Butch Jones Addresses Allegations of Improper Benefits Received by Mo Couch.
On Wednesday night during his weekly appearance on Vol Calls, Butch Jones was asked to comment about the Yahoo Sports article claiming Mo Couch, along with four other SEC players including former Vol quarterback Tyler Bray, received “extra benefits” from former Alabama tight end Luther Davis, who was said to be acting as an intermediary between several high profile football players and NFL agents and financial advisors.
Jones’ response:
“The only thing I can comment on right now is what we’ve done since we’ve been here. And we take great pride in our personal growth and development football program that we have in place, our agent compliance and our agent education, but our rules compliance as well. We have a compliance officer right in our football office and they meet with our football team on a regular basis. I think that’s the cornerstones of our football program. Everyone—every person—has a track record and I think if you look at our track record of myself and our coaching staff, it speaks volumes. All I can tell you is we are well aware of it. We’ve been educating our players since the minute we walked in the door and we’ll see what happens.”
When asked specifically about the current status of Mo Couch, Jones had the following to say.
“Mo Couch had an injury in practice with heat exhaustion and he didn’t even practice today due to that heat exhaustion. We expected him back but he couldn’t go, so right now it looks like he probably won’t be able to play and that’s all injury related.”
According to the investigation, Couch received four payments totaling $1,350.