KNOXVILLE — Several University of Tennessee football fans have sent me e-mails that, directly or indirectly, asked this question:

Just what in the world is coach Phillip Fulmer thinking?

Fair question.

The Vols are 2-4, and they’re 0-3 in the Southeastern Conference. They’re underachieving, because they have the ability to at least compete with the top teams in the SEC — something they’ve sort of done this season.

Anyway, today’s “I type it, you read it” takes us to Neyland Stadium’s new media center for Fulmer’s Tuesday afternoon news conference.

Fulmer, as always, gave us 30 minutes to come out swinging. And, as always, he swung back when given the opportunity. Kudos to Fulmer for his funny shot near the end about most writers not creating their headlines (or “the greatest copout in history,” as he likes to call it).

I haven’t written one headline since I started working for the Times Free Press in 2003, at first freelancing as a college student — honestly, not one — but Fulmer’s comment still made me chuckle.

PHILLIP FULMER

Opening statement ...

“I think it goes without saying that no one’s happy at all with the season to this point. We all know and understand that winning cures a lot of things — frustration, our confidence level, those kinds of things that come with having a disappointing season. Anybody that’s stayed in this game for any length of time has had their struggles from different times when things don’t come together quite like you would have expected them to.

“Going back to high school or my time as an assistant coach here or my time as an assistant coach at Wichita (State), there have been lots of battles to fight. As a head football coach, at different times, like this one, that you’ve had to persevere and overcome, and we’ve been able to do that in the past and certainly expect to do that again.

“We look at our team every Sunday as we grade the tape and make evaluations and (see) who’s doing well and what schemes are working. We’ve certainly done that to a greater degree — probably now more than ever — looking at our personnel, looking at our practice schedules, looking at our schemes; anything that we can do to do better, to change what’s going on. And we have changed some of our practice schedule routine.

“Going into this week, (we’ll have a) little bit more game-like situations with some full-speed, thud-type things to get some of that carryover for an inexperienced quarterback, for example, from practice to the games, because we feel like our plan has been good and those kind of things but the execution has not been there and how can we help ... a guard be better or a quarterback be better or a tight end be better or a safety to be better, and so we have certainly looked and adjusted that some, starting today.

“The good thing is we don’t have an effort problem. Our guys are busting their rears. If you go back and watch the tape, there’s a lot of really good effort on both sides of the ball. Our defensive football team, particularly, is flying around. We just made some mistakes over the course of the ballgame, gave up some big chunks of yards — mostly in the passing game.

“I don’t see our team making excuses or having a lack of effort. We saw a lot of them yesterday as they came and watched tape on their own. I saw a group of quarterbacks and receivers out there on their own yesterday throwing and catching in the indoor facility, that was completely unsolicited from us. Those are real positive signs that our guys are really listening and staying the course and they’re anxious to get this turned around like we all want to.

“I have to credit the staff some for that. I think their energy and their character — how they’ve approved this — has continued to work through the disappointment and the frustration that comes with not having the kind of season you would like to have.

“Obviously, we’ve got a number of issues that we have to address. Early in the season, we were a very good running football team. What’s happened to that basically is people are daring us more to run the ball against numbers that get really not in our favor, with safeties and extra people being involved. That makes things more difficult, and then down and distance gets to be a problem and we haven’t been very good in any kind of third-and-medium or third-and-long situations with just consistent execution.

“However, we have in the last two ballgames made people pay for those efforts to play man-to-man, and we’ve got to continue to make them pay for that.

“Denarius Moore’s made a couple of really nice big plays, and Nick’s (Stephens) got a knack for finding those guys and getting the ball to them with accurate throws, so we’ll continue to work toward those kind of plays. To throw a fade route or throw a post or throw a corner, those kind of things sometimes aren’t as high percentage, but the rewards often times are much greater, so we’ll continue to work on those.

“Mississippi State, you’ve heard from both the (coordinators), so you probably don’t need to hear a lot from me, but they’re a good team. They had a very nice win versus Vanderbilt. Their tailback’s a good player; their quarterback’s making plays for them. I think he’s given them a lift, much like Nick has us. Their offensive line’s physical. They’ve got a good group of receivers and tight ends. They’re a real challenge for our defensive football team. Last year, they might have been the most physical team we played.

“We’re expecting the same kind of football game this year. Defensively, again, they’re a very aggressive type of football team. They’ll challenge you, working like heck to stop the run. I think Vanderbilt had 107 total yards. That’s really not very good at all, but good on (MSU’s) defensive part. We’ve got to work at it and have a great week of preparation, and then take that preparation and be as good as we can possibly be in the game. We’re going to do some other full speed thud things that will carry over for us.

