Tag Archives: Ty Chandler

Gameday Today: Is Butch Jones immune to the legion of the miserable?

Butch Jones stiff arms the negative talk and keeps building an awesome class, a bunch of Tennessee baseball players get drafted, and VFLs just keep making us proud, all in today’s Vols link roundup.

Football

This headline from Gridiron Now makes a really interesting point: 

Tennessee recruiting booms despite Butch Jones speculation

You’d think that recruiting would be even more difficult when rumors begin to swirl about your imminent demise, but Jones is instead putting together one of his best classes. Chest bump to Jones for that. Maybe players just understand that relentless optimism better than fans do.

And yet Jones seems to be learning to season that optimism with a pinch of reality when talking to fans through the media. He’s “proud of [his] players, but not yet satisfied.” He says in one breath that Tennessee-Alabama is a “great, great rivalry,” but in the next that “we were very disappointed when we played them last year.” Basically, he’s still being himself but also learning to keep his foot out of his mouth.

There’s little danger in this statement, though, in which Jones says that he is pleased that his veterans are leading and his freshman are following.

Mike Griffith has an excellent feature on incoming running back Ty Chandler that you should go read now. Speaking of Mike, here he is saying interesting things on the SEC Network:

And again, GoVols247 entices you to bear the indignities of a 16-click slideshow by promising Vols football’s best moments against the Georgia Bulldogs. Yes, it’s a pain, but this one’s worth it. (You can also see the whole thing on one page if you are a subscriber.) 

Recruiting

Offensive line coach Walt Wells is up to No. 5 on 247Sports‘ recruiter rankings after landing the commitment of 4-star D’Andre Litaker. He’s third among SEC assistant coaches, and largely responsible for Tennessee’s 2018 class, which is currently ranked in the Top 10 and heading into Orange Carpet Day.

Speaking of which, GoVols247 has a list of five guys to watch this weekend ($$$).

New offers:

Baseball

The Atlanta Braves drafted Tennessee third baseman Jordan Rodgers in the sixth round on Tuesday. Pitchers Kyle Serrano (10th round, by the Houston Astros), Zach Warren (14th round, by the Philadelphia Phillies), and Hunter Martin (20th round, by Houston), and infielder Jeff Moberg (30th round, by the Colorado Rockies) were also drafted. Serrano, however, told Jimmy Hyams that he’s inclined to return to Tennessee rather than heading to the big leagues.

If you’re interested, SEC Sports has a list of all 75 players taken in the 2017 MLB Draft. Actually, they still have it even if you’re not interested, but you know what I mean.

The baseball Vols have also hired Frank Anderson as pitching coach.

Hoops

Five of the first six picks in the Pilot Rocky Top League draft were Vols. Guard Chris Darrington went No. 1 overall. Jordan Bowden went second, and Admiral Schofield went third. Grant Williams and Jordan Bone were fifth and sixth. Play begins Monday night at 6:00 at Knoxville Catholic High School. 

VFLs

Cam Sutton has signed his contract with the Steelers, and according to Spotrac, it’s worth $3,236,714. Love to see these guys so richly rewarded for their hard work.

Peyton Manning offered Lamar Jackson this advice after he won the Heisman Trophy:

“Peyton Manning told me that if you’re not having fun with it, always talk with your guys. Talk to the people around the program who can help you with stuff like that. You’ve got to always have a smile on your face. People are always watching.”

Eric Berry said that he has a very good reason to regularly give hungry people food:

“I don’t do it for the attention,” Berry said. “I don’t do none of this for the attention. I do it to better myself and give back. That’s what you should do it for.”

Other fun stuff

Another sports book has set the over/under for the Vols this fall at 7.5 games. So the money-where-your-mouth-is people are banking on 7-8 wins for Tennessee. 

The USTFCCCA, which wins the award for laziest acronym, named Vols junior Christian Coleman its National Outdoor Track Athlete of the Year. Assistant coach Tim Hall earned National Men’s Assistant Coach of the Year.

Golfer Hunter Wolcott is tied for 13th after the first round of the Southeastern Amateur at the Country Club of Columbus.

Post-Spring Projections: Running Backs

As we enter the football-less days of summer, we’ve got to fill our minds with visions of orange-and-white grandeur to pass the time, right?

