If/When Tennessee beats WVU...

[Blanton's Vol]

With the East still being terrible and WV not being a world beater by any means and Auburn not being as good as last year. I will be disappointed with anything less than eight wins. With our schedule we should always win at least 9 games.

West Va. - W We should win!
ETSU - W Easy win!
UTEP - W Another joke game
Florida - W can't lose at home
Georgia - L
Bye week
Auburn - Toss up game
Alabama - L
South Carolina - L Muschamp owns us!
Charlotte - W another joke game
Kentucky - W
Missouri - W
Vandy - W
8 wins
3 loses
1 Toss up
Should be expecting nothing less!

 

[Munarb]

With the East still being terrible and WV not being a world beater by any means and Auburn not being as good as last year. I will be disappointed with anything less than eight wins. With our schedule we should always win at least 9 games.

West Va. - W We should win!
ETSU - W Easy win!
UTEP - W Another joke game
Florida - W can't lose at home
Georgia - L
Bye week
Auburn - Toss up game
Alabama - L
South Carolina - L Muschamp owns us!
Charlotte - W another joke game
Kentucky - W
Missouri - W
Vandy - W
8 wins
3 loses
1 Toss up
Should be expecting nothing less!

You are entitled to your opinion, but just know that this is unrealistic and just sets up Pruitt and the team for failure.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

You are entitled to your opinion, but just know that this is unrealistic and just sets up Pruitt and the team for failure.

Want to break your response down in three parts:

"You are entitled to your opinion...."

I agree entirely. He certainly is.

"...just know that this is unrealistic...."

Given how little we know at this point, I'm not going to call out anything between 3 wins and 9 wins, regular season. This fella says 8 wins. Okay. No more or less realistic than any other guess in that range.

"[your opinion] sets up Pruitt and the team for failure."

His opinion has zero impact on Pruitt and the team's chances of success or failure. You may have meant that it sets them up IN HIS MIND as potentially failing to meet his expectations. But that is only in this one fellow's mind; it means nothing to the rest of us. Including Pruitt and team. So, this part really devolves right back to the first statement: he's entitled to his opinion.

Right?

 

[Behr]

Want to break your response down in three parts:

"You are entitled to your opinion...."

I agree entirely. He certainly is.

"...just know that this is unrealistic...."

Given how little we know at this point, I'm not going to call out anything between 3 wins and 9 wins, regular season. This fella says 8 wins. Okay. No more or less realistic than any other guess in that range.

"[your opinion] sets up Pruitt and the team for failure."

His opinion has zero impact on Pruitt and the team's chances of success or failure. You may have meant that it sets them up IN HIS MIND as potentially failing to meet his expectations. But that is only in this one fellow's mind; it means nothing to the rest of us. Including Pruitt and team. So, this part really devolves right back to the first statement: he's entitled to his opinion.

Right?

Agree

 

[I_Bleed_Orange77]

No

Thanks for your awesome contribution to the conversation.

 

[Brave Volunteer]

7 losses? eh.

it's not like 6-6 is awesome. but i think they can squeeze that out of this schedule.

It's not. But it's very important to get to 6 and reach a bowl. It gives the team extra practices and shows recruits that we are making progress. 6 wins is a pretty big deal for CJP's first season.

 

[jasonvol18]

Probably 9-3. WV’s offense might be the best we see this year. From what I saw in the spring game, it’s gonna be a 45-20 loss.

You must not have watched W.Va's defense last yr. It will be the best offense we play all yr, but will also be one of if not the worst Defense we play all yr too. They give up almost the exact same amount of yards on D that they put up on offense. We will have a physical run game and that will be a mismatch for the Defense. Our pass game should put up big numbers too. We will probably have to outscore them but that's very doable. We also get lucky by it being the first game. Passing offense's typically are rusty in game one so that will help. Especially when they aren't a huge running team.

 

[WilliamDuVOL]

I don't think we do better than 7 or 8 wins with a bowl, but people here seem to forget that a couple of our losses last year came down to either 1 play or final possessions. South Carolina, Florida.... If a Butch Jones coached team can almost be 6-6 with that abysmal offense and defense last year, I see no reason a much better coached/schemed team couldn't go 6-6 this year.

 

[jasonvol18]

With the East still being terrible and WV not being a world beater by any means and Auburn not being as good as last year. I will be disappointed with anything less than eight wins. With our schedule we should always win at least 9 games.

West Va. - W We should win!
ETSU - W Easy win!
UTEP - W Another joke game
Florida - W can't lose at home
Georgia - L
Bye week
Auburn - Toss up game
Alabama - L
South Carolina - L Muschamp owns us!
Charlotte - W another joke game
Kentucky - W
Missouri - W
Vandy - W
8 wins
3 loses
1 Toss up
Should be expecting nothing less!

