unfrozencvmanvol
Bushman of the Kalahari
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2018
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I don't remember who it was, but after the Auburn game, somebody on here was trying to temper the expectations of others who immediately expected that we would win out with the exception of Bama and said something to the effect of "when you've been down as long as we have, a little can seem like a lot". Those were wise words. We played extremely well against Auburn winning more than our share of 50/50 balls, but at the end of the day, it was over a team that is probably going to end up 7-5 and unranked. Things were not as good as they seemed.
By the same token, things aren't as bad as they seem now, I don't think we've got another dud coach, CJP has won and been around winning his whole life, he knows what winning football looks like it. It's just going to take time. I know that's what people said about Kiffin/Dooley/Butch, but I choose to keep having faith until there is a clear reason not to. Statistically speaking, we are bound to get a good coach eventually and 1 in 4 is not to much to ask. It would be the most Tennessee thing ever to not give CJP any time because of butthurt against past coaches only to go see him succeed wildly somewhere else.
I think what we are seeing now is just boils down to not having the players, and there ain't a quick fix for that. We have dug ourselves a deep hole in the last 10 years. At present and for the forseeable future, we are not the peer of the Alabama, Georgia, LSU's, that's a tough pill to swallow for those of us who remember when we used to regularly beat those teams but it is the truth nonetheless, and we can't change it, for any endevour to succeed to first thing you've got to do is stop kidding yourself and take an honest assessment of the stock in trade.
We've got to get to where we can consistently beat the South Carolina's, Missouri's, Kentucky's, and Vanderbilt's before we even think about running with the big dogs, we aren't a big dog anymore, haven't been since most of these modern recruits were in diapers. You can quote me all the composite roster recruiting rankings you want but my eyes tell me a different story. Those recruiting rankings tell us how good a player was when he graduated high school, not how good he is compared to other kids he graduated from high school with 1-5 years later. I know 5-7 wasn't what anyone wanted this year, but if we can beat Vandy that's where we'll finish, and that's where most of the sober objective preseason assessments in the preview magazines had us ending up this year. We hoped it was wrong, but it wasn't. Still, this is a sharp contrast to last year, when most of the same people thought we should be 8-4 or 9-3 and we miraculously faceplanted to 4-8, no we are right about where many predicted this year. I expect improvement next year, but not Nick Saban/Kirby Smart Year 2 improvement, CJP simply did not walk into anything resembling the same situation. We should go to a bowl next year, beat the teams we beat this year and knock off a couple of the similarly situated others (the South Carolina's, Missouri's, Kentucky's, and Vanderbilt's), that's the first step to making the long climb back up the ladder.
By the same token, things aren't as bad as they seem now, I don't think we've got another dud coach, CJP has won and been around winning his whole life, he knows what winning football looks like it. It's just going to take time. I know that's what people said about Kiffin/Dooley/Butch, but I choose to keep having faith until there is a clear reason not to. Statistically speaking, we are bound to get a good coach eventually and 1 in 4 is not to much to ask. It would be the most Tennessee thing ever to not give CJP any time because of butthurt against past coaches only to go see him succeed wildly somewhere else.
I think what we are seeing now is just boils down to not having the players, and there ain't a quick fix for that. We have dug ourselves a deep hole in the last 10 years. At present and for the forseeable future, we are not the peer of the Alabama, Georgia, LSU's, that's a tough pill to swallow for those of us who remember when we used to regularly beat those teams but it is the truth nonetheless, and we can't change it, for any endevour to succeed to first thing you've got to do is stop kidding yourself and take an honest assessment of the stock in trade.
We've got to get to where we can consistently beat the South Carolina's, Missouri's, Kentucky's, and Vanderbilt's before we even think about running with the big dogs, we aren't a big dog anymore, haven't been since most of these modern recruits were in diapers. You can quote me all the composite roster recruiting rankings you want but my eyes tell me a different story. Those recruiting rankings tell us how good a player was when he graduated high school, not how good he is compared to other kids he graduated from high school with 1-5 years later. I know 5-7 wasn't what anyone wanted this year, but if we can beat Vandy that's where we'll finish, and that's where most of the sober objective preseason assessments in the preview magazines had us ending up this year. We hoped it was wrong, but it wasn't. Still, this is a sharp contrast to last year, when most of the same people thought we should be 8-4 or 9-3 and we miraculously faceplanted to 4-8, no we are right about where many predicted this year. I expect improvement next year, but not Nick Saban/Kirby Smart Year 2 improvement, CJP simply did not walk into anything resembling the same situation. We should go to a bowl next year, beat the teams we beat this year and knock off a couple of the similarly situated others (the South Carolina's, Missouri's, Kentucky's, and Vanderbilt's), that's the first step to making the long climb back up the ladder.
