Can Tennessee climb the ladder at all tomorrow?

[Halph66]

Yeah but why are they transferring? It's because there are other coveted 5 star players beating them out for a starting job.

That's a biproduct of a well run program, not a sign that they are failing. I WISH Tennessee had that problem.

Because they will never see the field. Why stack them up if they aren't going to ever play? So you can beat your drum and say we have a lot of 5 star players that never see the field.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

Dude if they had a 12 team playoff last year we were in. Will some of y'all wake up and see we moved past the three stooges of yesteryear.

Dooley - the coach of Christmas crutches
Butch - the coach of Christmas collapse
Pruitt - the coach of Christmas McStakes

Dude if they had a 12 team playoff this year we WOULDN'T have been in. What's your point? Last year we had Hendon Hooker. I guess wake me up when he decides to come back to UT .

I hope Nico is the man and we get Bama and Florida at home and we can go 10-2 again but most people on this board have us going 8-4 again if we are lucky. Doesn't sound like the trend you are hoping for. I could be wrong I guess but history says that's probably not true.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

Because they will never see the field. Why stack them up if they aren't going to ever play? So you can beat your drum and say we have a lot of 5 star players that never see the field.

Uh yeah, like I said I would take their problem over ours any day especially with them likely beating us yet again next year.

Also those players are just 1 injury away from seeing the field. Very short sighted IMO.

Georgia just backfill with more 5* players in this recruiting class and move on still better than Tennessee.

 

[a vol n tears]

I mean what do you mean by recent past?

Butch Jones had 4 5* and 13 4* players and the #1 player in the state in 2015.

He had 2 5* and 16 4* and the #2 player in the state in 2014.

Derek Doolittle had a comparable 2010

In 2020 even The Gump had a 5* 13 4* recruit and the #2 player in the state

If Jones could have coached ( Ark St), those players should have beaten Ok and won the SEC East at a minimum. Gump recruited enough talent to let CJH use them to win 11 games and beat Ala in 22 season. Dooley just can’t be anything more than an assistant coach.
I’m saying there is enough talent coming in to be competitive and beat anybody on the Vols schedule. You can never predict injuries or amount of injuries, players who fail to live up to expectations, or players who exceed expectations. I think the talent is good enough, but not sold on Heupel’s in game coaching just yet. Coaching is very underrated in wins and loses.

 

[DD4ME]

Dude if they had a 12 team playoff this year we WOULDN'T have been in. What's your point? Last year we had Hendon Hooker. I guess wake me up when he decides to come back to UT .

I hope Nico is the man and we get Bama and Florida at home and we can go 10-2 again but most people on this board have us going 8-4 again if we are lucky. Doesn't sound like the trend you are hoping for. I could be wrong I guess but history says that's probably not true.

You cited a 15 year narrative that you just agreed was broken last year. Maybe make a clearer point.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

If Jones could have coached ( Ark St), those players should have beaten Ok and won the SEC East at a minimum. Gump recruited enough talent to let CJH use them to win 11 games and beat Ala in 22 season. Dooley just can’t be anything more than an assistant coach.
I’m saying there is enough talent coming in to be competitive and beat anybody on the Vols schedule. You can never predict injuries or amount of injuries, players who fail to live up to expectations, or players who exceed expectations. I think the talent is good enough, but not sold on Heupel’s in game coaching just yet. Coaching is very underrated in wins and loses.

I definitely won't argue that Heupel is a better coach than those 3. Or at least he has a way more explosive offensive scheme. I would never argue otherwise. But we cannot be obsessed with this "we are so much better than we were back then" mentality. We need to be obsessed with how good we are compared to the teams we HAVE to beat this year and in the future.

We have to stop looking at the schedule and saying that Bama and Georgia and Florida are automatic losses because now we have Texas and OK to deal with. We have to get better and get better in a hurry. The only way to measure that is in recruiting.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

You cited a 15 year narrative that you just agreed was broken last year. Maybe make a clearer point.

The entire point of this thread is me asking if we will get our recruiting up to par with the programs we have to beat to win the SEC. You're the one bringing up irrelevant points about a year that has passed and has nothing to do with recruiting.

 

[DD4ME]

The entire point

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[BigOrangeTrain]

I don't know about per recruit average. I just know how we finished in relation to our direct competition. Recruiting metrics and averages have changed over time but how you do in relation to other teams on the same scale of measure is what matters most.

