Steve Kiner discusses Tennessee's team leadership

#51
#51
Boston Vol said:
Why shouldn’t we have closed the gap in 2 1/4 years? Again if your head coach doesn’t have your program rolling by year three it’s not going to happen.
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I feel it is more like a 4-5 year challenge to close the gap with Bama. This season has been turned upside down with Covid19 and many young players didn't have the practice time to develop. I feel like next season is more like year 3 for Pruitt. He isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
 
#52
#52
chas said:
Lane Kiffin does not have the talent tha tennessee has and play them a lot tougher than tennessee did and in 2009 should have beateb saban and would have if kicker did not have a groin pull.
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I like Kiffin (wish he would have stayed at UT much longer). However let's keep in mind that in spite of playing Bama closer he is still only 1-4 this year including loss to Pittman who probably has even less talent.
 
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#53
#53
vols1707 said:
I think Pruitt has questionable leadership at best.

Hard to step up and lead with the head guy yelling what everyone else is doing wrong. And he continues to roll with guys that aren’t getting it done at several positions.

Then he fires a coach, takes over his position group and that group gets worse instantly.

Pruitt’s credibility is very low right now. He is pointing fingers everywhere & it’s him that has to look in the damn mirror.

The kids see this everyday, Won’t have leaders step up for a coach that blames everyone else for problems.
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What do you do as a coach when certain units don't perform ro your expectations? Pruitt has said multiple times that him and his staff have to do a better job. But if you or anyone expected magical results against one of, if not the best offense in the nation over a week your crazy.

Yes its a team sport, but if 1 guy ( JG ) sucks so bad, it hurts everyone. Kind of like an engine with a misfire. That engine won't perform optimally until you fix that misfire. JG needs replaced, the defense is still relatively young, guys playing out of position and needs some better play calling, but they are still decent enough to keep us in a game if the offense could perform better
 
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#54
#54
TGVol said:
I like Kiffin (wish he would have stayed at UT much longer). However let's keep in mind that in spite of playing Bama closer he is still only 1-4 this year including loss to Pittman who probably has even less talent.
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I will agree with you there
 
#55
#55
JohnWardForever said:
You think all the Criticism is about Losing to Bama? Then you don't see the Big picture at all. The big picture is Tenn is headed for a 4-6 record in year 3 of a new Coach's tenure, and that's when the HC is supposed to show big improvement. Well, he "AINT". We didn't expect to beat bama. We DID expect to beat Kentucky! We DID expect to go 7-3 , 6-4 at worst. We "AINT".
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All SEC schedule is tougher as well...A lot of schools will have mediocre records due to this as well...
 
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#56
#56
landscapingvol said:
No one, or at least I am no talking about beating Saban, but there have been several losses in Pruitt’s short tenure to teams that aren’t in the same stratosphere as Bama or Georgia. He is a defensive minded coach and for the vast majority of the time against a team UT should be able to at least compete against hasn’t been able to even slow down the opponent.
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Tell me one coach that could come and win instantly with the team he walked into. How many teams with out talent won 8 in a row. Who else has beaten Georgia and Alabama. Yes Kentucky was a disaster, but I thought we played just as good as Georgia did against Alabama and Georgia is a top 10 team
 
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#58
#58
allenfan1 said:
Tell me one coach that could come and win instantly with the team he walked into. How many teams with out talent won 8 in a row. Who else has beaten Georgia and Alabama. Yes Kentucky was a disaster, but I thought we played just as good as Georgia did against Alabama and Georgia is a top 10 team
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Frustrating thing right now is that at this point we actually have a lot more talent than we have shown, but they are not on the field yet. This is partialy due to covid, and some of the blame is on the coaches who did not develop them a little bit faster - some of that again can be excused due to covid, especially when it comes to freshmen who only recently joined the program. One thing I will definitely agree with Pruitt (but only after listening to his post game yesterday) is that you can't play talented guys if they have not earned it in practice - that just sends a terrible message to the rest of the team (probably recruits as well).
 
