Upon further review: Georgia-LSU

Usually when I watch the replay after I’ve been to the game live, I’m conscious of tempering my Saturday impressions.  I figure generally that I’m overly optimistic after a win and tend to overstate the bad after a loss.

Not so much this week, brother.  In fact, I think I owe Mike Bobo an apology for lumping his playcalling in the same category with the overall play and direction of the special teams (minus Drew Butler, of course).  I’m officially moving him from the land of the ugly to the merely bad, because special teams deserve to be in a category all their own.

Part of my frustration stems from the obvious:  the fundamentals of blocking are so clearly missing on kickoffs and kickoff returns.  Not that there were too many to evaluate, but on every kickoff return, LSU had players in position to tackle the ball carrier before he could get up much of a head of steam.  On the other side, Holiday had plenty of real estate to scoot through, especially, as I noted yesterday, on that second run back that set up the winning score.  It’s apparent to me that not enough time or attention is being given to making sure players on special teams know what they’re doing.

I’m not looking for Urban Meyer levels of self-promotion here (hey, look at how we make special teams special at Florida!), just a willingness to put the effort into making sure that players know their roles and purpose and execute them competently.  That we’re complaining about this for as extended a period as we have tells me that there’s a structural flaw here in Richt’s approach that he needs to address immediately.

But even more disappointing than the kickoff game is what Georgia did on punt returns (and there were plenty of those in the second half).  Four punts, zero return yardage.  There wasn’t even an attempt made to return one.  Georgia had Logan Gray fielding a punt on its own forty.  Nor did Georgia ever attempt to put any pressure on the punter, including the golden opportunity the defense gave the punt return team after the first defensive series of the second half when LSU had to punt from inside its own two yard line.

Richt’s explanation?

… the use of Logan Gray on punts is in large part because Georgia is using essentially its regular defensive unit to prevent a fake.

That is the essence of why Georgia came up on the short end of the stick Saturday.  This staff has grown fearful of being aggressive.  I don’t know if that’s because they’ve come to distrust their players’ instincts, or if it was some lame attempt to cut down on turnovers.  In any event, it’s not winning football.

LSU had 44 yards of punt returns.  Georgia had none.  On kickoff returns, Holiday’s average (44.5 yards) was almost equal to Georgia’s total (48 yards).  You can’t concede that kind of yardage in a tight game like the one we saw.  Besides that, what kind of message are you sending your players when you make tactical decisions like that?

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UPDATE: David Hale replays Georgia’s greatest hits… um, kicks… um, misses… oh, hell, you get the idea.

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UPDATE #2: Paul has another special teams concern.