This tells me what I needed to know about you then. Your first sentence tells me you don’t really under understand recruiting.

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

The entire point of this thread is me asking if we will get our recruiting up to par with the programs we have to beat to win the SEC. You're the one bringing up irrelevant points about a year that has passed and has nothing to do with recruiting.

Are we gonna finish THIS year with a class that’s gonna enable us to beat UGA and Bama? No we aren’t. The chances of us out recruiting those teams are slim. Nobody out recruits them.

 

[Volfan1000]

With early signing day upon us a quick glance at the team recruiting rankings has us either the #7 or #8 team in the SEC. Now with the addition of Oklahoma and Texas things just got even harder in recruiting.

Can UT flip some big names with some big $$$ to get us into the top 5? Or will UT be dependent on the transfer portal?

The flipping of commitments is always the most interesting part of signing day.

 

[Orange_Crush]

I definitely won't argue that Heupel is a better coach than those 3. Or at least he has a way more explosive offensive scheme. I would never argue otherwise. But we cannot be obsessed with this "we are so much better than we were back then" mentality. We need to be obsessed with how good we are compared to the teams we HAVE to beat this year and in the future.

We have to stop looking at the schedule and saying that Bama and Georgia and Florida are automatic losses because now we have Texas and OK to deal with. We have to get better and get better in a hurry. The only way to measure that is in recruiting.

What's interesting is that we've beaten two of those three without out-recruiting them. I wouldn't call that automatic losses. And it undermines your bald assertion that the only way to beat them is to out-rank them on signing day.

Now, your come-back on that has been that the only reason we beat them was Hooker, and I'd challenge that by pointing out that Hooker wasn't blocking for himself or throwing to himself, but... To further challenge your flawed, hand-wringing mentality, I'll just point out that Hooker never once showed up in a UT-recruiting column on signing day. He transferred in.

So, your "auto-loss-have-to-out-recruit-them" argument is objectively self-refuting, and your come-backs against its criticism are also self-refuting, as your savior (Hooker) to the argument wasn't a high school recruit.

You're just all over the place, man. It's almost as tough you are blindly protecting the need to have hypertension.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

This tells me what I needed to know about you then. Your first sentence tells me you don’t really under understand recruiting.

I understand plenty about recruiting. You can get mired down in the details that don't really matter because any one recruit can be a huge bust. Teams like Bama and Georgia figured that out. All I know is that the same teams that beat us on the field are the same teams that our recruit us. Pretty clear correlation unless you are settling on being a 9-3 team and sometimes beating Bama or Georgia every 5 years or so. Not me tho.

 

[Orange_Crush]

The entire point of this thread is me asking if we will get our recruiting up to par with the programs we have to beat to win the SEC. You're the one bringing up irrelevant points about a year that has passed and has nothing to do with recruiting.

Your entire premise is a loaded question. It's begging the question whether we have to out-rank these programs in recruiting to beat them, while ignoring that we've beaten two of them without out-ranking them in recruiting.

It's like asking, "Have you stopped beating your wife" when the wife is sitting there confirming that he's not beating her.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

The flipping of commitments is always the most interesting part of signing day.

I agree!!

 

[Orange_Crush]

This tells me what I needed to know about you then. Your first sentence tells me you don’t really under understand recruiting.

Ding, ding ding... lol

 

[UTFranklinVol]

What's interesting is that we've beaten two of those three without out-recruiting them. I wouldn't call that automatic losses. And it undermines your bald assertion that the only way to beat them is to out-rank them on signing day.

Now, your come-back on that has been that the only reason we beat them was Hooker, and I'd challenge that by pointing out that Hooker wasn't blocking for himself or throwing to himself, but... To further challenge your flawed, hand-wringing mentality, I'll just point out that Hooker never once showed up in a UT-recruiting column on signing day. He transferred in.

So, your "auto-loss-have-to-out-recruit-them" argument is objectively self-refuting, and your come-backs against its criticism are also self-refuting, as your savior (Hooker) to the argument wasn't a high school recruit.

You're just all over the place, man. It's almost as tough you are blindly protecting the need to have hypertension.

Uhhh that's some mighty fine cherry picking you did there. Lol "we have beaten 2 of those teams" ha no you don't get to cherry pick like that! First of all we beat neither of those teams this year and secondly we beat Bama 1 time in 17 years and Florida 2 time in 19 years. Even a blind squirrel can beat Florida more than once a decade . We beat them cause we got lucky once in a blue moon had nothing to do with recruiting.

