Here’s the quick view from Rocky Top this morning:

• VFRT was named Mr. Numb Existence in this season’s first BlogPoll for the “rightest ballot.” I’m awaiting a defense from Frank McGrath, who earned the designation of Mr. Bold.
• The Volunteer football team was reportedly exhausted after the first day of two-a-days. Tuesday morning, the team focused on special teams, which was no better than fifth in the SEC and 31st nationally in any category. They were last in the SEC and 113th in punt return defense. Coach Fulmer opened Wednesday’s practice by letting each of the 11 offensive starters call their own plays. Today is the last day of two-a-days, and the team will go through limited scrimmage situations, including goal line and short-yardage scenarios.
• Running back LaMarcus Coker is turning heads on the practice field. “He’s stepping up like you would like,” Fulmer said. “He’s in shape, maybe for the first time since the sixth grade or something. He’s learned how to work and has a nice presence about him, a confidence, demeanor or swagger. It’s not cocky, which I thought he had a little bit of that arrogance to him at times before.
• Defensive End Gerald Williams’ ACT score of 23 was invalidated due to too big of a jump, and he had to take the test again last week.
• Receiver Jayson Swain is parlaying The Season of Which We Do Not Speak into a leadership role this season.
• Junior cornerback Roshaun Fellows has a torn pectoral muscle and may have to miss the season.
• Redshirt freshman Josh McNeil seems to have overtaken Michael Frogg as the first team center.
• The three new linebackers that have a combined three career starts are looking like Tennessee ‘backers: fast, strong, explosive, and smart.
• Tenn Vol Champ appears to be back in the saddle.
• Scouting reports. GoVolsXtra.com’s John Adams warns Volunteers not to underestimate the Pac-10 and Cal. Cal’s offensive line, which looked to be a question early on, is apparently a question no more. Another Florida lineman, Maurice Hurt, was injured a couple of days ago, but it appears he won’t be out long.
• If you missed it, the UT men’s basketball schedule has been released. What a difference a year makes. Lots of t.v. this time around.
• Rivals.com has a nice feature on defensive back Inky Johnson.
• James Wilhoit is on the Lou Groza watch list. Wilhoit is the active SEC scoring leader with 229 career points.

All for now.

All right. Brian at mgoblog has posted the final pre-season BlogPoll. If you have no idea what the BlogPoll is, you can find out all about it here.

View from Rocky Top has won the year’s first designation as Mr. Numb Existence (the “rightest ballot”), which is pretty funny because I was Mr. Bold (the “wrongest ballot”) for my first poll last year (the second-to-last of the season). For such an inept debut, I earned this rebuke from Brian:

Mr. Bold is the aforementioned newbie The View From Rocky Top, who, um, really likes the SEC: UGA #4, LSU #5(!), Florida #6(!), Auburn #12, Alabama #14… okay. Florida State is #9, GT #11… er, okay. Perhaps the ballot entry form was excessively confusing? Perhaps the Tennessee Season of Doom has sent our newest poller into a nervous breakdown where this year never happened and it’s 1967 or something? It is the mystery. Explain yourself! Try not to say the words “Southern Speed,” lest you feel the lash of my whip!

Well, I employed the insanity defense (don’t even bother with the video — it’s buggy and really small), and I was, in fact, in the final throes of lunacy, which was understandable in light of The Season of Which We Do Not Speak.

I’m feeling much better now. Thanks for asking.

Anyway, as Mr. Numb Existence, here is my charge:

Each week the top blog on each list will be given a fancy title–”Mr. Bold” and “Mr. Numb Existence,” respectively–and politely requested to comment on their ballot. Mr. Bold is asked to convince poll voters that he is right on a team or two he has ranked strangely. Mr. Numb Existence is asked to evaluate Mr. Bold’s argument, decide whether he buys it, and declare if he will adjust his rankings accordingly next week (pending the games, of course). Should either Mr. Bold or Mr. Numb Existence be unable to participate in this exercise, the next blog on the list shall step forth into the void.

