What Does Joe Milton Have To Be?
The Vols have their new QB1. Now what for the Michigan transfer?
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For the first time in a long time Tennessee Volunteer fans have no reason to talk about former Vol quarterback Jarrett Guarantano. The longtime signal-caller moved on just about as far as anyone could to Pullman, Washington where he will suit up for the Cougars of Washington State this fall. In a different conference on a different team in a different part of the country. Regardless of what you thought about the kid’s tenure in Knoxville, that is now in the past. Tennessee fans must now move forward. No more talk about Jeremy Pruitt, or Kevin Steele, or Phillip Fulmer or McDonald’s bags. With the announcement that Joe Milton will start for the Vols on Thursday night at Neyland Stadium vs. Bowling Green, things are going to be different this fall in Knoxville. New coaches, new quarterback, and a new opportunity, and that is an exciting place to be. The unknown. The slate is clean if you’re a Tennessee fan, it has to be, if you want to enjoy this football season for what it can be.
After Guarantano left the program, many Vol fans expected the keys to be handed over to Harrison Bailey. Maybe even fan-favorite Brian Maurer. Bailey came to Knoxville with high recruiting marks and a special senior season at Marietta High School where he won the title state title for the Blue Devils. He was widely considered the best quarterback in the state of Georgia when he was coming out. At 6’4, 224 pounds, he had the look and experience, a four-year starter at the Cobb County school, to be a star in the SEC when he got his opportunity.
But Bailey came to Tennessee to play in former offensive coordinator Jim Chaney’s scheme, not Josh Heupel’s scheme. He is a statue in the pocket, which is clearly not what Heupel desires, highlighted by adding Milton in the transfer portal and recruiting Tayven Jackson and Kaidon Salter. Bailey, unlike Hendon Hooker, Milton and Maurer, before he left the program, were all quarterbacks who could potentially survive if the offensive line was being overwhelmed by Georgia or Florida. For every Mac Jones, there is a Bryce Young, Emory Jones, Justin Fields, Trevor Lawrence, D’eriq King, Desmond Ridder, etc. Versatility is everything for football coaches now, and it’s why Hooker and Bailey did not beat out Milton.
What Milton now faces is going to be challenging. The Vols haven’t had a quarterback they believed in since Josh Dobbs was launching hail-mary bombs in Athens half a decade ago. The years of angst and pain that followed his stardom in Knoxville are still fresh in the mind of Vol fans everywhere. This is not Milton’s fault. He was in Ann Arbor and before that he was in high school in Florida. Milton and Heupel’s staff should not have to deal with the ghosts of Tennessee’s past, but that is what they will face. Milton will have to earn Tennessee fans’ trust, and, with this schedule, it’s going to take time. It’s not going to be Bowling Green or Pittsburgh or Tennessee Tech that changes the narrative. It will be how Milton clashes with Jones at Florida. How Milton clashes with Lane Kiffin’s stud quarterback Matt Corral. How Milton clashes with Kirby Smart’s four-game wonder J.T. Daniels.
The most uncomfortable part of the Milton conversation is that the former Wolverine needs to either pop like Dillon Gabriel at UCF or fail like Chase Brice at Duke. He can’t bounce between the two where one drive he looks like Cam Newton and the next drive he looks like D’Wan Mathis against Arkansas. That is what Tennessee fans loathed most about Guarantano. The talent was there and you saw it in spurts, but it was never there consistently. Milton has to either be consistently great or consistently poor. If it’s the middle ground, the Bailey noise will become a problem. Milton can be anything, he just can’t be mercurial.
There is hope for Milton, even if you may have raised an eyebrow at Bailey not winning the job. Heupel’s last quarterbacks are as followed: Dillon Gabriel, McKenzie Milton, Drew Lock, and Kent Myers. If you want to go even further back, dating back to his Oklahoma days under Bob Stoops, you can add Sam Bradford and Jason White to the never-ending list of success stories. You can wonder about the offensive line, the running-back room, the linebackers, the corners, whoever else, but to wonder about the quarterback with Heupel would be a waste of time.
Vol fans will learn a lot against Pitt, not against the Falcons, who finished No. 126 in Net Points Per Drive in 2020, per BCF Toys. Pitt was 43rd in DPD in 2020 and 27th the year prior. Milton and this offense will be tested here, similar to the way Nebraska was tested by Illinois on Saturday. Adrian Martinez was pressured on over 20 dropbacks and it showed. Against Minnesota in the opener, Milton had a clean pocket with all five starting offensive linemen registering a PFF grade of 77 or better. In that brutal win against Rutgers, Milton had a right guard in front of him who finished with a pass-blocking grade of 13.7 and a center with a pass-blocking grade of 38, per PFF. What’s scary, though, is how much Milton’s YPA varied from game to game, with it being in double-digits one week only to be back down to five the next. That heavy variance cannot happen in Knoxville.
But we shall see. We shall see if Milton’s variance in Ann Arbor was a fluke. We shall see if Heupel finally gets a quarterback choice wrong after a decade of evidence to the contrary. We shall look at this development with an open mind, though. Milton and Heupel deserve that, so enjoy the freshness and excitement of the unknown because these feelings can evaporate in a hurry. Just ask Cornhusker fans right now.
