Pruitt Confidence level?

His team didn’t quit. Butches team quit. That’s what they were programmed to do. Your last statement is almost 100% true. Those who’ve wanted to get better, have. But they have definitely quit. Only bright spot this year is Taylor and Thompson.
Agree, Butch's recruits quit because they are used to it, they did it last year. Playing at a high level is more mental than physical (assuming you have the physical abilities in the first place) and Butch recruited neither, he relied on 3rd party rating agencies to decide whom to recruit without regard to need, will to improve, or anything else. We are where we are via Butch's (and Haslam's) 'wisdom', but we will get better.
 
They can't fire him for 2 or 3 years but my confidence level is ZERO. His team quit on him and they have shown no improvement in the 11 months he and his staff have been on the job. NO talent, no heart, no technique.

I would have argued with you 7 1/2 games into the season. I believed we were improving every week and playing inspired football then something happened. The second half of the SC game we went into the tank and got worse and worseR as the season progressed. Now the team looks just as bad as the past two years which I thought was impossible. I'm without hope at this point for any significant improvement for years to come.
 
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Well, 5-7 first season closed out with back to back embarrassing losses. Honestly makes me wonder how tf we beat Auburn and Kentucky. What do guys think of year 1?

I know the reasonable thing would say “he just doesn’t have the players yet.” And that is 100 true. But no UT coach should ever lose to Vandy, let alone get beat down by them. It’s honestly made me question him a lot. How do you be a competent coach and even let this happen?
Jones built this roster. IMO, the players were "coached"... they just aren't very good and the development for the last 4 years has been worse than pathetic.

I don't know if Pruitt can turn it around or not. I have no idea how good or bad he is. I am now convinced that Butch Jones in every respect was the worst HC at UT in my lifetime. He was bad on the field but much worse off it.
 
Who in the hell is saying anything about competing for the East??? We can’t compete with Vandy. Why don’t you go and compare TN recruiting classes with Vandy’s and then come back and report what you find.

You can’t just look at that, you need to look at how they have been coached since they were recruited. Vandy has been coached and has a coach that has his players and has coached them up. Pruitt is working with Lyles players that Lyle didn’t coach up and actually coached talent and natural ability out of.
Don’t believe me go back and listen to our highly rated players that turned out to be crap. Listen to their interviews from when they first got here and they all talked about coaches making them change their foot work and fundamentals and everything they do, including not doing the things they had done naturally for years and how they had to do everything Lyles way.
 
I put this on Fulmer. He should have hired a coach that matched the type of talent we had . Pruitt came in and tried to beef up this team thus eliminating whatever speed we had. We look real slow against SEC teams. He wants us to play the Alabama schemes with less physical players and it was never going to work.

A finesse coach would have been more successful with the roster that we had in place.

It also hurt hiring a coach with no head coaching experience.

A coach like Brohm would have been a much better match for our situation.
I’m sorry but this is absurd regardless of what you think of Pruitt. What talent? You don’t hire a coach based on the players a previous coach left behind. This roster sucked in that scheme too. Just absurd.
 
He damn sure should be able to compete with Vandy!
Vandy has better players. That's amazing... but true. Five years of abject incompetence at HC has left UT even WORSE than they were. And I have no idea how good or bad Pruitt is. He may be just as bad... but I'm pretty confident he cannot be worse.
 
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I’m sorry but this is absurd regardless of what you think of Pruitt. What talent? You don’t hire a coach based on the players a previous coach left behind. This roster sucked in that scheme too. Just absurd.

You do if you live in lala land and can’t see the big picture and still believe we had gruden and he would’ve had us playing for a title this year
 
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His team didn’t quit. Butches team quit. That’s what they were programmed to do. Your last statement is almost 100% true. Those who’ve wanted to get better, have. But they have definitely quit. Only bright spot this year is Taylor and Thompson.

Sorry, but the only reason we can’t say they quit today...is because they never had any life coming out of the locker room.

