Stop Blaming COVID

#26
#26
finn said:
This pretty much sums it up.

Covid is a huge obstacle to overcome but is pretty democratic in how it affects teams, businesses by sector....etc. Some adapt and persevere while others lean on it like a crutch. Penn St/Jimmy Franks has been let it destroy them while Alabama hasn't skipped a beat. Essentially the same inputs but very different outputs.
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Penn State and Franklin aren't solely to blame. Big Ten F'd up their season by taking away 10 games in 18 weeks. Now some teams are ineligible for conference title game because there isn't time to make them up.

I'm starting to think the season won't even be finished now across the board.
 
#29
#29
GAVol said:
I’m not sure what’s more stupid: automatically blaming Covid for everything or completely denying it has had some effect.
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No one is denying the affects of it. But we are tired of it being used an excuse for our season when you have every team in America dealing with the same issues. Look at Liberty beating Virgina Tech. What about all the other teams that are average and are playing decent like Arkansas. Look how Ole Miss leads the SEC in offense and has the #5 offense in the country. Seems to me these few not highly ranked teams are all playing better than we are all because of coaching. Nothing more nothing less.
 
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#30
#30
OrangeWave2 said:
I'd give all teams a mulligan through Week 3 of this season because there's no spring, summer, games/scrimmages/practice to get set.

After Week 3 if you still don't have your s#$% together, then that's a personnel/scheme issue.
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Yea, a slow start is understandable this year. So what does Tennessee do? The exact opposite..

Sorry, covid doesn't wash the poop out that nasty bed......
 
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#31
#31
VolFreakJosh said:
I’ve read numerous posts around the FB forum, how COVID is the main reason why we’re struggling this year.

Why not just admit Pruitt and his staff have failed developing a serviceable QB to replace JG?

Why does our defense continue to struggle with defending the slant pass?

Sorry but getting stomped by Kentucky and Arkansas in year 3 is NOT because of COVID.

Every team has been dealing with this pandemic, not just us.

This excuse has to stop.
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There is no question it has had some effect on every team but NOBODY because of HIPPA knows which teams it has affected the most. I dont think James Franklin forgot how to coach since the Cotton Bowl last year and he just won his first game yesterday. But your point is well taken, it does provide a convenient crutch for any coach not having a good season.
 
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#32
#32
Matt2496 said:
How people can keep making excuses for Pruitt is just mind-boggling. There is zero excuse for the performance being this bad this season, especially at the QB position.
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My biggest beef is QB. If you have JG in the game cut him loose. Can’t play scared all the time However not getting HB behind center is by far my biggest issue.
 
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#33
#33
Is COVID a legit excuse for us being as bad as we are? No way. Has it had a pretty significant effect on us? Yes. That’s undeniable. Not every team did the stupid contact tracing BS.
 
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#37
#37
GAVol said:
My thing is that I can’t quantify how much of any of it is Covid. I just know it’s in there somewhere whether it’s 1% or 90%. My guess is that there were already issues and Covid magnified them.

As far as QB goes, I can’t think of a worse scenario than JG underachieving, Maurer slowed by a hamstring, Bailey severely limited due to contact tracing and WRs constantly held out of practice. Some of that is Covid. Some of that is coaching. Some of that is underachievement. Some of that is bad luck.
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If COVID adversely affected UT in comparison with other schools one could make an argument that COVID was responsible for some of our problems. It didn’t, in fact we were lucky compared to many schools. COVID has zero impact on the state of our program this year.

Bailey was not held back because of contact tracing. Pruitt is on the record that Bailey participated in 10 snaps one day in practice and did not look good. Pruitt decided then Bailey was 4th string and did not warrant any resources for practice because he was 4th string. Bailey did not receive any special attention from the staff until the Sunday night scrimmage well after the season had started. This is where Pruitt failed in Qb development and it is likely the biggest reason we are on a 5 game losing streak. Bailey is the real deal, obviously a huge upgrade over JG.

Edit: COVID has zero impact on our 2-5 record.
 
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#38
#38
All I know is the China virus has a 99% survival rate and we have a better chance of surviving that than we do Pruitt succeeding here
 
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#39
#39
Rocky Top Raby said:
What problem does it contribute to at this point?
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It's been covered ad nauseam, here and in past PC's. We had no spring ball and a lot of players missed fall camp due to contact tracing. Preseason practice is different from in-season practice, where everything is about game prep. We didn't get enough of it for our young guys.

