Category Archives: Football

Subscribe!

 

Listen here

Robo-Transcript below.

Pardon the errors, as the bot understands neither southern accents nor football.

GRT Podcast 9.18.18

NOTES

[00:00:49] Favorite novels: Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse, Harry Potter, Michael Crichton, Dr. Suess, and Shel Silverstein.
[00:04:43] How does Will feel about the 24-0 score against UTEP?
[00:08:30] Those moments in the stadium with pockets of fans intently watching other games that matter.
[00:12:02] The race for the SEC East and where Tennessee and Florida fit in as of right now.
[00:17:04] Is Tennessee improving?
[00:21:55] Pruitt’s, and coaches’ generally, communication with fans.

TRANSCRIPT

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:13] This is the Gameday on Rocky Top Podcast, episode 150. That’s a big mark there isn’t

Will Shelton: [00:00:19] Wow.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:19] it Will. That’s

Will Shelton: [00:00:21] I’m honored to. I mean I’ve been on most of them but I’m honored to . . . apologies to Brad for being on episode 149. I’m happy to be on episode 150 here.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:31] Yeah. Does anybody know what the special gift is for 150

Will Shelton: [00:00:37] I don’t know it’s probably like a piece of candy or something

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:40] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:00:40] Something like that.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:42] It might

Will Shelton: [00:00:42] Yeah.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:42] Be a sack of potatoes.

Will Shelton: [00:00:44] Yeah. I have to treat ourselves tomorrow to a peppermint or whatever.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:49] All right so I got three seconds in before I got sidetracked. So yeah I’m Joel Hollingsworth and I’m with Will Shelton tonight. So we got lots of stuff to get . . . . We’re going to run through basically the same questions with Will that we ran through with Brad last night including the off topic question which Brad and I just are talking about books last night for some reason. So Will’s short answer Do you have you have a favorite novel.

Will Shelton: [00:01:20] Oh man. A favorite novel. Man I have. I have lots of favorite things. I really like. I like Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse when I was growing up. That’s kind of a coming

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:36] I’ve never.

Will Shelton: [00:01:37] Of age of a different sort of religious perspective.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:39] Ok.

Will Shelton: [00:01:40] Never. Never read it didn’t have. Didn’t have to read it in school anything like that.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:44] Me

Will Shelton: [00:01:44] Like

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:44] I’ve

Will Shelton: [00:01:45] I

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:45] No

Will Shelton: [00:01:45] Had to read it for school. Yeah.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:46] I’ve never even heard of that. It must be

Will Shelton: [00:01:48] Never

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:48] Like

Will Shelton: [00:01:48] Even heard

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:48] Alcoa

Will Shelton: [00:01:48] Of it.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:49] Thing or something.

Will Shelton: [00:01:50] Maybe we are. Alcoa was an A+ class school system in the state of Tennessee when I was there. My I don’t remember if it was like freshman year or it was a high school year that it was required reading but it’s like, it’s Hermann Hesse it’s like a Near Eastern sort of coming of age thing is one of the first things I read from a like a non white Christian perspective but also still very spiritual about this guy that sort of looking for meaning in all kinds of different ways. And that was a helpful book to me when I was someone who was also looking for meaning outside of the sort of normal judo Christian sort of answers that are given there so I really like the answer that I want to give when I want to sound smart and distinguished. I really like Harry Potter

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:42] It

Will Shelton: [00:02:43] So you know

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:44] Worked.

Will Shelton: [00:02:44] Like right now I can I’d be happy to talk about Harry Potter as well. So

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:49] I’ve never read those. I probably should.

Will Shelton: [00:02:51] Really

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:52] Yeah

Will Shelton: [00:02:52] Man

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:52] I really have. Have

Will Shelton: [00:02:54] They

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:54] Not

Will Shelton: [00:02:54] Are it’s for me. I came into them later on like I think the first book now is a bit of a challenge because the kids are so young in the first book. So you’re dealing with like I think 11 year olds in the in the first book but then every next book is another year at the Hogwarts school and so by the time it gets like three or four they get really good. And she is just a fantastic writer. So really like I’m trying to cover all my bases

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:23] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:03:23] Here. I really like some of the less famous Michael Crichton Books like Sphere. It was made into a terrible movie after they had tried like five of his other books into movies. But that is a really good interesting interesting book. So

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:42] Very cool.

Will Shelton: [00:03:42] Yeah.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:42] See you guys were way too smart for us in public school in Edgington Illinois. You know our required reading was like Dr. Seuss, Shel Silverstein.

Will Shelton: [00:03:56] Yeah Where the Sidewalk Ends is I mean it’s not a novel but also a favorite. Sure.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:01] I once memorized Sarah Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout Would Not Take the Garbage Out. That was fun. So anyway and I just want to mention too, I thought I heard you say Judo Christian which I found like really really funny for some.

Will Shelton: [00:04:15] Like karate Jesus

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:16] Yes.

Will Shelton: [00:04:17] Yeah

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:17] There you go.

Will Shelton: [00:04:18] Yeah. I do. I’m a fan of. I like talking about karate Jesus in sermons. In terms of like when they came to arrest him to be crucified could he not have just turned into karate Jesus and taken everybody out so

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:33] Wax on wax

Will Shelton: [00:04:34] That

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:34] Off.

Will Shelton: [00:04:34] Maybe that was a Freudian slip there because I really do enjoy the image of karate Jesus.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:40] It’s very

Will Shelton: [00:04:40] So

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:40] Good. Yeah I like that. All right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:43] So Vols. Yeah that’s why we’re

Will Shelton: [00:04:46] Right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:46] Here.

