While there’s still a big mystery surrounding Tennessee Football’s starting quarterback situation for the upcoming season, excitement is high around true freshman Faizon Brandon and the potential he has. Brandon is currently in the thick of a quarterback battle with redshirt freshman George MacIntyre and Colorado transfer Ryan Staub, which will continue into training camp this fall.
Josh Heupel didn’t give any indication about which player had a lead on things coming out of spring camp, but Brandon did leave a lasting impression with the media around the team. Analysts and reporters were impressed by Brandon’s size and skill despite it being just his first camp at the collegiate level.
ESPN’s Billy Tucker ranked the Top 100 newcomers (transfers and true freshmen) around college football on Tuesday, slotting Brandon in as the No. 22 player on the list and the Vols’ second-highest newcomer behind DT transfer Xavier Gilliam. And while there’s plenty of praise in Tucker’s write-up, the ESPN analyst ends his thoughts with two names that Tennessee fans are plenty familiar with.
“Brandon is more advanced than Hendon Hooker at the same stage and more advanced as a passer than Joe Milton,” Tucker writes.
It’s not the first time that we’ve heard those names in comparison to Brandon. In July 2025, while Brandon was still one of the top-ranked recruits in the country, ESPN’s Tom Luginbill shared a similar sentiment to some of Tennessee’s previous quarterbacks.
“Several recent Volunteers quarterbacks have similar stature, athleticism and arm strength,” Luginbill wrote last July. “Brandon is more advanced than Hendon Hooker at the same stage and the pair share several traits. Brandon is also much more accurate than Joe Milton. While he lacks (Nico) Iamaleava’s polish at this stage, Brandon throws an exceptional deep ball, which is a requirement in this scheme that loves to attack vertically.”
More From RTI: College Football Insider Gives Insight Into Faizon Brandon’s Chances to Win Tennessee’s QB Battle
Heupel was never going to name a starting quarterback during the spring, opting to give his competitors the chance to soak in training camp feedback over the summer to come back and compete for the job during fall camp. But that hasn’t stopped some voices covering the team to share their opinions on what’s already happened and what may happen in the future.
Former Tennessee wide receiver and Knoxville radio host Jayson Swain was impressed with Brandon from what he saw over the course of the spring.
“Nobody is going to admit that one has the lead over the other, but from my time seeing a quarterback competition, it’s not tied all the time… Somebody has a lead based on the last practice or last season of the offseason,” Swain said on The Sports Animal. “That was spring, Faizon was better. That doesn’t mean that Faizon is going to be the starter; that just means he has the lead right now.
“George has to have a really good summer to catch back up. It’s possible for him to do that, but that’s what he has to do. But Faizon has the lead right now, and I’m not letting anybody tell me otherwise. I believe my eyes. Folks saw what they saw during the Orange and White Game, too.”
It’s the second straight quarterback competition for the Vols after Joey Aguilar won the 2025 battle, and it’ll now be five straight seasons that Tennessee has had a different starting quarterback at the helm: Hooker in 2022, Milton in 2023, Iamaleava in 2025, and Aguilar in 2025.
Stay tuned to Rocky Top Insider for more Tennessee Football coverage this offseason.
