Joe Milton

[Spurhunter]

After seeing all the Joe Milton bashing on social media yesterday I started wondering why he is still the starting QB at Tennessee. Why does Josh Heupel not bench him and play true freshman 5 star QB Nico Iamaleava. Could it be the offensive line is terrible at pass protection and Nico, at 6-6, 195 pounds, looks like a stickman and Heupel is waiting for the offensive line to get better? Perhaps he's waiting for Nico to put on some weight? Maybe he doesn't want Nico to get hurt or develop bad habits running for his life every passing play? Even so, you have to admit, Joe Milton is terrible and it's time for a change. After all, as a starter at Tennessee Milton is 8-1, and has thrown 15 TDs against 4 interceptions. Is there a QB with worse stats anywhere in the Country?

Apparently Heupel forgot everything he knew about coaching football during the off season. Surely this isn't the same head coach that Vol Nation fell in love with last year! Obviously Bubba that stocks shelves down at the Sack and Save and the rest of the couch coaches know more about the QB situation at Tennessee than Josh Heupel! Surely they know more about coaching football in the SEC and developing QBs! Maybe it's time to think about parting ways with Heupel. I'm sure Bubba or any of the other couch coaches would take the job for a fraction of the $9million Heupel is being paid. Can we really trust a coach that led Tennessee to an 11-2 record last year and is 5-1 this year? Obviously the guy has lost his marbles playing a QB that is 8-1 as a starter that throws almost 4 TDs for every interception!

 

[Hduke86]

Saban would have him winning the SuperBowl by the end of the year and probably the Daytona 500 cause you know……. It's Saban

 

[Spurhunter]

Saban would have him winning the SuperBowl by the end of the year and probably the Daytona 500 cause you know……. It's Saban

Absolutely!

 

[Gravey]

If he could block for himself and catch his own passes his completion percentage would go up. Is he Hooker, no but there's a reason he's playing and not Nico. I think I'll trust Heupel to play the right folks including the QB. After all he might know a thing or two about the position seeing he was a Heisman runner up playing it.

 

[Spurhunter]

After all he might know a thing or two about the position seeing he was a Heisman runner up playing it.

And an All American. And the AP Player of the Year. And a National Champion.

 

[deerfanatic]

While I don't disagree with you I will point out we scored 1 offensive touchdown. We had one pass play over 15 yards yesterday. I forget his stats throwing on the run but they are atrocious. The accuracy isn't there scrambling and he misses seeing wide open receivers and stres down his primary too much. He is still fooled by defenses regularly. That's the bad. The hood is he's a good backup and a capable game manager but he's not gonna put you on his shoulders and take over games like hooker did. He hasn't been a turnover machine. Now he's thrown 4 interceptions in his career at UT but he wasn't playing too sec teams until the last 4 games or so. He's thrown 3 of his 4 in the last two games. I'm not advocating to start Nico but we aren't gonna beat bama and Georgia playing a game manager. I think it's time to start getting Nico some reps with the starters and not just meaningless snaps with the backups. Bad time to start that at this point in the season but this offense isn't gonna scare anyone as is.

 

[Spurhunter]

While I don't disagree with you I will point out we scored 1 offensive touchdown. We had one pass play over 15 yards yesterday. I forget his stats throwing on the run but they are atrocious. The accuracy isn't there scrambling and he misses seeing wide open receivers and stres down his primary too much. He is still fooled by defenses regularly. That's the bad. The hood is he's a good backup and a capable game manager but he's not gonna put you on his shoulders and take over games like hooker did. He hasn't been a turnover machine. Now he's thrown 4 interceptions in his career at UT but he wasn't playing too sec teams until the last 4 games or so. He's thrown 3 of his 4 in the last two games. I'm not advocating to start Nico but we aren't gonna beat bama and Georgia playing a game manager. I think it's time to start getting Nico some reps with the starters and not just meaningless snaps with the backups. Bad time to start that at this point in the season but this offense isn't gonna scare anyone as is.

