January 1, 2011 · 1:03 PM

A man’s got his pride.

At least after the game is over.

… Georgia coach Mark Richt didn’t accept the runner-up trophy, instead telling an official to get it to him later.

44 Comments

Filed under Georgia Football

44 responses to “A man’s got his pride.”

  1. Russ
    January 1, 2011 at 1:56 PM

    Now it just looks like petty pouting. Nothing “prideful” there IMHO.

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  2. W Cobb Dawg
    January 1, 2011 at 2:10 PM

    Don’t send him a contract renewal either.

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  3. AthensHomerDawg
    January 1, 2011 at 2:14 PM

    Not cool. Not a good example. Geezz.

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  4. Ben
    January 1, 2011 at 2:23 PM

    I think he gets a pass here, honestly. At least it shows he’s pissed off instead of standing up there sullenly receiving a runner up trophy for a crappy bowl game. I mean, what kind of pride would there be in accepting the trophy for a Liberty Bowl win? I get cheering for your team, but this game and this bowl and this season has been a disappointment since the word “Go.”

    I’m watching the Citrus Bowl and seeing the way Alabama plays hard and fast when they’re in a disappointing bowl (relative to their expectations) and seeing that UF has enough guts with their round-robin QB situation to put some points on there board, and it makes me really sour on the whole season.

    I kind of wish we had played Caleb King just so the game could be stricken from the record books.

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  5. dboy
    January 1, 2011 at 2:28 PM

    What kind of morons give out a runner-up trophy? Maybe if there were many teams /competitors like the olympics it would be more appropriate but there are two teams: a winner and loser. This isn’t 5 year-olds playing soccer… wow

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  6. aious
    January 1, 2011 at 2:29 PM

    Richt has lost just about all of his supporters

    All of his Disney fans have abandoned ship

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  7. sUGArdaddy
    January 1, 2011 at 3:19 PM

    The Caleb King situation is part of the problem. Did he know the rules? Yes. But, only at UGA and Vanderbilt does that kid not play in that bowl game. He didn’t flunk out. He missed some classes and meetings. We can pound our chest about our integrity all we want, but we need to level the playing field or PUBLICLY pursue the SEC to standardize class attendance and academic policies.

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  8. Dawg 39
    January 1, 2011 at 3:21 PM

    Blame Bobo too, but the play in the trenches, Ol & Dl, has been terrible. It is time for a complete revamping of the entire coaching staff. Time to move on.

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  9. Will Trane
    January 1, 2011 at 4:21 PM

    Where do you think this program will be this time next year. Vandy is getting a new coach. No recruit commitments since August. Recruiting is going to be very difficult for CMR and group. It is hard to tell young HS players that you are bringing a program back based on your performance the past two years. CMR has dung himself a big hole to come out of. Player issues off the field and the play on the field will influence a lot of kids and parents to look elsewhere. A player like King is a “high maintenance” player. It is not that hard to stay out of trouble, go to class and practice, put some time and effort into it. Write those checks to a D1 school for your child to get an education and a degree. If you have the talent why in hell waste it. Sorry, but I do not have the tolerance for those kind of players. Take the Kris Durhams day in and day out. What I take from this woeful season is Kris Durham…a player and a man for all games and all seasons.

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  10. D.N. Nation
    January 1, 2011 at 4:41 PM

    Georgia has the longest current winning streak of any SEC team. In basketball.

    Just thought I’d note that.

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  11. Castleberry
    January 1, 2011 at 5:20 PM

    I like the move. Maybe the depths of this loss have brought out the Evil Richt persona once and for all. It may be his only chance for survival.

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    • G
      January 1, 2011 at 9:45 PM

      Evil Richt was just a gimmick, just like the Celebration, black jerseys, and the Grambling uniforms. I’m tired of his gimmicks.

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  12. The Original Cynical in Athens
    January 1, 2011 at 5:32 PM

    It was a great ride guys. Hopefully McGarity will have the balls to make the proper decision soon enough that we will not all be sitting here in 2025 talking about how great that 2005 SEC Title was.

    UGA football is a tire fire. I really do not know what has happened, but I think that Coach Richt getting disgustingly rich and way, way too comfortable with his position and the loss of Brian Van Gorder have led to the place we are now.

    We are the most mentally weak football team I have ever seen at any level of football. It’s clear that the coaches and staff are lazy and that there is absolutely no accountability within the program at any level. Unfortunately the foundation of the program has so severely eroded and the players have such a lack of respect for Coach Richt, that it is likely going to require total turnover to get out of this downward trend.