Spring practice — like most all the springs before of the Butch Jones era — didn’t tell us much. But after what we saw and read, we can make some prognostications about what we may see, or at least expect to see, once fall practice starts. So, over the course of the next couple of weeks, I’m going to break down position-by-position what we saw, what we read and what I’ve heard about to project who’s gonna play where come opening weekend against Georgia Tech.

We’ll continue this series with our look at the Running Backs.

RUNNING BACKS

The John Kelly Show is going to debut with heaps of critical acclaim.

Way back when the 5’9″, 212-pound rising junior first arrived on campus, UT running backs coach Robert Gillespie turned heads with an otherwise-throwaway comment. When discussing his running backs room, which featured prominent offensive stalwarts Jalen Hurd and Alvin Kamara, Gillespie said he believed he had three NFL running backs watching film. At the time, those who actually dug into the comment thought, “Woah, he’s including John Kelly, too, and he is a true freshman who’s never even played a snap.”

Flash forward to 2016, and our first extended look at Kelly following Hurd’s shocking mid-season decision to quit on his teammates. That Gillespie comment, in retrospect, looked prophetic. If anything, Hurd is the biggest long-shot of the trio to be in the pros, considering he transferred to Baylor to start over his career as a receiver, electing to sit out a year before changing positions.

With Hurd gone, Kelly wound up rushing for 630 yards and five touchdowns and led the team with a 6.4 average. He showed a second gear when he reached the linebacker level, but he was easily Tennessee’s best running back at attacking holes. Now, with Hurd at Baylor and Kamara in the NFL with the New Orleans Saints, this is Kelly’s team.

GoVols247’s Grant Ramey and Wes Rucker believe he’s the one irreplaceable player on the offense, even more so than junior receiver Jauan Jennings.

This spring, he took another step forward with the intangibles, all the extra-curricular stuff that goes along with his immense talent. Associated Press writer Steve Megargee wrote about Kelly’s emerging leadership ability, and head coach Butch Jones noticed the change in Kelly this spring.

“He’s probably more vocal than he’s ever been,” Tennessee coach Butch Jones said. “He’s coaching the younger players. It gets back to details, accountability and toughness. John has done a really good job of accountability not only to himself, but his teammates around him. His voice is well respected.”

He didn’t even play in the Orange & White Game; the Vols didn’t need him to. He’s already proven he’s the offense’s horse, and he’s going to have to be the Man as UT breaks in a new quarterback.

Though several Big Ten schools (like Ohio State and Michigan State) wanted Kelly as a defensive back, it’s obvious he belongs in the offensive backfield. He’ll enter 2017 as UT’s feature back, and there’s really no question about his ability. It would be a shocker if he wasn’t a 1,000-yard rusher if he remains healthy. Considering this should be the strongest and deepest Tennessee offensive line of the Butch Jones era, Kelly should be licking his chops. He’s an all-around running back, and it’s possible he could be one of the league’s breakout stars. At the RB position, I predict he and Arkansas’ Devwah Whaley will be emerging studs.

It’s behind Kelly that the concerns start.

Tennessee has plenty of talent behind Kelly, but every ounce of it is unproven. It starts with rising sophomore Carlin Fils-aime, who looked capable in very limited action, scoring two touchdowns and gaining 58 yards in 14 total carries. Though he isn’t an electrifying player, he can get up and go and has a second gear. Is he big enough to endure the wear and tear of an SEC season? Fils-aime may not ever be an every-down back at Tennessee, but he has the ability to be a nice niche player who could excel getting 10 touches a game. There’s an outside chance he could emerge as a Kamara type, but at 5’11”, 175 pounds, he’d have to add 35 pounds to do so, and he just doesn’t have the same type of frame. CFA would be a good complimentary back, but if Kelly goes down, it remains to be seen if he could adequately fill the void.

The biggest hope comes to Knoxville this summer in the form of Nashville (Montgomery Bell Academy) true freshman Ty Chandler, a kid pretty much everybody in the Southeast wanted. He wound up choosing the home-state Vols over Georgia, Clemson, Southern Cal and Ole Miss, where his father played. The nation’s fifth-rated running back and No. 68 overall player according to the 247Sports Composite ratings is a dynamic athlete who represented a major win instate in a year where the Vols lost a lot of good players to other teams.