The pre-season Mr. Bold is Frank McGrath, who might have an insanity defense of his own, as he is a New York City banker who likes both chess and NASCAR and whose favorite movie is March of the Penguins. Here’s his ballot:

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Notre Dame	25
2	Ohio State	24
3	Florida	23
4	Auburn	22
5	Southern Cal	21
6	Miami (Florida)	20
7	Florida State	19
8	Georgia	18
9	Tennessee	17
10	Nebraska	16
11	Texas	15
12	Penn State	14
13	Virginia Tech	13
14	Clemson	12
15	Iowa	11
16	West Virginia	10
17	Tulsa	9
18	Alabama	8
19	TCU	7
20	Louisiana State	6
21	Oregon	5
22	UTEP	4
23	Oklahoma	3
24	UCLA	2
25	Michigan	1

Dude likes the SEC. For the sake of comparison, here is the composite BlogPoll:

BlogPoll Week 1

Rank	Team	PPB	StdDev	Delta
1	Ohio State (20)	23.3	2.2	25
2	Texas (11)	22.6	2.3	24
3	Auburn (9)	22.2	2.3	23
4	Southern Cal (5)	22.0	2.1	22
5	Notre Dame (8)	20.5	3.2	21
6	Louisiana State (2)	18.3	4.5	20
7	Florida	17.3	3.4	19
8	West Virginia	16.9	5.2	18
9	Miami (Florida)	14.3	4.1	17
10	Cal (1)	14.1	5.5	16
11	Louisville	14.0	4.7	15
12	Iowa	13.9	4.7	14
13	Florida State	12.7	4.5	13
14	Michigan	12.6	4.1	12
15	Georgia	12.0	4.2	11
16	Oklahoma	11.0	6.0	10
17	Virginia Tech	8.1	4.8	9
18	Clemson	7.4	4.2	8
19	Penn State	6.6	5.2	7
20	Nebraska	5.6	4.8	6
21	Oregon	5.2	4.3	5
22	Tennessee	4.2	4.9	4
23	Texas Tech	2.5	3.0	3
24	TCU	2.4	3.6	2
25	Alabama	2.1	3.1	1

Also Receiving Votes:
Boston College(2.0), Arkansas(2.0), Arizona State(1.9), Georgia Tech(1.3), Utah(0.8), UCLA(0.8), Wisconsin(0.6), Navy(0.5), Michigan State(0.5), Boise State(0.4), Fresno State(0.4), Northern Illinois(0.4), South Carolina(0.3), Tulsa(0.2), Pittsburgh(0.2), UTEP(0.2), Purdue(0.2), Iowa State(0.1), Arizona(0.1), Texas A&M(0.1), Rutgers(0.1), Duke(0.0), Central Florida(0.0), Toledo(0.0), Hawaii(0.0), Colorado(0.0),

Total Ballots: 59

So there you have it. Brian has done the work for us and boiled down the questions for Mr. Bold to answer:

Mr. Bold is Tulane blogger Frank McGrath, apparently the last person on earth with faith in the state of Florida. He ranks the Florida-Miami-FSU triumverate extremely high (3-6-7, respectively), but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. I wonder if the placements of LSU (20) and Michigan (24) have something to do with McGrath’s split Tulane(NR)-Notre Dame(1) fandom. Other sources of BOLD: Tennesee and Georgia in the top ten; Penn State and VaTech 12 and 13; Louisville unranked. Let’s try to keep the writhing hatred somewhat better cloaked, kids!

So Frank, Mr. Numb Existence is listening. Convince me.

By the way, I’ve updated the Animated Race to the National Championship with the BlogPoll results, if you care to have a look.

Okay, here’s the final VFRT initial pre-season BlogPoll. No changes from the draft.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Ohio State	25
2	Notre Dame	24
3	Texas	23
4	Southern Cal	22
5	Auburn	21
6	West Virginia	20
7	Florida	19
8	Cal	18
9	Louisiana State	17
10	Florida State	16
11	Miami (Florida)	15
12	Louisville	14
13	Michigan	13
14	Georgia	12
15	Iowa	11
16	Virginia Tech	10
17	Clemson	9
18	Penn State	8
19	Nebraska	7
20	Tennessee	6
21	Oregon	5
22	Oklahoma	4
23	Boston College	3
24	Texas Tech	2
25	Arizona State	1

The Upside. In an offense full of question marks, Tennessee coaches have to feel the least uncomfortable with the running back position. After Gerald Riggs went down with a season-ending injury against Alabama last year, most of the carries went to freshman Arian Foster. Foster, who caught former offensive coordinator Randy Sanders’ eye while playing in a high school game despite the fact that Reggie Bush was playing for the opposing team, finished the season as the starter and averaged 148.4 yards per game. He had 223 yards against Vanderbilt, and despite only starting five games, he finished the season with 879 yards.

