Vols Update (via 247)

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There's a lot of chatter about Tee Martin tonight, so I thought I would address it here.

I was told Tee never had a ton of interest in the Tennessee job over the course of this search, but now that all of this stuff has gone down today, he does see this as an opportunity he could possibly take advantage of. The Tennessee opening certainly looks different now than it did 12 hours ago. But it's also worth noting that Jimmy Sexton is his agent, so a lot of that talk could be coming from Sexton trying to get his guy a head coach gig. But apparently Tee is keeping his eye on the movement at Tennessee. Whether the Vols would go down that road remains to be seen.

As much public backlash as there was today against the possibility of hiring Greg Schiano, there was just as much backlash among Tennessee donors. The big names, too, as in seven-figure donors. And with reports that Currie flew to Columbus and already had an MOU signed by both parties, you'd have to imagine he was taking this search where he wanted to take it without much meaningful input from those big-name donors. So they spoke up and spoke loudly.

There was similar backlash from a lot of former players, some voicing it on social media and others communicating amongst each other about how unhappy they were with the thought of Schiano being Currie's hire.

It feels like, as much as anything, it was the big donors and former players that forced Tennessee's hand this afternoon and eventually forced the Vols to walk away from what was a finalizing deal.

Despite the attention Tennessee's fanbase has gotten from national media today, saying the fan backlash made this fall apart. There were obviously a lot of factors in play.

With an MOU signed by both parties, questions that will have to be answered going forward are how much money, if any, that Tennessee owes Schiano and how this affects Currie's role going forward. It's hard to imagine he has the same support inside his own athletic department that he had at the beginning of the day, but that's just outside speculation at this point.

Darren Rovell, ESPN's Sports Business Reporter, said earlier on twitter that factors that would go into the money would be if the MOU was signed and executed and which party backed out first, or if it was mutual.

We reported Saturday that Currie went around to some select UTAD personnel seeking feedback on a handful of candidates, and the feedback on Schiano was unanimously negative, as it was described to me.

That sentiment seemed to be reflected when the Schiano leaks started this afternoon, with Currie in Columbus finalizing a deal while many UTAD employees were in the dark in Knoxville and not happy with the news.

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