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#59
#59
TGVol said:
JG did what they asked him to do yesterday - to have a clean game and given what happened recently that was reasonable ask. If the defense did not play so poorely we also would have had more posessions and he probably could have done more. One more issue (which is on coaches for sure) is that Palmer is the only legit receiver on this team - all the other upper classmen and simply over their head playing aginst this type of competition - makes it much harder for QB when you only have one option (since we also don't use TE's at all in passing game). I think the focus right now needs to be getting as many of the freshman receivers ready to play vs Arky, and to fix the defense in terms of stopping big plays (those two things are at least as important as debate about who should be the QB going forward).
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Qb is number one problem but the other problems need to be addressed as well.
 
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#60
#60
West Vol said:
And by our own coach’s admission, he’s spent almost zero time preparing them to play this season.
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I agree with you and that is the huge problem. They both had an opportunity to get snaps in the game Sat. They should have played the entire second half and they would have got valuable game time experience. No good reason why they didn't play the second half.
 
#61
#61
cgrish said:
I agree with you and that is the huge problem. They both had an opportunity to get snaps in the game Sat. They should have played the entire second half and they would have got valuable game time experience. No good reason why they didn't play the second half.
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I think the reason Pruitt kept JG in there is that he thinks JG gives us better chance to win in the rest of the games this year (JG has some credit with him given this is kind of what happened last year so he is hopping for repeat of that). So Pruitt used Bama game to try to restore JG's confidence and see if he can have a clean game (which he did). If he would have replaced him in second half that would have had exactly the opposite effect (we would have QB controversy over next 2 weeks leading into Arkansas game).
 
#62
#62
Seattle Hillbilly said:
If I remember correctly that one kinda backfired. Regardless, Kiner and “Hacksaw” were a pair to draw to.
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Yes it did. That was a national championship team and year except for stubbing our toe that day. Funny thing about it, despite the 38-0 score, Archie was just 9 of 18 passing with a little over 100 yards. That’s a horrible day by today’s standards.
 
#63
#63
TGVol said:
I agree - Kentucky was completely unacceptible. However, let's remember we should have been up at least 10-0 in the first half before Kentucky even had 1 first down (in which case we probably would have blown them out). So I still believe that UK game was a one off and result of lettdown from the previous game at UGA. Also, we did beat that same Mizzou team that beat UK, (and USCjr) without playing all that great. So it's not like suddenly we became the worst team in the world over the period of 2 weeks. This is what needs to be taken into account in these emotional conversations after bad losses - do we just throw out coaches every couple of years and start from the ground up or have some more patience (I know it's not easy to ask for patience after 15 years of misery but that's sadly what is needed right now). I still think Pruitt is a good football coach (not snake oil salesman like Butch) - it was brutal to listen to his post game yesterday, but he did come across as sincere and seriously disturbed by what's going on and I think he will do everything possible to fix it (as long as he can keep recruiting at high level, and if we win most of the remaining games this year I'm still sticking with him).
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Agree. I wrote Pruitt off after the first two games last year. I believe I was wrong now. In the first two games this year we looked like an SEC football team for the first time since Fulmer. (Butch owes absolutely everything to Dobbs and Barnett and we see what happened when they left Neyland.)

We know what we have with JG. I couldn't believe the O gameplan yesterday that was actually built around the limitations of JG - I assume Pruitt got after Chaney to do it. If they can do that instead of forcing JG to be something he isn't (as Chaney has always done) and Pruitt can re-energise the defense, we will win a bunch of games going forward. If JG goes "lights off" again, bring in Maurer or HB for a couple of series. It's always helped him in the past. Presumably HB is the future (but Covid); right now, the senior is our best chance to win if Chaney keeps tailoring the offense to his capabilities as we did yesterday.
 
