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Everything about Tennessee Vols is much quieter at 2017 SEC Media Days than it was in 2016

By Caleb Calhoun

KNOXVILLE, TN - OCTOBER 10: Head Coach Butch Jones of the Tennessee Volunteers celebrates after the game against the Georgia Bulldogs on October 10, 2015 at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by Scott Cunningham/Getty Images)
KNOXVILLE, TN - OCTOBER 10: Head Coach Butch Jones of the Tennessee Volunteers celebrates after the game against the Georgia Bulldogs on October 10, 2015 at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by Scott Cunningham/Getty Images) /
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Tennessee football is set to take the stand on Monday at SEC Media Days for 2017. Everything about the Volunteers seems much quieter than 2016.

Remember SEC Media Days in 2016? The Tennessee Vols entered the event with a ton of hype surrounding the program.

Butch Jones was entering his fourth year, had almost everybody back from a 9-4 team the year before, and looked to have a team that should easily win the SEC East and compete for the SEC Championship.

Well, we all know how last season unfolded.

Now, with key players gone from the 2016 team, the Vols enter SEC Media Days in 2017 with much less hype. And things are a lot quieter.

They take the stand the first day, after the Arkansas Razorbacks and LSU Tigers, with very little build-up.

There is no talk about winning the SEC East this year. Nobody is thinking about Tennessee football as a Top 10 team. The only subjects surrounding the Vols at this year’s SEC Media Days are Butch Jones’s job status, all the staff shake-ups and the quarterback situation.

Heck, even the players representing the school generate very little hype.

They are senior defensive tackle Kendal Vickers, offensive lineman Jashon Robertson and cornerback Emmanuel Moseley.

All three guys are solid contributors who were three-star commitments to the program years ago. But they aren’t superstars.

Compare that to last year when Joshua Dobbs, Cameron Sutton, Jalen Reeves-Maybin and Alvin Kamara attended. Dobbs was the quarterback, Sutton was an All-American, Reeves-Maybin was the leader, and Kamara was a superstar playmaker.

All four guys went in the first four rounds of the 2017 NFL Draft.

Meanwhile, Vickers, Moseley and Robertson have achieved zero national recognition outside of Robertson’s freshman All-SEC recognition in 2014.

In fact, this team has almost a no-stars mentality. That could be good news because they could be flying more under the radar. But it could also be bad news because it simply means they have no elite standout players yet.

Either way, it’s clearly representative of how Tennessee football enters SEC Media Days this year.

Now the interesting part of this is that nobody really expects the Vols to fall off too hard. Many preseason outlets have them ranked in the Top 25.

That suggests a season very similar to last year. And it also shows that, regardless of whether or not they’re building a championship program, Butch Jones has at least rebuild the Vols to be contenders.

And at the same time, it speaks to the restoration of the program when the Vols can enter SEC Media Days as a likely Top 25 team but with very little hype. That means they are back to a level where being ranked is nothing to celebrate.

However, last year’s results were not the expectation heading into SEC Media Days. It was all about championship talk.

This year, the Vols enter the event with none of that. The only headline they are likely to generate is one where Jones makes another ridiculous quote.

But that could be just how the program wants it.

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