A University of Tennessee graduate was named this week by CBS Sports as one of the top front-office executives in college football.

CBS Sports pointed out “22 front-office executives who are revolutionizing how rosters are built”, and they included Auburn Tigers GM of Player Personnel Will Redmond on their list.

Redmond, who has also spent time with the LSU Tigers, earned his earned his undergraduate (2013) and graduate degrees (2015) from Tennessee.

From CBS Sports: Family ties to the university helped Auburn pull Redmond away from LSU, and the Auburn GM has helped transform the program’s talent base. The first two years of the Hugh Freeze era haven’t gone as fans have wanted, but industry and personnel sources credit the work Redmond and his team have done in getting the necessary talent to be successful in the SEC after taking over from Bryan Harsin. Auburn signed the nation’s No. 6 recruiting class (led by in-state 5-star Malik Autry) and then loaded up in the transfer portal with a stacked group headlined by Georgia Tech receiver Eric Singleton

“They’ve cleaned up over there the last two years and if they can get the quarterback problem right, they are going to be an absolute problem,” said one personnel source. “If they move on from Hugh, someone will take over one of the most loaded rosters in the country that has just not produced.”

Tennessee is one of several Power-4 programs that doesn’t have an official general manager (one source recently told AtoZ Sports that around 70 percent of Power-4 college football programs currently have a general manager).

Billy High, who is currently Tennessee’s director of internal and advance scouting, is the closest thing the Vols have to a general manager.

“We’ve got really good people that handle everything that goes into the recruitment process — our personnel side of it, what we’re doing on the high school side of it and portal side of it,” said Vols head coach Josh Heupel at the Big Orange Caravan in April.

“(Heupel) and I are talking about that,” added Tennessee athletic director Danny White in the spring when asked about the general manager position. “We have a great setup right now, and he (Heupel) has a really strong recruiting staff. They work with our administrative staff to manage the financial side. And as we get into July 1 and moving forward as we’re funding the rev share directly, that will be even more important….(The possibility of hiring a general manager) is definitely an ongoing evaluation entering this new territory.”

Tennessee seems comfortable, for now, with its current setup.

But it also seems like Tennessee dealt with more personnel/NIL issues this offseason than most Power-4 programs (Nico Iamaleava, Mike Matthews, Boo Carter, Rickey Gibson, just to name a few).

If Heupel and White ever decide that a general manager is necessary, maybe they should look into bringing Redmond home to Rocky Top. After all, he’s helped Auburn accumulate some impressive talent despite mixed on-the-field results from Hugh Freeze.

Tennessee Volunteers News

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Zach Ragan