OneManGang
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[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Tennessee vs The Maxims vs Alabama[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]After the euphoria of last week, it was inevitable that reality would reassert its presence. Tennessee is much improved. Tennessee, overall, is playing much better than at this point last year. Tennessee is not, however, ready to play in the NFL. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Alabama is. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]And there you go.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Most Americans who remember even a smattering of what passes for American History class can tell you that June 6, 1944 was D-Day, the day the Americans landed somewhere near Norman, Oklahoma to liberate it from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt, or was it Saruman?[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]OK, enough snarking about the dreadful quality of historical education in this country for the moment. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Amongst those who actually DO understand that on June 6, 1944 a massive force of over 1,000 ships and landing craft and well over 2,000 combat aircraft were supporting the 100,000 men who landed on the beaches of Normandy, France to begin the long and bloody process of liberating Europe from the clutches of Nazi Germany. Virtually nobody understands that while this effort was underway in the English Channel, on the other side of the globe, in the waters off the island of Saipan in the Pacific another giant American fleet was gathered to launch an invasion of that island and the nearby islands of Tinian and Guam currently under the management of Imperial Japan. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Japanese considered Saipan to be part of metropolitan Japan. For the Americans, seizure of these islands would create ideal bases for the new B-29s to strike the Japanese Home Islands. Japan would spare no effort to block the American invasion. In fact, the Americans were counting on that.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Imperial Japanese Navy assembled its greatest strike force of the entire war for the upcoming battle. They mustered no less than 9 carriers with over 400 aircraft, 5 battleships and a host of cruisers and destroyers. In both numbers of ships and aircraft, this iteration of the Mobile Fleet under Vice-Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa out-gunned the carrier task force that had conducted the Pearl Harbor attack thirty months previous. Surely this force would put the Americans to fly. They would win the Decisive Battle the Japanese admirals had been promising the Emperor since the Battle of Coral Sea back in 1942.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unfortunately for the Japanese plans, the Americans had perfected their carrier tactics. Overall command of the 5th Fleet rested with the brilliant Admiral Raymond Spruance, victor of Midway. The mailed fist of the 5th Fleet rested in Task Force 58 under Vice-Admiral Marc Mitscher, the foremost expert on carrier tactics on the planet. Task Force 58 boasted 15 aircraft carriers, 7 battleships and hordes of cruisers and destroyers. The American carriers embarked over 800 combat aircraft. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]It was in the pilots, though that real difference was most evident. The Japanese had started the war with the best-trained and most experienced carrier pilots in the world. It took over five years for a student pilot to make his way to an operational unit. The problem was that the Japanese lost over half their carrier pilots at Coral Sea and Midway and many of the survivors perished in the raging air battles over Guadalcanal and the Solomon Islands in 1943. Pilot training was cut to the extent that many of the pilots in the Japanese carriers making their way toward the Philippine Sea southwest of Saipan were barely able to take off and land without crashing.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Americans took a different approach. Their training was about two years, but in the final stages they were taught by men who had been in combat and in many cases were aces. During the battle of Guadalcanal a Marine ace by the name of John Smith was ordered home to training command. When he asked about returning to combat he was told, Not until you have trained a hundred John Smiths. No other country did this in World War II. It is worth noting that no other country waged air war with the effectiveness of the Americans, either.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]On 19 June, the two fleets found each other. The Japanese launched everything they had toward Mitscher and Task Force 58. Pete Mitscher's boys were busy flying attack missions over Guam and Tinian when his radars picked up the Japanese. Mitscher himself got on the radio and shouted Hey Rube! the code word that the fleet was under attack and all planes were to return NOW. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The resulting air battle was a massacre. The Japanese were out-classed in every category and American fighter pilots shot down so many of the Emperor's Sea Eagles that they began calling the battle the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot. By 20 June, Ozawa was limping home having lost all but a handful of his planes and over half his carriers. It was time to apologize to the Emperor and assure him that this wasn't the Decisive Battle, it would be the next one.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Like Admiral Ozawa off the Marianas, Head Vol Butch Jones found himself in Tuscaloosa Saturday leading his troops against a foe that outclassed his team in every single category. Alabama scored at will and laid a shellacking on our Beloved Vols.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]So how did the team do compared to the Maxims?[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]1. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Much like the Oregon game earlier this year, the critical error for Tennessee was allowing their recruiting to deteriorate over the last decade or so. Jones would send out a three-star player, Saban would send out a five-star. God, in the SEC, is on the side with the big battalions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]2.Play for and make the breaks. When one comes your way SCORE![/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Simply put, the Vols got NO breaks Saturday. Alabama's team speed and talent level saw to it that creating said breaks was going to be virtually impossible as well.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]3. If at first the game or the breaks go against you, dont let up PUT ON MORE STEAM![/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
If there is one thing Tennessee fans can view as a positive coming out of the game Saturday it is that the Vols never quit. They fought hard the whole way but were just out-manned and out-classed. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]4. Protect our kickers, our quarterback, our lead and our ballgame.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
Josh Dobbs is a Steely-eyed Missile Man.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]5. Ball! Oskie! Cover, block, cut and slice, pursue and gang tackle THIS IS THE WINNING EDGE.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
At one point, counting time-outs, commercials, half-time and when Tennessee had the ball, Alabama was still moving at five miles per hour[/FONT].
