College Football Rumors: Tee Martin To Leave USC for Tennessee?

One of the biggest stories in sports news coming from Los Angeles, CA yesterday, was of newly hired head coach Butch Jones, and the Tennessee Volunteers interviewing USC Trojans wide receivers coach, Tee Martin.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise considering that trips around the coaching carousel are what’s expected this time of year, and especially considering that Martin’s alma mater is Tennessee.

What is surprising is that Martin would entertain the idea, given that the Southeast region is the base of his recruiting. This includes 2013 Trojan commits, 4-star CB, Jalen Ramsey from the Brentwood Academy in Brentwood, Tennessee, and 4-star DE Jason Hatcher from Trinity High School in Louisville, KY.

Jones began the pursuit of Martin several days ago, but USC is a private university and doesn’t have to disclose salary, so the $3 million dollar salary cap Jones has to work with might be the deal breaker for the Vols former 1998 National Championship winning QB.

Martin’s comments following the trip seemed to allude that he’s taking the matter lightly, and will be discussing the option with his family, but should he decide to head back to Knoxville, he’d become the third wide receivers coach to resign under Kiffin with Ted Gilmore and John Morton in 2011, and 2010, respectively.

There have been reports that since the Home Depot College Football Awards in Orlando, Florida last weekend, Martin has expressed frustration because he couldn’t be in attendance to support Marqise Lee, winner of the 2012 Biletnikoff Award.

Again that’s speculation, but while Trojans have accepted Kiffin’s strip-down of the once hyped up, Pete Carroll days in hopes of avoiding NCAA inquiries, perhaps more “structured leniency” would increase that retention statistic.

As we all know, there’s no definitive way to approach the possibilities of coaching changes until they are declared and we accept them, so for now, Trojans and Vols wait, and over-analyze Martin’s quote: “we’ll see what happens”.

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