Will Shelton: [00:04:47] Right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:04:48] Ok. So we beat UTEP, but the score 24 to 0. Lots of people sort of grumpy about that. How’s your emotional level about a score of 24 0 versus UTEP.

Will Shelton: [00:05:04] I think you could kind of see it happening as the game was unfolding. I mean I know I saw it happening on my Twitter feed of people reliving the angst of scores that were far too close against inferior competition in the last few years. But this one was so different from those in terms of the way Tennessee actually dominated the opponent in yards per play and S&P+ those kinds of things. So you know we’ve covered the offense both as it happened and I know you wrote about this that when you fumble at the one yard line and when you have a chop block callback another touchdown. And when you’re coaching staff like it wasn’t that they didn’t seem disinterested in doing anything the way that Butch Jones and those guys often did when they were playing the North Texas of the world. But they certainly didn’t see they seem very confident that Tennessee was going to win the game as they should have been. And so you know they were efficient without trying to be overly explosive I’m not sure they thought they were going to score a touchdown on that little toss to Ty Chandler there even though it was the I think the first play of the second half right. So I think they coach that exactly the way they wanted to plus or minus a fumble at the one yard line so offensively you know Tennessee went up like 17 spots in S&P+ this week. And UTEP is literally the worst team in college football in that metric so you really have to handle them well to make that big of a jump when the the you know that system expects you to really dominate them.

Will Shelton: [00:06:40] I think the other thing too is the defense dominated in a non exciting way which is to say reminded me of some high school games that I’ve seen where the other team has just so much better that every drive is a punt. And like that’s not exciting there’s no interceptions there’s no goal line stands or turnovers or anything like that. But I mean it was just a complete boring. It was as dominating as you can be defensively while also doing that in the most boring way possible. So yeah like it wasn’t memorable you’re not going to at the end of the year say Oh remember this big play or whatever but still I mean incredibly impressive not that they shut them out but just that they made them punt on every single drive. That’s really good and impressive so yeah I think it was. I think if we don’t see the last couple of years of Tennessee struggling with UMass and Ohio I mean there’s a long list. You know UMass Ohio North Texas Southern Miss last year kind of things had already gone off the rail but even Indiana State last year was was closer play for play than it should have been. So if we hadn’t been through all of that the last couple of years I think folks would have really not had much to say about this game other than that is what happens when you fumble the one yard line.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:07:57] Yeah there’s something to be said about boring forgettable wins too. I remember watching a few weeks ago John Pennington had a bunch of 98 players on and they couldn’t remember that. I think it was Jeff Hall he said you know somebody said something about our win over who was at UAB that year and he said we

Will Shelton: [00:08:19] Yes.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:08:19] Didn’t play we didn’t play UAB. And Will Overstreet said that he didn’t remember the game either. So you know 20

Will Shelton: [00:08:28] Yeah

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:08:28] Years

Will Shelton: [00:08:28] That

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:08:28] Later

Will Shelton: [00:08:28] Was.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:08:29] But.

Will Shelton: [00:08:30] Well no that was that day was the day that Ohio State lost to Michigan State and so like I was in the stadium at Tennessee’s game. This is back. Back when the only way you could follow other games is if you had a radio or maybe you like five people in the stadium brought one of those portable handheld TV sort of contraptions. You know if you’re under the age of 20 you probably have no idea what I’m talking about. But anyway like people I think we beat UAB like 37 to 13 or something like that. But all anyone was interested in was watching Ohio State struggle and then ultimately watching them lose that game which meant Tennessee was number two going into the day which then Tennessee went to number one and they of course played Arkansas the next week. But yeah I remember being in the stadium that day and it was one of those games where once you got up two touchdowns on UAB you knew you were going to win. And then that slow trickling is Ohio State really going to go down to the Nick Saban’s Michigan State team. And finally what had happened seeing pockets of the stadium. I used to love this. It doesn’t happen as much anymore. Pockets of the stadium where people have radios or TVs celebrate when there was an interception. I think late in that game. So like I say I do the things I remember most about that they are not what Tennessee did against UAB. It’s that emotion of oh my gosh we’re going to be number one tomorrow so I can I can forgive Jeff Hall and Overstreet and those guys for forgetting as UAB. I think Houston was the other way that we beat Houston 42 to 7. So yeah those are those are not the games anyone thinks of when they think of 1998. It’s alright.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:05] I guess it’s fair to say that Hall and Overstreet probably didn’t have Ohio State Michigan State or whoever it was on on their little TV things done on the sidelines

Will Shelton: [00:10:15] They could have

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:16] Either.

Will Shelton: [00:10:16] Had the. The Bobby Denton update. That was the greats. You know how most of the stadium found out back then when you don’t have twitter or anything else is waiting for the P.A. announcer to to announce it over that thing. This happened a couple of years ago I think I wrote about this two years ago when we needed LSU to beat Florida to win the East. And we were playing Missouri. The fact that now not everyone’s phone the Wi-Fi in the stadium is terrible and not everyone’s phone was refreshing at the same time and so I know the game ended with LSU getting shut back shut down twice at the one yard line. But before there was a play before that that LSU like hit a big pass or something

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:59] Yeah

Will Shelton: [00:10:59] Where they got down to the 5 yard line or something. And I remember sitting there in the stands and seeing people all over the stadium start celebrating. I mean I remember saying over and over something good is happening. You know LSU must have won the game. Something good is happening but it was instead just people were delayed with their people were celebrating something that actually happened five minutes earlier. And then you know other people obviously were not jumping up and down realizing that Florida had won that game. So that’s just an interesting. That’s how things have changed inside Neyland Stadium when you’re trying to pay attention to other games that have a huge impact on Tennessee. It is. It has changed and the fact that we can’t all . . . we all needed a radio. No. No