You might be thinking, well, okay, but the last five games in which Foster started were against South Carolina, Notre Dame, Memphis, Vanderbilt, and Kentucky. Not exactly powerhouse defenses. One need only go back and look at the Alabama game, however, to be convinced that he can do it against teams with a quality defense as well. Foster split time with Gerald Riggs almost the entire game against the Tide and carried the ball 14 times for 56 yards for an average of 3.8 yards.

Competing for the No. 2 running back spot are Montario Hardesty and LaMarcus Coker. Hardesty, a 6-0, 205-pound back from New Bern, North Carolina, appeared to be ahead of Foster early last fall. Coker, a highly-touted recruit is a shifty one with great speed. Also in the mix are Ja’Kouri Williams, David Yancey, and Ricardo Kemp.

Senior Cory Anderson (6-3, 255) is a lock for the starting fullback position and should see some more action as new offensive coordinator adds some wrinkles to the Volunteer offense.

Anderson had an impressive sophomore season, but struggled a bit last year. Anderson’s backup is 6-1, 250-pound David Holbert.

The Downside. The Volunteers almost lost as many running backs to injury last year as they lost games. Hardesty tore an ACL in the fourth game against Ole Miss and was still rehabbing in the spring. He had a less serious injury to his other knee during spring practice. One of his knees then buckled during one this fall’s scrimmages, and although he initially though it was fine, the latest word is that they’re evaluating some unanticipated swelling.

After Riggs’ season-ending injury in October, Williams underwent arthroscopic knee surgery in mid-November. In December, both Foster and Coker went under the knife. Foster had both knee and shoulder surgery in the off season, and Coker had surgery to repair torn ligaments in his shoulder.

Foster, Hardesty, Coker, and Williams all missed all or most of spring practice. Foster did not go home to San Diego this summer, instead electing to stay on campus and focus on rehabbing his two surgeries and getting himself into condition. He is apparently a leaner, quicker, stronger version of the back we saw last year.

Fumbles were a grave concern last year, as the Vols lost two games by a total of four points due to three fumbles inside the ten-yard line. It is still unclear whether this tendency has been fixed, as the first all-live scrimmage this fall featured two fumbles, one by Foster and one by Yancey.

Best-case scenario: Run, Forest Foster, run! Arian Foster averages 150 yards per game on his way to a 2,000+ yard season and fumbles only twice, both times on the right side of the field. He begins to get some Heisman attention mid-season. Coker and/or Hardesty contribute another few hundred yards each. Opposing linebackers wet their pants when they see Anderson coming at them full-speed. The team runs the ball with such efficiency that all pressure on Erik Ainge is relieved, and Ainge regains his confidence.

Worst-case scenario: All three primary backs tear a total of six ACLs in the first game against California, and the team turns to Ainge to bail them out.

Best guess: One of the running backs does not make it back into the mix, probably Hardesty. Foster shoulders the load and averages 120+ yards per game, with Coker adding another 30+ yards per game. When one is nursing injuries, the other is available. Should be the strength of the team this year, provided the offensive line comes around.

The Volunteers apparently followed up their less-than-impressive all-live scrimmage on Saturday with a decent practice yesterday. A couple of quick notes:

• Jacques McClendon “got better.”
• Fulmer says “it’s good to see LaMarcus Coker doing what he’s doing.”
• Safety Antonio Wardlow is pushing for more playing time.
• Ellix Wilson got a bit banged up, but should be fine.
• Running back Arian Foster, who fumbled during Saturday’s scrimmage, carried a football with him to church on Sunday.

I told you that would be quick.

The Florida Gators have lost projected starting guard Ronnie Wilson, at least for the first three games, including the game at Tennessee. Wilson fractured his left ankle at last Saturday’s practice. Not good news for the team with the toughest schedule in college football this year.

ESPN delivers a pretty cool feature: The X&O Men of college football. It’s a Flash presentation of ten “super-heroes” of the upcoming season. No Tennessee connection, but you should check it out anyway.

SI.com has a decent feature describing coach Fulmer’s vow to fix the Volunteers.

