Don't most Mississippi kids usually stay there anyway? Vols will never own Memphis. It's an open city where you gotta pay to play. Bama spent almost a decade in purgatory because of getting wrapped up in Memphis recruiting in the 90s. Most of those kids are dumb as rocks and criminals to boot. We don't need the headaches IMO.
The Vols got a great number of players from west Tennessee during the Dickey-Majors era(1960s-1980s). I don't see why Tennessee shouldn't be able to grab some stud players with hard recruiting from Memphis and West Tennessee. Heck James Berry was a darn good running back and he was from Mississippi.