I agree with everything except Auburn. Auburn will have one of the best Defense's in the country, QB Stidham is returning and it's at Auburn. That's one of the toughest places in football to play at, ask Ala and Ga. Then we haven't beaten a west team in 6+ yrs and haven't beaten AU in God knows how long. But every other game I'm right there with you. Especially on W.Va, Fla and Mizzou. I guarantee JP has that Florida game circled, highlighted and in lights. That's gonna be his first SEC game, vs a big rival and the chance to win over some of the skeptical Vol Fans.

 

[jasonvol18]

You are entitled to your opinion, but just know that this is unrealistic and just sets up Pruitt and the team for failure.

There's nothing unrealistic about it, except for AU being a toss up. Fans opinion's on how many games we win has no bearing on JP or the team failing. Same could be said for fans that are already assuming failure this yr. Truth is , it's all speculative anyway. None of us know how this yr will go, it's purely for conversation. But there's no reason we can't win 7-8 games. Especially with Fla, UK, Mizzou being in Neyland. We were 3 plays from being 7-5 last yr with that God awful coaching staff. We are all allowed our own opinion though. At this point nobody is right or wrong.

 

[k-town_king]

I don't think we do better than 7 or 8 wins with a bowl, but people here seem to forget that a couple of our losses last year came down to either 1 play or final possessions. South Carolina, Florida.... If a Butch Jones coached team can almost be 6-6 with that abysmal offense and defense last year, I see no reason a much better coached/schemed team couldn't go 6-6 this year.

There's nothing unrealistic about it, except for AU being a toss up. Fans opinion's on how many games we win has no bearing on JP or the team failing. Same could be said for fans that are already assuming failure this yr. Truth is , it's all speculative anyway. None of us know how this yr will go, it's purely for conversation. But there's no reason we can't win 7-8 games. Especially with Fla, UK, Mizzou being in Neyland. We were 3 plays from being 7-5 last yr with that God awful coaching staff. We are all allowed our own opinion though. At this point nobody is right or wrong.

Both of you are right. 7-5 will be about where we finish.

 

[jasonvol18]

I don't think we do better than 7 or 8 wins with a bowl, but people here seem to forget that a couple of our losses last year came down to either 1 play or final possessions. South Carolina, Florida.... If a Butch Jones coached team can almost be 6-6 with that abysmal offense and defense last year, I see no reason a much better coached/schemed team couldn't go 6-6 this year.

Exactly.Throw UK in there too. We were 2 plays from being 2-10 but were also 3 plays from being 7-5. At the absolute worst we should be 3-1 in non conference games. UK and Vandy should be wins so that's 5. W.Va, Fla, Mizzou and S.Car are all Tossup's. I doubt we go any worse than 2-2 in those games. Only one of those is at the opponent's home field. 2 are in Neyland and 1 a neutral site game. I'm really counting Mizzou as a win too. All 7 of Mizzou's wins were against teams that weren't bowl eligible. They beat Missouri St, Idaho, UConn, TN, Fla, Vandy and Ark. Vs bowl teams they were 0-6 and outscored 243-108( 41-18 avg score). They lost 31-13 vs S.Car, 35-3 vs Purdue, 51-14 vs Auburn, 40-34 vs UK,53-28 vs GA and 33-16 to Texas. Having a hard time understanding fans picking us to lose in Neyland to Mizzou, with first time OC Derek Dooley calling plays.

 

[volfan102455]

With the East still being terrible and WV not being a world beater by any means and Auburn not being as good as last year. I will be disappointed with anything less than eight wins. With our schedule we should always win at least 9 games.

West Va. - W We should win!
ETSU - W Easy win!
UTEP - W Another joke game
Florida - W can't lose at home
Georgia - L
Bye week
Auburn - Toss up game
Alabama - L
South Carolina - L Muschamp owns us!
Charlotte - W another joke game
Kentucky - W
Missouri - W
Vandy - W
8 wins
3 loses
1 Toss up
Should be expecting nothing less!

I agree this is really what we should be expecting.

 

[volfan102455]

It's not. But it's very important to get to 6 and reach a bowl. It gives the team extra practices and shows recruits that we are making progress. 6 wins is a pretty big deal for CJP's first season.

6 wins is NOT a big deal IMO unless we are all back to making excuses for a coach.

 

[volfan102455]

I don't think we do better than 7 or 8 wins with a bowl, but people here seem to forget that a couple of our losses last year came down to either 1 play or final possessions. South Carolina, Florida.... If a Butch Jones coached team can almost be 6-6 with that abysmal offense and defense last year, I see no reason a much better coached/schemed team couldn't go 6-6 this year.

THIS!!! ^^^ According to most Pruitt is a much better coach - so we should assume that if he had been coach last year - he wins the close ones plus others last year.

Please note that I don't expect this to happen because I see Pruitt pushing his offense / defense even though he does not have the players to do that ... verses ... deciding how to use the talent he has in the best way to ensure success.

