“It gets personal.”

Methinks something is getting to Mark Richt.

When asked if there was a particular game circled in red on the Bulldogs’ calendar, Richt smiled and said, “I would never tell you. It’s just motivation for the other team.”

But he did say some unnamed games are “personal.”

“Over the years, it has become more personal,” he said. “I was at FSU for 15 years and … I wasn’t mad at anybody. We were winning. Now that I’ve been in this league for 11 seasons of football, it gets personal.”

Has it gotten personal because he doesn’t like losing?  Or is it because of something more… well, personal?

I hope at the end of the season we’re all cracking jokes about opponents not liking Mark Richt when he gets angry.

49 Comments

Filed under Georgia Football

49 responses to ““It gets personal.”

  1. WF dawg

    It’s still Auburn for me. I’m still not over the Nick Fairley cheap shots two years ago, last year’s beatdown notwithstanding.

    Like

    • dawgfan17

      I live in Columbus so it is ALWAYS AU for me.

      Like

    • Macallanlover

      I am with you WF, those cheating bastards and their enabling fanbase have raised the bar in that rivalry. They were my favorite rivalry game with the to and fro of coaches, players, ADs, etc., and it’s long running competitiveness. Now it is all I stomach to even include them in conversations, they are lower than UF. Bama, and TN combined and I have little respect for any of them. I am usually not in favor of leaving players in once the game is in hand but last year we could have put 60 up on them and I regret we didn’t. We crushed them, but they deserved more for the sleazy way 2010 went down.

      As to who might be on the list, I vote there is a special edge for the Auburn, SC, and UF games this year, followed by Vandy and TN. Would be a great sweep for Evil Richt and I hope our players let him enjoy all of that, and more this year.

      Like

  2. Spike

    The Gators.

    Like

  3. ScoutDawg

    Spurrier’s smart assedness.

    Like

  4. Jrod1229

    No question it’s SC.. the hint was FSU.. obviously they played each other there as well “and it wasn’t personal”.. Richt is a quiet man who lets his actions speak.. whereas the blowhard Spurrier talks more shit than half his team.

    We’ve all known people like Spurrier, they’re the type of people we love to watch fail.

    Like

  5. timphd

    Just happy to see an edge to Mark Richt these days. Grumpy about scrimmages and feeling personal about some games. Just hope it translates to playing with hair on fire on the field.

    Like

  6. The last 2 times it was personal was LSU 2004 and Auburn 2011. I wonder if we have something special planned for Darth Visor.

    Like

    • David

      The one thing that stands out to me in the 2004 LSU game were comments that I read about the Oline from the players. “We are going to punch them in the mouth” “We are going to play angry” “We will intimidate them”. They were angry and mad and the way the team played it showed. That is the kind of attitude UGA needs in every game on both offense and defense. Then we can have that special year we all want for UGA.

      Like

      • I agree. That game was one where we came out not just to win but to make a point. I forgot one other in my list. UT ’03 in Knoxville. That one wasn’t personal to the coaching staff, but it certainly was to the defense that night. Orange Nation up to that point had rarely seen a beatdown of the Vols of the magnitude we applied to them. All because the Iceman’s “one arm tied behind my back” comment from 2002.

        Like

        • stoopnagle

          Man, I wouldn’t bring up UT after a discussion of the ’04 LSU game.

          The ’04 team should have won it all IMO. As big, if not bigger, disappointment than ’08.

          Like

          • Good point but we would have played the part of Auburn as the team on the outside looking in at USC and Texas. The defense that night in Knoxville especially in the 2nd half was just nasty.

            Like

  7. Dawgfan Will

    Now someone needs to photoshop a GIF with Mark Richt’s face on Bill Bixby’s just before he Hulks out and fucks some shit up.

    Like

  8. BMan

    Vandy’s also got a pimp-smacking coming to them, and until they get it, there’s something wrong with the universe. But agreed, Spurrier is the one that has Surly Richt swearing privately in his office.

    Like

    • Jrod1229

      I am really curious what happens at that game.. personally I think the defense makes it their bidness to make Vandy their little .. this season teams won’t be taking it easy on Vandy.. me thinks that recruiting class may unravel just a we bit.

      Like

  9. sUGArdaddy

    What I would give for mark richt to show up on Sept. 1 with a black polo and black slacks on, never to don red, white or khaki for the entire season…and looking angry.