    The schedule is very manageable next year, but we will be 0-2 by the 2nd week of September, and 83,000 will be the average attendance for the remaninder of the season.

    I am excited about the fact that the Hartman Contribution this year is going to be about $1,200, but that is literally the ONLY positive thing about the program right now.

    I would highly suggest that Coach Richt borrow Don Leebern’s checkbook and see the parents of ever 4* recruit in the state of Georgia over the next month.

    I don’t know how the numbers are broken down, but the minimum Hartman contribution prior to the 2008 season was over $10,000 and prior to next year will be barely over $1,000. That alone is probably a large enough drop in revenue to justify buying $10 million. Additionally, McGarity will be forced to put more games on local cable, rather than PPV, like he had to for the Idaho St. game this year, and that is additional revenue that is going to dry up.

    I hate that Miami already got Al Golden, but based on the level of play over the last 3 years, there are several handfuls of coaches who could have the program playing at a higher level than the current production.

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    • Castleberry
      January 1, 2011 at 8:03 PM

      Those Hartman numbers you referenced have little to do with revenue and a lot more to do with how many folks fail to renew season tickets. The drop between 10k and 1k is still only a few hundred seats turning over from one contributor to another contributor. All of those contributors still had to make a minimum per seat donation for their season tickets. I’ve seen commenters on here (and other boards) think they can multiply the difference between annual new ticket cutt-offs by the number of seats in the stadium to come up with football revenue. That’s way off. It works like this:

      Some season ticket holders don’t renew – that frees up new tickets. The ticket office fulfills requests for new tickets working their way down from the highest cumulative score (lifetime contribution – not annual contribution).

      After 2007, only a couple of hundred seats opened up. Enough established ticket holders with already high cumulative scores ordered new tickets to set the OMG 10k level. That’s not an annual amount – that’s just the cutoff of lifetime contributions required to satisfy new ticket requests. After 2008, several hundred more tickets opened up and there weren’t as many new requests – so the 10k level fell. Judging by the comments since last night you are probably close to the 2011 new ticket level, but no one will know that until after the 2/15 Hartman deadline AND the season ticket order deadline (usually mid-April).

      Your annual Hartman donation is based on a minimum per season donation based on your location. If you’re lower level between the 25’s, you’re look at $400 / seat in order to buy tickets two months later.

      Go to the website for more info.

      The athletic association is still in tall cotton compared to some other programs. My cumulative score will be over 23k this year and I probably won’t be able to order UT or Tech. No problem for Tech, I’m on the lookout for their season ticket order form in February and will have pretty sweet seats for that game. I can get a single season ticket for $260 and sell all but the Georgia game.

      Back to your original point – I don’t think ticket orders will be near the influence on the athletic association as heavy hitter contributors directly informing McGarity that they’d like to see a move.

      I’m really down about this season and yesterday, but I’d like to think back to the “hot seat” meme that was openly mocked by me and others on this blog going in to the season. Well, here we are. I’m going to stick to my guns. I didn’t think anything could happen in 2010 that would force a move. What happened was about as close as you can get. I’m getting behind coach for a big rebound in the official 2011 hot seat year.

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      • The Original Cynical in Athens
        January 1, 2011 at 8:10 PM

        Good info on the contribution stuff.

        I think the one thing that would have gotten Richt fired would have been losing to Gtu. I felt that week that had we lost to Tech, Richt would have been fired by Christmas, as that is the only unpardonable sin for a UGA coach.

        First week of February is huge for Coach Richt. The number of arrests this summer may be even bigger. The laziness that infected the program will preclude them from having a “big rebound,” but 8-4 with a mediocre schedule will probably buy him another year.

        It just reminds me a lot of Felton’s last couple of years, now. Even when we win, the game is so riddled with mistakes and ugly play that it is hard to watch.

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    • S.E. Dawg
      January 1, 2011 at 8:44 PM

      All the Brian Van Gorder’s in the world could have helped them in the bowl game.

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  13. Ed Kilgore
    January 1, 2011 at 5:49 PM

    All those who said this nothingburger bowl game didn’t matter should contemplate the dramatic deterioration of fan morale right now. It didn’t help that the game was sort of a Plato’s Cave perfect representation of everything about the program that’s been driving everyone crazy since Richt opted for a meaningless late-game FG against South Carolina in 2007 (after Bobo discarded the wildly successful running game to call three straight fade passes), ultimately costing us a national title shot.

