Why is Arch Manning not playing? Nico syndrome?

[SayUWantAreVOLution]

It was 2018. Please fact check me and post a link to call me out. Thanks. Year is not relevant anyways….Gabriel was behind two other qbs going into that year. Lucky for him the dominos all fell the right way

Lucky for him, he was ready. And Heupel didn't "show loyalty" to M Milton after his hard recovery and let Milton go to FSU.

But he's too loyal, you know.

The bottom line is Heupel knows what the heck he's doing when he gives Nico reps and when he doesn't. Nico got what he needed, appears to have no issues with not getting reps, etc. The locker room had no issues that "Nico is being held back" that we heard. Rumors were that Nico's family preferred the redshirt route (but that's just a rumor, I think.)

Heupel has good history with QBs. He's coached QBs up for years and knows when reps can be squeezed in and when they can't. It's really silly to suggest he's "stuck with Hooker too much" or "not pulled Joe when he could to give Nico some reps" or whatever.

That's your premise, I believe. Heupel doesn't give the new guy or next year's QB enough rep. It just doesn't pan out over his entire history.

Again, ABSOLUTELY NO ONE ON THE PLANET could've predicted Hooker would ball out like he did. Using that as proof Heupel isn't light years better than you or I at playing, developing, and evaluating QBs is just weak.

 

[EastTNVol423]

Lucky for him, he was ready. And Heupel didn't "show loyalty" to M Milton after his hard recovery and let Milton go to FSU.

But he's too loyal, you know.

The bottom line is Heupel knows what the heck he's doing when he gives Nico reps and when he doesn't. Nico got what he needed, appears to have no issues with not getting reps, etc. The locker room had no issues that "Nico is being held back" that we heard. Rumors were that Nico's family preferred the redshirt route (but that's just a rumor, I think.)

Heupel has good history with QBs. He's coached QBs up for years and knows when reps can be squeezed in and when they can't. It's really silly to suggest he's "stuck with Hooker too much" or "not pulled Joe when he could to give Nico some reps" or whatever.

That's your premise, I believe. Heupel doesn't give the new guy or next year's QB enough rep. It just doesn't pan out over his entire history.

Again, ABSOLUTELY NO ONE ON THE PLANET could've predicted Hooker would ball out like he did. Using that as proof Heupel isn't light years better than you or I at playing, developing, and evaluating QBs is just weak.

Heupel didn’t go back to Joe after he recovered. He stuck with Hooker. He went back to Milton this year because the only other option was a true freshman that wasn’t ready. Overall he has been great with qbs. I think he is a great offensive mind. Jury is still out if he’s a great head coach or not.

He had a similar situation at two different schools where a back up came in and was a stud over guys he originally named starters. Facts and very slight red flag

 

[SayUWantAreVOLution]

Heupel didn’t go back to Joe after he recovered. He stuck with Hooker. He went back to Milton this year because the only other option was a true freshman that wasn’t ready. Overall he has been great with qbs. I think he is a great offensive mind. Jury is still out if he’s a great head coach or not.

He had a similar situation at two different schools where a back up came in and was a stud over guys he originally named starters. Facts and very slight red flag

Gabriel was good, but UCF wasn't. That's a bigger red flag to me, frankly, than Gabriel taking the starting job. Heupel's 6-4? at UCF after Frost went 10-0? causes me more pause. Gabriel really started to shine at OU but his receivers were much better there. He's definitely better than Wimbush ever was but he, like Nico, was a true freshman. That's always risky, no matter how good they are. We've seen some do well but most coaches want to give them time, if they can. I don't see him as a red flag but as proof that Heupel WILL play a true freshman if he thinks he can help the team.

Hooker was an amazing anamoly. I recall the press briefings with Milton, Bailey, Hooker, Maurer and several of us on VN saying "Milton is a grown ass man" because he seemed to have the leadership, great physical gifts, etc.

The bottom line on Hooker is that no one would've believed he'd break out like that. Nothing suggested that. Many of us, if we're honest, thought he'd certainly be a downgrade from Milton. The entirety of college football was surprised by Hooker so it's hard to see that as a red flag either.