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:40] Yeah

Will Shelton: [00:11:41] One had a radio. That’s what we needed and that moment was a radio. But technology was not our friend that day.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:46] Yeah. There are no more radios everybody streams over the phone and you know everybody. Like you said different time shift. So anyway I had to ask Brad another question about UTEP. But we’re done with UTEP. We don’t care about UTEP

Will Shelton: [00:12:00] Right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:12:00] Anymore. Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:12:01] Yeah not going to matter.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:12:02] All right. So Florida. I know I I’m berating myself for even asking this question because it just it sounds like a terrible question but I think there’s some value to it. So is the game Saturday between the two worst teams in the SEC East. And if so how depressing is that.

Will Shelton: [00:12:30] Maybe I think I think this division is close enough that at the end of the year you’re going to have like 3 2 and 6 teams or something like that. I don’t I don’t think there’s going to be honestly unless it’s unless it’s us unless it’s Tennessee. I don’t think you’re going to have you know a couple of oh and a couple of one in sevens and then some separation. I think you’ll probably have a handful of teams that are two in six or three and five or something like that. But in terms of again in terms of S&P plus right now these are the two worst team in the division. I know Tennessee was the worst team in the division last year. And you can probably argue that Florida was the second worst team. I mean maybe Vanderbilt but not at the end of the year. So so yeah. And I think the others it’s too early to judge South Carolina. South Carolina is kind of like Tennessee where you thought hey maybe they can sneak up on somebody that’s much better than them. And it turns out not at all. But I don’t know that we know a whole lot else about South Carolina other than they’re not nearly as good as Georgia much like Tennessee. They’re not nearly as good as West Virginia but I don’t know what else.

Will Shelton: [00:13:40] But Kentucky better than we thought should have beaten Florida by more than they did. Vanderbilt very real. You know Vanderbilt is such a fascinating as we go and talk about the way things used to be. Not too terribly long ago it was still you’d never pick Vanderbilt ever. Doesn’t matter who they are playing don’t pick Vanderbilt. They won’t win and now I mean they have hammered. It’s not like they’re hammering UTEP. They hammered Middle Tennessee and hammered Nevada which are teams that have programs that have had a pulse recently. And I mean one was 28 points and the other one was 31 points I think I mean just hammered those teams and had every right to beat Notre Dame in South Bend. That was a legitimate close game. I thought Shurmur is a really good quarterback and not just a really good quarterback by Vanderbilt standards so now all of a sudden I think when we start talking about Tennessee. It’s not even so much of oh Vanderbilt or oh South Carolina or whatever just the matchups. Vanderbilt not a particularly good looking matchup for Tennessee right now Missouri. Not a good looking matchup for Tennessee. I mean that looks like all kinds of West Virginia. So

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:14:54] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:14:54] Now if you’re if you’re trying to find so Tennessee needs to go three and five in the U.S. to get bowl eligible and then the other three wins come in the nonconference you know given if they beat Charlotte. So you’re trying to find three here. You know it’s not going to be Georgia Alabama and probably not Auburn. There’s a little bit of wiggle room. Go ahead. I think I had Auburn at 15 percent in the old win calculator machine this week. You had them. You had a noticeably higher than Alabama or Georgia right like there was

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:15:24] Yeah

Will Shelton: [00:15:24] There was a little separation there now. Yes. So

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:15:26] Yup

Will Shelton: [00:15:27] We got the bye week. It’s a potential trap game for Auburn. These are all things we’ll talk about in a couple of weeks. Auburn’s got Mississippi State the week before and Ole Miss the week after maybe a little trap space but probably not. So now you’re talking about. We’ve got to get three out of the rest of the East. Even if you get this one this is not the happy conversation we want to get. Even if you get the gators. All right. What’s the next easiest one. I don’t

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:15:56] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:15:56] Know how to answer that question. You know like Kentucky

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:16:00] Maybe

Will Shelton: [00:16:00] Legit

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:16:01] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:16:01] Good. Vanderbilt legit. And you know on the road. It is not Missouri

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:16:10] No

Will Shelton: [00:16:11] I

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:16:11] No

Will Shelton: [00:16:11] Promise you that. Not right now. So then they’re back to South Carolina. The one that some people are even still looping in with that stretch so nothing is I expect all five of those games to be toss ups. So there’s nothing that can happen in Tennessee Saturday that can guarantee an outcome in terms of both eligibility to me win or lose against Florida. You’re going to have four more of these toss ups and if you when you’re going to still need to win two of them and if you lose you’re going to win three of them which obviously is a greater challenge. So yeah it is. Are these the two worst teams in the SEC East. Maybe by some metrics right now. They are but I don’t I just don’t think there’s a lot of space there between South Carolina and Tennessee and the rest of the division outside of Georgia and the middle there. I just don’t see a whole lot of separation right now.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:17:04] Yeah and you know it’s weird because it does seem like Tennessee is improving. And you know your knee jerk reaction is well it’s it’s the opponents right that that’s why you feel like they’re improving but there’s something about it that even accounting for the level of competition just makes you feel a little better about the team doesn’t it. Is that just me.

