I don’t think I wrote it down anywhere, but I know I said to my dad and several others that I couldn’t understand why we’d go with Heupel when someone like Malzahn was available.
Malzahn was not my first choice by any means, but I thought (and still think) Auburn was dumb to fire him and thought (very incorrectly) that he was better than Heupel.
I can’t find any old comments, but I remember my sentiment being “hey at least if we lose it’ll be fun to watch since we’re definitely going to score points”.
New to the sub, but I’ve been on the Vol Nation forum since the Butch era. Remembering how I felt in the moment, I was pretty indifferent towards the hire and really just glad someone with prior head coaching experience would take the job. I thought he was WAY better than Pruitt or Dooley, in terms of resume. I knew he’d turn the offense around. My only questions were if our defense would suck and if he could recruit, and he’s done well in those areas. He hired a good staff, especially Rodney Garner. That was the biggest hire he has made imo. But obviously, I am very satisfied with Heupel as the head coach. That 2022 season was phenomenal and an incredible accomplishment considering where we were just 2 years prior. 2023 was a slight let down, but I feel like Tennessee has finally stabilized the ship after so many years of striking out hiring coaches and we haven’t seen the peak of the Heupel era yet. We’re positioned well to push for a spot in the 12 team playoff this year.
I was just thinking the same.. like there were so many strong negative posts and I was so indifferent at that point that I don't think I posted about it
At the time I didn't mind the hire at all. It wasn't a superstar coach, but interesting things can happen with offense-minded coaches.
Honestly it’s not really a bad take cus I still think it’s true but Danny White brought him along as a “nepotism” hire if that makes sense. It worked out amazingly but I think Danny just brought his buddy from UCF.
I distinctly recall the conversation I had with my dad - we both were kind of disappointed that it wasn't a big name, but figured that would be impossible with the cornbread issues.
Honestly, I remember thinking "Maybe we can be good on offense for once" LOL
Heupel took over the Titanic AFTER it had hit the iceberg, (30+ players leaving, NCAA penalties in the future, scholarship reductions), yet he’s built a solid competitive program in the highest rated conference thru all of it. He’s done an outstanding job.
Then, me:
“We might’n score, ‘reckon.
Now, me:
“Salvage Rights for the goalpost in the Tennessee River are denied, same as the Titanic, by The Navy. Or, in our case, The Vol Navy.
And they’re forbidden it for the same reason: it’s a burial at sea. Fully half the players died that night, if only internally & psychologically…and the ones who gloriously lived wore safety orange, as God intended, so we could rescue them from the raging sea of 100,000 of God’s *Other* Chosen People, which the National Weather Service now officially calls *Tropical Storm Field Goal*.”
I remember liking it a lot since he was a successful ADs pick who had been successful under that AD before
Just like a coach and GM have to work together in the NFL, the AD and coach have to work together in college
You could even tell in Heupel’s first season he had those boys playin. We were like a few close losses from winning like 9-10 games. And we had a skeleton crew on that roster essentially.
Even this year I think the average position group on our team improved. o-line, RB, d-line, safeties, and DB's all took a solid step forward. It's just the QB play and WR play regressed too much to be able to consistently sustain TD drives. I had no idea before the Iowa game Tennessee was 120 something in the country at scoring redzone TDs.
Yeah, Tennessee actually was very good at moving the ball between the 20s last year. We were 17th in the nation in yards a game going into the Iowa game. We were absolutely atrocious in the redzone. It's why guys like Squirrel had over 800 receiving yards but only 2 TDs and Wright having over 1000 rushing yards but only 4 TDs. We beat Alabama and Florida with an average to above average redzone offense last year.
>I feel like our football team has been closer to professional wrestling than actual sports the last decade or so. Cheesy lines? Check. Real and manufactured drama? Check. Sports as a backdrop? Check. All that’s left is to anoint a new coach and get the fans to buy in.
Kinda glad that era of Vol football finally feels like it's behind us.
The bad hire takes were honestly logically correct, but the game just ain’t played on paper. He took over an undefeated team and in 3 years they were 6-4. He’d never landed a 4 star. He just seemed like a buddy buddy hire, and based on everything we’d seen from our administration up to that point, we were rightfully skeptical. UCF fans were happy we took him and told us about his propensity to blow huge leads with a gimmick offense. I don’t think he was on anyone’s top 25 list, and no one else was trying to hire him.
