Vols Need To Find Their Swagger

If there is one word I’d love to eliminate from the English lexicon, it would be “swagger”.

(Actually there are a lot more, but for the purposes of this story we’re going with swagger)

But “swagger” is exactly what Tennessee lacks right now. And if you’re a long-time fan of the Vols, you know it wasn’t always this way.

Now don’t get me wrong. Butch Jones is a fiery guy and he gets his team pumped up and ready to play. There are also plenty of players on the roster that embody that same fieriness.

However, the Vols don’t seem to have any attitude on the field. The Fulmer teams had that attitude. Kiffin’s team in 2009 certainly had that attitude. Even Dooley’s team had that attitude (even if was misplaced and misused at times — looking at you Tyler Bray throat slash in 2010).

Butch Jones is determined to never ever say anything wrong in the media and that spills over to his team. Not that I think he, or his team, should be out there saying “wrong things”, but it’s almost like he has his team scared to say or do anything that would be deemed even remotely “inappropriate”.

Take the Oklahoma game week for example. Bob Stoops engaged in some game-week banter, specifically talking about not being concerned about the crowd at Neyland (which ended up being one of the best crowds we’ve seen in a while). Jones should’ve taken that opportunity to take a jab back at Stoops.

But instead, Jones simply complimented the Sooners (which isn’t a bad thing, but there’s a time and place) and moved on to another cliche.

Predictably, when Oklahoma linebacker Eric Striker took a shot at UT running backs Jalen Hurd and Alvin Kamara (who he apparently “didn’t know” prior to the game), there was basically a non-response from Hurd and anyone else. The questions were dodged. In fact, when Hurd was asked directly about Striker and if he had any response he just said “nah”.

Please understand — Jalen Hurd is a bad, bad man. The dude is one of the most bruising running backs I’ve ever seen. He has that old school attitude. But he, like the rest of the team, has been overly conditioned to always say and do the right thing.

Look, I get that Jones wants to run a clean and classy program. And that’s very important. But let the kids have some fun. Do away with the “score standard”. Sometimes you need a taunting penalty to get your team fired up. Mark Richt did it against Florida in 2007.

Yes you need to educate your players on how to be men. Yes you need to make sure they know how to talk to the media. But let them trade barbs, to an extent, with opposing players if the opportunity arrises.

And if you’re Butch Jones, don’t be afraid to go at it a bit in the media with Bob Stoops or whoever it may be. When Stoops says it’s no big deal to play at Neyland because they’ve played at Notre Dame and Florida State, don’t be afraid to respond with “Well, Bob’s never played in front of 102,455 fans, so I guess he doesn’t know how loud this place can get”. Then back up the talk by going out there and winning the damn game (not by protecting an early lead).

It’s time for the swagger to come back to Tennessee. It’s time for teams to be scared of the Vols again.

It all starts at the top and what a better week to bring it back then against Bret Bielema and Arkansas.

Perhaps Jones can tell ol Bret how the Vols are going to sing Rocky Top all night long next Saturday night.

It would certainly go a long way in winning the fans back.