Will Shelton: [00:17:29] No I think the I think Tennessee’s weaknesses are the things that they don’t do well right now are much more understandable than they were under Butch Jones when when. Like when I watch this team and I watch the secondary get dusted by West Virginia. I understand why that is. It’s in part because we’re choosing to play freshmen and West Virginia’s got really good players. So you can not like the answers about the pass rush but those especially you really find out this week. But the answer just may be hey we don’t have the players for that. And that’s going to be a recruiting issue. And that means to get pressure on the quarterback we’re going to have to blitz our tails off. And hope that those freshmen back there in the secondary are getting better. As. The year goes along When they don’t do things well offensively. So far. That has typically been because of a breakdown on the offensive line. And. I get it. Like I don’t like it but I get it I understand. So it’s not what we’ve seen recently where either Tennessee’s play calling is just really really frustrating and borderline ignorant or were intentionally just doing a whole bunch of crap behind the line of scrimmage and a lot of it goes backward and there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of purpose.

Will Shelton: [00:18:53] And they’ve got unnecessary constraints on the guy who’s one more play away from being the starting quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers right now. So I think Tennessee’s weaknesses are apparent but they also are reasonable like it makes sense to me why we’re bad at the things we’re bad at and that helps me be able to say like hey yeah I like Missouri that’s a bad situation for us because we can’t put pressure on the quarterback and we’ve got freshmen on the back end. So like I’m not mad about it is what it is. You know so some of that stuff is is I think it’s just more understandable situations happening right now and it’s you know Jeremy Pruitt’s had one recruiting class so you can’t say oh we should’ve got better players in here. So that that to me has made things I think more than anything it just makes things a little more simple. With this team and that’s why we talked about leading into the season and what we see in these first three games is hey look look at every play look at progress. And I see. And I think everybody sees baby steps of progress you just also see in some places. Hey we’ve we’ve still got a really long way to go.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:20:04] Yeah you keep hearing Pruitt talk about consistency being the thing. And you know what. He’s right you know because they can do some things really well at times. But when you don’t get you know all 11 doing it right each time then that’s one weakness that can blow up a whole play and you blow up enough those plays. They start adding up and you get real problems. So anyway the other thing I was going to say you know those freshmen back there by the time we play Missouri and if they get torched everybody will say well they’re not freshmen anymore which is one of my favorite things ever for people to say because you know what they are still freshmen. Everybody else got older too. You know. So

Will Shelton: [00:20:48] And there too it doesn’t even matter so much about . . . . If we still can’t generate a pass rush up front and you’re going against I mean Drew Lock is an NFL quarterback. Hey Kyle Shurmur might be. I don’t know. We’ll see. But you know you can generate pressure at some point you can only cover those guys for so long. And some of that is on Pruitt. And I think this is another area of progress. Is learning how risk averse he should or shouldn’t be when it comes to calling a defense against an offense that’s got some firepower. This one Saturday should not fall into that category as much. But you know he’s learning too here’s how much I can ask of these guys and sometimes the consequence is like I mean I think he’s even said there isn’t times against West Virginia we’re like hey our guys were where they were supposed to be and just get beat like they’re guarding better players. So you know I really I can I’ve heard a couple of people say this and I wrote about it a little bit.

Will Shelton: [00:21:55] I like that Pruitt admits his own mistakes and his own flaws. He’s learning how to do this too. I think there’s a whole, when we’re talking before we started recording about Brad’s podcast and talking about Derek Dooley like there’s a whole fascinating thing of Tennessee coaches and how they communicate to us as fans because we’ve seen so many different guys in so many different personalities over the last ten years and both football and basketball that you know like I think Bruce Pearl ruined us all in this regard because he

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:26] Yeah.

Will Shelton: [00:22:26] Was both incredibly entertaining and also won a lot of games. But you know Dooley was Dooley was usually correct in what he said about his team. It’s also his job to make those adjustments that he never really made. But you know I think hearing especially after Butch Jones hearing Pruitt talk about hey I could have done this better hey I’ve got to do this better. After five years of a coach that within his personality or whatever reason did not want to admit any mistakes even when mistakes were obvious that that is refreshing to me. You know Pruitt will have to learn. Tyson Helton will have to learn fast enough to keep their jobs and so on and so forth as far as all that goes. And this is I wrote about it already this is a big test this week for Pruitt and Helton both to say how how long are we going to be patient with the run game against these guys. How much are you going to trust. Guarantano against the best defense he’s seen all year. You’re going to need more from him to win this game. So we’ll learn more as it goes but I think within reason those guys are off to a good start and I have enjoyed Pruitt talking fairly candidly it seems like about his team and individual players and himself in ways that after Butch Jones and knowing this guy came from Nick Saban. I wasn’t sure we were going to get that. You know I thought we might get again the Cuonzo Martin School of we lost this game because we didn’t make shots. Yeah I know that. But please elaborate. And I think he’s. Done. Barnes is good at this too. You know. Doing a good job elaborating on some things And being honest while also doing so in a way that’s not throwing your own team under the bus a little bit as Dooley could do sometimes. So I was I have been more encouraged just by what he says and admitting some flaws and admitting his own growing pains that has been refreshing to me and I’m I know I’m not the only one on that

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:24:29] That’s Will Shelton. That’ll do it for the Gameday on Rocky Top Podcast this evening we’ll have another one where we talk more about Florida later on this week. Brad is up the next day and then Will the night after that. So please subscribe so you don’t miss anything. Give us a rating. Give us a review. Make it a good one. Bonus points for using the phrase I guess we’re going to go with Dooley’s Sack of Potatoes again because that was from last night. And that was good enough. So for Will Shelton I’m Joel Hollingsworth and this has been the Gameday on Rocky Top Podcast.

Will Shelton: [00:25:11] S I D D H A R T H A Hermann Hesse

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:25:16] Is that Indian.

