Category Archives: Football

It’s almost August, the time of year when optimism not only blooms but grows into a monster with an unquenchable thirst for blood. Everybody’s 0-0 and dreaming of wins.

Most Tennessee fans, though, if they are dreaming at all, are dreaming modest dreams of six to eight wins. But things can always change in a hurry, and all it takes is just an innocent little taste of some good news. Feed me, Seymour!

Here’s what I’m hoping to hear over the next several weeks leading up to kickoff.

Trey Smith is cleared to play

If you’re a Vols fan, you know Smith’s story, but here’s the nutshell version: Incredibly highly-touted and recruited, Smith chose Tennessee, lived up to the hype as a true freshman, and then had his career derailed by a serious medical condition. He got back on the field early last year, but was sidelined by relapse. It had to be terrible news for him, and it wasn’t good for the team, either.

This offseason, so far, is playing out like the last in that Smith is working to get back on the field, but there’s been no official word heading into fall camp whether he’ll be able to play. At SEC Media Days a couple of weeks ago, Jeremy Pruitt said that the team and Smith’s doctors were “figuring out a plan” to have him play, which sounds encouraging. But until there’s an official announcement that Smith is going to suit up and start hitting people, we’ll just have to sit and wait and dream those modest dreams.

If Smith plays, his presence will immediately improve the outlook for an offensive line that was the chokepoint for the entire offense last season. This unit should improve even if Smith can’t play, but with him, the improvement could prove quite dramatic. And that, along with a capable defensive line, could make the most difference for the team this fall.

Aubrey Solomon is ruled eligible

Speaking of the defensive line . . . Aubrey Solomon is a 6’5″, 299-pound DL who transferred to Tennessee from Michigan this offseason. A 5-star recruit and an Army All-American out of high school, Solomon played in 13 games as a true freshman at Michigan and had 4 starts and 18 tackles. Last season, he suffered a knee injury early in the season and played in only five games.

Bottom line, this guy’s good (assuming he’s healthy), and Tennessee desperately needs him, as the majority of the productivity along last year’s defensive line has walked across the aisle, diploma in hand, never to return again.

Unfortunately, Solomon’s fate is in the hands of a schizophrenic mad man. For him to play as a Volunteer this fall, the NCAA will have to rule him immediately eligible, and the body of law that constitutes the NCAA’s eligibility decisions can best be summed up as “Huh?” Maybe if he petitions for wisdom, he’ll get both wisdom and immediate eligibility. Hey, it could work.

Pruitt, at SEC Media Days, said that they’d not yet received a ruling, and as you keep your eyes peeled for a headline that says Solomon has been cleared to play this fall, don’t trust Twitter.

No injuries, medical conditions, or early retirements

Just two short years ago, Tennessee was on the cusp of becoming Injury-U. Just prior to the 2017 season, we discussed Phil Steele’s bounce-back data, which is a measure of how many starts a team loses to injury in a given year. At the time, the data showed that Tennessee had lost more starts to injury (52) than any other team in college football in 2016. Woo.

The kicker? Having a lot of injuries in a season generally means that the team does better the following year, but the Vols bucked the trend and instead put together a two-year injury dynasty, leading the nation in starts-lost-to-injury in 2017 as well. As far as I can tell, Steele isn’t compiling that data anymore, and I suspect Tennessee is the reason why.

The numbers for 2018 elude me, but just going from memory, I’d have to say that Tennessee wisely abdicated its injury throne last year. Yes, I know there’s been a plague of medical retirements and that the offensive line has been hit the hardest, but it did seem to be mostly better last year, didn’t it?

Regardless, some of the best news we could get this August will be in the form of no news: no news of injuries, no news of more medical conditions, no news of early retirements. This no news is good news.

Making time for Guarantano

One other important bit of news I’ll be actively looking for over the next month is word that quarterback Jarrett Guarantano will be spending more time on his feet and less time having grass stains power-washed off his vertebrae.