Despite The Season of Which We Do Not Speak, Tennessee finishes No. 13 on College Football News’ best programs over the past three years.

And the Valley Shook is a new SB Nation college blog with a really cool name. Discover the etymology.

Well, what can be said about the quarterbacks that hasn’t already been said? Very little, but I’m going to mix up the order of the words to make it look brand spanking new.

Erik Ainge drew favorable comparisons to Peyton Manning his freshman year, and for good reason. He completed 109 of 198 passes for 1,452 yards and 17 touchdowns in nine games before a shoulder injury against Notre Dame ended his season. The following year, he got off to a good start, but morphed into a mushroom cloud in the end zone at LSU. The question then became Is There Life After Death Valley for Erik Ainge? By the Notre Dame game, the early returns suggested, well, maybe not.

Enter Ahead-to-the-Past offensive coordinator David Cutcliffe, sensei to the likes of No. 1 NFL draft picks Peyton Manning and Eli Manning, No. 3 NFL draft pick Heath Shuler, and National Championship QB Tee Martin. Job One for Cut is the Reanimation of Erik Ainge Project.

The jury is still out after the first all-live scrimmage, during which Ainge went 13 of 26 for 120 yards, with two interceptions and no touchdowns. Worse than the raw numbers, Ainge displayed some of the same pocket panic that we saw last year, even throwing a sure interception (it was actually dropped by the defender) off his back foot from his own end zone. Cut was “surprised,” and said such a play was unacceptable.

He did not, however, water the blooming controversy. “We are not shaking up or changing anything at this stage based on one scrimmage,” said Cutcliffe. “I evaluate every one of them every day. I grade every practice. They are all held accountable to perform.”

Cutcliffe didn’t, however, completely rule out the possibility of a change. “We are going to keep competition at all positions, including quarterback,” said Cutcliffe. “[Ainge] has to play better than he played from a mistake standpoint. I am sure he is disappointed. He is doing many things well.”

The offensive coaching staff is doing its best to both develop 2nd string QB Jonathan Crompton, a Parade All-American, and ignore the fact that he is nipping at Ainge’s heels. Crompton finished Saturday’s scrimmage 7 of 13 for 97 yards, two touchdowns, and no interceptions. According to Cutcliffe, Crompton is “transferring what I’m telling him and verbalizing it in the huddle and not getting frozen.”

Junior Bo Hardegree is nipping at Ainge’s other heel, and waiting in the wings is true freshman Nick Stephens, who passed for 2,602 yards and 24 touchdowns as a high school senior at Flower Mound, Texas last year.

Best Case Scenario: Erik Ainge improves decision-making under duress and efficiently manages the offense, occasionally hitting big-time, long-distance pass plays, and racking up big early leads that enable Crompton to get healthy portions of game experience.

Worst Case Scenario: Ainge barely holds on to the starting position, hording all of the first string practice reps, through the first game against Cal where he throws an interception from his own end zone for a touchdown while in the arms of a defender and gets yanked for good. Crompton, thrown into the fire without the benefit of any real practice reps struggles and thereafter splits time equally under center with Bo Hardegree, Nick Stephens, Jim Bob Cooter, and defensive tackle Justin Harrell. Tennessee finishes 6-6 or worse, and the University decides to hire Bob Stoops, who brings Rhett Bomar with him.

Best Guess: Cutcliffe will in fact reanimate Ainge and cure him of his poor decision-making under duress by having Ainge take the snap, count to three, and heave the ball into the Tennessee River on thirty consecutive plays (or something like that) to substitute a new panic mechanism for the old one. Ainge will struggle early, fans will holler for Crompton, and Cutcliffe will wisely guide Ainge through the firestorm, molding him into an efficient QB whose game plan consists primarily of handing off to the tailback and throwing short passes.

GoVolsXtra is reporting that Tennessee will be self-reporting a minor NCAA violation involving wide receivers coach Trooper Taylor, who apparently “spoke to a group of alumni without following UT’s formal process of approval,” in violation of bylaw 11.3.2.2, which I’m guessing provides as follows:

No scholarship player, coach, or any spouse, child, parent, sibling, cousin, in-law, or neighbor thereof, shall, intentionally or inadvertently, solicit, accept, or suggest the solicitation or acceptance of, any compensation in the form of cash, donations, wages, tips, Chuck E. Cheese tokens, or custom colored crayons, in return for any act or omission directly or indirectly related to his or her relationship with any university, college, trade school, tech school, or day care. Notwithstanding anything herein to the contrary, NCAA officials and employees shall be entitled to whatever the market demands.

