Terrific Tennessee Tuesday: Josh Elander
It's college baseball preview season, and there is a lot of reason for excitement for Josh Elander's first team as Tennessee's head baseball coach.
Sure, we still have a couple of months to go before the return of Tennessee baseball. However, with the departure of Tony Vitello to the MLB to manage the San Francisco Giants, it’s so dang hard not to spend at least a little bit of time every day thinking about Josh Elander’s first season on Rocky Top next year. Yes, the coaching staff is going to look a whole lot different next season with Vitello, Quentin Eberhardt, and Frank Anderson all off to the Bay Area. What isn’t going to look different is the roster the Vols were going to trot out in 2026 with or without Vitello – and it’s a roster that should be one of the best in the SEC once again.
Tennessee baseball fans have had an emotionally taxing last couple of months. It’s still mind-boggling to come to terms with the fact that the Vols lost their coach, who had won a national championship the previous season and built the best and coolest program on campus this century, to the professional ranks in what could be a trailblazing move for college baseball coaches everywhere. It’s going take time to get used to the post-Vitello world at Lindsey Nelson Stadium, that much is obvious. However, what will expedite the healing process is pretty straightforward – winning a lot of baseball games.
Thankfully, the good folks at D1Baseball, Joe Healy in this particular case, wrote a preview piece on Tennessee’s 2026 outlook, and if by the end of it that doesn’t light your fire for Year 1 of the Elander era on Rocky Top, then your wood is likely wet.
New pitching coach Josh Reynolds has a great problem to have, where he has four fantastic options for three key spots in the weekend rotation with returnee Brandon Arvidson, Rutgers transfer Landon Mack, returnee Tegan Kuhns, and Virginia transfer Evan Blanco. The bullpen is loaded with high-upside transfers like former ETSU pitcher Brady Frederick, former Kennesaw State pitcher Bo Rhudy, and former Duke pitcher Mark Hindy, not to mention the return of talented right-hander Brayden Krenzel and the arrival of top-50 true freshman lefty Cameron Appenzeller.
On the lineup side of things, you have the surprising but needed return of outfielder Reese Chapman. Jay Abernathy could be a breakout year-two player in center field and at the top of the lineup. Veterans Blake Grimmer and Virginia transfer Henry Ford could be key power bats in the middle of the order and play in the outfield or infield. Tennessee has never had this many intriguing options at catcher, and the Vols could have the best defensive 2B-SS combo in the SEC with Ariel Antigua and Manny Marin. If Levi Clark finds consistency and power at the plate throughout SEC play, he could be in line for a big-time Year 2 as well. Even at DH, Elander has a great problem with options like Rice transfer Blaine Brown, Walters State transfer Tyler Myatt, and Bowling Green transfer Garrett Wright, all figuring to battle for at-bats in the coveted DH role.
Sure, there are going to be some big-time battles for starting nods over the next couple of months. But when you take a peek under the hood at what Elander and his first staff have to work with in his first season as the head coach, it’s hard not to want to hop in your car, buy a ticket, and sit in quite frigid conditions for a February Tuesday night Tennessee against Georgia State ball game just like old times when Vitello was in charge.
I was pleased when Tennessee athletic director Danny White chose to promote from within and give Elander this much-deserved opportunity to keep the university’s best program humming. I’m even happier when I read pieces like Healy’s at D1Baseball. It’s baseball, so big-time success is not guaranteed with a big-time roster, but, man, that doesn’t mean if you’re Elander that you’re not fired up about how good your first team in Knoxville could be in 2026.