Gameday on Rocky Top

Offense: Can Vols Get Step-Up Performances from any Butch-era Bench Players?

We’ve taken a look at the potential for the 2019 Tennessee team were its former bluechip recruits on the offensive and defensive side of the ball to play up to their rankings. When you look at it from that angle, there is reason for some optimism if you put a any amount of faith in Coach Jeremy Pruitt and his staff to coach them up. However, we’ve also stipulated that regardless of whether or not that elevation in play from former 5 and 4-stars happens, the team does not have enough quality depth across the board despite Pruitt’s relatively strong efforts in his stub 2018 class and first full class of 2019.

That said, despite the coaching change there has been relatively little attrition, which not only lends credibility to the belief that the players in the program have bought into what Pruitt is trying to build but also leaves a base of older players – even if they weren’t bluechip recruits – who could just be looking for the kind of development that was sorely lacking during Butch Jones’s tenure. Specifically, the much maligned class of 2017 – Jones’s final class – is now made up of true Juniors and RS Sophomores, and as can be seen below there are still quite a few of them – eighteen to be exact. A handful of seniors and RS Jrs also dot the list below.

Along with getting the most out of its most talented players, squeezing as much juice from the former 3-star proverbial Big Oranges, who have contributed to varying degrees during their time on campus, would go a loooong way towards helping the 2019 team get over the current hump and win 7, 8, even 9 games this season.

RB/HB

Tim Jordan (Jr) – battling for the #2 spot with Jeremy Banks and Eric Gray behind Ty Chandler, Jordan brings a specific set of strengths and limitations to the Vol RB corps. If he’s improved his vision and straight line speed while keeping and even building on his natural strength and tackle-breaking ability, that would go a long way towards solidifying the position

Princeton Fant (RS So)/Austin Pope (RS Jr) – two guys who’ve bounced around position-wise, each of Fant and Pope have the size and skill to be a Swiss Army Knife HB weapon for Coach Chaney. Fant in particular just looks like former Vol Chris Brown, and if he can approximate that level of production it would open up a ton for the Vol offense

Josh Palmer (Jr)/Jordan Murphy (Jr)/Brandon Johnson (Sr) – likely the #3/4/5 WRs in the rotation pending Jajuan Jennings’s health, these guys are being counted on heavily. Palmer in particular oozes NFL potential with his size/speed combo and ability to high point the ball. If he takes another step this season he could absolutely jump to the WR1 spot

Jacquez Jones (RS So)/Maleik Gray (RS So) – two guys who haven’t done anything yet in their two years on the Hill, were one of them to jump up into the rotation and give Chaney and Jarrett Guarantano another option or two at the position that would be huge. More likely for these two is special teams duty where – especially given the small talent differentials between Tennessee and quite a few teams on the schedule – a big play or two could swing the season

K’rohjn Calbert (RS So)

Marcus Tatum (RS Jr)

Nathan Niehaus (RS Jr)

Riley Locklear (Jr)

Calbert is far and away the most physically gifted of the four OL listed, yet has played the least amount of football. He will be in the mix for a starting RG spot when fall camp kicks off. And while the other three have all started and played quite a bit, the best case scenario for the Vols is that the younger and more talented players earn starting roles and these guys provide the kind of high quality experienced depth that Tennessee hasn’t had on the OL for most of the last decade

Given the volume of players at each position, it’s easy to see both the necessity for the Vols that some of these players step up as well as how big it would be. Even if none of them become starters but just provide quality depth and rest for the first-teamers or even better make big plays when the opportunity presents itself, shoring up the bottom portion of the roster (from a star ranking perspective) with play that exceeds what anyone is expecting from them would simply be huge for Tennessee.

Robinson Gives Vols Trio of Interior Maulers to Build OL Class Around

While the 2019 OL class was built around 5-star OTs Wanya Morris and Darnell Wright, the Thursday commitment of James Robinson – to go with earlier commitments Javontez Spraggins and Cooper Mays – gives Tennessee an outstanding threesome of interior roadgraders around whom they are building this class to complement last year’s OT haul. While Mays appears to be pegged for Center, both Robinson and Spraggins look like they can play both Guard positions and Robinson even appears to have at least some potential to kick out to Right Tackle. At least at first, however, he’ll likely be paired on the inside with the aforementioned classmates. All three are well known for their nasty dispositions and bring the size to back up the attitudes.

