NFL Draft Experts Says Tennessee's Offense 'Not a Real System'

The Tennessee Vols have experienced winning at an extremely high rate under head coach Josh Heupel. Yet, the offense continues to take criticism.

The Tennessee Volunteers have seen quite the turnaround under head coach Josh Heupel. In the twenty years prior to Heupel’s arrival in Knoxville, the Vols averaged 7.5 wins per season. Under Heupel, the Vols have averaged 10 wins per season over the last three seasons.

Now, entering year five under Heupel and heading into a season with questions at the quarterback position fresh off a CFP appearance in 2024, the Vols have plenty of pressure on the offensive side of the football. A side of the ball that’s constantly receiving comments about play style, especially from “NFL Draft Analyst” 

The folks from ProFootballFocus are the latest to throw shots at the Heupel system, calling it “Not a real system” per Sam Monson. 

During their “Check the Mic” podcast on PFF, Sam Monson and Steve Palazzalo took turns taking shots at the Tennessee offense. 

"It's not a real system relative to an NFL system. It's abstractions. You're looking at wide receivers, like, this is not wide receiver tape. This is effectively like picking an athlete and asking him to run a go route and a hitch in practice and being like, yeah, that's my No. 1 wide receiver. It's impossible. It's a complete and total projection,” Monson said. 

Palazzalo added even further comments about the difficulty projected the athletes coming from Tennessee, applauding Heupel for his system, but pointing to the issues. 

"It is always difficult to unpack that offense. And to repeat for the millionth time, good for Tennessee, good for Josh Heupel, good for college football. Difficult for NFL evaluations. Because they're exploiting the hash marks, they're exploiting space, which is good football coaching, but it's bad for NFL draft projections. Because that's not what the NFL runs."