“As we go along here, I been asked a couple different times about how — whether it be administrative support, or friends in crucial positions — I appreciate how everybody’s handled and has been surpportive. That’s been a real positive for all of us, and we look forward to rewarding that support with a turnaround in the season and getting ourselves where we need to be.

“One other note, Coach (Larry) Slade will not be there. His father passed yesterday, so he wont be at tonight’s practice. Coach (John) Chavis will handle the meetings with the secondary and linebackers, and practice-wise, we worked it out for them to be together most of the time during the course of the day. We expect him back tomorrow.”

Q: How do you balance the need to improve full-speed work with the lack of proven depth at several key positions, especially along the lines?

FULMER : “I think you can have game situations in practice by having full-speed, thud-type drills. With that comes risk of piles and people falling over each other and our lack of depth, particularly at defensive tackle, is a concern. Now, you should be able to take team work periods and scout periods and middle drills and inside drills and front-seven drills and really crank those up and not have to do scrimmage type situations.

“We’re been out in full pads every Tuesday and had good work. We’ve always taken one period against the defense. (Now) we’re going to take another period and basically some inside run stuff, to help us stay sharp and be sharper on game day. That will be more like full speed, so it’ll be full speed thud.

“You get concerned about it as a coach with the numbers in this day and age, and the number of games you have to play, and our situation this year with number of games in a row. It’s very much a management issue. You tell yourself, ‘If they’re going to get hurt, they’re going to get hurt in a game.’ And we don’t want anyone hurt, but you want them physically sharp for a game.

“I can take them out and beat them up every day in practice, but that’s not what anybody should do.”

Q: You made a reference Sunday night that “nothing is off the table” personnel or scheme wise. Should we expect to see any major personnel changes this Saturday against Mississippi State?

FULMER: “When you say, ‘Everything’s on the table,’ that doesn’t mean you’re going to wholesale change everything that’s out there. But there’s some positions where the competition’s been good, and during the course of the week we’ll decide who starts — those kind of things. At this point now, everybody needs to be on their ‘A’ game and not wait until Saturday.”

Q: Is Denarius Moore one of those guys that we will see more on the field Saturday?

FULMER: “Denarius is a guy that’s showing up in games and making a lot of plays for us. That’s what you’ve got to do. If you’re going to get that much man-to-man, you’ve got to be able to separate and catch the ball and make plays. Life gets a lot simpler when they have somebody out there they have to double cover or account for, and Denarius has shown he can command some of that respect.”

Q: When you spoke about support from the administration, did you interpret that as a vote of confidence?

FULMER: “I was just asked, so thought I would bring it up. I really appreciate how supportive and everybody’s been. It’s just simple as that. I can’t speak for anybody as far as how they feel, but I do appreciate how people have handled some things.”

Q: Are you concerned that the players have lost confidence in what’s happening here, especially on offense?

FULMER: “Yes, I think that’s human nature to stand back and say, ‘My gosh, it’s not my fault.’ It’s my job to make sure we are doing obviously sound things. There is a transition with a new quarterback — two new quarterbacks. There is a transition with a new system, several new coaches on the offensive side and all of the above that has contributed to that, some of the difficulties that we’ve had. I don’t think anbyody’s shirking that responsibility at all. The players need to do better, and the coaches, we need to make sure we’re doing the things that we can do and do well, and it hasn’t come together. We’ve had certainly flashes of being really good, but our consistency hasn’t been what it needs to be.”

Q: Is this offense too complex to learn so quickly?

FULMER: “No. I think it’s just new, and I think it’s just a process of continuing to grow. We’ve married a couple of the ideas and things we’ve done in the past, and those are the things that they’re most familiar with. We want to be successful, and if we beat UCLA like we should’ve and we beat Auburn like we should’ve ... when you’re not doing well, everything is looked at with a very critical eye by us, and I’m sure everybody else concerned. You’re searching all those things that are an issue or could be an issue.

“We’ve done I think a good job evaluating ourselves every Sunday, since I’ve been here. You don’t want to get into a routine. There’s a lot of great things about this offensive system. We’ve just got to get it all in sync and everything.”

Q: I know you’re always hesitant to single-out the struggles of individual players, but are you disappointed with the way tailback Arian Foster and linebacker Rico McCoy are playing? Those guys were second-team All-SEC players last season, and first-team All-SEC preseason players this year.