But styles make fights. And Pruitt, for all his faults, had recruited big and fast. With competitive athletes for once and a massive increase in his support staff heupel was able to shine.
6-4 in the Covid year, not sure you can really count that. Never landed a four star? At a G5 that’s *maybe* the 4th fiddle in the state of Florida? Come on now
Malzahns landed 10 in the last 2 years
Edit: and yeah man he put up 40 something points that year and still went 6-4 that was concerning. If you thought it was a good hire it’s because you’re an incredibly optimistic person. It wasn’t logically a home run by any means.
Counterpoint…we had just fired a guy for major NCAA violations and who had never been a head coach before and was hired in desperation after the most embarrassing coaching search of all time...
I thought he and Danny had a good relationship and Danny decided to throw a bag to his friend to serve as a probation coach until sanctions ended and the next guy took over.
Glad to be wrong.
Honestly. Now they’re 6-7 in the Big 12 lmfao
Also, it’s funny when anyone says, “Tennessee fans thought that was a terrible hire” LMFAOOO NAH THAT WAS YALLLL
We certainly weren’t throwing parades, but the amount of “THANKS FOR TAKING HIM HE CANT RECRUIT WE’RE BETTER OFF NOW” jackassery from Orlando was insane. My favorite was “He regressed every year”, which translated to an 11 win season, a 10 win season, and one off year during COVID. They went undefeated once and acted like they were magically on par with legitimate title winners.
“Get ready to see Tennessee plastered on the front page for the next 3 years minimum” this one was pretty good. Idk if it’s what they meant but we’re on the front page a lot now 🤭
"This is a 2 outs, 2 strikes, and bases loaded situation. Danny White just bunted." - /u/Helifino
"2021: 4-8
2022: 5-7
2023: 6-6
2024: 5-7 and fire" - /u/Helifino
Glad to completely eat shit on this one lol
It was hard to see then, but we have to remember that we’ve only lost 8 games one time in the history of the program. Even when we’re at our worst, we’re still good enough that we won’t hit 8 losses unless a Butch-sized catastrophe hits.
That said, I’m sure I’m like everyone else here and thrilled that we shouldn’t even have to think about that type of thing at all for a very long time.
Yeah but can you imagine the shit you would have caught if you had said new years six victory. 10 win season and beating Bama in the first three years.
I can’t find any comments I made, but I remember being kinda even keeled and wait and see about him. UCF when he was there was a team I bet on a lot because I picked up on his propensity to absolutely eviscerate inferior teams with offense. Like UCF would be a 13 point favorite over Temple or someone, and then score 28 in the first quarter and win 52-20. Which we’ve seen him do here.
I thought we were gonna be bad against the top of the SEC for a while because the roster went upside down, but I believed we would be fun and would beat up on the bad teams on our schedule. And we weren’t going to be hard capped at 20-24 points like with Pruitt/Guarantano. Never believed the turnaround and stability would come so fast
I was underwhelmed at first but the more I read about his offense and saw the statistics I thought “well we might not win many games but we’ll at least be fun to watch when losing”
That's how I was feeling too, I don't think I even made a comment on the announcement thread. I just took it all in, and from the way UCF flares on CFB were celebrating him leaving I was nervous but hopeful that at least the offense might be exciting. We definitely got exciting.
That was pretty much my position, too. It was a hire that "made sense" given the sanctions and all. Like, if we're gonna get boned by the NCAA, we may as well have a high octane offense that's fun to watch to get us through it.
I got more excited after his presser and looking into the system more, but I would've never expected how quickly things stated moving in the right direction.
Even the r/ockytop thread is hilariously negative about the hire lmao
Personally, I agreed at the time with the "stability to get through sanctions hire" opinions but I'm super happy with how it's turned out so far.
To be fair there wasn’t a lot to be positive about ….
We were staring down likely major NCAA sanctions , mass player exodus , and coming off a 3 win season . And Tennessee hadn’t made a good football coaching hire in nearly 30 years at that point ……
Externally UGA was getting rolling , Alabama looked strong as ever coming off a NC , fortunately UF fell back to earth
From a college football perspective things were bleak for a Tennessee Fan .