Guarantano was sacked on over 8% of his dropbacks last season, and 39% of his throws were made under pressure. Dude needs more time to do his job, is what I’m saying.

As David Hale says in that linked article, Guarantano was much better than most are willing to give him credit for despite suffering from acute temporal distress. Imagine what he could do with just a little more time.

The team can make time for Guarantano on two fronts. First, improvement along the offensive line would increase the actual amount of time he has to make decisions. Second, if Guarantano can improve the speed at which he makes throwing decisions, he’ll decrease the amount of time he needs to throw. I’m no math whizz, but I think that if you combine those two things, Guarantano will have more time to operate back there, and the passing game should improve. Plus, Jim Chaney is probably worth a few ticks himself.

An improved passing attack should help the run game as well by preventing defenses from reducing Tennessee’s offense to a one-dimensional, can’t-do-anything mound of unproductive activity. Balance, it’s all the rage.

So there you have it, the tasty bits of news I’m desperate to hear during fall camp.

What is it you want from Seymour?

It’s not quite August yet, but the heat has broken (for now) and the birds are singing outside my window, so it’s feeling like a good time to throw open the garage door and take the GRT Expected Win Total Machine for a spin.

For those who might be new to this, this is an alternative method of gauging your expectations for the upcoming season. Rather than just assigning Ws and Ls to games, you assign each game a confidence level as a percentage. If you’re positive the Vols will win, you give it 100%. If you’re positive they’ll lose, you give it 0%. Toss-ups hover somewhere around 50%.

We take those numbers, crunch ’em up good, and spit something back at you that we believe better approximates what you really expect the win-loss record to be this fall.

We’ll likely do this again as we get more information from fall practice, but this will give us all a pretty good benchmark heading into the season.

The GRT Expected Win Total Machine

Use the form below to submit your data and get your answer.

My results and expectations

I’m at 6.55 wins. Here’s how I feel about each game, with space between the order of the games to help show relative confidence level of each game at this point:

My preliminary thoughts about each game are below. Leave yours in the comment section.

The non-con

The Vols have a relatively easy non-conference schedule this fall. Those of you who know me know that I never get to 100% certainty, but I do have both Chattanooga and Georgia State at 95%.

UAB and BYU are both a step above the others, but I still have them at 85% and 80%, respectively.

The Big 3

Alabama, Georgia, and Florida are all likely losses this season, but in different degrees. I have Alabama at 5%, Georgia at 15%, and Florida at 30%. Offensive lines matter, y’all.

Where the season will turn

The season will turn on the games against the rest of the SEC East and Mississippi State. I currently have all of these teams as toss-ups at 50%. I had to order them for the table, so I settled on Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Mississippi State, Missouri, and Kentucky, in order of likelihood of winning. As I said last week, I think Missouri’s a better team than Kentucky this year, but that the Vols have a slightly better chance against Missouri than Kentucky due to quirks in the schedule.

What about you? What are your numbers, what’s your expected win total, and why?

If I asked you to define the off-season in one word or phrase, what would you say about the last 11 years?

2009: Swagger

Once upon a time, Lane Kiffin might have been the most anticipated act at SEC Media Days. The Vols were 5-7 the year before, but the new coach turned the volume all the way up. It wasn’t just on a dozen Saturdays in the fall; Kiffin, more than anyone, made the off-season fly by because he essentially took it away. There were no off days for Tennessee fans.

2010: Not Kiffin

And in his absence the next year, things were still really about him. Even though there was less preseason excitement for what the 2010 Vols could do on the field than just about any team in my lifetime at that point, we rallied around the new coach because he wasn’t the old coach, even if the new coach went 4-8 at Louisiana Tech the year before. Derek Dooley never made you set a couch on fire.

2011: BRAY

The Vols built their own anticipation in 2011 behind Tyler Bray’s arrival in November 2010, a 6-7 team that should’ve finished 8-5. It paid off for exactly one Saturday, a 45-23 thrashing of Butch Jones and Cincinnati. And then it got hurt. By the time the Vols amassed enough firepower to compete on the highest levels in 2012, Dooley had lost to LSU, Alabama, and Arkansas by 104 combined points and lost to Kentucky for the first time since 1984.