FULMER: “Arian probably hasn’t had as many opportunities as he would have liked or we would have liked, again, because of the inefficiencies that we’ve had offensively. I think Arian certainly is capable of playing at a level that we all expect from him.

“Rico, I can’t 100 percent put my finger on it, and I don’t want to just single him out. There’s a couple guys on each side of the ball that aren’t playing as well as we would have expected them to. But there’s competition more than ever at some of those spots, and they need to get their game to the level that we expect them to be.”

Q: Do you know why the offensive line is struggling, and what can fix it?

FULMER: “Early in the season, I thought we ran the football pretty well. Since we’ve gone through the season and people have recognized the fact that we are a good running team, and we’ve had some difficulties at quarterback with consistent execution, we’ve gotten more and more extra (defensive) guys in the box. So it’s a bit more difficult to run the football, and you don’t ever know which ones are going to be those extra guys. It could be a corner coming from off (the edge), and everybody’s slanting to the tight end and you’ve called a tight-end side play, or it could be a weakside play, and somebody’s unblocked. Those get difficult in the SEC. Those guys are pretty good tacklers, you know?

“I’m not trying to avoid your question, but that’s the start of it. Now, have we been, the last couple of weeks, as good in the offensive line as I would have expected us to be or think we should be? No, and that goes back to our consistency. We have four guys getting it done real well, and then one not, and those kinds of things. Plus, honestly, we didn’t run the football a whole lot. We didn’t call a lot of runs — 11 runs — trying to play the game with the perimeter thing.”

Q: How do you keep outside criticism from causing players to press on the field?

FULMER: “I told them that again after the game the other night: ‘They’re going to talk bad about me. They’re going to talk bad about the staff. And they’re probably going to talk bad about some of you guys.’ That comes with the territory when you’re coaching at a place that has great passion for its football. Their maturity and the leadership and the energy of the coaches, and the character of the football team.

“I can’t tell you what they all think or say or hear 24 hours a day. But I do know ... they all are in class. They all are going to the tutors. They all are getting to their lifting on time. They were out there unsolicited throwing the ball by themselves yesterday, the receivers and quarterbacks. I can tell when they come to meetings and look at their body demeanor and their eyes and how they’re handling themselves, and if they’re sincere.

“Certainly, when that practice starts, you can tell a lot about how they’re responding. There’s competition, and that’s the best thing you have going for anybody, is competition for position.”

Q: Could the players’ pressing be blamed in part because of the disconnect between practice and game results?

FULMER: “It could be. I think maybe in the fourth quarter there, when Nick was trying to get the ball down the field farther and we were behind, he was probably pressing. I thought he played within the system, otherwise, reasonably well. Now, we didn’t always get open or throw it accurately. But his decision-making and handling all that was good.

“Everybody in general, it’s probably a tendency to press a little harder and want to do things. When you start getting out of what you’re capable of doing, it’s like anything else — it won’t be as good. So hopefully, we’ll really get back to good fundamentals, really get back to being consistent in our decision-making — whether it be at quarterback or a back cutting or a safety not getting himself in a position where he can’t make a play where he should be in a position to intercept the ball. Those kinds of things are what hurt us.

Q: What is keeping sophomore tailback Lennon Creer and sophomore tight end Brandon Warren off the field?

“We are trying to get Brandon involved. We really are. It gets back to making sure we’re taking assignments and those kinds of things, and getting those kinds of things down. And he’s working at it. I’ll give him credit. He’s working at it.

“Lennon is in a situation where he’s playing some — probably not playing as much as he would like to — and we’re trying to get all three of those guys involved. That’s when we’ve been our best, is when we’ve had two that are pounding that thing and the other one that comes in and helps out. That’s where we’re trying to get to with those three running backs.”

Q: Have offensive linemen adapted well to switching sides on some plays?

FULMER: “I think we’re past the point where it’s a concern. I think through spring practice, it was a little bit different for them — or completely different for them, in some ways. But during the course of the summer and two-a-days, I think we passed that point. And using our cadence and those sorts of things, I think we’re past that being a concern.”

Q: Have you ever experienced a situation like this, where a team practiced this well and played this poorly in games?

FULMER: “I’m not trying to allude to at all that practice has been perfect at all. I mean, that’s the reason you film it and you grade it, and you critique it and take it back and show it to the players. But our execution — and it should be when you’re going against a scout team or a defense that you see every day — execution hasn’t carried over as well as any of us would have liked to the games.

“That’s the word I tried to use earlier — our consistency in games has been surprising. It can’t be anything but just the speed of it different than practice. And it is different. It’s games. So we’re trying to pick up the speed in drills in places.”