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#67
#67
USMC-TNVOL said:
“You’ve got to find a quarterback because that’s the position that makes everybody around the rest of the field, offense, defense, special teams - better or worse,” Tebow said. “Right now, from the second to the fourth quarter last week, they were demoralized. That Tennessee team couldn’t have played worse because of how the quarterback position handled that game. You can find another guy that can make everybody play better and give yourself a shot in the big game. Right now, in the big game, they haven’t had a shot. That’s why they have to make a change.” - Tebow
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Sometime earlier this season there was a "Keys to the game" type thread. I said it was all about JG, and it is. Great QBs lift everyone around them. I don't know that Josh Dobbs was "great" per se, but he was certainly very good. When the game was on the line you felt like he was gonna do something with his arm or feet to make a play. As his career went along he became more consistent as a playmaker, and started lifting his teammates.

JG has never found that consistency. Two or 3 times a game he will throw as good a ball as you've ever seen.... then the next play is a strip sack where he has no clue where the pressure is coming from. Maybe a pro staff can harness that arm talent and coach him into being a decent/good QB, but right now he is not making winning plays or lifting his team.

And don't hand me any crap about "JG didn't give up 40+ points yesterday". I bet if we had some consistency on offense the defense would be lifted too.
 
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#68
#68
VOLnMiami said:
Wow...The stupid is strong with you today...Bryant was every bit as good as Saban maybe even better...He won 6 national titles and won 14 SEC titles.
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However from UT perspective Bear Bryant had a lot more trouble dealing with the great general Neyland than Saban had against anyone UT put up against him.
Below head to head stats are from Best SEC Football Coach in History: General Robert "Bob" Neyland vs. Paul "Bear" Bryant

Bryant vs. Neyland, Head-to-Head (record indicated is for entire season)

1946 Tennessee (9-2) defeated Kentucky (7-3) 7-0 at Tennessee
1947 Tennessee (5-5) defeated Kentucky (8-3) 13-6 at Kentucky
1948 Tennessee (4-4-2) tied Kentucky (5-3-2) 0-0 at Tennessee
1949 Tennessee (7-2-1) defeated Kentucky (9-3) 6-0 at Kentucky
1950 Tennessee (11-1) defeated Kentucky (11-1) 7-0 at Tennessee
1951 Tennessee (10-1) defeated Kentucky (8-4) 28-0 at Kentucky
1952 Tennessee (8-2-1) tied Kentucky (5-4-2) 14-14 at Tennessee

Total: Neyland 5, Bryant at Kentucky, 0, 2 ties

Neyland vs. Alabama
12-5-2 (68.4%)

Bryant vs. Tennessee
17-13-4 (55.9%)
0-5-2 (14.3%) at Kentucky
0-1-0 (0%) at Texas A&M (Gator Bowl)
16-7-2 (68%) at Alabama
 
#71
#71
I remember Jerome Pruitt talking about “habits” after the Kentucky loss. Why is a program 2.5 years into its existence and filled with young men concerned about “habits”. What the hell is this, HS football? Knew right then and there he was a fraud.
 
#73
#73
jkleno said:
Typical Vol fans who think we close the gap with UGA and Bama in 2 1/4 years.
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Would closing it just a little be acceptable. Sick of our #1 rival taking their foot off the gas for the 10th year so as not to embarrass us in front of our own crowd. Is it OK to at least hope to be within a score headed to the 4thQ every so often?
 
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#74
#74
vols1707 said:
I think Pruitt has questionable leadership at best.

Hard to step up and lead with the head guy yelling what everyone else is doing wrong. And he continues to roll with guys that aren’t getting it done at several positions.

Then he fires a coach, takes over his position group and that group gets worse instantly.

Pruitt’s credibility is very low right now. He is pointing fingers everywhere & it’s him that has to look in the damn mirror.

The kids see this everyday, Won’t have leaders step up for a coach that blames everyone else for problems.
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Coach Pruitt accepts responsibility at most of the pressers I've seen this year.
 
#75
#75
USMC-TNVOL said:
Not disagreeing but a leader or even just a good player at this point would do wonders for this team. I think they’re steadily losing their fight as they keep seeing JG go in and hindering the offense. They’re not going to play as tough when they already have that in the back of their mind. A good QB can bring energy.
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Yep and I'm watching a little scat back play right now named Kyler murray for the cardinals. Now that dude brings energy and electricity to the game,imo. For sure it makes his teamates play harder too. I was hoping to see Holiday get some reps at QB.
 
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