Tennessee football: 10 Vols who should redshirt in 2019

It’s no secret that Tennessee football is loaded at wide receiver for this year. However, they are very limited with their future at the position. So the one guy who should take a redshirt this year for everybody is a three-star receiver who isn’t an early enrollee.

Jerrod Means is highly unlikely to see action this year. In fact, it’s almost a certainty that he won’t. The 6’2″ 200-pound receiver isn’t even the best receiver in his class, and the guy ahead of him, four-star Ramel Keyton was an early enrollee.

As a result, Means should take a redshirt to work on learning Jim Chaney’s system this fall and be ready to go next year. The competition to start will be wide open by 2020, and it’ll actually be even crazier in 2021. But for the next two years, Means is going to be buried in the depth chart. So he should not waste a year barely playing.

Of course, the Vols can play guys like Means four games now before taking a redshirt, but the key is that he needs to have this year count as a redshirt by the end of the year. Jeremy Pruitt needs this more than Means because he needs some receivers in the pipeline for the long-term future. This is why both parties should support the redshirt.