He’s 5’11”, 187 pounds and can hold more than 200 pounds easily. He looks good catching the ball out of the backfield, shows good body lean, slashing ability and can kick it up a notch. Chandler looks like he could be one of the biggest recruiting victories of the Butch Jones era, and it would not be a surprise to see him leapfrog CFA into the No. 2 running back role in 2017.

After those three, the Vols are adding two more freshmen runners in Timothy Jordan and Trey Coleman. One of those guys was a late addition who saw his stock soar while the other was a camp find whose recruitment never really took off.

Coleman was one of the guys who visited Knoxville for Orange Carpet Day and wound up pledging to the Vols. Fans at the time were like, “Who’s this guy?” but UT desperately wanted a power back in this year’s class considering, at the time, they thought Hurd would leave for the NFL after his junior season. The 5’11”, 203-pound running back from West Monroe, Louisiana, had an offer from Arkansas, but he pledged to UT and both sides remained firm in that commitment. Though Coleman may not wind up an every-down back, if he stays on offense, he could be a great short-yardage find. He’ll be an intriguing storyline to watch.

If you’re looking for an under-the-radar find in UT’s 2017 recruiting class, receiver Josh Palmer would be my No. 1, but running a close second is Jordan, a running back from Bartow, Florida, whose recruitment didn’t take off until very late in the process. Jordan was committed to Western Kentucky a long time after surging late in football following a promising basketball career. GoVols247’s Ryan Callahan noted Jordan as the most underrated player in UT’s class. The 5’11”, 189-pound running back is the perfect runner for this system, and he’ll probably get carries immediately in 2017.

So, we may be concerned about running back depth. But the guy who is charged with making those guys great is not. And if you remember back to Gillespie’s first year as the RB coach with Raijon Neal as the No. 1 back, he doesn’t sugarcoat things much. Gillespie likes his guys, and he told Rucker that positional depth isn’t a concern.

“You have to recreate yourself. That’s what we do here. We go out and recruit,” Gillespie said after Thursday’s spring camp practice inside Anderson Training Center. “I think Ty Chandler is a hell of a football player. He’s gonna come in here and be ready to play. Trey Coleman, too. This is my first time being able to say those guys’ names. I think Ty Chandler, Trey Coleman and Timothy Jordan, those guys are gonna come in and be ready to play, and we need ‘em. We talk football almost every day. The same install in this practice which these guys just did, we’re gonna watch it with those [incoming] guys tonight. Technology is something special, with Skype and all that stuff.

“Those guys will know the offense and come in and be ready to play. It’s recreating yourself. This is the SEC.”

It’s gonna be fun to watch these guys develop.

Prediction: John Kelly starter, Ty Chandler 2nd string, Carlin Fils-aime 3rd string, Timothy Jordan 4th string, Trey Coleman 5th string

Next: Wide Receivers

Rocky Top Talk: Where is Team 121 most vulnerable to injuries?

Our buddy Will Shelton over at the old stomping grounds is asking scary questions today: Where would injuries be most costly to the football team this fall?

It’s a good, if frightening, question in light of the impact that injuries had on last year’s team. So where are we most vulnerable in 2017? Will identifies three positions: Tight end, running back, and wide receivers.

With Butch Jones’ recruiting prowess slowing down a bit after killing it for a couple of years, the depth behind the starters this year is not only inexperienced and unproven, much of it is not quite as anticipated as some of the depth was the last couple of years. We’re feeling good about Ethan Wolf at tight end and John Kelly at running back and Jajuan Jennings at wide receiver, but behind them is a bunch of questions. Running back especially is concerning. Carlin Fils-aime and Ty Chandler may well figure to be the same kind of surprise Kelly was for us last year, and perhaps the wide receivers will be everything we’ve been hoping they can be. But that’s just it. We just don’t know.

I’d add defensive line to the list of depth concerns as well because as much as I am excited about seeing Kendal Vickers, Shy Tuttle, Khalil McKenzie, Kyle Phillips, and Jonathan Kongbo keeping each other fresh, I have this uncontrollable twitching when I remember what happened when we had no defensive tackles left last season.

Hopefully, we’ve now been inoculated against the injury bug and the new strength and conditioning guy will help as well. It sure would be nice to have all of our main guys plan almost all of our key games this season.