Robinson likely caps off Tennessee’s interior OL class as long as they can hold onto Spraggins, whose recruiting is still in the midst of blowing up, especially since the class of 2019 also featured two interior OL in Jackson Lampley and Chris Akporoghene. Therefore OL Coach Will Friend and the rest of the staff will now turn their focus to much needed OTs. Tackles are always a hot commodity every cycle, but for the Vols their an even bigger need despite last year’s stud tandem because the roster is still thin there. Top options there include the following:

Chris Morris is currently in a heated battle the Vols and Texas A&M, with Tennessee probably trailing the Aggies at this point. He took his OV to Knoxville for their Cookout recruiting event in late June before the Dead Period began, then visited College Station unofficially after the Dead Period ended and has been there quite a few times. Tennessee will undoubtedly need to get him back to campus, ideally for a game and then again for another unofficial in December, since A&M still has their OV available

Marcus Dumervil spent 3 days in Knoxville in mid-June after having OV’d to both LSU and OU in the spring. He took an UV to instate UF when the Dead Period ended last weekend and the Gators have made a move there. He does have ties to Vols via Josh Palmer and Kivon Bennett from St Thomas Aquinas HS. This is going to be a bigtime battle but the Vols are definitely in play here and look like a likely OV destination for him in the fall

JUCOS Tariq Stewart and Antwan Reed have ties to Vol staffer Joe Osovet from his days as the former head coach at their Junior College. Stewart has an offer from Maryland after earning a UT offer when he and Reed camped in June. Reed was a Penn State commitment before academic concerns caused him to sign with Western Michigan before ultimately heading to JUCO

Tyson Wannamaker is a longtime South Carolina commitment with a tie to Chris Rumph via a longtime relationship with Tyson’s father. He visited the Vols for their Cookout event in late June before the Dead Period began and Tennessee continues to be in contact with him and the family. That one is likely an uphill battle for the Palmetto State native and longtime Cocks commitment, but the Vols will look to hang around and get him back to campus for an OV

The best news of fall camp

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?

What if Highly Ranked Vols on Defense Play to their Ranking?

In our last piece we looked at the 5 and 4-stars on the offensive side of Tennessee’s roster and wondered what the Vols’ offense would look like in 2019 if the most highly recruited players on the team – from seniors to true freshman – play up to their rankings this season.

Acknowledging that Tennessee not have enough bluechip talent, there is some on both sides of the ball. So what would happen if when camp starts on Friday Strength & Conditioning Coach Fitzgerald has worked wonders and then Pruitt and his staff can get all of his blue-chip talent to play up to those past rankings? Before we even get to former 3-stars being coached up and playing beyond those rankings, if the Vols can get its true top-end talent to play like it things could look much different this fall. As an aside, both the dearth of top-end talent that existed on the roster when Coach Prutt took over as well as how quickly he’s added a good amount of bluechippers is striking when you look at it from this angle.

Below, by position, are former 5-and high 4-stars on Tennessee’s 2019 defensive roster:

5-star Aubrey Solomon

4-stars Greg Emerson, Emmit Gooden, Savion Williams

Assuming Solomon gets his transfer waiver, he and Gooden and Williams are quite possibly the starting DL. That’s a legit SEC DL – each bluechippers as recruits and each with the kind of size and talent necessary to win the line of scrimmage more often than not. Emerson is coming off RS season after a gruesome injury cost him his senior high school season but he’s now almost 2 years removed and likely is in the best shape of his life. He’s not currently being counted by most observers as even part of the 2^nd wave of the DL rotation, but what if he takes a leap and emerges as one of, say, the Top 5 DL? All of the sudden Tennessee’s DL goes from being arguably the biggest question mark on the team to a real strength.

5-stars JJ Peterson, Quarvaris Crouch

4-stars Daniel Bituli, Darrell Taylor, Will Ignot, Jordan Allen, Henry To’oto’to, Roman Harrison

The position with the most bluechip talent on the entire roster, the issue of course is that three of them are true freshman and one is a RSFr. However, this is a spot where guys playing up to their billing – both off the edge as well as ILB – would be just huge. A pass-rushing group led by Taylor, Crouch, Allen and Harrison playing like truly elite players, complemented by a an ILB wrecking crew of Bituli, Ignot, To’oto’to, and Peterson (who could also play some at OLB) would not only cause problems for offenses in both the passing and running games but also give DC Derrick Ansley tons of options and flexibility.

