Ed MOTHEREFFING G
Chances make champions
pretty scummy, but if she's trying to prevent him going to MSU or ohio state, i completely understand.
National Signing Day 2014
- Thread starter Black White Sox Hat
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You know we play Bama every year right?a murders' row sched that always seems to avoid Bama
It's going to be interesting this Spring. Backfield is loaded, but Los is the only back with significant experience. Pender hasn't seen the field, Green has in mop up duty, and Cook will be here for Winter Conditioning/Spring practice. That's going to be some nice competition back there.Yall got a very special impact player in Dalvin Cook
O.iatlhawksfan
Devoted Joel Embiid hater
@ y'all thinking Fournette is not going to be a super star
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Yall won
James Franklin leaving Vandy should help out a lot too.
Unfortunately, Fulmer got full at some point and left the big table to take a bathroom break. While he wasn't paying attention, our spot got snatched up by the likes of UGA, LSU, South Carolina(!), Vanderbilt(!), and on some level Ole Miss and Mississippi State. Now Mizzou is piling on. Unacceptable.
Dooley didn't help ANYTHING either. He contaminated the program with complacency (the enemy of "the best"), and let Kentucky beat us for the first time in TWENTY SIX (26!) YEARS. He also flooded the program with the kind of talent that lets Vanderbilt beat Tennessee back-to-back seasons for the first time since THE 1920's. THE fukkING 1920's.
SEC East:
Florida - Muschamp - could very easily turn it around, but they're not what they were under Meyer, or Spurrier for that matter. As of right now, this Florida team looks Zookish.
Georgia - Richt - where Richt is reminds me a lot of where Fulmer was right before Tennessee went into their tailspin. He's hit the ceiling numerous times. He's a great coach to play for, and UGA is a great program, but they will never be able to get to the next level, whether that be the best in the SEC East, the best in the SEC, or National Champs. There's always some excuse, or some time when Richt/UGA had the goal within their grasp, but let it slip away.
South Carolina - Spurrier - what Spurrier has done at South Carolina should solidify his place as one of the greatest football minds in history. However, Spurrier is only getting older, and SCar is still only 566-544-44 all-time. Think about that. They finally broke .500 under Spurrier. After he leaves, the program WILL falter.
Missouri - Pinkel - They've shown that they're SEC-ready. I truly think that they lucked up with all of the other teams in the SEC East imploding the past couple of years, especially this year. However, they took care of business. I don't think that they'll make it to the SEC Championship game for another ten years. I would consider myself an objective fan of college football, SEC football in particular, but they won't have the luxury of the traditional SEC East powers being poisoned every year. Pinkel is an AMAZING coach. They'll be Top-25 for the remainder of his stay. However, doing what they did doesn't happen every year.
Vanderbilt - trending down. James Franklin is gone. The buzz is gone too. You don't see the new coach everywhere like Franklin was. Part of the job at Vandy is marketing yourself, the school, and the program to EVERYONE, ALL THE TIME. Franklin was good at this, and he worked constantly to keep Vandy in the conversation.
Tennessee - This is where UT has fallen to in the pecking order of the SEC East. Until they beat Vandy (they should in 2014), they're way down here. Bringing home the best recruits in the state and running Franklin off was a good start. Butch is already turning the state orange again, he just has to win now.
Kentucky - basketball school.
The good news for Butch Jones and Tennessee, is that Muschamp is having a hard time, UGA is in danger of going into the tailspin that UT had, Spurrier is old, Pinkel is getting old, Franklin is gone, and Tennessee is getting some of their shine back.
Tennessee is also a traditional power, so people DO want to see them get back to the top again. UT is a top-10 program all-time, even with the 08-13 stretch of debacle after debacle.
Butch is exactly what Tennessee needs right now.
Thus far:
-Beat a top-10 team in South Carolina. Almost toppled UGA. Should have beat Vanderbilt. Those were three games we weren't supposed to win. We hadn't beat a top 25 team since Kiffin, and Butch did it in his first year.
-Inked the contract for the game at Bristol Motor Speedway vs Virginia Tech in 2016 for the biggest football game OF ALL TIME. 160,000+ people to watch Tennessee take on Virginia Tech. It could ultimately become the big coming out party for Butch/UT too because we should have been able to build Butch's team by then. Fans of both schools have wanted this game for the better part of 20 years now as well, and it seemed like it would never happen. Butch MADE it happen in his first year.
-Signed a top 5 recruiting class. Kept 8 of the top 10 in-state players at home in orange, and out of Vandy black/gold. Dooley struggled with this year in and year out. He couldn't even bring interested players to UT. Butch did it in year one.
-Switched the program from Adidas to Nike, which players/fans have been begging for FOR YEARS, and Butch made it happen in his first year.
There is no reason for me to believe that Butch won't be able to achieve his other goals. Make it to a bowl. Win a bowl game. Continue signing top-10 classes. Finish in the top 25. Beat Georgia. Beat Florida. Win the SEC East. Beat Bama. Win the SEC Championship. Go to the tournament. Win the National Championship. We're getting there. I'm not saying that it will happen in the order that I just listed, but he will get most of those things done in the next 3 years, with a good shot of completing the whole list before 2020.