 

[jasonvol18]

Both of you are right. 7-5 will be about where we finish.

That's exactly where I have us at 7-5, possibly 8-4 with some break's and luck. I think Ala, Ga, Aub and S.Carol are the 4 for sure losses. Even S.Carol could go either way simply based off the series history. But think we lose at S.Carol. W.Va and Fla are the 2 that decide if we get to 7 or 8 wins. But think we go 1-1 at the very least. Char, UTEP, ETSU, Vandy, UK and Mizzou are all games we have no business losing.

 

[Johncarter53]

You must not have watched W.Va's defense last yr. It will be the best offense we play all yr, but will also be one of if not the worst Defense we play all yr too. They give up almost the exact same amount of yards on D that they put up on offense. We will have a physical run game and that will be a mismatch for the Defense. Our pass game should put up big numbers too. We will probably have to outscore them but that's very doable. We also get lucky by it being the first game. Passing offense's typically are rusty in game one so that will help. Especially when they aren't a huge running team.

I watched a few of their games last year. I’m not saying they will win the big 12 but their offense is really good. It will be Pruitt’s first game as HC not to mention breaking in a new system on both sides of the ball. What I saw in the spring was an inconsistent defense and a FCS level O line. That’s not gonna cut it against good teams.

 

[jasonvol18]

I watched a few of their games last year. I’m not saying they will win the big 12 but their offense is really good. It will be Pruitt’s first game as HC not to mention breaking in a new system on both sides of the ball. What I saw in the spring was an inconsistent defense and a FCS level O line. That’s not gonna cut it against good teams.

I see what your saying but W.Va is very 1 dimensional. They were 80th+ in rushing offense last yr and not in a defensive minded conference. Their defense is just as bad as their passing offense is good. It's hard to judge our defense in the spring game with DK Jr, Kirkland, TK Jr and numerous others out and not on campus yet. Our OLine was also missing numerous players and others not on campus yet. We have 8 OLine guys who were *4 and *5 recruits. We have depth issue but when healthy they should do much better under a real Oline Coach. What we saw this spring will be much different than what we see in the fall. Like JP said, there will be close to 30 additional guys in fall camp. Between injured guys returning, remaining recruits and transfers arriving. Many of them will either be starters or in the 2 deep.

 

[Brave Volunteer]

It's not. But it's very important to get to 6 and reach a bowl. It gives the team extra practices and shows recruits that we are making progress. 6 wins is a pretty big deal for CJP's first season.

6 wins is NOT a big deal IMO unless we are all back to making excuses for a coach.

Amazing. It's like you didnt even read the first part of my post at all.

 

[gunner]

I don't think we do better than 7 or 8 wins with a bowl, but people here seem to forget that a couple of our losses last year came down to either 1 play or final possessions. South Carolina, Florida.... If a Butch Jones coached team can almost be 6-6 with that abysmal offense and defense last year, I see no reason a much better coached/schemed team couldn't go 6-6 this year.

7 or more wins and this season is a big success especially if they compete hard in every game.

 

[RavinDave]

Like it or not WVU is a top 25 team this year. It doesn't mean we can't or won't beat them but it also means they aren't exactly chopped liver. We are a team that has not won an SEC game since 2016. I think all of us on VN should tamper our expectations somewhat until we see the product that we put on the field. I expect to win, I want us to win, but by the same token this WVU team is no pushover and we for at least a year and perhaps longer have not been the usual Vols either. I trust CJP but must verify on the field what he is producing.

Trust but verify. Yes.

 

[SobeVol]

West virgina has added two DT’s now as grad transfers. One from Clemson and one from USC.
With our line issues this doesn’t help our chances

 

[RavinDave]

Want to break your response down in three parts:

"You are entitled to your opinion...."

I agree entirely. He certainly is.

"...just know that this is unrealistic...."

Given how little we know at this point, I'm not going to call out anything between 3 wins and 9 wins, regular season. This fella says 8 wins. Okay. No more or less realistic than any other guess in that range.

"[your opinion] sets up Pruitt and the team for failure."

His opinion has zero impact on Pruitt and the team's chances of success or failure. You may have meant that it sets them up IN HIS MIND as potentially failing to meet his expectations. But that is only in this one fellow's mind; it means nothing to the rest of us. Including Pruitt and team. So, this part really devolves right back to the first statement: he's entitled to his opinion.

Right?

JP you should teach a course in Logic for VN...

 

[VFL-82-JP]

JP you should teach a course in Logic for VN...

Heh, thanks Dave. :hi:

 

[USMC-TNVOL]

West virgina has added two DT’s now as grad transfers. One from Clemson and one from USC.
With our line issues this doesn’t help our chances

Those two DTs will magically make their defense better? Their defense was ranked way lower than ours last year.