A Team of Constant Sorrow
In watching the Tennessee Vols play this season, I have come to one conclusion. I really need to get my hands on some of those member berries from South Park so that I can reminisce about the good old days. I can lay back on the couch, maybe pour a nice glass of wine, grab a bowl of my member berries and let them serenade me with quips like, "Oh, member Peyton Manning?" "Yeah, I member Peyton. Member Peerless Price?" Yes, member berries, I member as well. Unfortunately memories are all most Vol fans have to hold on to at this point in time. In a year that was supposed to be our coming out party, we once more find ourselves starring on in disbelief and muttering on about what could have been.
Maybe that's unfair to an extent. There are definitely a lot out there who would argue that it is. After all, we're still in a position to go 9-3, an improvement over last year's 8-4 record, and we're by no means out of the SEC East race. But wouldn't it all feel like a consolation prize at this point? When you have the chance to win the division out right but fail to do so, is winning because another team lost really that much to get excited about? This is especially true when all signs seem to point to Alabama to be the team on the opposite side of the ticket. That's a daunting task for any team coming out of the East to overcome. It's by no means impossible, but it seems very unlikely at best. If you had told me before the season started that this Tennessee team would go 9-3 on the season, my first thought would have been, "Well, I know we're better than that, but it's an improvement." I would not, however, believe one of those three losses would come at the hands of South Carolina.
To make matters even worse, our star running back entering the season, Jalen Hurd, has decided to remove himself from the team. I have my personal beliefs as to what happened with Hurd, but this is neither the time or place for such discussions. Anything I believe cannot be substantiated, so what's the point in fueling the fire anymore at this point? The best thing both parties can do at this point is move on.
The one thing than cannot be argued to this point, however, is that Butch really botched this season. I'm not going to call for his head, because what good would that do at this point? The university is basically operating without a Chancellor or an Athletic Director at the moment, so who would they even get to run the search? Before they hire an AD, they want to get the Chancellor situation shored up, so that they may be involved in the hiring of the new AD. So parting ways with Jones at this point would be disastrous. Plus, as bad as the South Carolina loss was, I'm not of the mind that you fire a coach because of a single loss. At this point we can't really gripe about losses to A&M and Alabama, two teams the playoff committee felt deserving of top four rankings.
That doesn't let Jones off the hook, however. A 5-0 start likely saved him from these talks creeping up sooner, though there were many who felt uneasy with how rocky the Vols season started. Most fans chalked it up to using a vanilla play book, but how much of that can be believed? Don't get me wrong, I'm sure that we didn't open things up very much, but we also failed miserably at executing the plays we did run. Not to knock Appalachian State, but with the talent on this Tennessee team, we should have been able to invite them into the offensive huddle and still impose our will on them. Instead we faltered time and time again, forcing us to rely on a fumble recovery in the end zone to win the game in overtime. As bad as that game looked, fans still offered up that age old adage, "at least we got the W". Pollsters saw it differently, and the top 10 ranking Tennessee entered the season with quickly disappeared.
As the weeks went by, Tennessee's on-field struggles continued. A fumble prone Virginia Tech made things easy on us, and though it was the only game in which we never trailed, the Ohio game was anything but pretty. At times it seemed as if the Vols were doing everything in their power to let Ohio back in. After three weeks of ugly football, fans started questioning just how far this team could go. What once seemed like a dream season all of a sudden felt as though it would turn into a never-ending gauntlet. While it has turned into just that, fans were quickly back on track with the way things were going after a huge win over division rivals, Florida. After another slow start, the Vols were able to battle back with a performance worthy of a national championship. We saw our first glimpse of how good this team could be. Unfortunately that's all it was, a glimpse.
The Vols struggled once more the following week on the road at Georgia, and once more they were able to secure a big win in the most stunning was possible. It was as if karma had finally answered for all the years of perennial bottom feeding. Yet due to another slow start the following week at A&M, the Vols seemed to have used up the last of their good karma.
Looking back now, after a month of action has gone by, the Georgia win no longer feels very special. That program has hit a low never before seen in the Richt era, and one UGA fans must surely be sick over. The big win now seems rather sad, looking at the state of things. The Florida win was huge, but it may have put blinders back on the fans who had good reason to question this team's woes earlier in the season. Most of us felt we had finally hit our stride, but now it seems it was more of a fluke effort. Regardless, that win effectively shut up all the talk of a struggling team. But is that something Butch can rely on again late this season? My answer is an emphatic NO!