Call me when we beat Bama 16 out of 17 years and tell me how Bama fans feel about how good their recruiting is

Oh, we're making great progress. Let's shoot for beating Bama twice in 20 years that will show them who's boss!

If you told Bama hey we will give you a top 5 recruiting class every year but once ever decade or so Tennessee will beat you. I'm sure they would walk away from that deal.

Your whole mindset is that once every 10 years we will hit lighting in a bottle and "that will show all those people they know nothing about recruiting they are so dumb"

 

[UTFranklinVol]

This tells me what I needed to know about you then. Your first sentence tells me you don’t really under understand recruiting.

Sure and why don't you pull up some of your old posts from 5 or 10 years ago I bet you were blathering on about how much UTs recruiting was improving back then. How'd that work out? Exactly. Give me a break I know all I need to know about recruiting. I'm sure Bama and Georgia are shaking in their boots over our recruiting while they let 5 stars hit the portal because they have so many.

 

[Orange_Crush]

If Jones could have coached ( Ark St), those players should have beaten Ok and won the SEC East at a minimum. Gump recruited enough talent to let CJH use them to win 11 games and beat Ala in 22 season. Dooley just can’t be anything more than an assistant coach.
I’m saying there is enough talent coming in to be competitive and beat anybody on the Vols schedule. You can never predict injuries or amount of injuries, players who fail to live up to expectations, or players who exceed expectations. I think the talent is good enough, but not sold on Heupel’s in game coaching just yet. Coaching is very underrated in wins and loses.

See, I'll take slight issue here. Most of Pruett's quality recruits, as well as previous class recruits, transferred out when he left. Speaking from memory, CJH inherited a 67 player roster and a class that he had to tightrope to try to hold together. His '21 class had 4 4-stars and 10 3-stars.

I would argue (recruiting classes aside, his actual) roster for roster, CJH most likely out-coached and beat several teams with superior rosters than his. Add that to the fact that he beat Bam and UF in his second year, and it gives me indication that he doesn't have to out-rank others on signing day to beat them.

In any event, Pruet did NOT leave CJH in position to beat many teams on our schedule.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

See, I'll take slight issue here. Most of Pruett's quality recruits, as well as previous class recruits, transferred out when he left. Speaking from memory, CJH inherited a 67 player roster and a class that he had to tightrope to try to hold together. His '21 class had 4 4-stars and 10 3-stars.

I would argue (recruiting classes aside, his actual) roster for roster, CJH most likely out-coached and beat several teams with superior rosters than his. Add that to the fact that he beat Bam and UF in his second year, and it gives me indication that he doesn't have to out-rank others on signing day to beat them.

In any event, Pruet did NOT leave CJH in position to beat many teams on our schedule.

CJH did have an empty cupboard and he's definitely better than Pruit but this whole argument that he does more with less no longer holds water after this year. He didn't repeat 2022. He didn't beat anyone he wasn't supposed to beat in 2023, not a single one out of 3 teams (no I'm not counting Missouri because we should be good enough to beat them every year).

Some people around here for some unknown reason say Milton is one of the best QBs UT has had in 20 years But CJH couldn't get the job done.

Maybe he repeats 2022 next year but I don't see anyone predicting that.

IMO 2022 was a wonderful coincidence that CJH had Hooker and Hyatt on the same team at the same time and until proven otherwise that was the exception not the leading indicator of how he does more with less. I think he needs to do more with more to survive at UT and be successful like we want him to be.

 

[Orange_Crush]

Uhhh that's some mighty fine cherry picking you did there. Lol "we have beaten 2 of those teams" ha no you don't get to cherry pick like that! First of all we beat neither of those teams this year and secondly we beat Bama 1 time in 17 years and Florida 2 time in 19 years. Even a blind squirrel can beat Florida more than once a decade . We beat them cause we got lucky once in a blue moon had nothing to do with recruiting.

Call me when we beat Bama 16 out of 17 years and tell me how Bama fans feel about how good their recruiting is

Oh, we're making great progress. Let's shoot for beating Bama twice in 20 years that will show them who's boss!

WTH are you talking about? You called those three automatic losses until we out-recruit them. It's not "cherry-picking" to point out that you can't call them automatic losses when we beat them. You seem to struggle with how discussion and debate works.

If I'd claimed that we beat them this year, that point would mean something. Otherwise, it's a red herring. Learn how to follow a discussion.

