Tennessee football: Five positives from Vols hiring DL coach Jimmy Brumbaugh

4. Understanding of conditioning

This is a rare combination. Tennessee football already has a strength and conditioning coach, but the Vols now have a second person with experience in that field who will actually be coaching on the field. Given the fact that most of their injuries last year were solely on defense, they could use a guy like Jimmy Brumbaugh as a result.

When he was at East Mississippi Community College, or Last Chance U, Brumbaugh doubled as a defensive line coach and a strength and conditioning coach. Before that, back in 2006 and 2007, he served as the assistant strength and conditioning coach for the LSU Tigers under Les Miles. So he has done it in multiple places.

Now, to be fair, he was with the Maryland Terrapins when a failure on the conditioning staff led to the tragic death of Jordan McNair. That’s a major drawback to this argument. But he’s not actually the strength and conditioning coordinator. The fact of the matter is he has a major advantage just having some background in that while coaching the defensive line at the same time.

Defensive line is easily the most tiring position in football. As a result, it’s the one position where conditioning most comes into play. UT’s most catastrophic injury last year was Emmit Gooden Jr.’s season-ending injury in fall camp. Brumbaugh, as a result, brings a unique level of experience to the job, and that’s a major plus for him. It could really help the defense as a whole going forward.