Fulmer was a good coach at the beginning from his interim period through however many years, until he wasn't. Then there was Lane, who bonded almost as an equal with the younger crowd as he was still so young, like an older brother. His team reflected that as the players loved him but they also acted the part of kids. And then he was gone. Then there was Dooley. He shirked his duties with a sense of entitlement, perhaps due to being Vince Dooley's spoiled kid. Then there was Butch. He is what he is. I won't go there. Finally Pruitt. Though I wanted to like him, a coach with terrible grammar, a N Alabama hillbilly, who could coach or so I thought. In the end, he was a disciplinarian at best and an abusive hick or worse, with no sense of being able to run a whole team in the end. Heupel is the only one since Fulmer to have had to truly had to work for it. He is not only preaching daily perseverance, he is living it with no crazy highs and lows, just steady improvement and encouragement, a balanced show of love and discipline. It will show in the win-loss column.
This is a quote from njvols in the Best TN OLs Since Sliced Bread thread, "Net talent is probably about the same as last year, but because of the scheme, it could end up better, if JH offense is as advertised.' I am aware that his response is referring to the OL, but I would argue that the overall talent is equal or better than last year. Last year was an underachievement of epic proportions. The 2019 season saw Tennessee go 8-5 with UT winning its last 6 games. This was in spite of JG being the QB. He may have been playing his best but he was in no way a high caliber SEC QB. Flash forward to 2020, CoVid, and everything else. The team wins the first two games then is up UGA at half. We all know that they fell apart but they were on an 8 game winning streak. One could argue that this was the best that they could do, but I would argue that the ensuing implosion was the worst that they could have done and a better coaching staff would have done better than the 8 streak.
Pruitt was an ass of epic proportions. He literally could not have gotten less out of his players if he had tried. He could recruit or at least we thought he could although it is quite possible he and his staff just anteed up more than the others. He was as bad a head coach as you could be. He fired his DL coach 4 games in. I cannot go further in explaining how bad he was. Some coaches get more from less, and then there is Pruitt. If he had fallen off the face of the earth and Cheney or Ansley had been interim coach, the team could have easily gone 6-4, maybe better. And he was incredibly abusive.
I am tired off hearing about our supposed lack of talent. I am tired of hearing that there aren't enough 4 or 5 stars. It is not true. We have the "star" talent to be top 6 in the SEC. Heupel's teams from Mizzou to UCF have done much more with less. There is quite a bit of talent on the field. The problem over many years has been the coaching, not always the Xs and Os, but more importantly the psychological side, the fatherly aspect and it has been sorely lacking.
College Football is a game played in the mind as much as in the training room and on the field. The "Game" could be looked at as a coming of age, a time in which these young people go from being kids to men. The coach is certainly a surrogate father and as such the players take on his personality to a large extent with help from the assistant coaches. They might be considered uncles. Players emulate and act accordingly regarding their influences. Of course they act out at times and some players just do their own thing, BUT a team which has bought in largely follows the lead of the HC and coaches. With a better team, one that holds each other accountable, they will fall in line.
I am aware of Battered Vol Syndrome. I know what has happened for the last 20 years, but each team, especially when a new staff arrives is new. There are no players from the 2011 team on this one. All the turnover we have had in the last year is a good thing, whether the players were being paid and had to leave, or whether they had not bought in or were just bad apples from the get go.
College football is about talent. Also, training, conditioning, scheme, facilities, Xs and Os, cohesion between units as well as offense and defense, support staff,...etc. As these young men develop physically, it becomes more about the mental aspect. All top even decent schools in the top conferences have what it takes to be good or better(see Kentucky of late, Miss State with Mullen, Boise State even...UCF. Then there is talent. We do absolutely have the talent to be as good as any of the aforementioned in their best years.
This thread is not about me so I don't want to discuss more about me than generalities. I don't want to pull out my junk and compare it to everyone else's insofar as what sport I played at what level, where, when, what my 40 was, etc. Having said that, I did play a sport very seriously, about 11 months a year from 8th grade to Senior year. My coach was a disciplinarian and I had lost my father at 5 to a car accident. I wanted and needed a father figure even though I didn't know it at the time. I wasn't the most imposing specimen though I was a good athlete. I tried as hard as anyone though, and I was relentless. I wanted approval more than anything and more than anyone. I did not need to be pushed to work, at all, but that coach would ride me and ride me and ride me, even though I was generally one of the best two or three players every year until senior season, when I finally overcame a couple of other guys. I was finally the best. He never let up and leading the team in all major categories a third of the way through my senior season, I quit. I have regretted it from time to time over the years. But again, this is not about me.
These young men as they grow into men need all sorts of discipline. They need leadership. They also need love and acceptance as well as being pushed. If you dissect all of our coaches over the last 30 years, Fulmer in his early years was the only one who came close to being a decent father figure, someone who could inspire, someone who could get more out of someone than the next guy. Even if every player does not need a father figure, they do need to see a professional who knows how to be a man and handle his business, without excuses, someone who accepts responsibility for his actions and realizes that hard consistent work is the only way to success.
Not many things are given to most of us in this life. Pruitt, working for his Dad and Saban had a sense of entitlement, as did Dooley, and Lane as well. Butch was Butch riding on Kelly's coattails. Heupel from South Dakota started at Weber State, tore an ACL, transferred to a JUCO, then walked on at OU, then won the Heisman. Our fathers' lives do impact them and therefore us as children, so it would make sense that the coach's experiences would shape how he teaches and what he teaches. Heupel is the man for the job and he will get everything out of these young men. Argue as much as you want, as I will be waiting for your response at the end of the season. When he turns it around, don't be surprised.
