This explains a lot.
… Jones was a freshman in 2008 when he blocked for Knowshon Moreno, who could make a three-yard gain for what might have been a two-yard loss for another tailback.
“I know my freshman year when I was blocking for him, they just told me to cover somebody up,” Jones said. “Don’t even worry about moving him because Knowshon will make you right. Now we really take pride of getting him off the ball and making it easier for Isaiah so he’s making his cut four yards down the field instead of at the line of scrimmage. That’s big for a running back. He knows he’s got four yards from the get-go. Then he can make a move, and hey that’s seven or eight off the pop. That’s always nice to have for him.” [Emphasis added.]
As a run-blocking scheme, that doesn’t work so well once Moreno is gone, of course.
I’d call that half-assed coaching, except I may be giving too much credit. How about three-quarters-assed coaching?
Get The Picture 
You know, they probably told Barry Sander’s blockers the same thing. Listen you actually don’t know where he is going to run on this play. So block something. Let Barry do the rest.
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That does not excuse the laziness. In fact, it all but makes the run game a kind of short pass. A true offensive running scheme, the blockers should be blocking someone specific, imo.
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It’s what you get with a staff that thinks talent solves everything.
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well said.
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The old “somebody needs to make a play” coaching technique.
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Exactly. And that mindset transferred over to the players, too.
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Then you get outcoached at a specific darkly attired football game where you are waiting for players to ‘make a play’. Soon you are down 30 somthin’ by halftime.
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I’d go with full-assed coaching. This makes my head hurt, and am rather dumbstruck.
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Searles wasn’t the only one giving half-assed coaching. Coaching has been the root of the problem at UGA all along. Maybe that is coming to an end, now. We can only hope.
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I have spoken unfondly of Searles for some time now. Glad to see the suspicion validated by Jones. You know, of course, that ESPN is trying to follow Searles in order to refute the wisdom of our change. Hope they both get sewage treatment plants named after them somewhere in West Texas.
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Mayor you maybe right, but I would be interested to go back to the archives and review all the bloggers who heaped praise on the Searls’ hiring. It’s funny how Searls was revered up until the time he left his position at Ga. Maybe just maybe we all do not know as much about coaching football as the guys that get paid to do it for a living.
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I was a big fan of Searels until the 2010 season. With all 5 O-line starters returning and what I thought would be a pretty deep bench, we should’ve dominated all season. I don’t expect much from most assistants. But Searels had credentials and a winning history when hired. He seemed to be the top pick from a lot of good OL candidates. If he’s a failure, what does it say about our other assistants who remain.
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It’s kinda like when the office secretary quits. Then you find all the stuff she screwed up but covered up. So it was with Searles. Glad he’s gone.
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Preseason #1 ranking nationally for our OL unit by a few major pundits in 2010. The results? Well below average (at best). Searles quickly became the primary object of my utter disappointment as last year unfolded. Happy for the change.
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Texas traded out DGD Mac McWhorter for Searels….good luck with that. Recently saw Mac at the Austin Annual SEC picnic. Looks great and tells great stories about Erk, Vince, etc.
BTW, he is also Tech’s all-time winningest coach (by %)!
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I’m afraid we’re gonna be a LOT better.
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stop it!!!
lalalalalala, can’t hear you, lalalalalala…
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LOL +1
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Fing Dynasty, baby!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
maybe we can just shorten that to FDB.
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Might want to use an apostrophe next time. I was really close to googling the ancient Chinese Fing Dynasty and trying to find the tie in. I guess that’s what we get with some of the high level references that go on in this blog.
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me too
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All of you make me blush.
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F’ing Dynasty Dawgs, FDD, sorta has a ring to it.
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+1 Fing.
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Of course, use the apostrophe.We don’t want to appear as History dumbasses on here.
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F ing apostrophes, always one nick shy of a quote and too tall to get a gig as a comma.
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It’s like the coaches got really spoiled with the talent we used to have. Martinez used to say his strategy for mediocre secondary play was to get more of a pass rush. Well that was fine when we had monster DE’s, BUT that does not really answer the question or solve the problem we have NOW. I’m having a hard time blaming Samuel or King for the 0 yard runs if this was the practice of the line.
Come on guys! Hit somebody! Again! And keep hitting until the whistle blows! Even if you are down field. When the “ball bounces your way” it’s because of the little things you do that don’t matter 98% of the time but will win you the game when it counts.
