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Tennessee football: 10 most underappreciated Vols in school history

By Caleb Calhoun

6 Dec 1997: Peerless Price #37 of Tennessee runs into the endzone for a touchdown during the Volunteers 30-29 win over Auburn in the SEC Championship at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, Georgia.
6 Dec 1997: Peerless Price #37 of Tennessee runs into the endzone for a touchdown during the Volunteers 30-29 win over Auburn in the SEC Championship at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, Georgia. /
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Photo by Elsa/Getty Images
Photo by Elsa/Getty Images /

Another key member from the 1998 national championship team who doesn’t get a lot of respect, we simply couldn’t ignore Billy Ratliff. Everybody remembers the key play he made for Tennessee football that year. Ratliff recovered the Clint Stoerner fumble against the Arkansas Razorbacks to set up the Vols’ game-winning drive.

However, there’s a lot more to Ratliff’s career that nobody talks about. Ratliff was the anchor with future NFL start Darwin Walker at defensive tackle that year. That defense was elite all the way around because of the push those guys were able to get.

In that game against Arkansas, Ratliff’s recovery is attributed to luck. But it was actually all because of a great play he made. He got an insane push on All-American guard Brandon Burlsworth, pushing Burlsworth back into Stoerner. That’s what caused Stoerner to stumble and fumble.

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So the fumble all started because of Ratliff making a great push and then the heads up play to recover the ball. If that were all he had to his resume, though, he wouldn’t be on this list. What puts him on here is how good he was all season.

If you don’t think Ratliff was elite, consider the fact that John Henderson had to sit behind him in  1999 before he got injured. And that’s the key here. Ratliff got injured and then kind of fell off among Tennessee football fans.

He remained known for the recovery. But Henderson’s explosion onto the scene made fans forget about his reliability as a starter. That’s why he’s underappreciated to this day in Knoxville. And he shouldn’t be at all.

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