Report: Butch Jones being considered at Arkansas
For the second time this season, former Tennessee coach Butch Jones is being linked to an open Power 5 job. This time it’s Arkansas as the Razorbacks continue to look for a replacement for Chad Morris.
“Butch Jones is a guy being considered at Arkansas,” Steven Godfrey, a Senior Writer for Banner Society, said on The Midday 180 in Nashville. “It’s a name being tossed around by CAA. For a guy being “pushed,” he is the only one with actual wins in the SEC.”
Jones was mentioned for the open Rutgers job, but reportedly pulled his name from consideration about a week ago. He’s in his second season as an analyst at Alabama.
Jones was 34-27 during four-plus seasons at Tennessee, despite a 4-6 start to 2017 that saw the Volunteers eventually go 0-8 in SEC play.
At Central Michigan, Jones was 27-13 from 2007-2009 — including an 11-2 mark in his final season there —before a 23-14 run at Cincinnati that saw him go just 4-8 in 2010 before a 10-3 record in 2011 and 9-3 in 2012 before being hired for the Volunteers’ post before the Bearcats’ appearance in the Belk Bowl.
Well his resume is better than Kiffin’s.
I don’t know you well @junkerjorge but did you see Tennessee last year and the first of this year with Butch’s players? Apparenly he can coach “Champions of Life” and develop “5 star heart” by teaching with “Leadership reps” in practice–but as far as coaching an actual team on the field, he nearly put Tennessee in an unrecoverable tail spin!
Not defending Lyle’s tenure at Tennessee (don’t want him at Arkansas). But at least he only destroyed 1 program, whereas Kiffin destroyed 3 programs and sabotaged 1 national championship…
That being said Butch Jones’ winning percentage at Tennessee is higher than Kiffin, Dooley, and Pruitt. Basically he’s the best coach of the last decade since Phil left.
Kiffin didn’t destroy the program. He spent one year in TN. While Dooley underperformed, he didn’t destroy it either. Jones was toxic and could recruit players with character.
So toxic that he had a higher win percentage than Kiffin, Dolley, and Pruitt, and in 5 seasons had 3 bowl wins and 2 9 win seasons. Butch’s biggest problems were Tenn fans unrealistic expectations.
Face it, it’s the Tennessee fan base that is toxic.
He’s objectively worse than Pruitt as your basis for stating he’s not, the winning %, is a by-product of Butch’s tenure. As a reminder, Jones went 4-8 and winless in conf in 2017. Those highly touted recruiting classes were also decimated by transfers and lack of strength and conditioning. If you compare SEC wins heads up, Pruitt had 2 upset wins his first season and is sitting at 3 wins in conference this year (all of which were wins over favored opponents) and 2 consecutive years of beating the rotating SEC west opponent. Jones never beat an SEC west team. Before you bring out the Ga St loss, remember that this qb situation is primarily a result of Jones’ mismanagement. Lastly, our so called “toxic” fanbase would be suffering under Schiano had we not revolted. You had better hope your fanbase is as toxic; however, I’m hoping y’all do hire Jones.
You are seriously citing the Schiano debacle as evidence that your fanbase is NOT toxic? Lolz. You can’t make this stuff up.
I’m not sure you understand what the word “objective” means.
BTW I don’t want Lyle. My point was not that Butch is great. It’s that he sucks. But Kiffin sucks equally and with character issues. But he probably sucks less than Pruitt. Which is probably a moot point since Phil will backstab his way in somehow soon enough. Enjoy all that.
It’s telling that you’re resorting to insults and not backing up your argument with additional stats. It seems the only stat you can provide is comparing win percentages, which is both an incomplete stat and a stat that’s impacted by Jones’ poor 2017 performance and player development. I’ve provided evidence my evidence. If you have no other evidence apart from that which I’ve debunked, I’ll take your insults as your concession.
Haha. You’re “evidence” is that Butch’s wins aren’t really wins and Pruitt’s losses aren’t really losses. And somehow Pruitt’s losses are Butch’s. You haven’t debunked anything.
The “objective” facts are the Butch has the highest win percentage of any coach’s since Fuller, that he went to 3 bowls in 5 years and was 3-0 in bowls. He also had high rated recruiting classes.
Your “feeling” that Pruitts loss to Georgia State over a year after Jones left was somehow Butch’s fault is the opposite of objective. If you want me to evaluate on something other than wins and losses maybe sports aren’t for you.
First off it’s “your” when describing the possessive.
