Wide Receiver/Tight Ends
A week after Tennessee’s receivers dropped two passes against Florida, the group bounced back and didn’t have a drop against the Bulldogs. Josh Palmer led the group with a touchdown while Marquez Callaway, Dominick Wood-Anderson, Brandon Johnson, and Jauan Jennings all caught two passes. Ty Chandler led the team with five receptions.
I’m all for getting the ball in Chandler’s hands as much as possible, but he shouldn’t lead the offense in catches. Callaway, Wood-Anderson, Jennings, and Palmer all need to touch the ball more, and that goes back to allowing Guarantano to attempt more intermediate to deep passes.
Helton utilized swing passes, screens, and wide receiver reverses against Georgia more than he had any other game this season. Palmer received the ball on two different reverses, while Johnson was used on a swing pass along with Chandler, which resulted in a touchdown.
A unique wrinkle we saw this week, was Jennings lined up in the backfield, as seen below. Jennings lined up to the right of Guarantano in a shotgun formation, carried out play-action, caught the check down pass and bullied his way up the field for a hard-fought five yards.
Tennessee’s tight ends did the offensive line no favors. They had a miserable a game blocking on Saturday. Wood-Anderson is a great weapon in the passing game, but he’s a liability in run-blocking at times. The JUCO transfer will clear out an end on one play, providing a running lane, but then he’ll completely whiff on the next play. If he can clean that area of his game up, he’s destined to play on Sunday. Against Georgia, Wood-Anderson had 12 negative blocks to just nine positive blocks. Wolf and Latrell Bumphus were also liabilities when blocking.
