We had a fun time on the air on Tuesday ranking Tennessee's opponents in degree of difficulty from 1 to 12. We had some great banter around this fun topic. We allowed the listeners of your Tony Basilio to show choose these opponents in a draft fashion. Here's what you came up with.

Tennessee's Schedule Broken Down By Most To Least Difficult:

#1. @ Alabama: This game should be as much fun Bama's recent ascent to world domination. Probably staring at a couple touchdown loss here. No game even comes close to this one in degree of difficulty.


#2. @ Florida: Though it is the second most difficult game on Tennessee's schedule, this game is highly winnable. What does that say about UT's schedule? I say this is great news. Sure, when you're making predictions in the summer you can pencil this in as a loss if you're keeping it real but whatever you do, don't use ink. Could Florida be this year's Tennessee? Could Florida be the team that fails to meet expectations?


#3. Ga Tech: This one could easily be listed of @Ga Tech as Tennessee plays Tech 10 minutes from their urban Atlanta campus. It's a beautiful place but 45,000 seats won't be enough to accommodate this one. A couple of things throw this one into the high question mark category which is why I think this will be a difficult football game. For one thing there's Tech's offense. The option being assignment football makes it counterintuitive for defenders to bottle up. The second factor here is that this is the season opener for both teams and Tennessee has a basically brand new coaching staff outside of a few coaches. This is especially true on offense where Larry Scott has never called a play in a college football game. The third reason this game is of concern is that it will take place on Monday night. If you'll remember, when Tennessee first agreed to this game, they were sold on the opportunity to be the first ever major sporting event in the GA's new dome. Well, that honor is going to belong to Alabama who muscled the Vols out of the way. I do think Tennessee will win this game but I do believe there's reasons to be concerned about this one. Again, that the case could be made for Ga Tech as the 3rd most difficult game on UT's schedule speaks volumes to the overall ease of 2017's schedule.


#4. Georgia: This one makes great sense. Georgia is here. Tennessee beat them last year at the buzzer. Several of Tennessee's key guys are gone from that that team while Georgia is supposedly healthy and fortified. I'll believe it from Georgia when I see it. They will have to play an A game to win in Knoxville. This game at #4 seems right.


#5. LSU: The Tigers are loaded. They should stay that way throughout O's tenure as he can recruit. He just needs Rosetta Stone (as one of my great callers said yesterday...Great line) in transposing his language into English. If LSU would've hired a serious head coach with a serious staff you could make the case that LSU is a game in UT's top 3 in degree of difficulty. As we've seen around here, the man with the big headset can have a lot of bearing on the outcome of signature games. Speaking of which, Butch Jones is still looking for his first win versus the SEC West. It should be pointed out that Jones is far from alone in this distinction as the East had two wins over the SEC West last year. Those were Kentucky over Miss State and Florida somehow over LSU. Tennessee over the past decade has been a paltry 5-22 versus the West. Believe it or not, during that same time period, Vanderbilt has been 7-19 versus the SEC West. Huh?


#6 South Carolina: I'm going to refrain from SCjr references here until Butch Jones can figure out a way to beat Wild Eyes Will. Last year a 17 year old kid beat a man when Josh Dobbs and Tennessee turned the division over on Halloween night in Columbia, SC. Here's the real head scratcher. Though he's 0-3 versus Muschamp, Jones will go into the history books with a perfect 2-0 record versus Steve Spurrier. Hello.







#7. @ Kentucky: This program is a federal government level waste of money. How many times in the past 25 years of divisional play has Kentucky finished in the upper division of the East? If you answered once, I'm going to say ding ding. And people I respect are telling me that Kentucky will finish ahead of Tennessee in 2017. No chance. Kentucky is the popcorn fart of the SEC. I used to buy the lie that Kentucky Football was analogous to Tennessee Basketball. Perhaps after 10 years of Rick Barnes, but no way Jose does this work. Kentucky is a sugar high never was in this league. As un-Tennessee like as the Vols have been for the past decade or so, Kentucky only has one win over the Vols. That was the Dooley Debacle. So, unless Derek Dooley shows up to coach the Vols in late November, Tennessee WILL win this game. How do I know? Because they are Kentucky football and this is Big Orange Country.


#8. @ Mizzou: I feel sorry for the fans of Mizzou sports. Put yourself in their shoes. You grew up watching the Big 8 where you competed nationally in hoops with an HOF head coach. During that period you were scrappy but never tremendous in football. Then you get absorbed into the Big 12 and your football program achieves tremendous success while your basketball team declines. Then you join the SEC, an honor you never wanted. Now, if you want to see your team play, the closest road trip is almost a half a day away. Meanwhile your football team shows early promise in this foreign league and you're thinking, "Well, this ain't so bad." Then the hunger strike happens. Then the manufactured protests. Now your alma mater is in financial dire straits with shuttered dorms while you know your football program is in also ran status. Oh, did I add your hoops fortunes are in the hands of Mr. March....Aka Cuonzo Martin. Good luck being you Mizzou. New slogan...Mizzou...It Sucks To Be You....


#9. Vandy: If Vandy wins in Neyland Stadium in 2017......Ah forget about it. It won't happen. It can't happen. Can it?



#10. Sou Miss: Unless Brett Favre can find some eligibility and get Curley Hallman back, this one ain't happening for the flying Tom Marines.


#11. U Mass: Dr J. Marcus Camby. Natalie Cole '72. Richard Gere '71. Taj Mahal '63. Ken Ober '80.


#12. Indiana State: Larry Bird. Tommy John. John Wooden. Bubba The Love Sponge. Kurt Thomas. Tony George.



And yes, I did just list famous alumni for our 3 buy games. What else did you want me to do? Break em down. That's just not me.























How bad was the SEC East last year? Check out this snapshot in time. Link


Check out the graph in this story. The SEC East has been trash. Surely Tennessee can break through in 2017. Link


Tennessee won't be having Juice Friday. Link






Did I tell you above that UT/Ga Tech got bumped for the greatest opener of "all time"? Link


I've been saying this very thing on Knoxville radio airwaves since 1993. Link


Is it OK if I ignore the Finebaum comments about Butch Jones?



Final Thought: We'll have a special announcement on our football game with Amachi and the kids this year. We're aiming to make this bigger and better in 2017. We're endeavoring to reach hundreds of people this year through this Volunteer effort. I hope this time around EVERYBODY reading this can get to our tailgate for these kids. 2016 was such a wonderful day. We'll have a special announcement today on the show regarding this. This is the kind of thing I love facilitating because it's bringing sport to the next level. Hope you'll join us in this. I'll have more on this in the blog tomorrow.










Thanks for the pick me up on our show relaunch week.

Tony

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