    I’m with Will Trane; Signing Day will be the ultimate test of all the talk about future improvements. Barring some extremely improbable decision by A.J. and/or Houston to stick around to help execute a turnaround, we’re going into recruiting crunch time in a downward spiral, with recruits having no particular reason to assume that any of the UGA coaches they are talking to are going to be around in 2012. If this staff does manage to close a Top Ten class, I’ll be very impressed; otherwise, we are in a situation where nothing short of an SEC East title next year would make much difference. And if we have the now-habitual offseason issues leading to a bunch of two-game suspensions, the Boise game could become a signature humiliation.

    The future really is Now.

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  14. Red Blackman
    January 1, 2011 at 6:32 PM

    Occam’s Razor, or the law of parsimony, applies here.
    It is what we think it is.

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  15. Scott
    January 1, 2011 at 8:00 PM

    With the exception of Saban, doesn’t it seem like the successful coaches these days are 40-ish and recent coordinators at big programs? A decade ago it was Richt, Stoops, Rich Rodriguez, etc. but now all of these guys seems to be out of touch and on the hot seat. Maybe its the obscene money earned over a decade that puts out the fire in the belly? Or maybe its just a younger man’s game these days?

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  16. WFdawg
    January 1, 2011 at 8:16 PM

    I love Mark Richt the man. But among his (fatal?) flaws as a coach is this: he’s consistently a year late in making the staffing changes necessary to maintain an elite program. This flaw remained unexposed in 2001-2004 due to the success of his assistants and the program in general. But in the past several years, it’s raised its ugly head. Exhibits A & B are Martinez and Van Halanger. Along those lines, Proactive Richt would fire Searles right now, but Reactive Richt will wait until 2012, at which point I’m afraid he’ll be shown the door too. Loyalty is generally a virtue, but as we’re seeing of late, it can certainly be a vice.

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  17. Will Trane
    January 1, 2011 at 8:59 PM

    I’m so pissed I could knock over a fire hydrate.
    Change, we are close, we will all go into Butts Mehre on Monday and rededicate ourselves. Words, words, and more words. And the record of wins and losses get worse each year.
    Personally I don’t think they can recruit the players. But I am one who thinks all those rivals list and all the others are vastly overrated. I’d like to see a few kids on the D side like TCU, MSU, and Central Florida. Can you show me one list that had those guys listed with all the stars and accolades.
    Will someone kindly explain to Buck Belue and Ben Dukes that there are serious coaching issues on the offensive side of the ball. When you think our RBs are on the same level as Bama, you may have let your heart and bias slip into your thinking. Last time I looked at our media guide the last Heisman and stellar RB we had played with Belue. I offer this question for those two guys. Do you think Bobo can coach an offensive for a national champ?

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  18. BulldogBen
    January 1, 2011 at 9:53 PM

    Scott, I’ll give Rich Rod but Stoops?? He’s won 6 Big 12 titles in the last 10 years and a National title. If Richt did that we’d have statues of him on campus by now.

    But, I get what you’re saying and there will always be new hot shot guys coming up. Doesn’t mean they’ll always pan out over time. I mean, if Pete Carroll sucks it up in the NFL I’d take him here in a heartbeat.

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    • Scott
      January 1, 2011 at 10:20 PM

      Stoops has definitely declined. From 2000-2004 (5 seasons), he was 60-7 with never more than 2 losses in a season. The past six seasons, Stoops is 61-19, including a 5 loss season, a 4 loss season and a pair of 3 loss seasons. And the Big Ten is weaker in recent years. And Stoops has lost 5 straight BCS games going into tonight’s game. He has lost a bit of his luster.

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      • D.N. Nation
        January 2, 2011 at 2:58 AM

        OU came to play tonight, so give them that. This said, Stoopsid has defined for a generation how not to prepare for big games. I have no doubt 2006 Georgia (really.) would have taken 2006 Boise behind the shed.

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  19. BulldogBen
    January 2, 2011 at 9:32 AM

    Re: Stoops, fair enough, he may have lost some of his luster but who can keep up the torrid success he achieved in his first few years?

    All I know is that we just had one of he worst seasons in UGA history and OU is 11-2, Big 12 Champs, and just won a BCS bowl. Alll of that coming off a 5 loss season the year before. Oh yeah and they lost their Heisman trophy player as well.

    That’s called getting the ship righted. You can cite his bowl record but to say the game has passed Stoops by is foolish.

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  20. dboy
    January 2, 2011 at 1:14 PM

    What would be considered a sufficient turnaround next year for Richt to keep his job?

    10-2?

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    • Mayor of Dawgtown
      January 2, 2011 at 3:59 PM

      Actually, the worst possible thing that could happen is to keep Richt another year and for him to have something like an 8-5 or 9-4 season. Can’t really fire him for that, then on and on and on with mediocre teams. He needs to go NOW.

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