![]() In UT’s last five games, Thomas started four of them and notched 40, 34, 36, 32 and 30 snaps, respectively. Thomas’s snap counts went from averaging fewer than 20 per game the Vols’ first five games to nearly hitting a 30-snap average in the season’s final eight contests. Instead, I’m going with the notion that Thomas’s late-year uptick in playing time and production represent the snapped twigs and footprints of a trail that leads to an even more productive season for him this season. But we’ve gotten enough precipitation in town lately. ![]() ![]() So there’s a counterpoint here that, of course he made more plays, you rube, he was playing more. He started playing more and playing better.īefore we get into the nitty gritty, and I start throwing numbers at you like Hela throws swords in “ Thor: Ragnarock,” a universal truth in football: a player has to be on the field to make plays. In a more literal sense: Thomas’s game versus The Landsharks/ The Black Bears/ The Rebels was seemingly the point in the year when things clicked. I know I’m outside of most of our target-audience demographic here, but Thomas against Ole Miss was his version of DMX’s intro to “It’s Dark and Hell is Hot,” (widely regarded as one of the best intros to an album, ever). Via Pro Football Focus’s various grading metrics, this was the sophomore’s best game of the year against SEC competition. That one play represents a sort of microcosm of Thomas’s game against Mississippi. It took Thomas all of one second to rudely impose on Matt Corrall’s personal space and cause a safety. I figure a blocker missed an assignment, via negligence, inability or by the grace of unforeseen Devine intervention. But I have eyes, and my goodness Thomas just blows through the interior of the Ole Miss offensive line. I don’t pretend to know enough about football to describe for you what happened here schematically. Safety for the #Vols /Txz2klUToe- RockyTopTalk October 17, 2021 ![]() Last season, though, is when we really started to see flashes of Thomas and the problems he can create for opposing offenses at the point of attack.Ĭorral intentional grounding in the end zone. Such is life as a lineman, his stats don’t jump off the page - 110 total snaps and 10 tackles with one tackle for loss. The combination of Thomas’s size/speed/quickness garnered him playing time in his first year with the Tennessee defense, and the young bull made appearance in all ten games of the Vols’ of the 2020, COVID-shortened and all inner-conference schedule. 2 ranked player in Tennessee in the 2020 class and was naturally considered a pretty “big,” get for the Vols’ former coaching staff.Ī brief aside and trip down memory lane: the Vols did well recruiting Tennessee in 2020, nabbing several top-ranked, instate players: No. I think he has a neck there, somewhere, partially hidden behind the beard and barricaded in on both sides by trap muscles that might have their own zip codes.īut his aesthetic isn’t gonna help the Tennessee’s defense take a much-needed step forward (literally and figuratively), nor will it help Thomas fill the production void Butler left in the middle of the Vols’ defensive front.Ī former consensus 4-star prospect from Briarcrest in Memphis (same HS as Vols’ RB Jabari Small), Thomas was the No. Most guys stand at the podium, but here, the podium is standing at Thomas. Here’s a screenshot of Thomas’s media availability from August 8th. Listed at 6-foot-4, 320 pounds, Thomas most definitely looks the part. So, I reckon it’s fitting that one of the most prominent main characters, to one of the biggest plots in the story of Tennessee’s success or failure this year, would be one of the team’s biggest humans: junior Omari Thomas. And only one of those players who played more snaps graded out better than Butler, according to Pro Football Focus’s all-encompassing, defensive grading metric. Let’s pare that down some, focus on the defensive line and look to who’s going to replace the double-take invoking production of Matthew Butler.īut first, a brief nod to the eventual 5th-round NFL Draft pick: Butler led the DL position group in just about every statistical category out there, all while playing a staggering 726 total snaps, which ranked him seventh nationally among defensive linemen in the NCAA. One of the biggest narratives/ concerns/ storylines of Tennessee’s 2023 season is the defense.
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