It’s hard to miss the facts about faith, and scripture, in Tennessee QB Hendon Hooker’s life — GetReligion
Thus, let me note a story of two in East Tennessee media that spotted crucial faith facts about this calm, steady quarterback and worked them into a sports-page basic — the pre-game rituals feature. The headline at the Knoxville News Sentinel read: “How Hendon Hooker will calm his nerves before Tennessee football plays Florida.” The faith issue even made it into the overture:
Neyland Stadium will be rocking before Tennessee football plays Florida … , but Hendon Hooker will go into slow-jam mode and lean on his faith.
ESPN’s College Gameday will rev up the crowd. Checker Neyland will create quite a scene. And the sellout crowd will shake the stadium moments before the Vols run through the Power T.
A few lines later there is this basic quote:
“I just go into meditation mode and put my gospel playlist on,” Hooker said Monday. “I really just listen to a lot of slow jams and really just relax. I kind of go through the locker room and dap up everyone, just to make sure that I’m ready to roll. And they give me the reassurance back by the look in their eyes that they’re ready to roll too.”
Now, this is where this short story paused for a moment and asked some follow-up questions.
Raise your hand if you think it would be logical to ask for some examples of the music in that pre-game playlist. This story didn’t go very far into the specifics, but it did like this subject to one of the most interesting facts in the quarterback’s resume.
Hooker’s playlist always includes Kiki Sheard, a Grammy nominated gospel singer, as well as Kirk Franklin and Fred Hammond. And when Tennessee’s quarterbacks know the game plan inside and out, they turn their attention to a different playbook.
“Me and (backup quarterback Joe Milton), we have a devotional book that we read every day,” Hooker said. “So before the game, we’ll read one or two pages.”
It’s not surprising that faith has a role in Hooker’s pregame ritual. One of his first forays into the name, image and likeness space was done to create a faith-based children’s book called “The ABCs of Scripture for Athletes.”
If readers are interested in that topic, they can go to Hooker’s website — Hooked On Sports — or read some almost identical material in a feature — “Meditation, gospel music key to Hooker’s pregame routine” — at the Vols section of this fan-niche website, 247sports.com.
I would ask if “meditation” is another word for “prayer.” Also, it is interesting that the religion hooks in this story do not appear in a UT sports press release entitled, “ ‘Brotherhood’ Helping Tennessee QB Duo Flourish.”
That’s especially interesting since the deep friendship between Hooker and Milton is truly eyebrow raising. Why? Milton was the 2021 starter until an injury put Hooker on the field and the rest is Vols history.
College-football fans all know what is supposed to happen next in this age of the red-hot NCAA “transfer portal” — that legal wormhole that allows athletes to jump from school to school in search of a slot in the starting lineup. Then again, some stars may be seeking a better financial deal under the “Name, Image, Likeness” rules allowing them to get paid for promotional work with local, regional or national brands.
So why is the massive, talented and fast Milton still at UT-Knoxville?