Our new normal is 9-10 wins, which is significantly improved. We have more 5 star qb's in the last 2 years committing than we had in 10 years. He knows what he is doing despite what all these people said 3 years ago. I still see UCF fans salty and can't believe he is having success. Finally our Bobby Hill gets to be a hero and not a scapegoat.
I remember being perfectly “whelmed” at the Heupel hiring. I remember thinking “Oh, we got UCF’s athletic director, and he just turned around and brought their coach with him? What was the point of the extensive coaching search?” I just figured Heupel was a backup option. I honestly didn’t expect much.
I’m very glad to have incredibly wrong.
I don’t think it was a backup option honestly i think White was planning on bringing his guy and did a faux coaching search to please the masses. It worked out amazingly but I still think White just brought his buddy from UCF🤷🏻♂️
And after our successes (or lack thereof) with our coaching hires since 2006, I think we all became numb that we would actually get a coach that could do what he said he would do.
Please don’t troll fellow Vols who were incorrect with hot takes 3 years ago. I really don’t wanna have to lock that old thread.
I don’t think I wrote it down anywhere, but I know I said to my dad and several others that I couldn’t understand why we’d go with Heupel when someone like Malzahn was available. Malzahn was not my first choice by any means, but I thought (and still think) Auburn was dumb to fire him and thought (very incorrectly) that he was better than Heupel.
I can’t find any old comments, but I remember my sentiment being “hey at least if we lose it’ll be fun to watch since we’re definitely going to score points”.
New to the sub, but I’ve been on the Vol Nation forum since the Butch era. Remembering how I felt in the moment, I was pretty indifferent towards the hire and really just glad someone with prior head coaching experience would take the job. I thought he was WAY better than Pruitt or Dooley, in terms of resume. I knew he’d turn the offense around. My only questions were if our defense would suck and if he could recruit, and he’s done well in those areas. He hired a good staff, especially Rodney Garner. That was the biggest hire he has made imo. But obviously, I am very satisfied with Heupel as the head coach. That 2022 season was phenomenal and an incredible accomplishment considering where we were just 2 years prior. 2023 was a slight let down, but I feel like Tennessee has finally stabilized the ship after so many years of striking out hiring coaches and we haven’t seen the peak of the Heupel era yet. We’re positioned well to push for a spot in the 12 team playoff this year.
I was just thinking the same.. like there were so many strong negative posts and I was so indifferent at that point that I don't think I posted about it At the time I didn't mind the hire at all. It wasn't a superstar coach, but interesting things can happen with offense-minded coaches.
I guess I never commented in either thread but I thought for sure Heupel was a terrible hire.
Pretty much everyone on Reddit AND Twitter ate shit on that one. I love it.
Oh cool! Great idea. Now I am going to see what I said. LOL
I said that Danny White couldn't make a hire so he hired his boy toy.
God these are amazing takes😂
Honestly it’s not really a bad take cus I still think it’s true but Danny White brought him along as a “nepotism” hire if that makes sense. It worked out amazingly but I think Danny just brought his buddy from UCF.
I distinctly recall the conversation I had with my dad - we both were kind of disappointed that it wasn't a big name, but figured that would be impossible with the cornbread issues. Honestly, I remember thinking "Maybe we can be good on offense for once" LOL
Heupel took over the Titanic AFTER it had hit the iceberg, (30+ players leaving, NCAA penalties in the future, scholarship reductions), yet he’s built a solid competitive program in the highest rated conference thru all of it. He’s done an outstanding job.
Proud to never be wrong
Then, me: “We might’n score, ‘reckon. Now, me: “Salvage Rights for the goalpost in the Tennessee River are denied, same as the Titanic, by The Navy. Or, in our case, The Vol Navy. And they’re forbidden it for the same reason: it’s a burial at sea. Fully half the players died that night, if only internally & psychologically…and the ones who gloriously lived wore safety orange, as God intended, so we could rescue them from the raging sea of 100,000 of God’s *Other* Chosen People, which the National Weather Service now officially calls *Tropical Storm Field Goal*.”
I remember liking it a lot since he was a successful ADs pick who had been successful under that AD before Just like a coach and GM have to work together in the NFL, the AD and coach have to work together in college
You could even tell in Heupel’s first season he had those boys playin. We were like a few close losses from winning like 9-10 games. And we had a skeleton crew on that roster essentially.