5-stars Nigel Warrior

4-stars Alontae Taylor, Bryce Thompson, Jaylen McCullough, Tyus Fields, Deangelo Gibbs

Another position where the majority of the elite talent on the roster skews incredibly young, the secondary will likely feature at least three former 5 and 4-stars among the five starters. If Gibbs is eligible he’s instantly vying for a starting spot at Nickel, and either way true freshman McCullough will be in the mix there. If the light turns on and Warrior takes a 5-star leap while both Taylor and Thompson make a big jump in their sophomore season, the secondary could end up being the #1 strength of the team.

As you can see, while there isn’t enough elite talent on the roster – yet – there is perhaps more than one might think on both sides of the ball. What Tennessee fans are hoping is that Coach Pruitt, Coach Chaney and Coach Ansley, along with the rest of one of the highest paid staffs in the country, can unlock that potential. If so, and of course if they can also get some 3-stars to play up a level at the same time, the program will make the kind of massive improvement in Year 2 that both fans and recruits are looking for.

What if Highly Ranked Vols on Offense Play to their Ranking?

Before any discussion of Tennessee’s 2019 roster and season outlook can go anywhere, it must be acknowledged that the team does not have enough talent. It doesn’t have enough talent to realistically compete for an SEC East championship; it likely doesn’t have enough talent to win more than 8 games; and it doesn’t even have enough talent to feel that good about beating all of the other SEC non-contenders on the schedule, including Missouri, Mississippi State, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Vanderbilt. That’s just where the program is right now and will be unti Coach Jeremy Pruitt adds another couple (1-2?) of recruiting classes. But…

What if the highest ranked and most highly recruited players on the team – from seniors to true freshman – play up to their rankings this season? Because while Tennessee not have enough high 5-and-high-4-stars, and is still lacking high quality depth up and down the roster, there are still quite a few former blue-chip recruits on campus in Knoxville. So what would happen if when camp starts on Friday Strength & Conditioning Coach Fitzgerald has worked wonders and then Pruitt and his staff can get all of his blue-chip talent to play up to those past rankings? Before we even get to former 3-stars being coached up and playing beyond those rankings, if the Vols can get its true top-end talent to play like it things could look much different this fall.

Below, by position, are former 5-and high 4-stars on Tennessee’s 2019 offensive roster:

Jarrett Guarantano

There are differing opinions on JG, but regardless of how one feels about the Vols’ signal caller it’s clear he’s got more room to grow in order to live up to his billing as one of the very top high school QBs in the country. If he does that it might mean more than any other player on the list, as it goes without saying that top end QB play can take any team to another level

5-stars Trey Smith, Wanya Morris, Darnell Wright

4-stars Brandon Kennedy, Jerome Carvin, Ryan Johnson, Jackon Lampley With Trey coming back from injury he’ll almost assuredly pair with Morris on the left side, and Kennedy is locked in as the starting Center. Wright will be thrust into a battle at RT, while Carvin and Johnson are top contenders for the RG position and will be firmly in the rotation no matter who wins the starting job. So Tennessee could potentially have 3 5-stars and 2 4-stars starting on its OL, with another 4-star as the top backup two true freshman OL– ignoring the potential perils of starting one let alone two freshman OL, that’s really strong. And if those six in particular play like 5 and 4-stars, look out. Ideally Lampley will redshirt, but even having the luxury to do so is a far cry from the very recent state of Tennessee’s OL.

4-stars Ty Chandler, Eric Gray, Carlin Fils-aime

That’s your likely starter and 3^rd back in a 5-RB rotation in Chandler and Gray, with “CFA” being a potential gadget player in new OC Jim Chaney’s creative offensive system. If Chandler and Gray can become bigtime Swiss Army Knife weapons all over the field and Chaney can optimize CFA’s very solid speed/power combination then the Vols will have an incredibly dynamic backfield.

