Tennessee WR Coach Tee Martin joined 105.5 WNSP in his hometown of Mobile, Alabama, this morning for an interview. Martin joined longtime hosts Mark Heim and Lee Shirvanian, as they discussed the 2020 season so far and playing through these difficult times.
Check out the interview here.
“First of all, just proud of our players and staff for being able to manage everything we’ve had to manage under the circumstances of dealing with a pandemic. Motivating players to come out every day and prepared to play, players accepting it and doing what they have to do to play the game of football.
With the pandemic shooting down any hope the Vols would have for playing inside a sold out Neyland Stadium, Martin appreciates the support the players and coaches are getting from Tennessee fans.
“The fanbase and people who come out to support us. Its been a great atmosphere to wake up on Saturdays and know you’re being supported and see the guys going out to play. Our guys have played really hard, prepared well. We had a limited and modified training camp that really affecting a lot of our young players. But the veterans having a coordinator on the offense and defense for the second year in a row has really helped us. You see the familiarity on both sides of the ball with the guys that have played here; I think that has helped us a lot because we’ve been in some close games, and this time last year, I don’t know if we would’ve won those games.”
Tee was asked about his confidence in quarterback Jarrett Guarantano this year compared to last year. Martin knows how important it is for Guarantano to be playing for the same OC in consecutive years.
“He’s playing really good football, and he understands the plays, he understands what we’re asking him to do, he’s operating at the line of scrimmage really well. We do a lot of checking at the line of scrimmage, we do a lot of things that require the quarterback to operate pre-snap, post snap, and you can see the growth in him being comfortable in his 2nd year in Jim Chaney’s system. This is the first time in his career he’s had a coordinator for two years in a row. So, I am happy for that young man, and he has done a phenomenal job for us.”
With the loss of production at wide receiver, due to Jauan Jennings and Marquez Callaway being gone, Tee understands how important it is for this current group to gel with the QB.
“Hats off to these young men, you’re asking a group of guys for a lot of time during this shutdown, they had to voluntarily get together and throw. They were finding parks around the city, finding different places around the town to go throw, because it’s so much about trust, so much about timing, so much about body language that goes into a quarterback-receiver relationship. They came in having put in a lot of work before we started training camp, so once we started camp, we just focused on “What can we do well?”. You knew you couldn’t put in the whole playbook and expect these men to operate it, given the short training camp. We wanted to focus on what can we do and really tried to design plays around their strength.”
“I am really proud of my son, he’s starting to see the hard work pay off, and actually this was a comeback season for him, coming back from ACL surgery. This year is his confidence. When I speak to him, he’s so much more confident this season than he was last season, and I am really just proud of him and what he’s doing.”
This wide receiver group has many weapons at the disposal of Jarrett Guarantano, but it’s all about chemistry. Not having a full group during Fall camp can put you behind the eight ball on production. But, as we’ve seen over the last three weeks, they’re slowly but surely syncing up, which will only help Tennessee as the season rolls on.
Tee Martin believes things are starting to fall into place with his group and this offense. The Tennessee offense has an opportunity to prove itself on Saturday in Athens, especially with a wide receiver group complimenting the fierce rushing attack.