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]6. Press the kicking game. Here is where the breaks are made.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
Michael Palardy played his heart out. There were several occasions where he made saving tackles that prevented touchdowns. Tennessee's kick coverage was sub-par to non-existent in far too many cases. The kickoff return team did have a couple of nifty returns in the second half.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]7. Carry the fight to Alabama and keep it there for sixty minutes.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
As pointed out previously, Tennessee fought the whole way but the speed and talent differential meant that it was Alabama carrying the fight to Tennessee, not the other way around. Positive: this will change as Coach Jones gets his system and recruits in place. Better days are ahead.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]This writer was a student at UT during the waning days of Bill Battle and the early years of Johnny Majors. Bye-the-bye, HOW did I miss the fact that Bill Battle is now AD at Alabama? Jeez, he looks old but then so do I. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In any event, it took Majors three rebuilding years to even make a bowl game of any description. In his case, it was the now-defunct Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl where the Vols came up short against Purdue.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]It warms the cockles of this Old Vol's heart to see these guys reach down a keep fighting and staying positive in the face of disappointment and losses. It is not inconceivable that two or three decades from now we will look back on these early teams of Butch Jones with the same fondness as those of the early Majors era.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Better days are ahead. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]MAXOMG [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]After the euphoria of last week, it was inevitable that reality would reassert its presence. Tennessee is much improved. Tennessee, overall, is playing much better than at this point last year. Tennessee is not, however, ready to play in the NFL. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Alabama is. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]And there you go.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Most Americans who remember even a smattering of what passes for American History class can tell you that June 6, 1944 was D-Day, the day the Americans landed somewhere near Norman, Oklahoma to liberate it from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt, or was it Saruman?[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]OK, enough snarking about the dreadful quality of historical education in this country for the moment. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Amongst those who actually DO understand that on June 6, 1944 a massive force of over 1,000 ships and landing craft and well over 2,000 combat aircraft were supporting the 100,000 men who landed on the beaches of Normandy, France to begin the long and bloody process of liberating Europe from the clutches of Nazi Germany. Virtually nobody understands that while this effort was underway in the English Channel, on the other side of the globe, in the waters off the island of Saipan in the Pacific another giant American fleet was gathered to launch an invasion of that island and the nearby islands of Tinian and Guam currently under the management of Imperial Japan. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Japanese considered Saipan to be part of metropolitan Japan. For the Americans, seizure of these islands would create ideal bases for the new B-29s to strike the Japanese Home Islands. Japan would spare no effort to block the American invasion. In fact, the Americans were counting on that.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Imperial Japanese Navy assembled its greatest strike force of the entire war for the upcoming battle. They mustered no less than 9 carriers with over 400 aircraft, 5 battleships and a host of cruisers and destroyers. In both numbers of ships and aircraft, this iteration of the Mobile Fleet under Vice-Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa out-gunned the carrier task force that had conducted the Pearl Harbor attack thirty months previous. Surely this force would put the Americans to fly. They would win the Decisive Battle the Japanese admirals had been promising the Emperor since the Battle of Coral Sea back in 1942.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unfortunately for the Japanese plans, the Americans had perfected their carrier tactics. Overall command of the 5th Fleet rested with the brilliant Admiral Raymond Spruance, victor of Midway. The mailed fist of the 5th Fleet rested in Task Force 58 under Vice-Admiral Marc Mitscher, the foremost expert on carrier tactics on the planet. Task Force 58 boasted 15 aircraft carriers, 7 battleships and hordes of cruisers and destroyers. The American carriers embarked over 800 combat aircraft. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]It was in the pilots, though that real difference was most evident. The Japanese had started the war with the best-trained and most experienced carrier pilots in the world. It took over five years for a student pilot to make his way to an operational unit. The problem was that the Japanese lost over half their carrier pilots at Coral Sea and Midway and many of the survivors perished in the raging air battles over Guadalcanal and the Solomon Islands in 1943. Pilot training was cut to the extent that many of the pilots in the Japanese carriers making their way toward the Philippine Sea southwest of Saipan were barely able to take off and land without crashing.