Now that we’ve covered basic grammar, lets talk facts, evidence, and reason. I didn’t deny Jones win percentage, but you can’t compare five years to two. In addition to the fact that your evidence is a false equivalency, you’re cherry picking data in that you ignore why Butch was fired. You also ignore that most of his highly touted recruits ended up transferring or retiring from football. You also ignore that he didn’t beat one SEC west team while Pruitt is .500 vs west teams, including last year’s road win vs top 25 ranked Auburn.
The fact that Jones didn’t recruit lineman (we start 4 players Pruitt brought in) and didn’t recruit qb’s materially contributed to the GA St loss. Over 50% of the starters are Pruitt guys. Lastly, Butch has a worse record beating top 25 teams he was ranked below. Again-let’s see your evidence.
If you compare Jones at year one to Pruitt, they were both 5-7 with 2 sec wins. Jones beat ranked SC and unranked UK. Pruitt beat ranked Auburn and UK. Jones had the same 5-7 record Dooley did, but improved by 1 conf win. Pruitt improves by 1 game from 4-8 to 5-7 and beat 2 SEC teams, both of which are ranked. Thus, it’s a verifiable and undeniable fact that Pruitt’s first year was better as he had a higher conf win percentage than Butch and had a better win loss record overall than Butch did in his final year. He also had more wins ha ranked teams.
*vs
Your seriously blaming butch jones for losing at home to Georgia ST? TN fans really believe after beating a few really bad teams all of a sudden Pruitt is a good coach lmao.
No. We think Pruitt changed the underlying character and culture problem. But I wouldn’t expect someone who roots for Florida to understand anything about culture and character.
It’s “you’re”, idiot.
You’re joking!
How am I joking? One is empirically better than the other.
Coach A: Head coaching record 84–54 (.609), 4-2 in bowl games, 4 conference championships.
Coach B: Head coaching record 63-49 (.563), 1-2 in bowl games, 1 conference championship
Which one has a better resume? This doesn’t even take into account that Coach B’s character has been called into question literally everywhere he has been.
Actually, Kiffin’s winning percentage is 63%, all at big schools. Jones is at 60%, part at small school.
Kiffin spent three years at Alabama, OC and calling plays, Jones is an off field assistant.
Think I’d take Kiffin’s resume.
NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!
Please! Do it! Although, I know it’s just Jimmy Sexton floating his name around to try and get him hired.
He recruited fairly well at Tennessee, but as a program manager and CEO, he wasn’t great.
NO!
couple of thoughts:
1)LOL
2)He actually could come in and “sell” some recruits and donors on “his” process–which was based on Brian Kelly, but now probably has a Saban slant
3)You will have some limited success and he will be very proud of it.
4)On the surface, the program will appear to be moving in the right direction.
5)It will be MOSTLY smoke and mirrors. He will have made promises he can’t keep and will have some cracks in the foundation which will begin to show in the brick laying as time passes.
6)Get rid of him before year 4! Everything will seem fine, but have someone ready and waiting to take over and actually coach the recruits he’s brought in (some of which will be over-hyped by him)
But please hire him so UT can’t stop paying him.
Lastly, you’ll have a nice juice bar near the workout equipment.
*can stop paying him
These reporters don’t know jack! They have deadlines and pulling stories out of their backside!
Everything is just rumors and speculation until AD HY makes a statement. No one knew who was being hired to replace Mike Anderson for basketball. I would expect the same radio silence in this search as well.
There are way too many other potential candidates out there that do not have the very ordinary to downright bad resume that jones has. he may very well have learned a lot from the goat but he needs to prove it at a G5 or lower school. Surely arky will make several others turn them down before going down the red brick by brick road with Sargent Carter.
It’s stories like this that add to my suspicion that Yurachek is just as clueless/inept as CM was. Why would Butch Jones be in the running? What possible reason could he proffer for wanting Tennessee’s garbage? If his only candidates are coaches from the American Athletic Conference and Butch Jones, maybe he should go back to the AAC where he belongs.
Did Yuracheck or anyone at Arkansas say that Butch Jones was in the running? No one knows anything.
ArKansas could do much worse. Butch is a much better coach than what UT ended up with replacing him with. He could recruit, coach Potatohead can’t do that even though he says that is his goal. Butch could coach, coach Potatohead can’t do that unless you define coaching as kicking whiteboards on the sidelines, using profanities against your players relentlessly, and throwing most of the seniors and juniors off of your team after you tell the public that they suck and they’re the problem with the program. Butch got Tennessee to a bowl game in most of his seasons and had a winning bowl record, coach Potatohead can’t even spell the word ‘bowl’ let alone miracle UT into one.