Q: Players said last season’s Mississippi State game was the most physical they played. How does this UT team compare to last season’s, toughness-wise?

FULMER: “It’s about the same guys, minus Jerod Mayo, who was a tough guy, and Ellix (Wilson) has played real well. I think he’s the leading tackler in the conference right now.

“It’s basically the same guys. At this point, much like last year when we were fighting through that early and went on and won the division, they’ve got to bow their necks. But the Georgia game was extremely physical, and we won our share of physical battles there. One place that we need to get better at is third-and-short, through the entire year. The percentage of those aren’t going to be great anyway, for stopping them. But we need to get some of those done.”

Q: How frustrating is it to have guys who have played but still can’t carry that performance from practice to games?

FULMER: “That’s a real general statement, because a lot of guys do. A lot of guys know how to go through practice, because they practiced a lot, and transfer it to a game. I’m not talking about everybody on the team. But the quarterback is one of the positions.

“And receivers, them being on the same page at the same time, is more of what I’m addressing. Like we’re going against the defense — which we’ve done for several weeks. This is not brand-new. It’s a full-speed blitz, period. It’s good for our defense. It’s good for our offense and quarterbacks and linemen — everybody. It’s good for them. So we’ve done that. We’re going to do it a little bit more, because he’s got to get the ball where it’s supposed to be and on time, and receivers have got to separate and catch the ball.

“Versus our inside stuff, it’s like anything else. If you go out (and practice) inside drill, if you go out and practice poor habits in golf or tennis or anything else, or you don’t play enough — you see what I’m saying? — you’ve got to be able to play the game at a speed that’s game speed. And we’re going to try to get as close to that as we possibly can.”

Q: Are there any young players that aren’t playing that much but are making great strides in practice and might be able to help down the stretch?

FULMER: “Yes. I think Ahmad Paige is one of those guys that’s getting really close. He might be our fastest receiver. He hasn’t been very consistent or physical, but you can see in the last two or three weeks that’s really coming on.

“I see (cornerback) Art Evans making good progress. Unfortunately, Herman Lathers, a linebacker, he’s out for a while, it looks like, with a real serious tonsillitis. He was closing that gap considerably. The two young ends (Ben Martin and Chris Walker) are playing a lot for us. I don’t know if you’re talking true freshmen or guys that have just been around a while. They have really come on and helped us.

“You look at Denarius Moore and Gerald Jones and Eric Berry, and there’s a really good group of young players right there that are pretty darn exciting for what they’re doing. Did I mention Art Evans? I think.

“(Safety) Anthony Anderson has consistently showed some progress. Jarrod Shaw, as an offensive lineman, he is really close to being able to get in a game. But, shoot, when you’re battling to win a game, it’s not necessarily the time you say, ‘Hey, I’m going to just try and see how ol’ Jarrod does.’ I mean, I’m dying to get him in a game and play.

“And you mentioned Brandon Warren. Brandon’s making good strides. I’m just trying to think off the top of my head of guys who haven’t played that much that we would like to see play more.”

Q: What about redshirt freshman defensive tackle Donald Langley?

FULMER: “Donald needs to be more consistent, just to be honest with you, and consistent in his practice habits. He’s a great young man. He’s obviously had a real difficult time with his family situation (mother’s illness), and we’re very sympathetic to that. But he has to be more consistent in his practice habits.”

Q: With physical games against Mississippi State and Alabama coming up, are you concerned about starters wearing down without an open date?

FULMER: “Yeah. That doesn’t change. It’s been that way ever since. ... Now, we do have more games in a row this time than we’ve had, but it’s always that way. That’s the reason you try to temper your practices and be sure you’re practicing smart — hard, but smart, along the way.

“I don’t want anybody to think we’re going out there and throwing the ball out there and going to scrimmage for two hours. That’s not at all what we’re talking about. But there are certain periods we’ve designated to try to get the tempo back to closer to a game so our youthful quarterback, or Lennon Creer — whoever it might be that needs a little bit more of that kind of work — can get some of that a couple of periods a day.

“We’ve always had individual live work all over the field — whether it be two-on-one with defensive and offensive linemen or one-on-one pass pro, those kinds of things. I don’t want the headlines to (say) we’ve changed our entire practice. I mean, that’s not the case.

“Of course, you don’t control the headlines. I understand. That’s the greatest copout in history.”

Closing, unsolicited comment ...

“Recruiting is going very well. All of our commitments are holding, and that’s good stuff.”

Read Thursday’s Times Free Press for more Vols information.

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