The last two weeks have hurt Pruitt in everybody’s mind. These aren’t elite SEC teams that are crushing us
 
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I’m confident in Fulmer to evaluate the kind of coach TN needs to return to dominance. Pruitt was his choice. Pruitt hired an incredible staff of elite recruiters and player developers. Someone already said it but a losing/quitting mentality can take root in a person/team and when it does, it’s hard to get out. If Pruitt lands a LEGITIMATE top 10 class(not a BJ kind of class) after this garbage over the past 2 weeks, then he will no longer have the “play the right way” excuse. We may have more talent than Vandy, but we are a team chalked full of kids who’ve been programmed to quit. Just my opinion.
THIS
 
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Well.. considering the guy had only 9 months to "Develop".. This is better than what the record could have been. Year 1 coach with a dusty cupboard..
We have roughly equal talent to Florida. They have about the same average recruiting rankings as us over the past 4-5 years and have suffered a lot of attrition as well. And look how well Mullen did in year 1.
 
The record is where i thought it would be prior to the season, but it actually feels worse than I expected, given the "hope" after the Auburn and Kentucky games.
Best DB (Gaulden) and best Defensive Lineman (Kirkland) left from a team that went 4-8 last year.

Tennessee is now a bottom of the conference team that occasionally catches the other teams sleeping or "plays up" for them.
I guess there is always next year.
i.e. Vanderbilt
 
Jones built this roster. IMO, the players were "coached"... they just aren't very good and the development for the last 4 years has been worse than pathetic.

I don't know if Pruitt can turn it around or not. I have no idea how good or bad he is. I am now convinced that Butch Jones in every respect was the worst HC at UT in my lifetime. He was bad on the field but much worse off it.

Yep, this.
 
Ears ain't got it. You have to give him a chance, but it is not going to happen. He has two more years and that is it. When you get pounded by Vandy you suck.
 
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EXACTLY!!!! How the hell are we supposed to overcome this Vandy juggernaut? Its Vandy damnit. THE BEST OF THE BEST!! Fans need to chill. We will get to Vandys level in due time. A couple of recruiting classes and I'll bet we can keep it close with these guys.
IF the Vandy level is our goal, we're in deep sh-t !!!
 
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I hate saying we will have to wait another year to see what he can do as HC . But this year was so up and down and not the close ups and downs either. But this team absolutely did not want to be their today playing this game and he should have used KC for a few series to change it up some because JG sucked bad today almost like he quit . So I will have to hold judgment till the last game next year lol
 
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This is a 26 senior vandy team that took Notre Dame to the end, next year we smash them with freshman and sophomores. I'll reserve judgement for Pruitt for 3-4 years, I think this staff is capable of evalutating and developing SEC talent unlike the previous staff.
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We have roughly equal talent to Florida. They have about the same average recruiting rankings as us over the past 4-5 years and have suffered a lot of attrition as well. And look how well Mullen did in year 1.

True. But at the same time, if the players were not developed for sec play- Talent, stats or stars will not matter. Dobbs was anomaly in Butch Jones tenure.
 
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100 percent. We will get to the promised land.


Well, 5-7 first season closed out with back to back embarrassing losses. Honestly makes me wonder how tf we beat Auburn and Kentucky. What do guys think of year 1?

I know the reasonable thing would say “he just doesn’t have the players yet.” And that is 100 true. But no UT coach should ever lose to Vandy, let alone get beat down by them. It has honestly made me question him a lot. How do you be a competent coach and even let this happen?
 
Why so confident in a rookie AD who had never hired a HC before? Same reason you're so confident in Pruitt? Blind orange optimism?

It certainly isnt for any logical reason.

Rookie AD? If Fulmer was hiring the golf coach, I’d be nervous. But if there’s anything he understands, it’s football.I’m not confident in Pruitt yet. But if he can learn the nuances of game management, hiring and firing and the off the field crap I’m very confident in his coaching ability. Because all he’s ever done is win. He didn’t play trumpet or make some extravagant dip.
I’m confident in the play of Taylor and Thompson and they have gotten better all year. The mitakes they’ve made we’re freshman mistakes.
Listen, I hated tonight more than you know. I live in the Nashville area and have to put up with Vandy fans all year. They are insufferable. But we’re stuck with Pruitt for at least 3 years and that’s about the amount of time he needs to perfect his way. If he doesn’t win 9-11 regular season games by then, let’s revisit this topic then.
 
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