The past 17 years doesn't matter when we're talking about CJH. He's proven that he doesn't have to out-rank other teams on signing day to beat them, which disproves your bald assertion.

"A" blind squirrel...? "Once" a decade? You do know CJH has been here three seasons, right? Are you feeling OK?

"Luck"? That is an INCREDIBLY lazy way of making an argument. You are starting to come across as desperate. It's strange.

If you'll only stop hand-wringing when we're beating Bama, UGA, and UF every year for a couple of decades, then you need to buy some lotion and get on meds. I don't think the SEC is for you, amigo. Maybe you should drop down a couple of divisions where you can be a little more comfortable.



To recap, you clearly stated that until we start consistently out-ranking those three on signing day, they are auto-losses. I pointed out that they can't be auto-losses when our staff has beaten two of them. You initially tried to save your logic by referencing a QB that transferred in, and never helped our recruiting ranking. Then you tried to hand-wave the fact with emojies and losses that have nothing to do with our current staff (whom, might I add, have beaten two of the teams that you claim are impossible to beat), and some unhinged reference to this ill-defined cosmic force called "luck".

 

[GUNTERSVOL]

I want Tennessee's classes to be better than Bama or Georgia. Measure it however you want by ranking or average player I don't care. But until that is true they will continue dominating the SEC and UT will not.

No matter how you slice it they finish higher in the ranking and they finish higher in the standings. Seems like a 100% correlation to me.

People getting caught up in "nuance" are just finding things to do with their spare time.

Bama,GA, LSU, and TX and probably TAM, will ALWAYS have an advantage in the biggest element of HS recruiting that will be hard to overcome. But we have wins over 3 of those in the last couple of years because we closed the gap enough for other factors to put us in reach. Getting in range, not getting better than them is a more reasonable target. Best is an OK. Objective or goal.

It is possible schools that historically trail can gain ground with the right amount of UNWANTED exits at the rich schools and GREAT success filling their own needs in the portal. Closer? Equal? Better? Players and a few bounces and relative talent can change short term, but advantages or deficiencies are still in place.



I want All posters to be rational and fully informed before they post, not likely to happen either.

Any poster that bitches about our NIL before they put on a second mortgage and donate it to the cause should be banned.

Wants have their limitations.

 

[Lars]

I will be bigly surprised if there are any big surprises.

 

[SSVol]

And here we are again. Arguing about how *we* must recruit if *we* are going to beat team XYZ. Asserting ad nauseum that *we* must do better or *we* are going to be a perpetual 8-4/9-3 team.

News flash, *we* have nothing to do with the outcome. *We* aren't involved with recruiting or coaching. *We* have zero skin in the game. *We* can't change anything. At all. Ever.

You'll get what they give you. And you'll like it.

Or you can leave.

 

[UTFranklinVol]

WTH are you talking about? You called those three automatic losses until we out-recruit them. It's not "cherry-picking" to point out that you can't call them automatic losses when we beat them. You seem to struggle with how discussion and debate works.

If I'd claimed that we beat them this year, that point would mean something. Otherwise, it's a red herring. Learn how to follow a discussion.

The past 17 years doesn't matter when we're talking about CJH. He's proven that he doesn't have to out-rank other teams on signing day to beat them, which disproves your bald assertion.

"A" blind squirrel...? "Once" a decade? You do know CJH has been here three seasons, right? Are you feeling OK?

"Luck"? That is an INCREDIBLY lazy way of making an argument. You are starting to come across as desperate. It's strange.

If you'll only stop hand-wringing when we're beating Bama, UGA, and UF every year for a couple of decades, then you need to buy some lotion and get on meds. I don't think the SEC is for you, amigo. Maybe you should drop down a couple of divisions where you can be a little more comfortable.



To recap, you clearly stated that until we start consistently out-ranking those three on signing day, they are auto-losses. I pointed out that they can't be auto-losses when our staff has beaten two of them. You initially tried to save your logic by referencing a QB that transferred in, and never helped our recruiting ranking. Then you tried to hand-wave the fact with emojies and losses that have nothing to do with our current staff (whom, might I add, have beaten two of the teams that you claim are impossible to beat), and some unhinged reference to this ill-defined cosmic force called "luck".

Yes they are auto losses except for the one time in nearly 2 decades that they have out recruited us. Again you're like the boy that cried wolf and then a wolf shows up once in 20 years and you think your point is proven. No sir I'm not buying it. We proved this year that it was a fluke. Auto losses.