It was brutal. It's hard to be a Tennessee fan and watch those games week in and week out. Meanwhile, Vandy is scheduling the weakest of the weak so James Franklin can get to 8 and 9 wins. We have to play Oregon and the SEC elite are chilling at home playing Doodoo State?! Why is this?! It was hard not to be pissed every week.
However, I think that Butch can get Tennessee back to the place where WE are the team that other teams don't want to rotate onto. It sucks that we have to play Bama every year, but that's just the way it is. Saban is there right now, and they're damn near unbeatable, but we HAVE to play that game. We smashed Bama for years while they were down and finding their identity again. It's just how it works.
This year we have a rough schedule again:
Utah State - going to be a tough win
Arkansas State - going to be a tough win, but should win
@ Oklahoma - loss (we do get to play them at home in 2015 though, and that could be a huge game for us nationally, so I see the tradeoff mentality for Butch)
@ Georgia - likely a loss
Florida - even though it's at home, it's going to be tough to win. UT fans and coaches have always wanted this game later in the year (we used to play them week 3), but the scheduling changes ended up helping us. We could have our feet under us by then and end up pulling it off. It would be huge for Butch and UT. I'm still going to call it a loss, because I'm not unreasonable. If I had to bet on it today, I'd say we lose. Butch wants this game BAD, but Muschamp can't afford to lose this game either.
Chattanooga - Win
@ Ole Miss - split, but probably a loss.
Bama - loss
@ SCar - a revenge game for them. Loss.
Kentucky - Win
Mizzou - split, only because it's at home
@ Vandy - I'm going with Win here. Butch has to set the tone that the state of Tennessee belongs to UT again, and Vandy merely borrowed it under Franklin. We'll probably HAVE to win this game to go to a bowl too, so it ups the ante.
By my calculations, that's a 6 win season if everything goes right. We have to split the Mizzou and Ole Miss games. It sucks to say this, but there's a chance that we only win five games again. Florida and Bama have our number, so having both of those games at home won't help anything. South Carolina and Georgia were our big conference games last year, and our best chances IMO, and we have them away. Ole Miss is away, which hurts.
We're probably going to have to beat UK, Miz, and Vandy three in a row to finish the season if we want to go bowling. We should have bought out of the OU game and played Cupcake A&M.
Bama can't help that they can't play themselves. When you're the best of the best, you don't get a boost for playing a mediocre team. When you're a mediocre team and you play Bama, it instantly boosts your strength of schedule.a murders' row sched that always seems to avoid Bama
Tennessee is also playing big games (Oregon and Oklahoma) because we signed up for those series a decade ago, when we were good. The administration never thought we'd suck. They just started scheduling big games, because we needed those to be relevant in the National Championship conversation. They never thought it would be possible that we would have rolled over by then. Alabama tries to schedule big series but it takes time.
I had to split that post in two because I can only talk so much about football in one post it seems...
The best part about the timing for Tennessee is that Butch and UT could be in a great place by 2015/2016 if they keep taking care of business. They could very well upset Oklahoma in 2015 when OU comes to Knoxville. The next year they play VT in Bristol in front of more than 160,000+. They are expecting more than 300,000 in/around the stadium for the game. The UT allotment has already sold out.
By then, Saban could have called it quits. Spurrier could have called it quits. Miles or Richt could have left or hit the skids. Missouri could have hit hard times. I'm not saying that the stars will align for UT, but there's a good chance that the SEC landscape could have changed enough by then for UT to make the same step that UGA and LSU did back in 01-02. Someone will falter in the next few years, and I think Butch is building UT back to relevance and getting us ready to hop back in our old spot, or move up the ranks when someone else slips.
This is football, it happens. I just need more dark liquor and patience, and for Butch to keep making small steps in the right direction.
Yes and no. He did recruit good players, but he never filled holes. Especially on defense. He pretty much recruited for, and built, Louisiana Tech at Tennessee. Great offense, lots of passing, serviceable line, but no defense to speak of. Our secondary and linebackers were/are incredibly slow. The DL were all overgrown vaginas. They were this way because Dooley wasn't aggressive and didn't put someone aggressive in place to build and maintain a SEC-calibre defense.
Like I said earlier, we were the shyt, then we lost our place. When you lose your place, another team will step up to fill that void. Florida has been lucky enough to have an amazing athletic department, so they've not really experienced a fall-off (minus the Zook era). Everyone else comes and goes in cycles. Eventually UGA, SCar, Mizzou, LSU, Ole Miss, Auburn will hit the skids again and we'll climb back up that SEC ladder.
The best part about the timing for Tennessee is that Butch and UT could be in a great place by 2015/2016 if they keep taking care of business. They could very well upset Oklahoma in 2015 when OU comes to Knoxville. The next year they play VT in Bristol in front of more than 160,000+. They are expecting more than 300,000 in/around the stadium for the game. The UT allotment has already sold out.
By then, Saban could have called it quits. Spurrier could have called it quits. Miles or Richt could have left or hit the skids. Missouri could have hit hard times. I'm not saying that the stars will align for UT, but there's a good chance that the SEC landscape could have changed enough by then for UT to make the same step that UGA and LSU did back in 01-02. Someone will falter in the next few years, and I think Butch is building UT back to relevance and getting us ready to hop back in our old spot, or move up the ranks when someone else slips.
This is football, it happens. I just need more dark liquor and patience, and for Butch to keep making small steps in the right direction.