Tennessee football: Notes from Vols coaches fall camp media session

1. Personnel updates

Jeremy Pruitt provided numerous updates on Tennessee football players who’s status is in limbo at this moment. Here are a few of them.

• Georgia Bulldogs transfer safety Deangelo Gibbs is going to take a redshirt, rendering the NCAA’s decision on his eligibility status irrelevant.
• Michigan Wolverines transfer defensive lineman Aubrey Solomon’s eligibility status is still up in the air.
• Trey Smith wants to play football, and a team of doctors are figuring out a way to make that happen, but nothing has changed yet in terms of the blood clots keeping him out.
• Baylen Buchanan was out in the spring and is going to be limited to start fall camp.

So Gibbs is redshirting, Buchanan is limited but will be back, and we have no idea about what will happen with Smith and Solomon. That’s pretty much the state of Tennessee football right now. However, Pruitt did note how healthy the team is otherwise.

For instance, Jauan Jennings is available and good to go. And he was willing to give the players time off before fall camp because of how well summer conditioning went.

"“When we get it, we’ll get it running. But they’ll probably be a few guys that might be limited to this drill or that drill but nobody we’re really holding out.”"

In the process, Pruitt touted strength coach Craig Fitzgerald and the offseason work he did.

"“He’s a guy I lean on for a lot of things, and we’re excited that he is here, and he’ll do a nice job with them during the fall also.”"

Simply put, Tennessee football is extremely healthy compared to years past with a few exceptions, and Rocky Top has to be very excited about that. Years of poor conditioning under Butch Jones was a major problem.