2012: Pressure

The 2012 Vols felt both exciting and desperate this time seven years ago. Excitement won out against NC State in the opener. Desperation was undefeated from there.

2013: Recruiting

2014: Freshmen

For Butch Jones, it seemed like his first season would generate even less interest than anything since the early 1980’s, the last time the Vols were in a funk like this. But he recruited his way out of it, forging a belief he could get Tennessee back even as the Vols went 5-7 in 2013. You got to see some of that talent in 2014, with another superb class coming in behind it. The Vols almost squandered all that excitement with a loss to Florida in the middle of a brutal schedule, but Josh Dobbs won it back in November.

2015: Are we back?

2016: We’re back!

Then we thought 2015 might be the year, and it almost was. Then we were sure 2016 would be – the only off-season with the kind of hype we were once accustomed to since Fulmer left the sideline – and it almost was. And then it really wasn’t.

2017: Last Year

And then we made enough noise talking about that to get us through the following off-season to 2017.

2018: The opposite of drama

Last year, then, after all the coaching search fiasco, was the quietest year one yet. From Dooley to Butch to Pruitt, we got another peg further from the good ol’ days, which makes it harder to believe in the next new guy. But it was still year one, and Fulmer was back in the picture. There was at least some curiosity, then two ranked wins, but six four-possession losses, and another 5-7.

2019: Quiet

Throw in one of the most talked-about basketball seasons in school history, and here we are: less than six weeks from kickoff, and all is quiet in Big Orange Country. It was quiet in Hoover too: no Vol made first, second, or third team All-SEC in the starting 22.

Now a dozen years removed from ten wins and a division title, the T on the helmet no longer gets the benefit of the doubt. These Vols, and their coach, will have to prove not just some of it, but all of it.

This fall will be my 14th season writing about the Vols, and I’m at 30+ years of going to the games. And as I type, 40 days from kickoff, this off-season carries less anticipation than any I can remember.

But I’m not convinced the quiet is a bad thing.

Since Fulmer left, how long have you felt good about things?

• The second half of 2009
• November 2010
• The first two weeks in 2011
• The first two weeks in 2012
• One game in 2013
• November 2014
• The second half of 2015
• The first half of 2016
• The first week in 2017
• Two games in 2018

The 2019 Vols don’t have to go undefeated to provide the kind of optimism that would rank quite high on that list. Can they provide a spark? Can they provide and then sustain hope? Does Pruitt have a Year Two jump in him?

The head coach has to prove himself. The same is true for this entire roster. It’s been a long time since we’ve been surprised. But surprises land best when it’s quiet.

Later today when the preseason All-SEC teams are announced, I don’t expect to see Jarrett Guarantano’s name. Tua Tagovailoa had one of the most impressive statistical seasons we’ve ever seen last year. Jake Fromm’s team is 24-5 the last two years, and he had a 30-6 touchdown-to-interception ratio. Kellen Mond seems to be in line for a huge year at Texas A&M, Kelly Bryant brings excitement from Clemson to Missouri, and there are other returning names – Joe Burrow, Jake Bentley, Felepie Franks – whose teams were more successful than Tennessee last season.

But Guarantano is not only Tennessee’s clear answer at quarterback; he’s quickly becoming the face of the program, as many at SEC Media Days have pointed out. And all of that comes with an underlying assumption: with Jim Chaney and a can’t-be-worse offensive line, this will be Guarantano’s best season yet.

That would be a pretty good result, considering in a couple of areas Guarantano is already one of the best Tennessee quarterbacks of the last 30 years.

After the win over Kentucky last season, Guarantano’s completion percentage was over 65%. He was on pace for the best season in that department since Erik Ainge completed two-thirds of his passes in 2006. But then he was knocked out of the Missouri game at 0-for-2, and went 13-of-29 at Vanderbilt to finish the season at 62.2%.