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Like the Atlanta Falcons. Their job is block someone until the echo of the whistle dies. And I can bet they know who they are going to block before the ball is snapped.
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Speaking of Samuels, remember the 80 yard td run he had against ARKy two years ago. The OL actually opened a hole and he exploded. Richards problem was that he was not KM and could not juke for 3-4 yards. He was a power/speed back but he needs an opening. I guarantee you that if the OL can pop him into the second level Bosie has no one that will catch him.
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Drool.
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…this blog did have a man crush on Searels for a couple of years.
Thank you Texas for taking Searels. A&M is right- ya’ll are idiots.
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Yeah, he apparently had us all fooled and drinking the Kool Aid, all because of that injury riddled season and how he supposedly made it work. Apparently, it was Knowshon who helped push Searels to Austin by looking so good. Once, again, the kid makes stuff happen. You can send your thank you card to an address in Denver, Stacey.
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its called screen blocking and i hate it
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I wondered if Searels was an Auburn plant. After reading this, I’m convinced. Ass-hat coaching.
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Wait, Searels an ass-hat?? (!) Man, if a title ever better fit…
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I can’t figure out if this frustrates the shit out of me or makes me very horny thinking about the possibilities. True mixed emotions.
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I will believe it when Billy Winn is a crying pile of stormtrooper in Ben Jones’ wake. Until then, I’ve tasted this kool-aid before – it’s great for a while but burns bad out the other end.
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This attitude helps explain why Knowshon was so quick to go pro too.
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That and the money…
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No doubt and taking a pounding, all RBs do. So the less pounding they get in College the better off, the more money they can make in the pros. I always wondered if that was the reason so many so-so college RBs did so much better in the pros. They had talent, but not as much as the guy in front and then sat on the bench a lot. While the number 1 guy was getting 20 carries, they were getting 5-10, taking less pounding but perfecting their craft.
Just a thought anyways.
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I feel zone-blocking schemes work best for teams that run a spread-type offense where the ball has no pre-designated hole to go. I believe WVU used that when Slayton and White were there, and it obviously worked well. UGA runs plays that have a specific direction/hole to block away from so being that loose seems a big mistake to me.
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I don’t think three-quarters ass is enough, to be honest. Seriously what was he even teaching? If the philosophy is just “go hit something” then why do you even need a coach? I think I’m going to like Will Friend a lot.
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Maybe that’s one reason Knowshon kept taking himself out for a breather?
Not knocking him, mind you.
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Lots of opportunities for 20/20 hindsight Searels bashing here…
My take is a little different. First of all, this is one quote from one player in one interview. I’m a little hesitant to draw the huge conclusion from this quote (without further context, additional info, etc) that Searles simply ordered the OL to stand around and cover guys after the snap.
Second, even if you can fairly draw that conclusion, what in the hell was Richt doing while this was going on? And what about our OC? Curse Searles all you want, but what about his supervisors? Oh yea, they were busy giving rehiring him and giving him raises.
If (1) Searles’ coaching was really that bad, and (2) our decisionmakers on the offensive side of the ball were buying into it, then we might have much bigger problems than just blocking schemes.
No doubt his OLs underachieved. But pinning all the blame on Searles’ schemes based on this quote is a bit of a stretch for me.
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A coach has to delegate to some degree. If your OL coach is blaming it on the running backs, who do you trust? Searels got three years, right? Seems to me that’s about the amount of time it would take to give someone a fair shot, considering recruiting the OL, coaching the OL, working in the scheme, working with various RBs, to really figure out a person can do it or is a “bad fit.” Or an ass-hat, you know, either one.
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Bevo’s right. CMR said Searels “did a great job, not a good job”. Plus, he’d STILL be our OL coach if Texas hadn’t come calling waving plenty of $$. So at least CMR thought he was a keeper at the pay he was receiving at UGA – which seems to fly in the face of what most fans think of CSS.
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That is what’s scary IMHO.
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I got the feeling Searels went looking for another gig because he knew he was done here. That is pure Richt to let a guy go find another job instead of canning him.
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That’s what I thought, too.
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First Callaway, then Searles. You’d think we’d hit on one out of three.
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I’m not so sure that Callaway was a bad coach. The best years the Dawgs had were when he was O-line coach. Musta been doing something right. Plus, somebody thought enough of the guy to make him a D-1A HC.
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Callaway’s weakness was talent evaluation. Unfortunately Richt played into that by letting Callaway have say so on who Georgia offered.