I have seen fans say, "Just win out, and all this will be forgotten, and we'll all go back to loving Butch." While that may hold true for some, it certainly will not for me, and in my opinion, it shouldn't be forgotten. Forgetting this loss does nothing to help anyone. Are we an injured team? You bet we are. Did that have any barring on us losing to South Carolina? No, it did not. Our offense is actually quite healthy. The only major injuries have been on the offensive line, yet Dobbs had more time in the pocket than he has had all year. So there's really no excuse to be made. South Carolina didn't do anything special, we just sucked. Dobbs looked the worst I have ever seen him look, and he seems to regress every time he touches the football. There are many who believe running Dobbs under center would not only improve our run game by playing to the strengths of our backs and offensive line, but that it would also improve Dobbs' pass game by allowing him to utilize a true three-step drop. Yet Jones refuses to change any aspect of this offense. It leaves fans asking, "Where do we go from here?"
The easy answer is to fire Mike DeBord, Tennessee's offensive coordinator. But let's not forget why DeBord was hired to begin with. He was hired because he was one of Butch's good friends and early mentors. He and Jones hold similar offensive ideals, and so it seemed the obvious choice. DeBord has been everything Jones wanted him to be - a relentless yes-man at the end of his career who has nothing to offer except the ability to run Jones' offense the way Jones tells him to. And that has lead to a boring and EXTREMELY predictable offensive scheme that doesn't fit the strengths of our team AT ALL! The players aren't executing it in the least bit, and none of them seem to be enjoying themselves in any capacity. With his stubborn refusal to evolve in any aspect, Jones has effectively killed the spirit of his team. It all feels like a team who doesn't want to be there, simply going through the motions. We can blame DeBord all we want, but the truth of the matter is, he's running this offense exactly the way Butch wants it to be run. And if Butch can't see that it needs to be changed, then I have no faith that we can win out this year, and that may be grounds for dismissal, in my opinion.
So with no marquee games on the horizon, what can Butch do to regain some respect? For starters, quit screwing around and scheme to your strengths. Stop these garbage, slow-developing run plays out of the shotgun. They're painfully predictable, and rarely work. Secondly, get your team in line. Saturday's loss to South Carolina showcased a team with zero drive. They were flat, they got out hustled, out played, and you got out coached. Quit it with all the clichés and coach speak. Just go out and win. No game should be close for the rest of the year. Stop propping every team we play up on a pedestal. I guarantee you he'll mention how many players on this Tennessee Tech team could be on an SEC team at least once. He was making excuses as to why the South Carolina game would be tough to win before they ever got on the plane. He even had players mentioning how close of a game they expected it to be. That's nonsense. I'm not saying to guarantee victory, or to degrade the opponent, but have some damn gumption. And for the love of god, put a team away.
I said before the season started that I wanted to see one thing, and one thing only from Jones this season. That was a killer instinct. I am a firm believer that any coach who ever dreams of being successful in this league needs to have a killer instinct. This is big boy, hit you in the mouth type football. There's no room for letting up and getting conservative. That gets you beat. I'm not saying to keep the starters in for four quarters in a 40 point rout, but don't handicap the back-ups. Let them get their reps. This was one of the biggest seasons for Tennessee in over a decade, and to be taken seriously as a contender, they really needed to establish their dominance. For just this one season I wanted to see that Jones had that killer instinct in him. From the get go of the App State game, it was clear he was not willing. Instead of subjecting our opponents to our will, we played vanilla to hide our hands for bigger foes. In essence, we played like the tail in a pack of wolves, playing just hard enough to escape defeat, but too weary to let others know any potential weaknesses. In reality we should be playing and acting like the pack leader. They don't hide their moves. They flaunt them and then tell the others, "Here I am, try and stop me." That's something this team has desperately lacked.
If Jones wins out the year, he more than deserves the chance to right this ship. I'm not going to deny him that. However I remain skeptical as to whether or not he has what it takes to make the next step in the process. He has yet to show me he can win consistently in this conference. To buy back some faith, I need to see him come out and stop playing scared. Submit these next four opponents to your will. Make them play your game, and make the Tennessee name one to be feared once more. As of right now, we're the nations' favorite punch line. I've done my fair share of defending coach Jones for almost four years now. I've made every excuse in the book as to why he's our guy, and the only thing I've got for it is embarrassment. It's time for him to swallow his pride, make the changes we need to be successful, and make us proud to watch this team again. Until that happens, I'll remain unimpressed, a man in constant sorrow for the rest of my days.