Still, for his career Guarantano trails only his secret weapon ($) in completion percentage:

Manning	62.5%
Guarantano	62.1%
Shuler	61.6%
Dobbs	61.5%
Clausen	61.0%
Kelly	60.8%
Ainge	60.6%
Worley	59.0%
Bray	58.6%
Martin	55.4%
Crompton	55.3%

(stats via Sports Reference)

Daryl Dickey is Tennessee’s overall career leader in completion percentage at 63%, but attempted only 162 passes in his career, stepping in for the injured Tony Robinson in 1985. For multi-year starters, it’s Manning, then Guarantano.

With Guarantano’s 2018 season ending on a sour note, he really arrived at this percentage without the kind of easily-recognizable great year most of these other quarterbacks had. Here’s the best single season in completion percentage for Tennessee’s multi-year starters:

Erik Ainge	2006	67.0%
Heath Shuler	1993	64.6%
Peyton Manning	1995	64.2%
Casey Clausen	2001	64.1%
Andy Kelly	1991	63.2%
Josh Dobbs	2016	63.0%
Jarrett Guarantano	2018	62.2%

And the other primary strength Guarantano already brings to the table: his accuracy includes not only completion percentage, but a lack of interceptions. Three last season, and only two in the second half of 2017. That’s five interceptions in 385 passing attempts, meaning Guarantano throws a pick on just 1.3% of his attempts. Here’s how that compares to his predecessors:

QB	ATT	INT	INT %
Guarantano	385	5	1.30%
Shuler	513	12	2.34%
Manning	1381	33	2.39%
Clausen	1270	31	2.44%
Martin	588	16	2.72%
Ainge	1210	35	2.89%
Dobbs	999	29	2.90%
Bray	922	28	3.04%
Crompton	629	22	3.50%
Kelly	846	38	4.49%

Obviously, there’s more to playing quarterback than limiting incompletions and interceptions. Manning’s career highs for both came in his sophomore season, but he increased his yards per attempt from 7.8 to 8.7 to his junior year while his completion percentage dropped slightly. He also threw eight more interceptions (to be fair, that ridiculous 1995 season with four interceptions in 380 attempts was going to be hard to top). If your quarterback is good enough to take more chances downfield, some of those chances are going to go the other way.

As we’ve pointed out throughout the off-season, Tennessee ran fewer plays than any team in college football last season. If he stays healthy, Guarantano will get more than the 20.5 passing attempts per game he had in 2018. With that should come more risk. There’s no guarantee his interception percentage won’t go up and his completion percentage won’t go down.

But with all his targets returning, and many of them proven threats? With better protection? And in the hands of Jim Chaney? Everyone expects Guarantano to be better. And he’s already building on a remarkably accurate foundation.

I don’t know if he’ll earn an All-SEC mention by season’s end. But I do think if things go right for the Vols this fall, it will come through the unfolding realization that Tennessee has a very capable quarterback on its hands.

With SEC Media Days taking place this week, it’s that time of year where everybody starts asking The Question again: How are the Vols going to do this season?

To me, it’s less about what the Vols accomplish in terms of an overall win-loss record and more about what they do against the second tier of the SEC East. Take care of that business (and run the table against the non-conference), and the overall record will take care of itself.

The second tier in the SEC East

Losing on a regular basis to Georgia and Florida (and Alabama) will get even the best coaches fired. But anyone who’s been paying attention knows that Tennessee has been wandering around in a damp, dark cellar for too many years now, and the way to the penthouse begins by climbing out of the basement. Put another way, we can’t deal with the first-world challenge of beating the Big 3 rivals on a regular basis until we solve the third-world problem of losing all too often to teams like South Carolina, Missouri, Vanderbilt, and Kentucky.

That stings just to type, but facts are facts. Granted, Kentucky hasn’t been too much trouble recently, as they’ve beaten the Vols only twice in the past ten years, but they have had more success lately than history suggests they should have.