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Who’s fault is that, bottom line?
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Hmm. Now I’m not sure why, but I’ve always assumed that the “half” that was “assed” was the good half … i.e., so that a full-assed effort is what we want. I have always had a high view of asses.
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We’d expect nothing less, Turd. 🙂
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So the glass is half-assed full?
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No. The half-ass is full of Turd.
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Awesome!
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I did as well actually.
Figured it was a comment on how much ass your put into it. Like… I would translate “I half-assed it” into something like “I put half the usual amount of work into it.”
When you’ve gone full-assed on something is when you’ve “worked your ass off.” Or something like that.
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Exactly. If someone ever accused me of half-assing something, I’d think, “I better put more ass into it this time.” Generally speaking, I think presumption should be on the side of ass being a good thing.
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Always has been and always will be. Of course, that depends on the woman.
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just FYI, 3/4 is more than 1/2. And full assed would be more than both.I think what you meant to say was 1/4 assed coaching. regardless it is piss poor. thank goodness Searels is gone.
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nevermind, now I get what you were saying. I guess I should think before posting…
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Why spoil a good time? You can see that I never do.
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wouldnt three-quarters-assed coaching be better than half-assed? i think i want my coaches to coach their asses off (full-assed coaching). so, if you only put half of the effort, thats half-assed. one-quarter-assed would be less/worse than half-assed.
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But let’s say you don’t give a hoot at all and are a “total ass.” That would put you on the scale at zero ass. How can you then be a zero ass and a total ass all at once???
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its a chicken and egg thing.
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I think what we are grasping for here is F’ing assholes. Descendants of the Ming Dynasty were fond of labeling them so.
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The best description I’ve heard is Zone Blocking creates “lanes to cut through” and Drive Blocking creates “holes to run through”. A slasher RB, like KM, makes the zone blocking seem beautiful.
Drive Blocking should also wear down the DL more than the past few years when we merely tried to ride them out of a play.
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I actually think Texas (or any other more spread oriented Big 12 team) would be a natural fit for Searles. The fact that Friend is drive blocking and a disciple of Pendry makes me feel optimistic. Also, I would imagine the learning curve changing from zone to drive is smaller than vice versa, so hopefully the new philosophy combined with (hopefully) improved S&C will make a big impact for the running game. Thank god it’s only 2 days till we finally get to see for ourselves!
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And we’ll want the drive blocking against Boise. Those D-lineman are quick, and we’ll want to get engaged and leaning on ’em as quick as we can.
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I felt that the offensive line definitely underachieved more times than not under Searls so by no means am I trying to be a Searls homer. That being said I find something this a little to hard to digest.
I think this is a case of words being slightly twisted and/or misunderstood. They were running a zone scheme at the time and that can be really hard to master. If Jones, a freshman at the time, were to ask a question about who to block I could see Searls coming back with an answer along the lines of, “When in doubt, remember we have Knowshon Moreno running the ball, just make sure that by the time he’s hitting the line of scrimmage that you have somebody covered up. That’s better than beign way late b/c you were confused.
90% of the words are the same, but the context is completely different. Who know though?
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Agree. Leaping to conclusions based on one line from one player from a 3/4 year old recollection, with limited context … not the kind of assumption I like to make a habit out of either.
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True. We shouldn’t lose sight of Georgia’s dominant run blocking results over the last three seasons.
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I’m okay with the destination: Poor running game results and Searles deserves some blame (he was running game coordinator, afterall).
But arriving at that destination through this quote and putting it all on scheme… I’m not so sure.
I guess it had nothing to do with lousy recruiting (before and during Searles), poor talent development, mediocre RBs post Knowshon, and horrific luck with OL injuries?
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It’s not scheme. It’s lazy coaching. Big difference.
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I hear ya on the difference between them. I just don’t know how lazy coaching is the take-away here based on this interview. Maybe you know something that I don’t about Searles’ habits as a coach.
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How do you parse this, then?
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I’ll play devils advocate here senator….what if the fact Jones was a freshman and not understanding things fully? Searles just trying to simplify things for a freshman?
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I admit not being required to block your man makes it about as simple as it can get.
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Searles said to cover someone up according to Jones in his Freeman year. Yes lazy coaching there by Searles but did inexperience have anything to do with it?
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Boise has a great front 7. Very good stopping run. Going to be very tough gentleman. Sure Boise will attack our 2 new offensive lineman, hope they hold up to the test.
