From the Office of Dubious Achievement

Darryl Gamble has something on his mind he wants to share.

… Gamble, who signed in 2006 and redshirted that first season, pointed out that there’s not a player on this team now who’s won an SEC championship.

“We don’t want to be the only class since coach Richt has been here that hasn’t won an SEC championship,” Gamble said. “This is our last shot, but we’ve got to make it happen, got to do extra stuff and make sure everybody’s doing extra stuff…”

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You know, you didn’t really need to point that out.

David Paschall plays Debbie Downer with this factoid:

… Thursday was the first time the Bulldogs have practiced in a 3-4 system since 1994, when Ray Goff was coach and Marion Campbell defensive coordinator.

Ugh.  Goff never should have asked a swamp fox to do a junkyard dog’s work.

The pleasure of uncertainty

Y’all can have the red meat comments from yesterday’s practice.  For my money, this was far and away the best quote:

… Playing faster will be the long-term goal. In the immediate future, Justin Houston expects a bit more confusion.

A week ago, he was pretty confident that the Bulldogs would be able to execute the defense quickly after the team studied the 3-4 scheme on film – watching new defensive coordinator Todd Grantham’s former Dallas Cowboys players run plays. Now that Houston has had his first chance to execute the defense on the field, he’s backtracking a bit on that enthusiasm.

“There was a lot of stopping and looking around,” Houston said. “It’s not as easy as it looks on film. Those guys in the pros make it look easy.”

To which I say, good.

You're not in Martinez-land any more, boys. (photo via Tricia Spaulding/AB-H)

After reading all the faux-confident comments from spring practices past about how that year’s model defense was tanned, rested and ready to GATA, it’s downright refreshing to hear an admission that there’s plenty of hard work ahead getting the defense put together to be an SEC-ready unit.  A little humility can go a long way.

Uncertainty cuts both ways, too.  This was my second favorite observation of the day:

… Coming off that same field, tailback Caleb King complained to teammate Nick Williams that Georgia’s 3-4 was going to be tough to compete against in practice this season. Despite any confusion among the defensive players, King was sufficiently impressed.

May opposing offenses this season share his impression.