Okay, then.

By the way, freshman Blake Garretson has been dismissed for an unspecified violation of team rules.

Last week, I capped off two weeks’ worth of discretionary time re-examining the cadaver of the 2005 Tennessee Volunteer football season. Two full weeks of pessimism, criticism, and general negativity.

What was I thinking?

Well, I did it to show why I’m optimistic about the upcoming season. The full explanation is further down the page, but here’s a teaser:

Before I reveal what was going on in the dark recesses of my bothered mind, let’s recap:

• August, 2005: No. 3 Vols indulge in pre-season fantasies of playing in the Rose Bowl for the National Championship.
• September 3, 2005: Vols come down to earth in unimpressive 17-10 win over UAB.
• September 17, 2005: Special teams debacle costs No. 4 Vols a 16-7 loss to No. 6 archrival Florida.
• September 26, 2005: No. 11 Tennessee shocks No. 3 LSU with 30-27 come-from-way-behind Rally in the Valley giving Vol fans the sole highlight of a troubled season.
• October 1, 2005: No. 10 Vols produce efficient but boring 27-10 win over Ole Miss.
• October 8, 2005: No. 8 Vols lose 27-14 to No. 5 Georgia in a penalty-plagued field position nightmare.
• October 22, 2005: Two fumbles inside the ten and a muffed punt at midfield costs the No. 17 Vols a 6-3 loss to No. 5 Alabama.
• October 29, 2005: No. 23 Vols lose 16-15 to Steve Spurrier due primarily to a fumble within a blade of fescue at the goal line.
• November 5, 2005: Two ships pass in the night as the staggering Tennessee program is soundly defeated by a revitalized Notre Dame program hitting its stride.
• November 12, 2005: The unranked Volunteers need another game-saving effort by Rick Clausen in relief of Erik Ainge to beat unranked Memphis 20-16.
• November 19, 2005: The end of the world as we know it. Failure to convert on 4th down and inches within three yards of the goal line results in the Vols’ first loss to Vanderbilt (28-24) in 22 years, ensuring the first losing season in 17 years and the first year without a bowl game in 16 years.
• November 26, 2005: The unranked Volunteers defeat Kentucky 27-8, marking the End of an Error.

A complete and utter flame-out.

What happened? What exactly was the root cause of the disappointing 2005 season? Here’s the lineup of suspects:

Lack of or improper focus

• Lack of character and/or discipline. From a player using his cell phone during half time of a bowl game several years ago to the rash of arrests and court appearances leading up to the 2005 season, individual and team discipline has declined.
• Me first. Many UT fans wondered whether running back Jamal Lewis gave the team his all during his last season or whether he was saving himself for the NFL. Receiver Kelley Washington pretty much came right out and said as much by declaring himself “The Future” while still a Tennessee Volunteer.
• Penalties and errors. Blocked punts, muffed punts, botched fake punts, missed field goals, poor kick and punt coverage, interceptions in end zones, fumbles at critical times, and the list goes on and on.

Conventional wisdom coaching philosophies

• Tall, fast, and chiseled guys are necessarily good receivers.
• Rotating eight or nine receivers keeps them fresh, which must be a good thing.
• Save it for the games. Avoid getting players hurt at all costs by utilizing a plethora of green, no-contact jerseys and by practicing at less than game speed.
• Bigger is always better on the offensive line.
• Two QB System? No worries.
• Special teams, oh yeah, we ought to work on those, too.

Context

• Embracing the hype. The normally stoic Phillip Fulmer openly embraced the pre-season No. 3 ranking in 2005, wanting to ensure that when they did get through the SEC slate unscathed they would not be denied an opportunity to play for the national championship.
• The Spotlight Effect. UT, both individually and collectively, generally under perform when expectations are high and over perform when expectations are low.
• Strength of schedule. Nearly half of Tennessee’s 2005 opponents were ranked in the top five at the time they played them.
• The demise of home-field advantage.
• Season-ending injuries to key players.

The Cause: One of the Above

So which of the above factors caused the losing season?

If you said all of the above, you’d be mostly right, but I think there’s an even better answer:

One of the above.

