ohio State’s offense like Florida’s (and Ole Miss’) or Notre Dame’s? Are they going to put up points at will, or are they going to find it much more difficult to put up points tonight? I don’t feel good about a prediction either way on that question. Maybe they just get their usual output?
Based on all of that, I’m going with Alabama 45, Ohio State 42.
Other predictions from other systems
As I said earlier, Vegas had Alabama as a 7-point favorite to open. With an over/under of 76, that’s a prediction of something like Alabama 42, Ohio State 35.
According to the SP+ rankings, Bill Connelly appears to like Alabama by 4.3.
Bottom line
The Statsy Preview Machine is waving the danger flag for Alabama by pointing to potent Ole Miss and Florida offenses actually being almost able to keep up with Alabama’s own potent offense. It likes Ohio State by 5 points. I have more confidence in Alabama’s defense than that, so I think the Tide win, but I will buy in to them not covering either the opening 7-point spread or the current 8.5-point spread.
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