Tennessee football: Decommit of JuCo DB brings back huge concern

Just over a week ago, signs began to point to Tennessee football managing to bring depth back to its secondary. The late commitment of junior college defensive back Roterius Torrence for 2021 on May 24 played a huge role in that.

However, eight days later, Torrence is gone again. The 6’3″ 195-pound transfer out of Hutchinson Community College in Kansas who is initially from Bessemer, Ala. would have been Rocky Top’s fifth JuCo commitment and 14th new transfer overall this offseason.

After his commitment to Tennessee football, Torrence was given a three-star rating on 247Sports, showing that he certainly had potential to make an early impact. He announced his decision to decommit from UT on Twitter.

With Torrence gone, the Vols and Josh Heupel once again have issues to address in the secondary, issues that Torrence was supposed to address. His size would have made him uniquely positioned to play cornerback in the SEC, the position he was listed at, as he could lock down big receivers.

Obviously, defensive back has been an area of huge concern for the Vols anyway. They struggled severely last year and lost their best player, cornerback Bryce Thompson, to the NFL as an early departure. Key Lawrence, a rising star at the position, also hurt things by transferring to the Oklahoma Sooners.

Meanwhile, a big reason for their struggles last year was Shawn Shamburger’s limited action. Shamburger was the highest graded returning player on Rocky Top heading into 2020 but only played three games. That combined with Nigel Warrior’s departure was able to explain the drop-off in the unit in 2020.

Taking all of that into account, the outlook for the Vols in the secondary is bleak, even with the returns of Alontae Taylor, Jaylen McCollough, Theo Jackson and Trevon Flowers. Heupel and Tim Banks have to address those issues for Tennessee football going forward, as Torrence’s decommitment reopens this issue.