Reality has intruded rather perversely into my blogging life this week, which accounts for the sporadic nature of my posting, but here are a few things for you to nibble on:
- At least Georgia’s players know we’re skeptical about the happy talk this preseason.
- Chris Brown talks about triangles. Yes, triangles.
- Here’s a list of Bodog’s over/under win totals for the 2011 season. Georgia comes in at 8 on the split.
- Jerry Hinnen’s preseason All-SEC list is just another reminder of how much running back talent there is in the conference this year.
- Greg McGarity’s hiring of a fixer to deal with the NCAA seems to have paid dividends with the Jarvis Jones results.
- Derek Dooley on Tyler Bray after Tennessee’s first scrimmage: “But the consistency is nonexistent. It’s enough to drive you crazy.”
- Marlon Brown stepping up this year would be a pleasant development, that’s for sure.
- Maybe somebody can make more sense out of CFN‘s SEC Unit Rankings as they apply to Georgia than I can.
- Team Speed Kills has a good scheduling comparison of Georgia and South Carolina.
Get The Picture 
McGarity is going to be so good for us.
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He already has been.
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Looks like someone threw darts at a wall to come up with those unit rankings.
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Maybe it was the kid who wrote that preview for the Boise State blog.
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Not even an overtly pessimistic Dawg fan could rank our RB’s and receivers 11th and 10th in the conference. Only a drunken buffoon could assert that Vanderbilt had a better group of running backs than Georgia.
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I’m fairly certain they didn’t even try. Or like Capt. Annoying said, it’s the same guy that thinks Richard Samuel has no career stats and John Jenkins has no career tackles.
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Finally some news on Marlon Brown. We need him as the goto WR.
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Watching Tyler Bray is going to be fun this year.
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They’re in the bunkers, they can’t find Rommel but they can do stand-up
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Every UT fan who actually graduated from high school should watch this clip and should be ashamed. This clip shows the mentality of a person who is not mature enough to hold the position as HC at a major college–or a minor college–or even a high school. When he was first hired by UT I thought DD would last 4-5 years. Now I think 3, tops.
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Did I miss Nash Nance’s stats from the UT scrimmage?
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“He’s [Bray] never shown an ability to play consistently well. He didn’t do it last season. Y’all act like he had these five games: He was all over the place last year …”
Sorry was that a quote from the head coach at UT or from a Dawg fan to a Vol fan on The Vent?
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Good to know that cocknfire isn’t looking through the world through garnet colored glasses, as he looks at his schedule and sees only one game that he considers dangerous enough to be considered a “possible loss”.
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I thought he made a pretty fair assessment. I think he considers “possible wins” as loseable games as well. I think he is just trying to make distinctions between how likely a loss is in that game and/or who would be favored in that game at this point. He even has a wider spread between the worst case scenario and best case as far as season records go for SC than UGA. He said the Cocks could be anywhere from 7-5 to 12-0. He has UGA’s bottom end at 8-4.
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There didn’t seem to be any sort of distinction between “probable”, “possible”, “win” and “likely win.” Something like win, lose, toss-up (edge: UGA), would be a lot easier to discern.
Overall though, it is a pretty fair assessment. My only slight issue is that SC and UGA’s likelihood of curb stomping Auburn is equally as high, and a likelihood of a W/L should be the same. I’d say our more likely ‘upset’ game would be Tennessee, given recent history and it being in the middle of the SEC table.
And realistically SC should have MS St as a possible loss, given the away game factor and the recent toughness under Mullen.
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I didn’t find it to be unreasonable on the level of OBNUG, but I’m also into semantics, probably to a greater degree than I should be. Even though I’m willing to believe in a team’s ability to improve over the previous year (or else it would be hard to go to Athens this fall), I’m also a realist, and South Carolina lost five times last year. Their schedule isn’t tough by any means, but looking at it, I’m putting a lot more games into the “possible loss” category than just one.
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I’ll try to answer as much of this as I can in one reply:
I probably need to change my rankings system, given that I’m constantly fielding questions about it, but it goes this way: “Win, Likely Win, Probable Win, Possible Win, Toss-Up (which I try to avoid), Possible Loss, Probable Loss, Likely Loss, Loss.” As noted, possible win means a very slim edge for victory.
The Mississippi State game was one I went back and forth on back when we previewed Mississippi State. It could go either way, and it’s probably the only game on the schedule that worries me as much as Arkansas and Georgia.
As for the “South Carolina lost five times last year” — that’s not really apples to apples. South Carolina lost three times in the regular season last year, so it’s only a two-game swing. Looking at it from too far away to make any predictions, I’d favor the West this year in the SEC Championship Game, no matter who gets in, so that’s a second loss, and a bowl game is a potential third (depending on who they play), so that could still be just a two-game swing. Which is not that unreasonable given the drop in schedule strength and the returning starters.