The others, though, have been major thorns in the side of the program the past several years. Tennessee is 2-5 against Missouri since 2012 and has lost the last two. The Vols are 3-6 against South Carolina since 2010 and have lost the last three. And after 22 Ws in a row from 1983-2004, Tennessee is now 2-5 against the Commodores since 2012, losing the last three in a row. I don’t need to add all that up to know that it’s an unprecedented level of futility for a proud program.

The first order of business for the Vols is correcting that problem. What they do against the Tide, Bulldogs, and Gators this season won’t matter nearly as much as what they do against the SEC East’s second tier.

It won’t be easy, but finishing at or near the top of that group of teams is doable even this season. Tennessee should have the edge over a Vanderbilt team replacing quarterback Kyle Shurmur, and in any event the Commodores look like they’re going to have trouble compiling a decent SEC East record. In our Gameday on Rocky Top 2019 magazine, we predicted an 0-8 SEC record and last-place finish in the East for the ‘Dores.

As for the Wildcats, they probably peaked last year, as they have to replace running back Benny Snell and linebacker Josh Allen. The schedule could present a problem for the Vols in this game — it will be the sixth in a row for the Vols, while Kentucky will be coming off a bye. For that reason, I’m putting this down as a loss for Tennessee. Despite that, I believe the Vols will finish with a better SEC record than the Wildcats and therefore ahead of them in the SEC East standings.

The real competition among this group this fall should be South Carolina and Missouri, as they and Tennessee are all ranked in the 20s in our magazine’s Top 25. We have the Gamecocks tied with the Vols in the SEC at 3-5 despite having the most difficult schedule among SEC teams, but we also have Tennessee winning the head-to-head and thus finishing ahead of them in the SEC East standings.

Missouri is the only team that we’ve actually picked to finish ahead of the Vols this fall, and we’ve done it despite predicting that Tennessee will beat them. Missouri not only appears to be a better team at this point, its schedule is also ridiculously easy. I think the Vols will beat them thanks to a quirk in the schedule (Tennessee has a bye the week before, while Missouri will be coming off consecutive games against Georgia and Florida), but Missouri will still likely finish ahead of the Vols in the standings. One game either way, though, and Tennessee could edge them out to come out on top of the SEC East second tier.

Secondary goal: Be competitive in the rivalry games

As I said earlier, competing directly with Alabama, Georgia, and Florida for the SEC conference or divisional crown will always be the chief goal for the Vols program, but it’s a long way to the penthouse and it’s guarded by a well-armed security detail.

This season, a reasonable goal is to simply make these games more competitive. The good news is that the bar is low. Hide the children; I’m about to remind you of the recent results:

Alabama

• 2018: 21-58 (37-point loss)
• 2017: 7-45 (38-point loss)

Georgia

• 2018: 12-38 (26-point loss)
• 2017: 0-41 (41-point loss)

Florida

• 2018: 21-47 (26-point loss)
• 2017: 20-26 (6-point loss)

I’m not yet convinced that Florida has actually risen to the level of Georgia and Alabama at this point, but they do seem to be well ahead of the Vols in their rebuild. I have them beating Tennessee this season and also finishing second in the East to Georgia, but I’m also keeping my eye on the fact that they have lost four starters along the offensive line. Of the Big 3 games, Florida is the most winnable for the Vols. I wouldn’t expect a win, but I would expect it to be competitive.

Georgia and Alabama are currently juggernauts, and the goal against these guys this fall is to keep the game respectable. Avoid double-digit losses this season and then make a run at winning next year.

Converting this into wins and losses, that’s seven wins for Tennessee this season: four wins against non-conference opponents and three out of four against the second tier of the SEC East. Mississippi State is a tossup game that I’m guessing will go against the Vols, but it’s also a good opportunity for an additional win.

What about you? How do you expect things to play out this fall?