In his book The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, Malcolm Gladwell attempts to explain “social epidemics,” or sudden changes from one state to another. In Gladwell’s own words:

The best way to understand the dramatic transformation of unknown books into bestsellers, or the rise of teenage smoking, or the phenomena of word of mouth or any number of the other mysterious changes that mark everyday life is to think of them as epidemics. Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread just like viruses do.

Think, for a moment, about an epidemic of measles in a kindergarten class. One child brings in the virus. It spreads to every other child in the class in a matter of days. And then, within a week or so, it completely dies out and none of the children will ever get measles again. That’s typical behavior for epidemics: they can blow up and then die out really quickly, and even the smallest change — like one child with a virus — can get them started. My argument is that it is also the way that change often happens in the rest of the world. Things can happen all at once, and little changes can make a huge difference.

Okay, so boiled down, the basic premise of the Tipping Point is this: (1) ideas can be as contagious as viruses; (2) like viruses, little things can grow in geometric progressions into big things; and (3) all these little things can lead to a tipping point at which one more little thing causes a great, noticeable change.

Application to the 2005 Season

The Tennessee Volunteer 2005 football season was the culmination of a lot of little things thrown into the cauldron until one more little thing tipped the whole blasted thing over, ending in catastrophe and scattering football helmets all over the end zone.

Sure, a player checking his cell phone for messages during half time of a bowl game is a bit troubling, but it’s just a little thing, right? Or was it a symptom of a social epidemic infecting the football team with the idea that there really wasn’t much of a consequence for a lack of focus? Did such an attitude spread exponentially and lead to a rash of arrests, a passel of players more concerned about the NFL than their current college team, and a host of penalties, fumbles, interceptions, and other errors on the field?

Could a catastrophic change come from a notion so mundane that you can’t even identify its origin? Exactly when did we start thinking that big, tall, fast guys necessarily made excellent receivers or that rotating eight or nine of them during a game in order to wear out the defenders was a good idea? Exactly when did we start thinking that two quarterbacks were better than one or that practicing at less than game speed and dressing key players in green, no-contact jerseys sufficiently prepared the team for actual games? Just when did having the heaviest offensive line in the SEC become the goal?

By 2005, those seemingly small ideas were epidemic within the Tennessee Volunteer football program. And it was not a good time to be sick. The plague-ridden 2005 Volunteers embraced their No. 3 ranking, mostly ignoring the daunting schedule, the recent demise of UT’s home-field advantage, and the team’s vulnerability to the Spotlight Effect. Season-ending injuries to players Jason Allen and Gerald Riggs didn’t help, either.

The 2005 team lost one game due to a special teams debacle. They lost another because of a penalty-plagued field position nightmare. They lost two more by a total of 4 points due to three fumbles inside the ten yard line. Another loss was by 4 points due in part to a failure to convert on 4th and inches within three yards of the goal line.

Little things can lead to catastrophic change.

Especially in a game of inches.

Application to the 2006 Season

So what was I thinking when I decided to poke and prod at the corpse of the 2005 season? I was thinking that if the red plastic Don’t-Spill-the-Beans cauldron can tip one way, it can also tip the other.

Coach Fulmer was ridiculed when he characterized the season as the Perfect Storm. Some media and fans interpreted this statement as an excuse, but I took it more as an explanation, and I never got the feeling that Fulmer was denying responsibility for the outcome.

No, I think Fulmer was reading the Tipping Point. Once 2005 had breathed its last, Fulmer and company were talking about the little things. If you’ve been keeping up with fall practice, reading the articles and listening to interviews, you’re hearing coaches and players talk about “the little things” all of the time. Here’s just a sampling of the little things they’re trying to reclaim:

