mayo still has something to prove

Rather than making his mark as the next great athlete to come out of the remarkably fertile Tidewater area of Virginia, Jerod Mayo, the Tennessee Volunteers' talented junior linebacker, is simply hoping to remain healthy for a complete football season.

Judging from his past productivity when he’s been at full-strength, Mayo could be the finest linebacker in the Southeastern Conference if he can finally overcome the nagging injuries that have forced him to be a spectator during impotant stretches of each of his prior seasons at UT.

The 6-foot-2, 230-pounder is regarded as one of top linebackers in the SEC despite an injury-plagued career, but with that being said, Mayo enters his junior season with as much to prove as ever.

Questions abound:

Is Mayo capable of staying healthy for an entire college football season?

Can Mayo, a First-Team Pre-season All-Conference pick by the league’s coaches, continue to be productive if and when he’s moved to the middle linebacker position?

Does he possess the mental make-up to be a team leader with the ability to mentor young linebacker prospects?

Will Jerod Mayo be the next great athlete to come out of the Tidewater area of Virginia?

More importantly to Vol fans, can Mayo be UT’s next great linebacker and perhaps open up a pipeline to help lure future football prospects from his hometown to Knoxville?

Mayo signed with the Vols after earning PrepStar All-American honors and 2003 Defensive Player of the Year in the Virginia Peninsula area as a high school senior.

He generated buzz with a head-turning preseason in 2005 before making his first career start and recording two tackles at weakside linebacker against the Florida Gators.

His first setback as a college athlete was perhaps a sign of things to come when he missed the Vols’ win over Mississippi that year with a knee injury.

He returned to the lineup to record a total of five tackles in limited action against SEC rivals Alabama and Georgia but wound up missing the Vols’ last four games of the season while nursing another knee injury.

Mayo’s star really shone last year as a sophomore.

The tough, fast and active linebacker finished the season with five and a half sacks and 13.5 tackles for loss to lead the team in both categories. His 83 total stops were third on the team and 11^th in the SEC.

What’s more impressive is the fact that Mayo achieved those accomplishments, as well as earning SEC Player of the Week on two occasions, despite missing a significant amount of playing time with yet another knee injury.

He was named a second team All-American by Rivals.com after his sophomore season and has been included on a list of candidates for the 2007 Bronko Najurski Trophy, an award that annually goes to America’s best linebacker.

The Vols' flashy linebacker is just the latest in a line of exceptional athletes to come out of that Tidewater area of Virginia. He’s not even the only star athlete on the UT campus to call the area around Hampton home.

Duke Crews, a rising sophomore star on the Vols’ basketball team, is a Hampton native, as is Brent Vinson, a highly-touted wide receiver who will be a freshman this season with the Vols.

Per capita, it would be hard to find another region anywhere in America that produces the incredible wealth of athletic talent that the Tidewater area near the Atlantic Ocean produces year in and year out.

Just over the last decade, some other athletic stars from that same area to break onto the national sports scene include: NBA basketball star Allen Iverson; NFL quarterback Aaron Brooks; former North Carolina and current Oakland Raider standout Ronald Curry; NFL All-Pro Michael Vick, and his brother Marcus, a troubled college quarterback standout at Virginia Tech; and highly-regarded quarterback prospects Tyrod Taylor and E.J. Manuel, just to name a few.

Manuel, a 6-foot-4, 205 pound quarterback prospect, has thrown 42 career touchdowns and amassed more than 3,800 passing yards. He is considered one of the top quarterback recruits in America for the Class of 2008.

A senior to be at Bayside (Hampton) High School this season, Manuel has committed to sign with Florida State on National Signing Day in February of 2008.

If Mayo has a chance to be the next great football player from his hometown, he’ll likely have to make his mark at middle linebacker as opposed to weakside linebacker where he starred last year

The linebacker position, coached by defensive coordinator John Chavis, could very well be the strength of the Vols’ defense this season, despite the loss of last year’s middle linebacker, Marvin Mitchell, to graduation.

Most observers expect Chavis and the Vols’ defensive staff to move Mayo from weakside linebacker over to the middle linebacker spot. Veteran Ryan Karl started in ’06 at the strongside linebacker position and will likely remain at that position this year. Ballyhooed sophomore Rico McCoy is expected to fill the weakside position if Mayo does indeed move to the middle.

Mayo isn’t concerned with where he lines up on the field, just as long as he stays healthy enough to remain in the lineup.

“Everybody’s speculating,” said Mayo after a workout during spring practice. “I’m not sure where I’m going to play right now. We have a lot of guys that can play each and every position. It’s kind of like a jack-of-all-trades type of position. I’ll play the middle if need be. It’s not a problem.”

Other candidates expected to push the Vols’ established linebackers for playing time this fall include sophomore Dorian Davis, redshirt freshman LaMarcus Thompson, junior Ellix Wilson and fiery walk-on Nick Reveiz. Chris Walker and Chris Donald are a pair of true freshmen linebacker prospects with a ton of athletic ability and potential.

Even though he’s proved himself to be one of the top linebackers returning in the Southeastern Conference this year, Mayo says there’s still so much talent around him that he feels like he has to prove himself everyday in practice just to keep his position.

“I still feel like I’m a third-stringer on this team,” Mayo said to the press after a spring practice workout. “There’s no position solidified on this team right now, so you have to go out everyday and practice hard.”