QB Milton likely key for Vols’ ‘freaky bright’ future
Quarterback Joe Milton III, a Pahokee native, earned Orange Bowl MVP honors after his Volunteers beat the Tigers Friday night at Hard Rock Stadium.
Listen to Joe Milton III speak, and it won’t take long to understand just how much football means to him.
The 22-year-old quarterback for the Tennessee Volunteers was born and spent most of his early life in Pahokee, a rural town located in Palm Beach County along the shore of Lake Okeechobee with a population of about 5,400. Milton has a tattoo on his arm that reads “Muck City,” the phrase given to his hometown and the surrounding area because of the vast sugarcane fields found in the area.
“I didn’t have everything I wanted,” Milton said. “I pretty much dreamed everything I wanted. And every morning, I played football.”
He always kept a football around — first it was foam Nerf footballs when he was just starting to play; now it’s extra balls from practice that he keeps by his bed at home in Knoxville while at school. His obsession with football was so great growing up that his mom would stop him from playing the sport as a punishment instead of, say, taking away video games.
“Little did she know,” Milton said, “I still went outside and played football.”
He stands 6-5 now and has been blessed with a cannon for a right arm that helped him become a four-star football prospect and has him in the position he’s in now. He once threw a football 70 yards from his knees and always told people he could throw it at least 80 yards standing up.
“It’s actually more than 80,” Milton admitted.
Milton tries to stay stoic regardless of his performance, and he’s had his share of ups and downs over the past five years of his college football career.
But on Friday, after a statement win in the biggest game of his career to date in a stadium about 90 minutes south of where he grew up?
“I smiled a couple times,” Milton said.
And for good reason.
Milton earned most valuable player honors after leading No. 6 Tennessee to a 31-14 win over seventh-ranked Clemson in the Orange Bowl at Hard Rock Sta