I'll stand by questioning Heupel's game management, play calling, etc. At least one of the 4th down choices to go for it was....... I don't know what to call it..... questionable.

On the plus side, Heupel has worked the portal, recruited decently (not stunning but not too bad for a new SEC coach who came into what he did) and we're not losing too many to the portal.

I can be critical of Heupel but I don't think he's mismanaged our QB situation. If Heupel has NFL aspirations, he'll almost certainly go as a QB coach and I think they'll look VERY carefully at his QB coaching, his development of QBs, and his ability to get them ready.

I think he pays a lot of attention to having a QB that can run the offense successfully and, for better but mostly worse, Milton was the best one for the job this year.

 

[EastTNVol423]

I agree with pretty much everything you said. Milton was always going to be the starter and I wanted to see him ball out. I wanted to see Nico get a few more reps here and here but he didn’t. I have questions about Heupel in areas. We will get answers to those questions soon and I hope he figures it out. I hope he’s the man here and wins tons of games! He brought life back to this place. My hope is that we can get back up to 9-10 wins next year (going to be super tough).

 

[SayUWantAreVOLution]

I agree with pretty much everything you said. Milton was always going to be the starter and I wanted to see him ball out. I wanted to see Nico get a few more reps here and here but he didn’t. I have questions about Heupel in areas. We will get answers to those questions soon and I hope he figures it out. I hope he’s the man here and wins tons of games! He brought life back to this place. My hope is that we can get back up to 9-10 wins next year (going to be super tough).

I want to see some shift to ball control if we need it on offense. I know Hooker was all gas and no brake but Hyatt was fire. If our offense isn't jet fueled, we need to work the clock sometimes. Heupel and I probably disagree about that and he gets paid better than me, but I'm old and old school and keeping the ball safe, in our hands, and bleeding the clock is in my DNA. I'd also like to see the QB under center for some situations but that's like yelling at kids to get off my lawn these days.

Recruiting and the portal are going to push us up to the next level. If we hire coaches, they need to be great recruiters. TN doesn't just recruit itself as well after years of Bama and now GA being so good. NIL helps and we're good at it but we have a long way to go to close the talent gap.

We have depth issues on offense and defense. I don't want to see Nico running for his life because our OLine is all beat up and the next man isn't an SEC lineman. The secondary needs higher quality athletes too so we can match up better against SEC teams.

I'm good with Heupel. He is, honestly, not my favorite sideline coach. Maybe I just don't see him working the officials hard but I wish I did. I'd like to see him a little more vocal, even if we see a fine, when we get calls like the "no lube" calls in the Bama game.

Overall, it's a good time to be a Vol.

 

[EastTNVol423]

I want to see some shift to ball control if we need it on offense. I know Hooker was all gas and no brake but Hyatt was fire. If our offense isn't jet fueled, we need to work the clock sometimes. Heupel and I probably disagree about that and he gets paid better than me, but I'm old and old school and keeping the ball safe, in our hands, and bleeding the clock is in my DNA. I'd also like to see the QB under center for some situations but that's like yelling at kids to get off my lawn these days.

Recruiting and the portal are going to push us up to the next level. If we hire coaches, they need to be great recruiters. TN doesn't just recruit itself as well after years of Bama and now GA being so good. NIL helps and we're good at it but we have a long way to go to close the talent gap.

We have depth issues on offense and defense. I don't want to see Nico running for his life because our OLine is all beat up and the next man isn't an SEC lineman. The secondary needs higher quality athletes too so we can match up better against SEC teams.

I'm good with Heupel. He is, honestly, not my favorite sideline coach. Maybe I just don't see him working the officials hard but I wish I did. I'd like to see him a little more vocal, even if we see a fine, when we get calls like the "no lube" calls in the Bama game.

Overall, it's a good time to be a Vol.

definitely need some push and pull with the offensive tempo. If we get back to top level talent across the board I say all gas all the time haha I liked the power I we ran last year with fant. I was really hoping to see that this year and I THINK we used something similar against uva. Then we never saw it again.

I think Heupel can be too laid back sometimes with refs AND players. This is first go at leading a top level program on his own.

Our time is coming (I hope haha)…we’re wayyy over due!