Not Top 10, you say? Make your case here!

[Volfan39]

Nobody expects us to win a championship. And if you do that’s on you for having expectations to high

 

[jeff1vol]

Do you know that there have been multiple Super Bowl winners and National Title winners with bad defenses?

Like who??? What NC winners have had terrible defenses?? Im not saying there arent any, but damn if I can remember one.

 

[jeff1vol]

Nobody expects us to win a championship. And if you do that’s on you for having expectations to high

I DONT expect a championship of any kind. He asked "what if we keep winning...." well if we keep winning, Id guess we'd play for one, right? And at that point, I would expect our defense to be our undoing.

 

[Old Geezer]

Withholding judgement. It's too early to tell if we rank top-10, so I take it with a grain of salt. Offense is explosive, but high leverage and stresses our own defense with little rest.

 

[Volfan8282]

I think we are a good team. What makes it hard for many to believe we are a top ten team is our defense. More specifically, the linebackers and secondary. However, I think our offense is so potent that we can beat teams that are more “complete”. It’s too early in the season to say we are for sure overrated or where we deserve to be yet. We’ve played 4 games and the two ranked teams we have played have had games where they look awful. LSU and Bama will tell us where we are.

Pretty much this.

 

[TrumpedUpVol]

Like who??? What NC winners have had terrible defenses?? Im not saying there arent any, but damn if I can remember one.

Michigan in 1997 and Ohio State in 2022 had less-than-stellar defenses. In the playoff era, 2014 Oregon, 2018 Oklahoma (a true outlier) and 2019 Oklahoma were not great defensively although none of those three won the title. All of these teams, save for #84 Oklahoma in 2018, were in the 40s defensively.

To be perfectly clear, Tennessee ranks #50 in terms of SP+ defenses which falls very much in line with the five aforementioned teams. I do agree with you insofar that Tennessee either jumps into the mid-thirties/low-forties in the eyes of SP+ or has no realistic chance of ending the season having bested one or both of Alabama and Georgia.

 

[TennVols12]

We are a top 10 team until we're not.

Ya dang right!

 

[McDad]

The AP says we are number 8.

/thread.

 

[Fanforlife21]

Dont GAF what youre sick of. The OP asked a question and I answered it.

Calm down, Brenda.

 

[VOL89grad]

Great post! Reading through the responses, seems like folks are not thinking about who are the Top 10 teams “right now” vice at the end of the season. I for one haven’t forfeited our upcoming games against Tigers, Tide, Wildcats or Dogs…. Why should anyone at this point after a wild CFB weekend? Spoiler Alert: VOLS are a Top 10 team right now, but the top 5 teams are legitimate top 5 teams too (again right now).

it would have been funny if someone said Notre Dame, Oklahoma, etc (even more outlandish to say Wisconsin, Texas, or those powerhouses of Kent State or Mizzou!). Against monumental odds, I’m so glad our VOLS are now clearly in the mix prior to the first CFP rankings (which soon will be only ranking that really matters).
Go VOLS!

 

[Stephen Gray]

Like who??? What NC winners have had terrible defenses?? Im not saying there arent any, but damn if I can remember one.

Some serious irony here with the “like who” (which the guy you’re asking answers above). The original post asked that if you think TN is not in the top 10 to say who is better and why. You didn’t do that and then claimed to have answered the question, when all you said was that defenses ranked like ours don’t happen on top 10 teams.

 

[vol1981]

To bad everyone in the country that actually does it for a job disagrees with you. And guess what our team doesn’t give a f what you think of them

* Too (LOL)

 

[camp_steveo]

UT is undefeated and scoring 40+ points per game. At this point a top 10 ranking is fine. The real question is how will UT fare over the next several weeks. Hopefully the Vols will still be highly ranked.

 

[DougVol]

Wake forest would be a tough match up. They would carve us up. We would score too. But…..

UT is undefeated and scoring 40+ points per game. At this point a top 10 ranking is fine. The real question is how will UT fare over the next several weeks. Hopefully the Vols will still be highly ranked.

 

[joevol33]

Dont GAF what youre sick of. The OP asked a question and I answered it.

Technically you didn't answer it, you only bashed our team. He asked for examples of other teams who you think are better, and why. All you did was cry about Tennessee being in the top 10.

 

[camp_steveo]

Wake forest would be a tough match up. They would carve us up. We would score too. But…..