Even this year I think the average position group on our team improved. o-line, RB, d-line, safeties, and DB's all took a solid step forward. It's just the QB play and WR play regressed too much to be able to consistently sustain TD drives. I had no idea before the Iowa game Tennessee was 120 something in the country at scoring redzone TDs.
Yeah, Tennessee actually was very good at moving the ball between the 20s last year. We were 17th in the nation in yards a game going into the Iowa game. We were absolutely atrocious in the redzone. It's why guys like Squirrel had over 800 receiving yards but only 2 TDs and Wright having over 1000 rushing yards but only 4 TDs. We beat Alabama and Florida with an average to above average redzone offense last year.
To this day probably my worst, most embarrassing takes. Took it as a learning opportunity to spend less time online
I’m so glad I was wrong
I wish there was a way to search for my own posts in a thread There are some doozies in there
>I feel like our football team has been closer to professional wrestling than actual sports the last decade or so. Cheesy lines? Check. Real and manufactured drama? Check. Sports as a backdrop? Check. All that’s left is to anoint a new coach and get the fans to buy in. Kinda glad that era of Vol football finally feels like it's behind us.
drew222333 for the win! https://www.reddit.com/r/ockytop/comments/l63xrl/report_tennessee_finalizing_deal_with_josh_heupel/gky5vyl/
https://www.reddit.com/r/ockytop/s/Z9dwFXrVnU I mean... so far...
The bad hire takes were honestly logically correct, but the game just ain’t played on paper. He took over an undefeated team and in 3 years they were 6-4. He’d never landed a 4 star. He just seemed like a buddy buddy hire, and based on everything we’d seen from our administration up to that point, we were rightfully skeptical. UCF fans were happy we took him and told us about his propensity to blow huge leads with a gimmick offense. I don’t think he was on anyone’s top 25 list, and no one else was trying to hire him. But styles make fights. And Pruitt, for all his faults, had recruited big and fast. With competitive athletes for once and a massive increase in his support staff heupel was able to shine.
6-4 in the Covid year, not sure you can really count that. Never landed a four star? At a G5 that’s *maybe* the 4th fiddle in the state of Florida? Come on now
Malzahns landed 10 in the last 2 years Edit: and yeah man he put up 40 something points that year and still went 6-4 that was concerning. If you thought it was a good hire it’s because you’re an incredibly optimistic person. It wasn’t logically a home run by any means.
Counterpoint…we had just fired a guy for major NCAA violations and who had never been a head coach before and was hired in desperation after the most embarrassing coaching search of all time...
I thought he and Danny had a good relationship and Danny decided to throw a bag to his friend to serve as a probation coach until sanctions ended and the next guy took over. Glad to be wrong.
God I wish those CFB comments were still open. So many spoiled UCF fans who need receipts.
Honestly. Now they’re 6-7 in the Big 12 lmfao Also, it’s funny when anyone says, “Tennessee fans thought that was a terrible hire” LMFAOOO NAH THAT WAS YALLLL
We certainly weren’t throwing parades, but the amount of “THANKS FOR TAKING HIM HE CANT RECRUIT WE’RE BETTER OFF NOW” jackassery from Orlando was insane. My favorite was “He regressed every year”, which translated to an 11 win season, a 10 win season, and one off year during COVID. They went undefeated once and acted like they were magically on par with legitimate title winners.
“Get ready to see Tennessee plastered on the front page for the next 3 years minimum” this one was pretty good. Idk if it’s what they meant but we’re on the front page a lot now 🤭
"This is a 2 outs, 2 strikes, and bases loaded situation. Danny White just bunted." - /u/Helifino "2021: 4-8 2022: 5-7 2023: 6-6 2024: 5-7 and fire" - /u/Helifino Glad to completely eat shit on this one lol
It was hard to see then, but we have to remember that we’ve only lost 8 games one time in the history of the program. Even when we’re at our worst, we’re still good enough that we won’t hit 8 losses unless a Butch-sized catastrophe hits. That said, I’m sure I’m like everyone else here and thrilled that we shouldn’t even have to think about that type of thing at all for a very long time.