I agree with everything you said. However, my point is, we as casual fans see the offense on the field for 20-40 minutes a week. The football program has coaches, coordinators, analysts, and anything else money can buy. The staff has umpteen years of football coaching experience. What makes us, the casual fan, think we see something they don't see? I have to believe that if Nico or Gaston Moore, or anybody else gave us a better chance to win, they would be on the field. Why would Heupel not play the best he has?

 

[MickThompson]

3 good deep passes yesterday with PI not called, a borderline PI in the end zone that wasn't called, an overthrown deep ball to a WR that appeared to have given up on the play and stopped running, and an almost certain TD dropped by a WR. Those would've changed his stat line and perpetuated drives, no?

Is he second coming of Peyton? Closer than you might want to admit. Peyton didn't win a natty and their winning percentage is almost identical- 0.888 for Milton vs 0.866 for Manning

 

[PalsPal]

The OLine will be worse next year, so I guess we sit Nico in 2024 also.

I think Heupel is loyal to a fault. After the interception in the end zone with triple coverage, I guarantee that Saban would have benched him.

 

[Spurhunter]

The OLine will be worse next year, so I guess we sit Nico in 2024 also.

Those were questions. I don't claim to know why Nico isn't playing.

 

[deerfanatic]

I agree with everything you said. However, my point is, we as casual fans see the offense on the field for 20-40 minutes a week. The football program has coaches, coordinators, analysts, and anything else money can buy. The staff has umpteen years of football coaching experience. What makes us, the casual fan, think we see something they don't see? I have to believe that if Nico or Gaston Moore, or anybody else gave us a better chance to win, they would be on the field. Why would Heupel not play the best he has?

While I do agree with that I'll ask you this question. This is the same coaches who saw all those practices and had all those years of experiences coaching and who get paid all of that money to choose Joe to be the starter. Didn't they also chose Joe over Hendon too?…..sometimes they can't tell or see until one is in live game action. Joe isn't it live. He is probably great in practice. Not saying Nico would be right now and I sure don't want to start him on his first college start ever against bama or any of our upcoming opponents except maybe UConn. I think they made a mistake not getting Nico more game time with the ones when we were playing lesser competition. Of course our offense couldn't get us big enough leads hardly to give him that luxury so it is what it is at this point. We are #126 in college in pass plus of 20 yards or longer. Our passing threat doesn't scare anyone but we are really good at running the ball so we aren't pushing that issue too hard either

 

[wayne]

While I don't disagree with you I will point out we scored 1 offensive touchdown. We had one pass play over 15 yards yesterday. I forget his stats throwing on the run but they are atrocious. The accuracy isn't there scrambling and he misses seeing wide open receivers and stres down his primary too much. He is still fooled by defenses regularly. That's the bad. The hood is he's a good backup and a capable game manager but he's not gonna put you on his shoulders and take over games like hooker did. He hasn't been a turnover machine. Now he's thrown 4 interceptions in his career at UT but he wasn't playing too sec teams until the last 4 games or so. He's thrown 3 of his 4 in the last two games. I'm not advocating to start Nico but we aren't gonna beat bama and Georgia playing a game manager. I think it's time to start getting Nico some reps with the starters and not just meaningless snaps with the backups. Bad time to start that at this point in the season but this offense isn't gonna scare anyone as is.

He played an SEC team and the ACC Champion last year and didn't have a problem seeing and hitting wide open receivers. But this year, I'm having a problem seeing wide open receivers also.

 

[scn]

I highly suspect that if Milton goes down that we will see Gaston come in as the replacement.

Nico played earlier in the year in one of the JV games and got rocked pretty good. I don't think they will risk their investment until he has some more time in the weight room. He badly needs another 20-30 #s.

 

[cbhunter]

I got frustrated once this year and said it was Nico time. After brewing on my thoughts for several days I realized I was just angry in the moment. I'm no Milton fan what so ever but I am glad that Nico is getting to sit and learn the system for a year. I don't think many true freshman are going to come into this high speed offense and run it super easily. Milton is not the only offensive issue but he the main one IMO. He don't have what it takes to "lead" a team, change plays at the line, know when to buckle down and hit someone to gain the tenth yard instead of running out of bounds after 8-9 yds. I could go on and on but the fact is he is lacking in several categories.