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When times are good at running back, offensive lineman could cost, but when Moreno left, lack of emphasis on technique showed up. So true.
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Boise State plays a front 6.
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Even more reason we need to be taking on bodies instead of places.
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Actually if you take away all the sacks (negative rushing yardage in college) that Boise State had last year their defense actually gave up 4.0 ypc. Decent but not great. Throw in that 4.0 was against the schedule they played and that 4.0 doesn’t look near as good. The reason Boise State looks so great against the run is that their offense puts up a lot of points forcing teams away from the run and into a must pass situation. This negates the other team from even attempting to run and allows Boise to rush the passer with no concerns about the run. The latter part of that leads to tons of sacks and makes their run defense look even better. Not saying they can’t be good against the run just saying they very seldom have to prove they are.
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The man wore sweatshirts outside in the Georgia summer. How smart can he really be?
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I hope that what Ben Jones is saying is 100% true, because if so then despite the lack of depth/talent we have supposedly had the last few seasons it could mean a HUGE improvement for this season.
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“The rushing game coordinator” is now the “O-line” coach for the dairy herd of Texas. I’m so anxious how he fares with Applewhite and Harsin…the co-OCs. That ought to be fun.
After Moreno left the running game virtually disappeared. Whether you can lay all of that at the feet of Searels, is up for discussion. His record last year speaks for itself. We could focus on the entire season or put it in a matchbox at the Liberty Bowl… remember that game with 2 drives, each at the beginning of each half. You remember watching the line come up and vitrually stand up. Was that ugly or what?
Last year…21 rushing TDs. 5 in KY game, think 2 or 3 at Vandy and Tenn..and that was it. Averaged one per game in essence the balance of the games. Take a look at those CFB stats, and you see why the Dawgs ranked 10th in the SEC in running…from a school that has a great history of running the ball. And then think of those 7 games they lost. In 2 they scored 6 points and in one they scored 12.
If “6-0” says they come off the ball…well, I’ll bank on that until I see it otherwise. I am a strong believer teams win championships with great O line play. Want to see how the Boise State lines up against the O line ..do they play off or crowd… and how many gaps the O line can quickly produce. If they come off the LOS quickly and good pad level…will see how it goes for the full ride.
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We are betting a lot on Friend. Va Tech’s O-line wet the bed at the start of the game last year. I’ve never seen so many D-linemen running free up he middle. (Crossing every finger)
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Nice discussion, guys. But, can’t y’all just enjoy the Kool-Aide for another day cuz we switch to the hard stuff on Saturday.
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That actually is becoming a division of time and space-out problem. Drinking too much early can ruin the game for you. So defer to other imbibing to coat and strengthen the stomach until just before game time. Zip 3 beers down just before entering for kickoff and ride them to half. Depending on the flavor of the game at that point you might want to pound 3 more down or blow the first three.
For home drinkers, I’d like to recommend tequila and white lightning. Not to drink, mind you, but to go outside, light it on fire and throw it in the air for celebration at the end of the game.
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Dang, well I’ve got some shopping to do, then.
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Did you say “blow the first three”?
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I’m going straight to scotch. No messin’ around.
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I remember our HS coach telling us to blow the guy off the ball. How in the world did Searels miss that? I’m glad he’s gone to Texas. Hopefully they’ll repeat their lackluster season.
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Better watch the “blow the guy” references. We don’t want to encourage the interlopers back on here.
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We’ve settled the whole “ass” issue, so now this!
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That was work related “ass”. Other posts (see above) are in new areas having to do with the dingle of the dangle. This is what happens when you have a bunch of guys hangin’ around and waiting for a football to suddenly start up.
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“Football game” that is.
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Does anyone know of any asshole tighteners? Feel that several of us are going to need something by Sat eve.
Does anyone know what a woman does to her ashole just before having wonderful sex? Right. She sends him off golfing with his buddies.
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Don’t know about you but I don’t need a supplement to make my sphincter “tighten up” two days before opening with a Top 5 rated team. I will naturally do the Tighten Up without any help from drugs, or Archie Bell & The Dells. If I find anything laying around that can help you catch up to me, I will put it on ebay…I won’t be needing it until at least Week 3.
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Was thinking that myself, Mac. Listening to The Payback just to get in the mood, though. Nothing’ll loosen a too-tight one like a lil’ JB on the good foot.
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Searels had no comment
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