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Americans took a different approach. Their training was about two years, but in the final stages they were taught by men who had been in combat and in many cases were aces. During the battle of Guadalcanal a Marine ace by the name of John Smith was ordered home to training command. When he asked about returning to combat he was told, Not until you have trained a hundred John Smiths. No other country did this in World War II. It is worth noting that no other country waged air war with the effectiveness of the Americans, either.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]On 19 June, the two fleets found each other. The Japanese launched everything they had toward Mitscher and Task Force 58. Pete Mitscher's boys were busy flying attack missions over Guam and Tinian when his radars picked up the Japanese. Mitscher himself got on the radio and shouted Hey Rube! the code word that the fleet was under attack and all planes were to return NOW. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The resulting air battle was a massacre. The Japanese were out-classed in every category and American fighter pilots shot down so many of the Emperor's Sea Eagles that they began calling the battle the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot. By 20 June, Ozawa was limping home having lost all but a handful of his planes and over half his carriers. It was time to apologize to the Emperor and assure him that this wasn't the Decisive Battle, it would be the next one.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Like Admiral Ozawa off the Marianas, Head Vol Butch Jones found himself in Tuscaloosa Saturday leading his troops against a foe that outclassed his team in every single category. Alabama scored at will and laid a shellacking on our Beloved Vols.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]So how did the team do compared to the Maxims?[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]1. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Much like the Oregon game earlier this year, the critical error for Tennessee was allowing their recruiting to deteriorate over the last decade or so. Jones would send out a three-star player, Saban would send out a five-star. God, in the SEC, is on the side with the big battalions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]2.Play for and make the breaks. When one comes your way SCORE![/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Simply put, the Vols got NO breaks Saturday. Alabama's team speed and talent level saw to it that creating said breaks was going to be virtually impossible as well.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]3. If at first the game or the breaks go against you, dont let up PUT ON MORE STEAM![/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
If there is one thing Tennessee fans can view as a positive coming out of the game Saturday it is that the Vols never quit. They fought hard the whole way but were just out-manned and out-classed. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]4. Protect our kickers, our quarterback, our lead and our ballgame.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
Josh Dobbs is a Steely-eyed Missile Man.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]5. Ball! Oskie! Cover, block, cut and slice, pursue and gang tackle THIS IS THE WINNING EDGE.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
At one point, counting time-outs, commercials, half-time and when Tennessee had the ball, Alabama was still moving at five miles per hour[/FONT].
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]6. Press the kicking game. Here is where the breaks are made.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
Michael Palardy played his heart out. There were several occasions where he made saving tackles that prevented touchdowns. Tennessee's kick coverage was sub-par to non-existent in far too many cases. The kickoff return team did have a couple of nifty returns in the second half.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]7. Carry the fight to Alabama and keep it there for sixty minutes.[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
As pointed out previously, Tennessee fought the whole way but the speed and talent differential meant that it was Alabama carrying the fight to Tennessee, not the other way around. Positive: this will change as Coach Jones gets his system and recruits in place. Better days are ahead.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]This writer was a student at UT during the waning days of Bill Battle and the early years of Johnny Majors. Bye-the-bye, HOW did I miss the fact that Bill Battle is now AD at Alabama? Jeez, he looks old but then so do I. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In any event, it took Majors three rebuilding years to even make a bowl game of any description. In his case, it was the now-defunct Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl where the Vols came up short against Purdue.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]It warms the cockles of this Old Vol's heart to see these guys reach down a keep fighting and staying positive in the face of disappointment and losses. It is not inconceivable that two or three decades from now we will look back on these early teams of Butch Jones with the same fondness as those of the early Majors era.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Better days are ahead. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]MAXOMG [/FONT]
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