A team can't have a Hendon Hooker every year but it also don't have to be such a wide gap when it's the new QB's turn.

Vols are still a very improved team from previous coaching regimes and I'm dang thankful for that! This year was always going to be a step down from last year IMO. We still have 4 of 5 games that could go either way. Let the games continue/begin.
Bama is next and I won't be surprised whichever way it plays out

 

[deerfanatic]

He played an SEC team and the ACC Champion last year and didn't have a problem seeing and hitting wide open receivers. But this year, I'm having a problem seeing wide open receivers also.

Disagree. I've seen ipen receivers downfield he doesn't see or throw to. Not every play but some have been there. He did beat Clemson and I don't think the acc or Clemson was great last year. Vandy technically is a sec team but let's get real. That's the worst team by far in the sec. He's serviceable and a good option for backup. He's just not gonna win big games because better teams will make him beat you with his arm and at this point most don't think he can. His accuracy on the run is really really bad. It's not all his fault. We don't have the receiving core we did last year so there's that. We can debate it but our passing is in the bottom 3 of the sec stat wise. Something is amiss.

 

[cbhunter]

Disagree. I've seen ipen receivers downfield he doesn't see or throw to. Not every play but some have been there. He did beat Clemson and I don't think the acc or Clemson was great last year. Vandy technically is a sec team but let's get real. That's the worst team by far in the sec. He's serviceable and a good option for backup. He's just not gonna win big games because better teams will make him beat you with his arm and at this point most don't think he can. His accuracy on the run is really really bad. It's not all his fault. We don't have the receiving core we did last year so there's that. We can debate it but our passing is in the bottom 3 of the sec stat wise. Something is amiss.

All true and accurate. Yes the receivers have dropped several absolute dimes. There is an issue there. But how many times have they "dropped" a pass where they were reaching behind them or contorting their body to try to get to it, pick up off the ground, jump as high as they can to try to reach it? I just don't think our receivers are near as bad as some fans want to paint them. Hooker would make them all look like stars.

 

[deerfanatic]

All true and accurate. Yes the receivers have dropped several absolute dimes. There is an issue there. But how many times have they "dropped" a pass where they were reaching behind them or contorting their body to try to get to it, pick up off the ground, jump as high as they can to try to reach it? I just don't think our receivers are near as bad as some fans want to paint them. Hooker would make them all look like stars.

Very true. Accuracy is an issue and to me Milton does not throw an easily catchable ball. Even when it's not a middle it's flat with little air under it and much tougher to catch than hookers were plus as you said he's not nearly as accurate or maybe his style of passes don't let the receivers adjust to it as well. We are just gonna be a run heavy team this year and that usually doesn't bode well against bama and Georgia. On the very positive side our d line looks so great! Pearce is gonna be a huge star and with him on one side and Barron on the other our rush is rough on the other team. I saw the stats where Johnson was pressured on like 24 of 36 pass attempts. That's pretty heavy cause some of the passes were just flares to the back out of the backfield and things like that. Basically every drop back he was pressured on

 

[bowhunterfanatic]

Milton stinks. Period. But you don't bench a guy who is 5-1 for an unproven freshman. We saw what Bama tried and how it didn't work at all and almost cost Saban that locker room. With the exception of BJM, the rest of the staff has shown their reluctance to play freshmen. I'd say we have to lose at least 3 more games before a change would even be considered no matter how much Joe continues to stink it up.

 

[7mm08]

Still a bazooka Joe fan. It's hard to follow someone like Hooker that was poised beyond years, accurate, had more shakes when he ran than STEAK & SHAKE, AND had two NFL receivers! You can't look like a rock star if the receivers are dropping wide open balls!!!

 

[tellico4x4]

Running out of bounds on 4th & 2 about did me in on Milton...