• Character/Discipline. This off-season was quiet, relatively speaking anyway, when it came to off the field incidents. When two players got into trouble within days of each other for the first time this summer, Fulmer reportedly went ballistic. He dismissed the player who’d used up his second chances and suspended the other who’d gotten in trouble for the first time in five years with the program. Fulmer later kicked promising young freshman tight end Lee Smith off the team after Smith made the non-sports page twice in one week. He suspended another pending investigation of a stupid incident involving a toy gun on the highway. While it appears the team still has some ground to cover on this front, it does appear to have improved. The coaching staff, at least, is responding differently, and that’s a good sign.
• Good receivers make good receivers. After having rejuvenated an under-achieving stable of running backs, Trooper Taylor has been assigned to repeat the feat with the receiving corps this year. The receivers are catching 100 balls a day. Footballs, tennis balls, and even some bricks. Yes, bricks. They are not wearing green jerseys. The rotation this year will consist of five receivers instead of eight or nine so that they can better develop chemistry with the quarterback. They are digging batteries out of buckets full of rice to develop grip strength. Word is, it’s all beginning to pay off.
• Practice. The spring story line earlier this year was that the Vols were re-learning how to practice. Essentially, that meant that they were practicing with tempo at game speed. This theme continues in the fall. Players receive a tongue-lashing if they simply walk the last couple of steps to the next practice drill. Even the quarterbacks have gone live without green jerseys in at least one scrimmage so far this fall practice. The offense is dictating tempo, and special teams is getting the attention it deserves.
• Big is good, but speed is better on the offensive line. The offensive linemen have lost weight. Lots of it. Chris Scott is the poster boy for the Vols’ weight loss campaign, having lost 60 pounds since last season. All of them have lost at least fifteen pounds. The goal is to better prepare them to get out quickly and block on screens, and the reports are that they are indeed quicker this fall.
• Fear the Two QB System. Erik Ainge is the starting quarterback. He is getting all of the practice reps with the first team. Even with promising QB Jonathon Crompton pushing him, the coaches are downplaying any hint of a controversy.

The 2006 Volunteers, led by coach Fulmer and the rest of the coaching staff are in the process of focusing on and correcting a myriad of little things. Maybe, just maybe, they can re-infect the team and create an epidemic of positive ideas. If successful, perhaps they can reach another tipping point this season, this time in a positive direction.

Packing it up

And now that the corpse of 2005 has been exhumed, dissected, poked, prodded, and otherwise fully examined, we can now officially slide it into the morgue drawer and forget about it.

The 2005 season shall from this point forward be referred to only as The Season of Which We Do Not Speak.

There were no green jerseys in sight. Linemen were lighter. David Cutcliffe was on the sidelines and Randy Sanders was somewhere in Kentucky.

A myriad of little things were different, but the result was eerily similar to 2005.

QB Erik Ainge and the offense apparently looked sloppy. They called a time-out before the first play and another one five plays later. Ainge went 13 of 26 for 120 yards, and he threw two interceptions and no touchdowns.

“It’s not what you want to see and I’m sure he realizes that,” coach Cut said of Ainge. “Until we just quit talking about it and do it — they’re two completely different things. It’s a matter of just doing it and we’re going to take care of the football.”

Ainge was also sacked four times and would have thrown another interception when starting a possession at the team’s own 4-yard line if cornerback Jonathan Wade hadn’t dropped the ball. Cutcliffe was “surprised.”

Okay, so what about the rest of the offense? There were several dropped passes, bobbled snaps, and fumbles on consecutive plays by running backs Arian Foster and David Yancey.

Backup QB Jonathan Crompton completed 7 of 13 passes for 97 yards and two touchdowns, including a 27-yarder to Lucas Taylor and an 11-yarder to runnning back LaMarcus Coker to finish off a six-play, 61-yard drive in a two-minute drill. According to GoVolsXtra.com’s Mike Griffith, Crompton is pushing harder for the starting position than coaches are wanting to admit. When asked by a reporter about the possibility of a QB controversy, Cutcliffe said, “Sure, if I were you guys, I would raise the issue, too. We’ll keep competition at all positions, including quarterback. [Ainge has] got to play better than he plays from a mistake standpoint, and I’m sure he’s disappointed. But he’s doing many things well. We’re not shaking up or changing anything based on one scrimmage.”

Third-string Bo Hardegree went seven of eight for 92 yards, two touchdowns, and one interception, mostly against reserves.

On a more positive note, James Wilhoit scored on a fake field goal, and Demetrice Morley blocked two field goal tries, but that was partly due to poor blocking. In an interview with Dave Hooker, Morley said that he once blocked four field goal attempts in one game.

John Pennington has a great article on how Volunteer fans’ expectations had been rising over the past couple of weeks as news has leaked out from practice that things were going well. I’d felt it, too. But yesterday’s scrimmage must be reigning in those feelings of optimism.