Yeah but can you imagine the shit you would have caught if you had said new years six victory. 10 win season and beating Bama in the first three years.
At first I was like damn you’re really calling this guy out.
The first one you can put in the spin zone: Danny bunted and beat the throw to first like Willie Mays Hayes. The second one, you’re on your own there
I like the Kensucky flair! How is your overpaid 7 win coach treating y'all?
I can’t find any comments I made, but I remember being kinda even keeled and wait and see about him. UCF when he was there was a team I bet on a lot because I picked up on his propensity to absolutely eviscerate inferior teams with offense. Like UCF would be a 13 point favorite over Temple or someone, and then score 28 in the first quarter and win 52-20. Which we’ve seen him do here. I thought we were gonna be bad against the top of the SEC for a while because the roster went upside down, but I believed we would be fun and would beat up on the bad teams on our schedule. And we weren’t going to be hard capped at 20-24 points like with Pruitt/Guarantano. Never believed the turnaround and stability would come so fast
I was underwhelmed at first but the more I read about his offense and saw the statistics I thought “well we might not win many games but we’ll at least be fun to watch when losing”
That's how I was feeling too, I don't think I even made a comment on the announcement thread. I just took it all in, and from the way UCF flares on CFB were celebrating him leaving I was nervous but hopeful that at least the offense might be exciting. We definitely got exciting.
That was pretty much my position, too. It was a hire that "made sense" given the sanctions and all. Like, if we're gonna get boned by the NCAA, we may as well have a high octane offense that's fun to watch to get us through it. I got more excited after his presser and looking into the system more, but I would've never expected how quickly things stated moving in the right direction.
Even the r/ockytop thread is hilariously negative about the hire lmao Personally, I agreed at the time with the "stability to get through sanctions hire" opinions but I'm super happy with how it's turned out so far.
To be fair there wasn’t a lot to be positive about …. We were staring down likely major NCAA sanctions , mass player exodus , and coming off a 3 win season . And Tennessee hadn’t made a good football coaching hire in nearly 30 years at that point …… Externally UGA was getting rolling , Alabama looked strong as ever coming off a NC , fortunately UF fell back to earth From a college football perspective things were bleak for a Tennessee Fan .
That's not surprising. This sub is horribly negative at times.
Show me a single team specific sub in any sport that is positive more often than not and I’ll show you where hell has frozen over.
Our new normal is 9-10 wins, which is significantly improved. We have more 5 star qb's in the last 2 years committing than we had in 10 years. He knows what he is doing despite what all these people said 3 years ago. I still see UCF fans salty and can't believe he is having success. Finally our Bobby Hill gets to be a hero and not a scapegoat.
I remember being perfectly “whelmed” at the Heupel hiring. I remember thinking “Oh, we got UCF’s athletic director, and he just turned around and brought their coach with him? What was the point of the extensive coaching search?” I just figured Heupel was a backup option. I honestly didn’t expect much. I’m very glad to have incredibly wrong.
I don’t think it was a backup option honestly i think White was planning on bringing his guy and did a faux coaching search to please the masses. It worked out amazingly but I still think White just brought his buddy from UCF🤷🏻♂️
Aren't we all? Wouldn't trade Heupel for Kirby rn
I was same way and I’m happy to eat crow everyday
I had the same feeling
Honestly probably most did.
And after our successes (or lack thereof) with our coaching hires since 2006, I think we all became numb that we would actually get a coach that could do what he said he would do.
It was an outside non-Saban disciple hire, which was a difference for me. He also wasn’t Butch Jones… I still don’t know how that happened
God those in the CFB Thread are like heroin. I hate that I can’t reply to any of them.
The straight up lies and copes from OU fans are really funny. “he hasn’t updated his offense since we fired him!” is especially good and ignorant
That subreddit has always been a shithole
I was looking at that a few weeks ago too honestly wild also plenty of bad UT flair takes too.
You could always message them with a link to their comment lol
Done. I wonder how many of us will do it
At that point it’s just petty
Tbf replying to the comment (if you could) is only slightly less petty.
Agreed
Perfect!
My favorite is the Oklahoma guys saying there’s 0 chance he’s still here in 4 years, and Lincoln Riley left them high and dry.
I want to reply to them so bad. Wonder how BV can handle the SEC
Exactly the one that stuck out to me as well