Players and coaches hate comparisons. And I certainly understand why. Once one comparison is made, then media-types can always go back and point to that comparison, especially if it turns out wrong. However, I couldn’t help myself.
When I saw some fiery body language from Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava in the Vanderbilt game, I couldn’t help but think of former Vol quarterback Hendon Hooker. The two come across as the quiet-type, but they’ve both shown that it’s best not to rile them up during games. There’s plenty of passion at hand.
Hooker had a couple of moments in which his fire spilled over into a face-to-fact meeting of wills against an opponent. Iamaleava had a similar instance in the Vols’ last game, a 36-23 win over Vanderbilt.
“I love it, man,” Tennessee center Cooper Mays said of seeing Iamaleava get fired up. “I mean, there’s nothing that really makes you fired up to protect somebody and to play for somebody and do all these things that we do as an o-linemen to see a little bit of, you know, just kind of be like us a little bit, you know what I’m saying?
“You’ve seen quarterbacks that that kind of act soft and kind of play that role of quarterback. And they just play the part. They’ll get hit and they’ll just lay there and you know, take a while to get up and kind of make everybody look at them and like, ‘Oh my gosh, you know, pitiful me.’
“But then you got guys like Nico, who, when there’s 10 people pushing in a pile, he’ll be the 11th guy to get in there and help. He’ll take off running and put his body on the line. And when you see a quarterback that operates like that, you’ve got no choice but to get in there in the fight with them.
“So I think it’s awesome.”
Hooker was known for doing the same thing. So does Mays see some comparisons?
“I don’t know if it’s a stretch,” Mays said. “I just think it’s hard to compare, just because of how different the whole scenario of their careers just played out. At the end of the day when I played with him (Hooker) and I was 21 years old and he was like 25, and now I’m like 23, looking at Nico as an 18, 19-year-old kid. I can’t really compare it much because I’m looking through a totally different lens now.”
Mays, however, can see one thing plain as day. He can see how Iamaleava was once down on himself, which was natural after the Vols’ offense went from hyped to hampered by too many new parts, including Iamaleava. Now, Mays sees a young man with much more confidence.
“He just probably feels a little bit more comfortable, looks a little bit more comfortable,” Mays said, likely referring to the improved passing pocket that Iamaleava has now as opposed to earlier in the season when offensive tackle play was, well, a bit sketchy. “I don’t really know anything about quarterback play, so I don’t really know anything technically that he would be doing different or any throws that he’s making better. But I do know as a 19-year-old man, a kid or whatever you want to call it at that stage.
“I do know that playing college football is hard, you know, especially when you haven’t done it before. And I know that he’s gotten opportunities throughout the year to get better at it. That makes anybody a little bit more confident and comfortable when you figure out you can do something and you know you can do it in your heart of hearts.”
Mays believes Iamaleava has more confidence than before. And who wouldn’t? He was thrown to the lions in the opening weeks of SEC play with an offensive line that was not ready to protect him. Still, Iamaleava didn’t flinch.
“If you don’t ever fail in life, when you do get crushed later on in life, it’s going to derail you,” Mays said. “So learn to fail early and often and learn to get back up and and make something right out of it, like it’s not the end of the world. You’re going to mess up, you know, it’s it’s a it’s a tale as old as time.”
