Dustin Dopirak of the News Sentinel spent eight and a half minutes with Butch Jones talking about recruiting recently, and came away with some really good insight into how Jones and his staff approach recruiting prospects.
At one point toward the end of the discussion, Jones is asked about dealing with the parents of prospects and what they're concerned about and how that's different than it was 10 years ago.
Jones' answer started out with him explaining that since he has a Freshman on the Vols team now (his son Alex is a place kicker), his perspective has changed a bit, and then the rest of his answer got even more interesting.
"I'm in the process right now of working through compliance, because right now, we want to be able to - in some way, shape, or form - be able to provide the parents of our new signees the book Generation iY by Tim Elmore. It's helped me as a partent, and it's helped me understand kids in this society, but it's also challenged me as a parent, and I always evaluate myself as a parent, and my wife Barb does the same thing."
"There are two types of parents. Number one is the parent who is preparing the kid for the path, and the [other] is the parent who is preparing the path for the kid."
"It's good to suffer adversity, and it's good to fail. That's how they learn. That's how you become better. It's helped me become a better parent, I think I'm able to relate to our parents a bit more, and also to relate to our players and I think we're better for that."