Vol Nation Cares More About Images Than Winning

When empty cliches are stressed as newsworthy, that’s the only conclusion one can come up with.

Are the Tennessee Volunteers more interested in winning or images?

For the last 13 years, Tennessee has tried to maintain the image they are still an elite football program.

They promote tradition and pageantry to promote this narrative, but the fact is of the 65 Power Five college football programs, 39 have won a conference championship since the Vols last did in 1998.

Four of the six other football programs in the Southeastern Conference’s East Division have won a division title since Tennessee in 2007.

And frankly, while the Vols may be able to trade punches with the also-rans of the SEC, they’ve lost 14 straight to Alabama, 14 of 15 to Florida, and 9 of 11 to Georgia.

Heck, the Vols have lost five of their last eight games to Vanderbilt!

After all this time, one cannot blame mere bad coaching for the Vols’ demise.

The demise must be more systematic. A program with the wealth of the Volunteers should be not be left behind by 8/13 of the teams playing on their level.

True, one of the reasons is likely because the state of Tennessee does not produce the football players many other states on the SEC map do. Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, South Carolina and Texas all produce more NFL players than the Volunteer State does for…