The problem is, Tennessee fans want instant gratification and despite the building process and recovery that Butch was performing at their school, they couldn’t tolerate just one bad season due to crappy quarterbacks. Overall he raised the talent level at that program more than any coach they have had since Phil Fulmer. He had the highest winning percentage (almost double what coach Potatohead currently has) and he got them to post season games. They very nearly won the SEC East one of his years too short of a UF upset at Death Valley.
Tennessee fans are blind to the fact that Butch didn’t succeed at Tennessee having more to do with the fact that it’s tennessee than it is about Butch Jones’s coaching ability. So they fired him and he remains the butt of their jokes and the target of their excuses. 2 more years of not getting to bowl games under good ol Mr. Potatohead here, and they will start shifting blame to Proot. In less time than you realize, they will come to remember the Butch Jones years with fondness.
Just remember, he took The SEC’s dumpster fire and had WINNING seasons there. The guy has to be pretty good at the job to do that.
And I just want to pre-empt any of the Vol’s out there who are incensed by my comments and will think it right to try and defend their clown car coach. Butch Jones had MUCH better recruiting classes than Proot. He averaged 4+ spots higher in national rankings during his tenure for recruiting classes than Proot is managing to come up with, so it is a FACT that Pruitt is driving Tennessee’s talent away and not recruiting as well. Butch Jones had winning records and an overall decent record in his 5 seasons at Tennessee. He had a good bowl record as well for such a program. He can at least say he HAD a bowl record period compared to whatever it is Tennessee thinks it has now. Butch Jones never threw his players under the bus like Proot does ON A DAILY FREAKING BASIS. He took credit on his own shoulders for each and every loss. Just too many losses after 5 years for an overentitled fanbase who thinks Neyland is still alive somewhere.
For all the Vol fans who think they have turned the corner with their current coach, the fact is, UT is living off of the skills of 2 of Butch Jones’ star players, Jennings and Calloway. The UT offense has devolved into whatever QB happens to be on the field just throwing hail mary’s on each and every single play and letting these 2 future NFL WR’s make a play. It’s working for now, but these 2 guys are seniors and there is nobody behind them left thanks to Pruitt driving everyone off. So in 2019, exactly how do you expect to win any games with a coach that doesn’t know how to coach, a team that can’t run the ball. A team that can’t pass the ball as it’s 2 receivers are gone. And a team that has no respectable defense to speak of?
Be careful of talking bad about your coaches and blaming it all on Butch Jones, because that’s how you fellers got yourselves into this situation to begin with. You weren’t happy with what your national championship winning head coach had done for one single season, and you sent Fulmer packing. Tennessee has been getting worse each and every time it has fired/hired its head coach ever since.
Arkansas can do far worse than hiring Butch Jones. Will he win the West? Probably not, but as long as Alabama has Saban, 9 years out of 10, nobody will. Other than perhaps Houston Nutt, can Arky do better? I don’t know enough about the program to say yes or no based on their finances.
Sorry I meant 2020, not 2019. rough week….
You are a complete idiot. I’m not even going to bother laying out in detail the many things you are obviously wrong about, and your obvious lack of knowledge about the program. You are one of those mouth breathing keyboard warriors that likes to run your cousin kisser…with zero intellect.
How many SEC west teams did Jones beat? How many has Mr Potatohead beaten?
Never thought I’d say this but Gromit your opinion is WRONG on so many levels. Pruitt does not throw his players under the bus. He continued to speak highly of Guarantano even after he went rogue and called his own number against Bama. If Butch was such a good coach then why didn’t some other school snatch him up when he was let go at Tennessee?? Think you’re right? Well, literally no one else agrees with you at all!! But I guess we’re all wrong and you are right LOL. Everyone, even the usual Tennessee naysayers have said that Tennessee is in a much better place now than they were under Butch. Time will prove you wrong. Butch going 0-8 in the conference and 4-6 overall in year 3 showed that he was going backwards. Butch never beat an SEC west team and never beat Muschamp…Guess who has? I’m not ready to crown Pruitt king of all Tennessee coaches but even Ray Charles could see that this team is better. If Champions Of Life, 5 star hearts and all that jazz seems like something a better coach would say then by all means hire him at Arkansas.
HELL NO!! I’m a Razorback living in Tennessee and married to a Vols fan. NO…just NO!! Are you kidding me???
Well Arkansas…this…this is finally rock bottom.
If this is best they can do…they should have just given the guy they had another year…even bringing back Houston nutt is a better choice than Jones…
1) this is clickbait.
2) I suppose we COULD do worse.
3) I BELIEVE we CAN do better.
4) this is clickbait.
5) God, please let this just be clickbait….
Like somebody else said, this is highly likely to have been started by Butch’s agent. Until the AD says it, don’t listen to it.
We couldn’t be so lucky, could we?