If the Vols do meet their rounded-up FPI projection and turn 7.6 wins into an 8-4 regular season, then take what would be a pretty solid bowl victory? There’s a good chance Jeremy Pruitt’s second squad would finish the season in the Top 25. A pair of 9-4 finishes got the Vols a #22 final ranking in 2015 and 2016.

One thing stood out when researching pre-and-postseason polls in the media guide: since 1970, the Vols have only gone from unranked in preseason to ranked at the end of the year twice: SEC Championships in 1985 and 1989.

Some of it is the extremes of Tennessee’s history. Both in the last decade and the period that most mirrors it in the early 1980’s, the Vols had plenty of opportunity: Tennessee went unranked in the preseason poll from 1976-1985, but only got there at the end of the season in that magical ’85 campaign. And the Vols went unranked in the preseason poll from 2009-2014, but never capitalized on any of those opportunities.

After the SugarVols season in ’85, Tennessee was ranked in the preseason AP poll every year from 1986-2008 except one: 1989, when the Vols followed a 5-6 campaign in 1988 with an 11-1 season and a top five finish.

In this sense, we really haven’t seen the kind of year Jeremy Pruitt has a chance to create this fall. We’ve seen unranked-to-top-five, and we’ve seen it the other way around. But a season of significant but not meteoric progress, where the Vols went from unranked to a finish in the back end of the poll? That would be new.

Think of it this way: when’s the last time a Tennessee team overachieved?

In relative terms, I’d probably go with Derek Dooley’s first team in 2010, which finished 6-7 but, as we know, had outcomes overturned against LSU and North Carolina. The narrative of that season, with Tyler Bray’s arrival in November and competitive losses to good teams from LSU and South Carolina, built hope in the immediate aftermath of burning couches. As we also know, that kind of season is no promise of the future; Dooley wasn’t the guy. But other than that year, I’m not sure any of the post-Fulmer teams have ended a year better than we thought they’d be at its beginning.

Fulmer himself pulled it off multiple times, and was also here long enough to experience his share of underachieving. If you’re looking at pre-to-postseason AP poll data, here are the most significant leaps and falls since Johnny Majors got the Vols back in the national picture in the 1980’s:

Leaps

• As mentioned, the Vols started the season unranked in 1985 but won the SEC at 8-1-2, then throttled #2 Miami in the Sugar Bowl to finish #4. In 1989, the Vols lost only to Alabama and went from unranked to #5.
• The Majors-to-Fulmer transition year in 1992 featured a gain of +10 in the final poll. Tennessee began the year at #22, moved to #8 after Fulmer-led wins over #20 Georgia and #14 Florida, and rose as high as #4 as Majors returned from heart surgery in October. Three straight losses by nine total points knocked the Vols back to #23 and essentially ended Majors’ time, but a big win over #16 Boston College in the Hall of Fame (now Outback) Bowl ended Tennessee’s year at #12.
• The National Championship season in 1998 started at #10 and finished, you know, at #1, for a gain of +9. The only national champions who started farther back in the BCS/CFP era (via Wikipedia): Oklahoma in 2000 (#19), Ohio State in 2002 (#13), LSU in 2003 (#14), Auburn in 2010 (#22), and Florida State in 2013 (#11).
• In 1995 and 2001, the Vols went from top ten to top five. Peyton Manning’s sophomore team went from #8 to #3 (and #2 in the coaches’ poll), and Casey Clausen’s 2001 squad went from #8 to #4. Both were legitimate national championship contenders.

