First snarky question of 2010

If you’re an assistant coach, is it more financially rewarding to get a job offer from Lane Kiffin or to be someone that Mark Richt is interested in?

Meanwhile, from another universe

After reading this, it’s almost hard to remember that Georgia won by 24.  (h/t Dawg Sports)

More he said, he said from Lubbock

Now the Texas Tech trainer has weighed in on what happened with Adam James.

However, Pincock said James was initially placed in a “sports medicine garage, there is no lock on this building.” Pincock said injured players are typically asked to perform exercises during practice, but “James could not participate in these drills, and was originally asked to walk around the field.”

“Adam showed up to practice in street clothes, no team gear, and dark sunglasses,” Pincock said, according to the statement. “Adam walked about 40 to 50 yards, very slowly and with a non-caring attitude.”

Pincock said Leach then asked that James be moved to a location “where sunlight could not bother him as he was wearing sunglasses.”

“I instructed Adam to stay in the garage and out of the sun, so the light would not worsen his condition,” Pincock said in the statement. “While in the garage, Adam was walking around, eating ice, sitting on the ground, and, at one point, sleeping; at no point was there any enforcement to make Adam stand up.”

Two days later, while the Red Raiders practiced at Jones AT&T Stadium, James was placed in a room that is used for postgame interviews involving opposing coaches and players. James told school officials he was placed in an electrical closet inside the room.

“I walked Adam to the room, which was at least as big as a two-car garage,” Pincock wrote. “Inside the room there is an electrical closet. I looked in the closet and stated that there was ‘no way that Adam would be placed in there.’ I shut the door to the electrical closet, and it was never opened again. At no time during this practice was Adam ever placed in the electrical closet.”

Two things here:

• First, somebody – I can’t say with certainty whom yet, although I certainly have my suspicions – is going to wind up looking very bad here.  I mean bad in the sense of being a public, lying SOB.  As this is going down, there isn’t a whole lot of gray area to the story as told by James and the story as told by the TT staff.  And if James is the liar, it’s going to get quite expensive for the school.
• Second, ESPN is backing off from its initially monolithic coverage of the events leading up to the firing and the firing itself.  Leach spoke with Rece Davis yesterday and now you have this Schlabach piece.  It’s just another indication that the pirate isn’t going to go off quietly like Mangino did.

CFA Bowl thoughts: Eat mor oranj.

A few scattered thoughts as I watched the CFA Bowl unfold:

• It wasn’t one of Monte Kiffin’s finest hours, that’s for sure – especially since he had a month to prepare for one of the less complex offensive schemes out there.  Heck, Georgia Tech did a better job holding down the Hokies’ scoring than the Vols did.
• Tyrod Taylor’s fake on the end around may have been the prettiest single play of the postseason.
• Bud Foster wouldn’t have looked too bad wearing red and black next year, would he?
• Junior was classy to the end.  Nice post game handshake.
• How did Georgia get smoked by those guys?
• While the rest of us argue about the regular season and the postseason, Vol fans are hip to the real season – recruitin’ season.  Tennessee’s gonna finish in the top ten, so there!

And a Happy New Year to all…

I hope 2010 finds every one of you happy and prosperous, GTP readers.  (I’m in the real estate business, so my recollection of prosperous is a bit hazy these days, but I mean well.)

And thanks for coming here every day.  December was the first month ever that the blog registered more than 200,000 hits.  I probably owe Willie Martinez a special nod for that.

Anyway, enjoy the day and the year.