I also don’t like to say “this team will win this many games this year, so I’ll make the results fit what I think.” I’ve done that at times, but I try to just look at the individual games and figure out how many I think the team in question should be favored in. I would also point out that my current prediction for Georgia is a three-game swing in the regular season and would be a four-game swing if they didn’t have a nonconference game against a solid Boise State team at a neutral site.
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That’s fair enough, but it’s still confusing as hell to go down the list and try to figure out exactly what you’re predicting. I’d stick with “win”, “loss”, and “toss up”. I mean, if you’re going to the trouble of saying “possible win” as opposed to “possible loss”, I get that you’re acknowledging it’s a tough game, but if I put a gun to your head, you still think you’re gonna win it.
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Probability that Garcia gets blitzed the night before a game and has a stinker of a game against a team Carolina should crush = 100%.
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I thought it was a pretty fair assessment. For the SEC-East, I’d list SC as the slight favorite followed closely by UGA, then UF.
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Yep, a dead on. And he is right, the winner of the East is a big underdog at this point to anyone who wins the West. Injuries may change that by early December but the top 3 in the West look much stronger than anyone in the East.
SC should be a slight favorite based on returning talent. UGA pulls at least even with the tie-breaker at home, and the easier schedule. A virtual toss-up for the Atlanta gig, imo.
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How can he rate microscopic differences with UGA and then pick SC to beat FU and UGA not to? It can easily go the opposite way for both picks. Does he secretly think FU is stronger than he preaches? His reasoning inconsistency matches Bray’s playing.
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Sorry! That post was to go under Go Dawg’s about cocknfire.
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No, I think Georgia has won three games against Florida in the last 21 years, and even had a losing record against the Gators when Florida was being coached by the Zooker and Georgia was the better team. (And before you ask, I checked — Florida is more dominant against Georgia in their last 21 games (18 W) than Georgia against South Carolina (13 W).)
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And how many times have the Cock’s beaten Florida since joining the league in ’92? 2, maybe 3?
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And if your reply reasoning has anything to do with your previous reasoning, you’re lost, son. Since when has that record had anything to do with this year’s prediction between Uga and SC? Hell, with that reasoning we can call your win last year an anomaly.
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UGA, the University, not Uga, the mascot.
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Is it just me or does anyone else think South Carolina always finds a way to dismantle themselves?
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Yes, and we caught that virus from them a few years back. Hope we’ve healed from it.
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My point exactly. South Carolina is one of those teams that “at their best” can always fall apart, any game, any opponent. The Dawgs have been the same way (except when they have a lot of positive momentum in the season, sans UF)
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I get a delicious cool tingle up my spine when I contrast how Georgia has handled the Jarvis Jones/Caldwell-Pope matter with how Tech handled the Thomas/Burnett situation.
I also like that UGA seems to have mounted a strong, vigorous defense by hiring Mike Glazier.
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“a strong, vigorous defense by hiring Mike Glazier.”
We don’t need double-talk, we need Mike Glazier, the Bob Loblaw of NCAA lawyers, who knows the best defense is reporting your offense before somebody else does
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And a reasonable self-punishment.
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And is there anyone out there, except maybe with the exception of Pope John Paul
Jones George and Ringo, who can come up with a better self-flaggellation than Mr. Glazier can?
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-01-27/world/pope.flagellate_1_vatican-radio-pope-john-paul-ii-vatican-insider?_s=PM:WORLD
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What’s the difference between a “possible win” and a “possible loss”? (And really, couldn’t either one be applied to every single game? Hate to break it to you cocknfire, but even your game against Citadel is a possible loss.) If it’s what I think it is, the word he’s looking for is “probable.” And although I may be a Dawg homer, I think calling the Sept. 10th match-up a “probable win” for South Carolina is a bit of a stretch. (And presumably cocknfire agrees, which is why he uses “probable” to describe wins against teams weaker than us.) At this point, I think we look pretty evenly matched. And if we beat Boise convincingly, I really doubt a SC victory on Sept. 10th will look “probable” at all … though still “possible,” of course.
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Hell, cocknfire states that we are evenly matched(microscopic differences). Before he states his conclusions, he sounds as if he had a party with Garcia and Mangus. He refuted his own reasoning. I expected better, but he let a lot of subjective thought intrude.
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I thought it was a pretty easy system to get. A possible win is a game that should be close but you would be favored in and a possible loss is the opposite. It’s better than toss-up, which is just an agnostic cop-out.
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Also, going down his list, the only two I might downgrade on their schedule is Auburn to possible win and MSU to possible loss.
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They fired the Bi Horsey (AD) at Boise St for NCAA sanctions! Who woudda’ thunk it.
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Make that the “Big” Horsey.
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He left with a pair of red pan…..soorrryy, wrong AD.
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It was undersized blue panties. The Smurf Community is agast. His big hoofs will be heard until the 8th of Sept. What tha…..? AFTER their season starts? If its for sanctions, won’t he be responsible for the coming year if he’s not gone until after the first game?
The NCAA can sharpen their knives on this one. Wouldn’t that classify as loss of admin control if he starts the year out? Why have they waited this late? Was he secretly OBNUG?
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