As far as I can tell these Vols are highly competitive, even if their defensive numbers are suspect. I am just gonna wait and see.

 

[Vol in Buckeye Land]

“We’ll know what we have after the Pitt game.”
*UT wins*
“Ah, well, Pitt isn’t very good. We’ll see how we fare against the Gators. They own us, you know. We can take stock after that game.”
*UT wins*
“Florida is trash. We’ll know what we have after LSU…”

We could go 12-0 and some of y’all will be saying “Well, college football was down this season. We’ll find out where we are next year.”

 

[zeppelin128]

The question from OP that nobody is answering is who ranked below us do you think should be ahead of us? Looking at today's AP poll, I don't see anyone an argument could be made for to jump us except for Ole Miss.

And that would still leave us top 10...

Edit to add: honestly it is Bama, UGA, and Ohio tier one, then the rest of us. Those are the only three teams right now I would bet money would beat us more often than not.

 

[Doberman]

Did we (as a collective) think Utah was Top 10 when UF beat them? No. Overrated was the overwhelming theme.

When UF jumped to #11, nope overrated trash.

When UK was a spot above us in the Top 10. Nope. Trash as usual. We’ll smoke’em.

Our ranking is legit though. lol. Reminds me of our players that end up transferring. “Beasts for us. The future is bright on the Hill, boyzzz!” When they transfer, pure garbage.

Now, our ranking is what it is, and that is Top 10, until it’s not. So yeah, for now, we’re legit. Period.

My real opinion is we’re probably not Top 10 material, but honestly not many others are either. It’s truly a Top 5 and everyone else. Right now we are one of the tallest midgets. I welcome all the accolades and press clippings that come with it. GBO

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

Right now there's Bama, GA, and the OSU, then about 15 more teams that can fill out the rest.

Look at who OSU has played. Who have they played? Let’s face it they are where they are because of brand name and Stroud. That’s it. Their schedule is Swiss cheese.

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

The question from OP that nobody is answering is who ranked below us do you think should be ahead of us? Looking at today's AP poll, I don't see anyone an argument could be made for to jump us except for Ole Miss.

And that would still leave us top 10...

Edit to add: honestly it is Bama, UGA, and Ohio tier one, then the rest of us. Those are the only three teams right now I would bet money would beat us more often than not.

If we are using what some of these idiots are e using as basis for arguments then OM win over UK wasn’t good. Why? Well according to some of the mega mouth breathers UF isn’t any good. So if we don’t get credit for that being a good win then neither does UK. So that means UKs best win is against Northern Illinois.

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

Did we (as a collective) think Utah was Top 10 when UF beat them? No. Overrated was the overwhelming theme.

When UF jumped to #11, nope overrated trash.

When UK was a spot above us in the Top 10. Nope. Trash as usual. We’ll smoke’em.

Our ranking is legit though. lol. Reminds me of our players that end up transferring. “Beasts for us. The future is bright on the Hill, boyzzz!” When they transfer, pure garbage.

Now, our ranking is what it is, and that is Top 10, until it’s not. So yeah, for now, we’re legit. Period.

My real opinion is we’re probably not Top 10 material, but honestly not many others are either. It’s truly a Top 5 and everyone else. Right now we are one of the tallest midgets. I welcome all the accolades and press clippings that come with it. GBO

OSU and Michigan have played nobody. After Bama, UGA and Clemson, it’s all personal preference.

 

[swampfoxfan]

Dont GAF what youre sick of. The OP asked a question and I answered it.

No you did not answer the question. Which three teams ranked below us are better and why di you think so.

 

[Vol in Buckeye Land]

Look at who OSU has played. Who have they played? Let’s face it they are where they are because of brand name and Stroud. That’s it. Their schedule is Swiss cheese.

You just never know what you have with OSU until the post season (Unless of course they get beat by Oregon at home and bodied by Michigan like last year). They could roll over and play dead or they could dominate. Will the real Buckeyes please stand up.

 

[DougVol]

If we are using what some of these idiots are e using as basis for arguments then OM win over UK wasn’t good. Why? Well according to some of the mega mouth breathers UF isn’t any good. So if we don’t get credit for that being a good win then neither does UK. So that means UKs best win is against Northern Illinois.

I know this… We will truck Kentucky. Ole Miss would get spanked too, if we played them.