Will Shelton: [00:25:18] Yeah I feel

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:25:18] Buika

Will Shelton: [00:25:19] Like I should like the shout out. I think my freshman English teacher because we did a lot of Shakespeare there but that was also a required reading in high school. And so shout out to either Ms Scruggs freshman year or Dr. Clark sophomore year for putting that in front of me.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:25:42] So Will are you saying that Derek Dooley is like the doctor who says hey you have cancer. Good luck.

Will Shelton: [00:25:50] I have I just have this image not the image I have the audio of Dooley. We may be talking about this before the end of 2011 when he was so tired of getting asked about when Tyler Bray was coming back and he just goes. He has a broken thumb like like exasperated because you know we were getting hammered by everyone we were playing and Matt Sims and Justin Worley were not inspiring any confidence and so it’s like a fanbase will Tyler Bray to come back for that Vanderbilt game you know. But I love you know he he Dooley was great at press conferences and all that stuff.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:26:28] There’s probably an upper level communications course that should be taught by Beverly Davenport. That that is basically you know the what you should do when you’re communicating with fans is the new coach is what the other guy who just got fired didn’t do. So you do that you’re going to be fine. There’s your 400 level course. I’ll take my billion dollar paycheck and go retire on the Tennessee River.

Subscribe!

 

Listen here

Robo-Transcript below.

Pardon the errors, as the bot understands neither southern accents nor football.

GRT Podcast 9.17.18

Bookmarks:

[00:03:21] Did the 24-0 score against UTEP bother you, and if so, how much?
[00:08:16] The UTEP criticism sandwich: One good thing about the game, a bad thing, and another good thing.
[00:11:34] Hilarious robo-transcript error here. 🙂
[00:16:50] Looking ahead to Florida. Is the game for last in the SEC East?
[00:21:18] Brad’s unnatural fascination with Derek Dooley.

TRANSCRIPT

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:13] This is the Gameday on Rocky Top podcast episode 149. I’m Joel Hollingsworth and I’m with Brad Shepherd again this evening. Brad how you doing.

Brad Shepard: [00:00:24] Great. How are you doing.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:25] I’m doing just fine. I’m not texting and driving unlike some people I know. So

Brad Shepard: [00:00:30] Oh I was at a red light so

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:31] Ok.

Brad Shepard: [00:00:31] You know

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:32] All right. All right.

Brad Shepard: [00:00:34] Grey

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:35] Well

Brad Shepard: [00:00:35] area there

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:36] Yeah well OK. You know they got cameras of those red lights now though. So you know

Brad Shepard: [00:00:44] Whether they’re probably. Yeah I’m going to plead the Fifth here. I don’t know what you’re talking about

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:49] It’s too late for the fifth man. Who is your attorney.

Brad Shepard: [00:00:55] Joel Hollingsworth

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:00:57] He’s terrible. Don’t rely on him. All right. So we got several Vols related things to get to tonight but I wanted to get the off topic question out of the way first something you mentioned on your Twitter timeline. I guess it was probably several weeks ago caught my eye and I’ve been meaning to ask you about it since. But you mentioned the book Boys Life by Robert R McCammon and I didn’t know that anybody else knew who Robert R McCammon was. So tell me about boys life into why you like that so much.

Brad Shepard: [00:01:28] Well I just I mean it’s it’s really probably if it’s not my favorite book I’ve ever read it. It’s in the top five. I mean I’ve read it probably five times in my life seeming seemingly every three or . . . since the time I first read it when I was 14 just get this urge to reread it it’s a great summer read it’s probably the best novel coming of age story. I’m still love The Body which was

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:56] Yeah

Brad Shepard: [00:01:57] Made in the movie Stand By Me by Stephen King.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:01:58] Right.

Brad Shepard: [00:01:58] But it’s probably the best you know full length novel a coming of age story that I’ve ever read. It’s just it’s just beautiful writing. It’s just everything that’s magical about being a kid growing up in the south and it’s just. I mean you know it’s it’s perfection. I mean I really can’t describe it any other way. Every

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:20] Wow.

Brad Shepard: [00:02:20] Time I read it I find these other things and it’s just it’s just great. It’s a great fun book to read.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:27] I have to go back and read that because I like McCammon Swan Song was actually one of my favorite books for a really really long time. Have you read that one?

Brad Shepard: [00:02:37] I have. I

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:38] Oka

Brad Shepard: [00:02:38] Have already gone south. Those

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:39] Ok

Brad Shepard: [00:02:39] Are the three

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:40] Yeah

Brad Shepard: [00:02:40] That

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:40] Yeah.

Brad Shepard: [00:02:40] I’ve actually downloaded a couple more. those are a good man. Is really good

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:46] Yeah.

Brad Shepard: [00:02:46] As fallen off the face of the earth a little

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:02:49] I always thought he was like a pen name of Stephen King there for a while because it seemed like Swan Song was basically like another draft of The Stand you know.

Brad Shepard: [00:03:00] Yeah you’re right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:02] So anyway.

Brad Shepard: [00:03:03] And

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:03] But

Brad Shepard: [00:03:03] I think they were they were good friends I mean they were you know they were both huge parts of that horror boom in the 80s. But this is not you know this is not a horror book it’s a just a it’s really just you know it’s it’s his masterpiece. I love it.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:21] I’ve got to go back and read it again I don’t remember it so. But oh I have to do that. So anyway the Vols. I guess that’s why we’re here right. So

Brad Shepard: [00:03:30] Yeah.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:31] Ok.

