Good news: some thing that David Ubben tweeted out projects Tennessee to have a top 10 defense. Bad news: we play against 3 other projected top 10 defenses.
That’s still great news - the other three were going to be Top 10 even if ours was still shit. Simply, those three teams just added a new Top 10 defense - we didn’t.
I need to see us without Bituli. We saw what it looked like without him before. Unsure of who will be our big lb to step up and if Henry T goes down we put in freshmen who arent as polished as he was, and we still haven't shown we can pressure with 4, so I'm not on the top 10 defense train right now.
Which means we will still need to outscore some teams and then I picture who is QB and i dont look forward to it, unless I picture Harrison Bailey slinging it to where a blitz vacated along with Lamar Jackson 2 coming in for 8-10 plays. Yes I will gladly start with 2 true freshmen right now and run the shit out of the ball, play action with the time we will have and chunk it deep or drop it off to Gray.
I think McCullough can replace Warrior. Flowers stays healthy, there's 3 good safeties on the roster. Keshawn Lawrence is an option too. Linebacker is unproven but there's a lot of options there, especially if/when Banks is brought back. DeAndre Johnson is your speed rusher, but he's got to attempt to play the run. Jordan Allen is supposed to be that guy, but he's done nothing so far. Bennett plays his ass off, but isn't the athlete Jordan and Johnson are.
Bituli is hard to replace. But replacing him now compared to him being out early this past year will be easier to do. We re more talented at LB now, but its unproven. I think the DL and secondary will be better even after losing Taylor and Warrior. Another year of recruiting, development, and implementation and the defense should be better.
I have concern about that as well, depending on what he had done. Shoulder injuries to lbs and dbs can be troublesome. Very difficult surgery and recovery if a labrum, cuff or bicep tendon. Hoping a cleanup and maybe a little subacromial decompression is all.
If Henry T can get the alignments called quickly and correct, I don't think it will be as bad as the beginning of last season. One thing that I like is that looking over the roster, we do have capable guys waiting in the wings. They have got to develop and step up. (Looking at you JJ Peterson)