Falls

• Like the leap from unranked-to-top-five, the Vols also went top-five-to-unranked twice. A beat-up 2002 squad started #4 but exited the poll after their fourth loss to a Top 20 foe via #1 Miami and never returned thanks to Maryland in the Peach Bowl. And in 2005 the Vols started #3 but a quarterback controversy and five top ten opponents spelled doom, with the Vols out of the poll by November.
• The biggest fall after those? Butch Jones’ infamous 2016 season, which looks even worse in this context. The Vols started at #9, dropped to #17 after a near-miss with Appalachian State, then worked their way back there after a 5-0 start. They stayed there after a double overtime loss to #8 Texas A&M. But it all went downhill from there. The win over #24 Nebraska in the Music City Bowl got them back in the final poll at #22, but a -13 drop is the worst for any Tennessee team that both started and finished the season ranked in the modern era.
• The combination of injured quarterback and obvious rebuilding year created drops that were based as much on Tennessee’s name brand in the preseason poll as anything else. In 1994 the Vols started #13 and finished #22. And in 2000 the Vols started #13 and finished #25.
• A pair of nowhere to go but down years: the Vols were #2 in preseason polls in 1996 and 1999, but finished #9 both years.
• Phillip Fulmer’s final team in 2008 started the year at #18 but finished unranked.

No one is expecting or asking for Jeremy Pruitt to take the 2019 Vols from unranked to an SEC Championship (except Colin Cowherd, apparently). But a tangible sense of major progress, winning a couple games above your preseason expectation and living into the optimism this fanbase would eat up? I’m not sure we’ve ever had a year like that in my lifetime.

And man, it would be a lot of fun.

If you want a glimpse of what the Vols hope to look like in a couple years, wide receiver and linebacker are the best place to look: proven multi-year starters with NFL potential, and elite incoming freshmen who might play but don’t have to be the answer. Tennessee’s two highest-rated recruits in 2019 don’t fall into the latter category, as you’ll be seeing plenty of Wanya Morris and Darnell Wright right away on the offensive line. But after them, the next three highest-rated signees can learn from proven answers on the depth chart: Henry To’oto’o and Quavaris Couch at linebacker, and Ramel Keyton at wide receiver.

It makes sense to find Tennessee’s wide receivers and linebackers among the highest-rated units nationally. Phil Steele lists the Vol receivers as the 13th best group in the nation, and the linebackers 12th. But Tennessee’s highest-rated position group in his magazine is…special teams?

The Vol specialists are 10th in his preseason unit rankings. Some of this is bringing all the pieces back in Brent Cimaglia, Joe Doyle, Marquez Callaway and Ty Chandler. But a couple of those pieces were quietly impressive last season.

When you’re trying to rebuild, special teams can make a big difference in close games. But the Vols were so far behind last season, there really wasn’t much opportunity for special teams to matter. In fact, one of Cimaglia’s few misses last season came in the Auburn game.

If you lose six games by at least four possessions, special teams can’t help you. But if the Vols improve enough to find themselves in more competitive games this fall? Tennessee’s experience and expertise in the third phase can be the difference in winning and losing (see 2009 Alabama, 2013 South Carolina, etc.).

Last season doesn’t offer much context for special teams, but the rest of Tennessee’s decade does. Check out Cimaglia’s performance compared to other Vol kickers in the post-Fulmer era:

Year	Kicker	Made	Att	Pct
2010	Lincoln	10	11	90.91%
2013	Palardy	14	17	82.35%
2018	Cimaglia	10	13	76.92%
2014	Medley	20	26	76.92%
2012	Palardy	9	12	75.00%
2016	Medley	11	16	68.75%
2015	Medley	21	31	67.74%
2011	Palardy	9	14	64.29%
2009	Lincoln	10	16	62.50%
2017	Cimaglia	8	13	61.54%

Or how about Marquez Callaway returning punts?

Year	Punt Returner	Avg	TD
2015	Sutton	18.28	2
2018	Callaway	11.86	1
2011	D. Young	11.75	0
2014	Sutton	11.29	1
2009	N. Richardson	11	0
2016	Kamara	10.22	0
2012	D. Young	9.69	0
2017	Callaway	8.38	0
2013	D. Young	7.88	0
2010	E. Gordon	6.5	0

If what the Vols do in close games projects to be a major factor in the difference between 6-6 and 8-4, special teams has the potential to swing an outcome or two in Tennessee’s favor. The Vol specialists quietly had a strong year in 2018. In 2019, expect more opportunities to make some noise.