Brad Shepard: [00:03:31] Yeah that was.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:32] So the Vols beat you up this past weekend. The score though was 24 to nothing and that seems

Brad Shepard: [00:03:39] Either

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:03:40] To have caused some consternation among some Vols fans. I have some things to say about that but I was wondering first does that score bother you and how much if it does.

Brad Shepard: [00:03:54] You know. Yes. No. I mean they should have been 38. Nothing. You know if it wasn’t for the fumble that in my opinion was not a fumble then the chop block that will have been and we felt a little bit better about 38 than 24 I mean the course UNLV hung 50 on them so but you can’t play that you know you can’t play that game but that is it you know it wasn’t pretty. I mean I think that that’s kind of why I wanted to see head into Florida and you want style points and you want to you want everybody to have the warm and fuzzies and you want things to look great. But you know the bottom line was it was thorough. I mean there was never it was not like UMass last year worker you never comparable to it. You know the team was a player to say well the whole. I mean the same issues that have cropped up that we that we have at which is the offense. And the Astros are like there. But you know it was last week against ETSU Tennessee created a lot of mistakes and capitalized and turned those two into points. And this week that didn’t happen. Matter of fact it kind of went the opposite way and Tennessee kind of shot itself in the foot. And I think that that’s where your points are made. So you know Tennessee made another couple plays oldies dance. You know it could have could have led to some points had they not made those at least two bad mistakes at crucial times. Well that’s what I’m you know going back and watching it wasn’t nearly as bad as I felt during the game.

Brad Shepard: [00:05:40] I think that you know Tennessee looked good run in the football which was encouraging as I should have against UTEP and then the and so even though it didn’t. I mean it’s even you know even though it didn’t create turnovers it’s still played very well. I mean you know it’s encouraging to play that those guys are the second level. And and in the in the defensive backfield even even though the defensive back. So it is not right. There you see them in the wrong place. And that’s something that we did not see ever during the Butch Jones era. And you know I saw a lot of development from just players being in the right place. No one no one where to be knowing what to do. And we’ve seen growth and that even from game 1 to game 3. Also when you see them in those positions you can still see the talent deficiencies Tennessee has. But that’s going to come what I have been encouraged by the progression in the development of guys seemingly knowing what’s going on and that think that those are the little things that we’ve all talked about that we need to look for. So it’s not perfect. Lots of room for improvement. But I mean it was 24 did nothing but it was it was a thorough 24 to nothing and it very easily could have been 38 or even you know 45 at Tennessee not a stop really trying to score in the fourth quarter

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:07:07] Yeah that’s mostly what I was thinking. The if you look at the yards the nonpoint stuff the first downs you know it was like you said pretty thorough beating. There’s probably should’ve been 35 to 0 because you know we do get three out of that one with the chop block but still there

Brad Shepard: [00:07:26] Right

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:07:27] Were there were several other drives that got stalled out by penalties as well and then we also gave what three or four possessions to Chryst which sort of interrupted the continuity. And I wonder how much to with switching quarterbacks whether that can actually lead to more penalties along the offensive line if they’re different too you know they’re used to a different cadence or whatever you know. So anyway I think there were more points on the board there I’m really not all that concerned about it. It would have been nice to go in with another 53 to something you know but hey it it also gave Pruitt the opportunity to be really unhappy afterwards which is probably going to pay dividends this week. So

Brad Shepard: [00:08:15] Right.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:08:16] All right. So the criticism sandwich like we did last time now you probably already mentioned a bunch of stuff but just so we can get it in a pretty little package. Want one good thing about the game a bad thing in the middle and then another good thing

Brad Shepard: [00:08:31] Yes. The best thing I saw was Ty Chandler. Right you know wrote about that yesterday and I think that we’ve all been encouraged by the running backs and how they looked so far win when Chandler goes down in the first game you’ve got Tim who comes and looks like he’s an SEC running back for lack of better terms. I mean I’m not saying he’s wrong in that Alabama group or anything but the kid can play ball. He’s got three years left and we should be excited about that. Of course Banks comes in and you know runs like his hair’s on fire against yes

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:03] He’s got a

Brad Shepard: [00:09:03] You

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:03] Lot of hair

Brad Shepard: [00:09:03] And

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:04] Too.

Brad Shepard: [00:09:04] He does have a lot of hair. And you know that looks like and that looks like an exciting future that you gotta get the one or two yards if they need it. You know be kind of a guy that’s going to be a really good player for Tennessee. He’s going to learn to hang on football. And let’s face it Lots of freshmen have that issue. It’s frustrating but it’s it’s it’s freshmen

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:28] That

Brad Shepard: [00:09:28] Those

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:28] Was probably

Brad Shepard: [00:09:28] Frustrating

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:29] The

Brad Shepard: [00:09:29] Freshmen are synonymous.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:31] Probably the perfect place to learn that lesson. Not when Pig

Brad Shepard: [00:09:34] Sure

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:34] Howard learned

Brad Shepard: [00:09:35] Absolutely.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:35] It but would bet against UTEP

Brad Shepard: [00:09:38] Yeah

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:09:38] Yeah.

