My depressing big-picture thoughts

[EmerilVOL]

Great points.  A counter-point is that it don't take a whole lot of blue chips.  Bray, Rogers, and Hunter give us three, so maybe on offense we need a couple more, and throw in a few on D?  And Bray was not a 5-star nor anywhere close in HS, and we might get a few more of those too.

I am all for getting players in here that can play and are good citizens but at the same time we have to be competitive so we are not maintaining number 2 and I am not sure we are going to.....

[BanditVol]

I am all for getting players in here that can play and are good citizens but at the same time we have to be competitive so we are not maintaining number 2 and I am not sure we are going to.....

What does "maintaining number 2" mean?   

[EmerilVOL]

What does "maintaining number 2" mean?   

being competitive is the second point in the sentence.....we got rid of Fulmer since everybody said we were nto competitive with him in charge....
now we are totally not competitive

[EmerilVOL]

There's one glaring difference: Under Fulmer, the program was still on a downward slide. Under Dooley, the downward slide has stopped and it's on its way back up. Slowly, sure, but on its way back up nonetheless. Everyone was cautioned that this would happen. You don't get rid of one coaching staff and immediately start getting better with another...at least not usually. There will almost always be a few years where it will get worse before it gets better. The Kiffin experiment was disastrous. If we go straight from Fulmer to Dooley, we're competing for the SEC East this year, IMO. But here's where we are: We're coming off seasons of 7-5 and 6-6, and with a little luck we'll be 6-6 this year. But there's some hope for the future. If Fulmer will still here, we would still be having mediocre seasons, and could we look into the future and say there's hope? I don't think so. We'd be sitting here with a 3-2 record and still have the 4 or 5 year process of turning it around ahead of us.

It's going to take patience. (I say that as someone who hoped for an 8-4 finish this season, so I'm as impatient as anyone...but our situation is what it is.)

A little luck we will be 6-6.....

well hell with a little luck we are 5-0 at the moment and we are not having this conversation.  With a little luck Hunter does not blow out an ACL and Bray does not break his thumb on a defensive players shoulder pad. With a little luck I could be coaching the Big Orange and making 1.8 million per year.....with a little luck I could be a millionaire by winning the Powerball for 200 million. 

I was afraid when the clamor started for Fulmer to be fired that we would wander through the wilderness that was college football and turn into Alabama under Shula while they were on probation......

When Lameo was hired I was agin it.......(quoting Seargent York) but I was willing to wait and see and I waited and seen I got told we are worthless pieces of flotsam on the college football landscape....well I am better than that and I am sick and tired of losing......

[DuckVol]

"And we don't have a shoe company founder as an alum to buy our recruits for us like some other programs I can name."

I don't know what Phil Knight ever did to you, BDV, but he must have gotten a serious pound of flesh.  I would love to hear what recruits Knight has bought for Oregon, as this is a clear reference to them.  If you look at the Oregon roster, it is filled with three and four stars like LaMichael James, who all the Texas schools didn't want.  If Phil was "buying" recruits, I wish he would start with some big, nasty DT, so Oregon could stop the Auburn's, LSU's and Ohio State's of the world.  That statement is laughable.

As for the Vols, I think we are on an uptick.  The OL is still relatively young, but I think we are lacking a dynamic back.  Look around at the schools in the SEC that run the ball well, and most have a really great back toting the rock.  S. Carolina has never been able to run the ball well except with Lattimore and when they had the back that played for the Philadelphia Eagles (can't remember his name now).  Bama with Ingram and Richardson.  Florida with Tebow.  Even the Vols with Arian Foster were decent at running the ball.  I think if Dooley can get one top back, and of course that is easier said than done, our running game would show some real improvement.  If Dooley had gotten Crowell, our running game would be good enough, especially with Hunter, Rogers, Rivera (was he bought by Knight by the way, he came from Oregon) and Bray playing as well as they are/were.

Now, defensively, Fulmer and Kiffin left the cupboard really bare.  But Dooley has recruited the two young LB's who look like players.  I think his job is going to hinge not on the running game, but on his ability to stock the defensive side of the ball.  We need corners, safeties and most of all DL.  Dooley's ability to recruit some studs in the tenches is going to tell the tale of his ability to retain his job.  Comparing out DL with Bama's, LSU's, Georgia's, SC's is no comparison, that, in my mind, is where Dooley must start to win some recruiting battles.

Maybe Herbert Hainer, the Adidas CEO can buy us some recruits.  Sorry BDV, couldn't resist.

[ChattanoogaVol]

A little luck we will be 6-6.....


....well I am better than that and I am sick and tired of losing......

I am Damn tired of watching UT lose too.......................................................I was furious after how we played against Georgia