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Spirited contest: Dobbs delivers under pressure in Vols’ spring finaleSutton’s steal highlights Vols’ spring game
KNOXVILLE — Is it not time, if not past time, to beg that FBS spring football games as we now know them be strongly encouraged to die quiet but quick deaths?
Now that Tennessee’s Big Orange Nation has failed miserably in its tepid attempt to jam 100,000 people into Neyland Stadium for Saturday’s Dish Network Orange-White game (maybe half that many would have been a far more accurate count), can we all agree that this controlled, contrived format of UT coach Butch Jones — and, to be fair, almost every other Division I head coach — needs to be radically improved if it must continue?
Sure, it’s fun for a minute or two to watch the Circle of Life drill, where two somewhat post-adolescent gladiators of roughly the same size and testosterone level square off against each other, determined to take the other’s head off.
The Quarterback Challenge competition was also somewhat exciting, though the highlight of the event may have been starting QB Josh Dobbs’ words rather than deeds. Taking the field last, Dobbs joked with Jones, “Well, are you going to introduce me?” since the coach enthusiastically had done so with the reserve quarterbacks.