Brad Shepard: [00:09:39] But Ty Chandler man I mean we know we’ve been hearing that each day brings a different level of other athlete to Tennessee. We didn’t really get to see it last year because the offensive line was so bad. And the receivers blocked so terribly and I wrote about it yesterday. You go back and watch the one yard touchdown run it’s a thing of beauty because everybody had a hat on their man. I mean the great block by POpe to spring it. Everything worked perfectly. But then you go but you take that run away and he’s still had 11 carries for 77 yards which you know a seven yard for carry average against anybody is pretty darn good. So I like what we saw there. I think he’s that kind of player that Tennessee has hit the ball 20 times against Florida and he’s not going to help you beat Georgia or Alabama this year. But you know neither is Bo Jackson. I mean so it’s

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:32] Well

Brad Shepard: [00:10:32] It’s

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:32] Bo’s over the hill a little

Brad Shepard: [00:10:33] Yet. I’m talking like prime time Bo Jackson. You know he he can help you win games like we’ve got coming up this weekend. So that is encouraging. Tennessee’s not really had a game breaking running back like him since Coker. And then you know the negative thing is I’m going to talk about that now. Are we going to wait or even talk about it.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:57] About

Brad Shepard: [00:10:57] What

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:57] Which

Brad Shepard: [00:10:57] Do you want me

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:10:57] Think

Brad Shepard: [00:10:57] To do. Yeah you want me to say the negative thing now.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:00] Yeah yeah go ahead do the negative and then yeah. You can’t have

Brad Shepard: [00:11:03] Yeah

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:03] Just

Brad Shepard: [00:11:03] You

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:03] A

Brad Shepard: [00:11:03] Know

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:03] Piece

Brad Shepard: [00:11:04] I’m

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:04] Of bread. Man you’ve got to have the whole sandwich

Brad Shepard: [00:11:05] Telling you

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:06] All at once.

Brad Shepard: [00:11:06] I’m telling you I’m I’m bummed out about the pass rush. You know I just got to do something there. I don’t know what they can do. Maybe you can’t tell me that there’s not one kid on that roster. The pressure on the quarterback. I don’t I don’t understand it. And that’s

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:23] How many times

Brad Shepard: [00:11:24] The

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:24] Have they blitzed though. I mean are they is that vanilla that we’re seeing. Or is it

Brad Shepard: [00:11:31] Maybe.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:11:31] Really just not able to do it.

Brad Shepard: [00:11:34] You know it’s I think it could be. But Jesse Simonton from Volquest had a great tweet today. It kind of makes you think twice it’s like you would think that Felipe FranksFlorida’s quarterback would really struggle against the blitz and apparently his numbers this year are something like 14 of 19 with five touchdowns when blitzed and like three of 14 for 22 yards when he faces a standard women [LEAVING THIS ERROR BECAUSE HA!] rush then somebody had a great comment on Volquest it was like hey if if if is blitzing him it’s not the right answer them with my play right into our hands because we’ve not got any pressure on them. You know that’s something that you know but it’s it’s funny it’s almost like when I’ve watched a lot of football this year and it’s almost like when Franks’s got time to make plays and run through his progressions he doesn’t do a very good job. So you know maybe maybe this is the top game where Tennessee can give a little bit of help on the back end and maybe just try to get some pressure with the four man rush. I don’t like that and that’s never that never needs to be part of your game plan. Hey we’re not going to pressure the quarterback at all in play. But you know it really might play into Tennessee but they’ve got to get that fixed. I mean they’ve got up on somebody. Deandre Johnson had some had some glimpses up all out even though he’s not.

Brad Shepard: [00:12:58] And even though you know this guy that I’m going to mention is not a pass rusher per se but I thought Will Ignont had a good game on Saturday. You’ve got some talent and athleticism that’s kind of flashing a little bit for Tennessee now. I mean I just know what it is that they’re doing. I mean you know it might be some of those guys just don’t know that yet. But I don’t see I don’t see what Kongbo give you on the field right now personally and it’s very much like Drew Richmond on offense I mean I’m I don’t want to pick scabs and throw darts. But you know Tennessee’s got to go a different direction because he’s not. But so anyway the pass rush is the thing to me that that just is more frustrating than anything. I think that I’ve seen thus far and then the final the other good thing. I mean I think that we should all be encouraged by Guarantno’s development. I think I think his ability to throw the ball is something that we’ve not really seen a lot. I mean Dobbs could throw the ball and then he didn’t get an opportunity to do that enough Bray could throw a deep ball. No it really it was it was just kind of weird and the intermediate game. Neither of those guys were very were very accurate. And Guarantano’s done a lot of good things.

Brad Shepard: [00:14:19] And yeah. Yeah. I mean he’s still he’s still young he still makes mistakes he still sometimes stalls drives by not you know not really. Knowing what to do with the football but it’s it’s few and far between. I mean he looks to me like he’s like he’s really gonna be a good player and that we can really rely on him. Of course we’ll know more about that this week because Florida does get the quarterback and you’ll have to face some some duress this week. Is that internal clock that we’ve talked about a lot with him. There is I don’t know we’ll know for sure this week whether whether that’s progressed and improved. But he can make all the throws every single throw. He can make the outs, he can throw the deep ball, he can throw the crossing patterns. He’s you know he everything has looked really good to me so far. And I did not expect to see that at this point of the season so I’m very encouraged by that. I think that if Helton would let’s say. But we haven’t really seen it yet. It’s Helton can get into a groove in a play calling and really and I think that that also could just be you didn’t really know what he had going into season but if he if he can get into a groove with his playcalling I believe Tennessee’s offense has got a chance to be pretty good.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:15:43] Yeah I agree with that. And continuity is a little hard to achieve when you’re devoting a certain number of possessions to the other guy to try to get him ready so you know hopefully that they can get things roll in that way and like you said earlier the defense actually you know I know that we’ve played ETSU and UTEP but the defensive numbers look pretty good. And and that’s that’s also you. If you’re going to if you’re going to try to poo poo it by saying Well look we’ve played. Yeah well look we played West Virginia’s on there you know and those guys are probably pretty good. So having the numbers where they are right now. I think that’s pretty encouraging. I think it shows that yeah Pruitt probably knows what he’s doing now. They’re going to take a hit because we got some elite level competition coming up probably after this week. But yeah it’s I’m encouraged. We’ll find out this week I think. How much further we still have to go.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:16:50] But you know and so since you know since we’re talking about Florida a little bit we’re going to talk more about them on the next podcast. We’re going to try to have we’ll on tomorrow and then you again the day after that. But so save some stuff to talk about Florida later but I wanted to ask you quickly before we got off on this one and I don’t mean to be negative or anything but is this game this Saturday between Tennessee and Florida a game between the two worst teams in the SEC east.