Note I'm not saying we should 100% blame all our problems this year on covid. I'm just pointing out that it is, without a doubt, a contributing factor.
 
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#40
#40
ABINGDON VOL FAN said:
If COVID adversely affected UT in comparison with other schools one could make an argument that COVID was responsible for some of our problems. It didn’t, in fact we were lucky compared to many schools. COVID has zero impact on the state of our program this year.

Bailey was not held back because of contact tracing. Pruitt is on the record that Bailey participated in 10 snaps one day in practice and did not look good. Pruitt decided then Bailey was 4th string and did not warrant any resources for practice because he was 4th string. Bailey did not receive any special attention from the staff until the Sunday night scrimmage well after the season had started. This is where Pruitt failed in Qb development and it is likely the biggest reason we are on a 5 game losing streak. Bailey is the real deal, obviously a huge upgrade over JG.
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There you go again... smdh. This is the biggest load of **** I've seen. Not having spring ball and having our players miss out on a lot of fall camp had ZERO IMPACT? You're a lost cause, brother.
 
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#41
#41
jwilliams said:
It's been covered ad nauseam, here and in past PC's. We had no spring ball and a lot of players missed fall camp due to contact tracing. Preseason practice is different from in-season practice, where everything is about game prep. We didn't get enough of it for our young guys.

Note I'm not saying we should 100% blame all our problems this year on covid. I'm just pointing out that it is, without a doubt, a contributing factor.
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Not compared to other schools. We are 2-5 with or without COVID. See post#37 for more details.
 
#42
#42
jwilliams said:
There you go again... smdh. This is the biggest load of **** I've seen. Not having spring ball and having our players miss out on a lot of fall camp had ZERO IMPACT? You're a lost cause, brother.
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You missed the point. Wake up from your nap. Not compared to other schools who experienced the same or even more hardship. We are 2-5 with or without COVID.
 
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#43
#43
VolFreakJosh said:
I’ve read numerous posts around the FB forum, how COVID is the main reason why we’re struggling this year.

Why not just admit Pruitt and his staff have failed developing a serviceable QB to replace JG?

Why does our defense continue to struggle with defending the slant pass?

Sorry but getting stomped by Kentucky and Arkansas in year 3 is NOT because of COVID.

Every team has been dealing with this pandemic, not just us.

This excuse has to stop.
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I’m giving Pruitt a pass this year... jmo
 
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#44
#44
ABINGDON VOL FAN said:
Not compared to other schools. We are 2-5 with or without COVID. See post#37 for more details.
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ABINGDON VOL FAN said:
You missed the point. Wake up from your nap. Not compared to other schools who experienced the same or even more hardship. We are 2-5 with or without COVID.
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So an equal number of players from every team had to quarantine? Nope... not buying your drivel. We’re better than 2-5 with a full offseason, IMO.
 
#45
#45
GAVol said:
I’m not sure what’s more stupid: automatically blaming Covid for everything or completely denying it has had some effect.
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Truth is usually somewhere in between BUT this same coach got his brains beat in by Georgia State. Not saying Covid didn’t effect things but Pruitt still isn’t the answer as a head coach. Completely out of his depth.
 
#46
#46
jwilliams said:
So an equal number of players from every team had to quarantine? Nope... not buying your drivel. We’re better than 2-5 with a full offseason, IMO.
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Actually we lucked out on the number of players quarantined. Look at the SEC schools that had games postponed. This fact was brought up here on Volnation several weeks ago. The difference between 2-5 and 5-2 is one position. JT and BM failed in their opportunities to replace JG. HB’s opportunity , as I previously stated , was stopped for several weeks
by Pruitt after 10 practice snaps
early on.
 
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#48
#48
jwilliams said:
It's been covered ad nauseam, here and in past PC's. We had no spring ball and a lot of players missed fall camp due to contact tracing. Preseason practice is different from in-season practice, where everything is about game prep. We didn't get enough of it for our young guys.

Note I'm not saying we should 100% blame all our problems this year on covid. I'm just pointing out that it is, without a doubt, a contributing factor.
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We have gotten worse as the season progressed. Our two wins were in the closest weeks to all of these problems and now we are going to be fortunate to beat Vandy. I just don't see how it adds up.
 
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#49
#49
Rocky Top Raby said:
We have gotten worse as the season progressed. Our two wins were in the closest weeks to all of these problems and now we are going to be fortunate to beat Vandy. I just don't see how it adds up.
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Fair enough... we all interpret it differently, and we all have different expectations. *shrug*
 
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