4-stars Marquez Callaway, Tyler Byrd, Ramel Keyton

One could strongly argue that Callaway has lived up to the ranking, but going back to the 2017 opener against Georgia Tech where he simply dominated, what if he does that every week? What if Tyler Byrd has the lightbulb come on and looks like the borderline 5-star he appeared to be in the US Army All American Game? Keyton has an opportunity to break into the rotation depending on how many WRs Tee Martin wants to play, but what if he’s taken a huge step this summer in the weight room and has a Justyn Ross/Jaylen Waddle type freshman year?

4-stars Dominick Wood-Anderson, Jackson Lowe

There are very big expectations for “DWA” coming into the season, as the former #1 JUCO in the country, for whom Tennessee beat out Alabama straight up, heads into his final college season. He’s got elite size and speed, can block at the point of attack, and has good hands. But he wasn’t the gamechanger needed last season – what if he is in 2019? What if he becomes an All-American and a force at the position, both stretching the field and dominating in the red zone while being a third-down conversion machine? Lowe is a big kid who had a nice spring as an early enrollee and has a chance to be the #2 TE. If he is an immediate contributor and can be a dominant inline blocker in two-TE sets with DWA the Vols will have a lot of flexibility in terms of sets no matter the down and distance.

Especially at the incredibly important positions of Quarterback and Offensive Line, the Vols have enough bluechippers that if Coach Pruitt, Coach Chaney and the rest of the offensive staff can get 5 and 4-star performances from them both the floor and the ceiling for the 2019 Tennessee season are raised significantly. That’s a big if, but not beyond the realm of possibility given the developmental history of the staff. We’ll next take a look at the defensive side of the ball where Tennessee also has some real yet untapped talent.

The Need for Speed: Vols Land Blazer at WR

Tennessee picked up a bigtime commitment at its end of July pool party recruiting event on Saturday when WR Jalin Hyatt pledged to the Vols. The former Virginia Tech commitment – a high school teammate and very close friend of current Vol stud CB Bryce Thompson – is the first pure WR commitment of the class for Tennessee, pairing with ATHs and potential WR commitments Darion Williamson and Jimmy Calloway.

Hyatt brings a number of things to the table that Coach Jeremy Pruitt covets in a prospect. For one, he’s a certified winner, coming off his third straight state title at Dutch Fork HS in South Carolina’s 5A classification, and is regarded as a leader in that program. Secondly, he’s a track athlete with blazing speed, something Pruitt is well known for targeting. In just the third track meet of his career this past March Hyatt set a new Dutch Fork record in the 200 meter dash, recording a Top 10 national laser-timed 21.33. But that speed isn’t simply limited to the track or empty calorie measurables – Hyatt’s functional athleticism is on full display both in his high school tape as well as this spring as showed out at multiple events. At The Opening in Charlotte he not only ran a 4.31 40 and won the camp’s fastest man contest but also shined in the skills portion and earned himself a 4-star rating by 247 Sports. He’s known for his great hands and shows impressive route running ability – especially or a guy who could do nothing but be a vertical threat and still be a real weapon – as well as the ability to high point the ball. At over 6’0 and with a wiry frame, Hyatt is a true WR who just happens to have elite speed and in Tennessee’s Strength & Conditioning program has the kind of size/speed/ability combo as a rising high school senior to project as a potentially elite SEC WR.

Hyatt also represents a recruiting win over the likes of not just Virginia Tech but also Michigan, Oregon, and Miami among others. At the same time, the Vols now have two bigtime prospects from a powerhouse program in Will Muschamp’s backyard, which is always a positive. Hyatt gives Tee Martin and Jim Chaney a true blazer in the class around which they can build the 2020 WR corps as they figure out where Williamson and Calloway fit and also continue to chase guys like Rakim Jarrett, Thaiu Jones-Bell, and a handful of other targets.

Tennessee now has 13 commitments in the 2020 class and, particularly with how its positioned itself with a good number of highly recruited and rated instate prospects, has a chance to sign a Top 10 class come December and February.

Dusting off the GRT Expected Win Total Machine

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?

The Secret Word is “Quiet”

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.

Jarrett Guarantano: Old Strengths & New Potential

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.

Reasonable goals for the Vols in 2019

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?