Brad Shepard: [00:17:32] I would say at this point. Yes. And

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:17:35] That

Brad Shepard: [00:17:35] Now

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:17:35] Depressing

Brad Shepard: [00:17:36] You know it’s it’s pretty depressing. And you know what I want to go back and talk about you know just to say one thing regardless because I feel like that this answer I’m about to does need a buffer. But my dad said something on Saturday that I would be I would be remiss not to repeat because I think it’s something that we can all be encouraged by. Even though you know Tennessee struggle a little bit on the scoreboard and didn’t scores as many points we would have liked. He said Well you know at least we’re watching football and I thought about that. And you know what I mean. We are. And that’s something that we can be encouraged about because what I talk about from a defense standpoint you know Tennessee lining up in the I formation on offense and they you know they’ve got some some motion they’ve got some some lead blocking. I mean they are throwing the ball downfield are mixed with their you know the run in some toss suites and then the run off tackle and it looks like football and not an unfolding rusty lawn chair off the fence that Butch Jones had. You know I mean it’s true. I’m encouraged by both sides of the ball and the coaching of what Tennessee wants to ultimately actually do. I just don’t think that the players are there yet to quite do it. But but yeah I mean you know a SEC Power Rankings article every week for Bleacher Report. And and right now you know Arkansas is number 14 team Ole Miss is on Number 13 team Tennessee’s number 12 team and Florida is number 11. So I think that I would be lying to you. I didn’t think that if I didn’t tell you that yeah it’s the two worst things right now do I think that Tennessee will be one of the two worst teams in the SEC east by the time they play Kentucky in Vanderbilt.

Brad Shepard: [00:19:21] I’m not sure it really depends on how Tennessee weathers the gauntlet that they’re about to go through from an injury standpoint. And how much these young kids get better. But until you know kinda my reasoning for that and I know that we want to know that we all want to and need to move on from last year. But Tennessee is 0 and 8 until they’re not. You know I mean they they lost to Vanderbilt they lost to Kentucky they lost to Missouri. And then and until they prove that they can beat any of those teams there’s no reason to rank Tennessee higher than those teams especially considering that all of those teams have looked better than Tennessee has looked so far this season. So you know to me Yes but that doesn’t mean that out think that Tennessee is going to go 0 8 again and that Vanderbilt Kentucky and Missouri and South Carolina are all. Worlds better than Tennessee and Florida. I don’t. I don’t think those things are. I think they’re all kind of right there. It’s like Dooley’s sack of potatoes you know. I mean. They’re all kind of right there. In the. In the sack. And whoever. Emerges as the you know. The. You. Know not. The least rotten potato and. You know they get to be third in the. East but. It’s it’s. It’s not it’s not great right now but. You know I don’t think it’s That doomsday scenario that we were looking at last year either.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:20:47] All right. That’s Brad Shepard and that’ll do it for our Gameday on Rocky Top Podcast this evening. Please remember to subscribe via iTunes or Google Play. Give us a rating. Give us a review. Give us a good one. Bonus points for using the phrase Dooley’s sack of potatoes. Because that is such an awesome phrase.

Brad Shepard: [00:21:12] I’ll never get it out of my head. It was just a great quote It was a great quote.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:21:16] Well I had written

Brad Shepard: [00:21:17] I

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:21:17] In

Brad Shepard: [00:21:18] See. I love seeing Derek Dooley. I watched Missouri game just to see it. He cracks me up. I just I don’t know.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:21:27] Does he do postgame media.

Brad Shepard: [00:21:30] He doesn’t. But you know and I want to just you know he’s he’s so he’s such a smart dude but you know every time I see him I think that’s our fool not to see him and I think there’s that guy. We all know that guy. They show him up at the press box and it’s just like yeah I just picture him. I want to see him put his whole hold his hands up to his eyes like the binoculars the Rommel binoculars.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:00] Once again that’s Brad Shepherd. Huge Derek Dooley fan, stalker, practically.

Brad Shepard: [00:22:06] Huge.

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:07] And so for Brad. I’m Joel Hollingsworth and this has been the Gameday on Rocky Top Podcast.

Brad Shepard: [00:22:16] I don’t love Derek Dooley but

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:18] Matthew

Brad Shepard: [00:22:19] You know

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:20] I’m

Brad Shepard: [00:22:21] I’ve

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:21] Going to

Brad Shepard: [00:22:21] Learned

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:21] Record

Brad Shepard: [00:22:21] To

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:21] That and so you know you won’t be able to do anything about it. I got the editing controls

Brad Shepard: [00:22:27] Embrace

Joel Hollingsworth: [00:22:27] Here man.

Brad Shepard: [00:22:28] I’ve learned to embrace the embarrassment. It’s been it’s been so many years of it that it just becomes part of you. And if you can’t look back at it and think wow you know one of the most storied football programs in college football hired Derek Dooley and Butch Jones back to back then. If you can’t come to terms with that and that can’t help you digest where we are as a football program right now then nothing will.