    Like

  10. Keese

    How bout Franklin? I’d love to see Grantham make that bitch cower on the 50yrd line on national tv

    Like

  11. Derek

    I don’t think it’s spurrier. Spurrier was running his cockholster in gainesville while richt was at tallahassee. It hasn’t gotten worse. If anything he’s slowed down the talk. If I had to guess its personal with:

    Vandy because of the cheap shot on kwame and franklin’s general attitude.

    With auburn because they are cheating their asses off.

    With bama because richt has to compete against a moral-less automaton for recruits and conference titles when he believes that there are things in life at least AS important as winning.

    Like

  12. B

    I’m not sure anything you have posted this year has pumped me up more than this article.

    Like

  13. JAX

    #1 Florida, #2 Florida, and #3 Florida.

    Like

  14. Chuck

    For me the a-holes from SC, they have two good season and that makes you top tier and relevant as a SEC power house. I do not think so. For Mark I believe that he has been so close to the top and has some great seasons, but yet he still hears the hot seat comments and the grumbling. I hope and he deserves this season. Go DAWGS!

    Like

    • Macallanlover

      ” I hope and he deserves this season” If someone doesn’t believe this (and there are some here) you don’t deserve to put “dawg” in your handle.

      Like

  15. Will Trane

    If I am a player on the 2012 team, all games are now very personal to me and hopefully for all the other players. Why? The coach just called us out.

    Three words all in one sentence. “we were winning”. We being FSU. That was a very high ride for FSU or any other D1 school. Coach Richt is saying he wants that back. The question is who is “we” now? Will it be UGA? If so it does not start in two weeks. It get ramped up from today forward in practice and all the games. Coach Richt wants to know if Georgia wants to be a “Florida State”?
    Time to make a choice in Athens regardless of the schedule, the numbers, and the commentators. Let’s see if the Dawg nation wants to go to the next level…Coach Richt wants it back.

    Like

  16. Irishdawg

    I gotta think Franklin’s he-bitchery got’s something to do with this. Or it could be Tech? Their low life fans mocked Larry Munson’s death; we should try and score 70 on them each and every year.

    Like

    • Will (the other one)

      Agreed, but only because their gimmick offense will eat up to much clock to make going for 80 realistic.

      Like

  17. Here’s a thought. What about VG at Auburn? There has got to be some personal stuff behind the scenes that we are not privy to.

    Like

  18. Is it September yet?

    I would think its the cocks, the barn, and the dores. Spurrier has not shut up about our ‘easy’ schedule and how they got the shaft.
    The barn because of their dirty recruiting tactics and the smoke still rising from Fairley.
    Vandy because Grantham didn’t get in the ring with Franklin.

    Like

  19. Normaltown Mike

    I can’t believe the ABH didn’t recount my question about the lack of scooter incidents this off-season.

    Hacks.

    Like

  20. What fresh hell is this?

    If this isn’t SC I am very disappointed. That whiny bitch cried about the schedule every day at media days.

    Like

    • Slaw Dawg

      While I think CMR was probably just making a general statement that it all feels more personal now with any number of teams, if I had to guess, I don’t think there was any love lost between him and Meyer, nor with Johnson. Both are sore losers, and we know that character matters to Richt. Say what you want to be about the big mouth in Columbia, when his teams lose, he usually admits the better team won.

      Also, my fuzzy understanding is that Richt and Spurrier get along well enough that the former called the latter to ask his advice on whether to take the UGA job or another offer he had at the time. May not be as much animus there as we fans would think or even prefer.

      Like

  21. W Cobb Dawg

    Definitely fu. I’d like to whip them so thoroughly that every player, coach and fan would be weeping uncontrollably – a la tebow.
    As the giant said, “I’d grind their bones to make my bread.”
    And to borrow from Sherman, “My aim, then, was to whip the gators, to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses, and make them fear and dread us.”

    Like

    • AthensHomerDawg

      I’m sorry I just can’t cotton to a Sherman quote. May I suggest a Robert E Lee quote instead?
      “You can have anything you want – if you want it badly enough. You can be anything you want to be, have anything
      you desire, accomplish anything you set out to accomplish – if you will hold to that desire with singleness of purpose.”

      Like

  22. stoopnagle

    I bet Chan Gailey knows when Mark Richt takes it personally.

    Like

  23. Brian Dawg

    During Richt’s tenure at FSU, they only lost to Spurrier four times, with two of those losses coming in the same season. His record as a HC against Spurrier is not so good: 4-4, with two consecutive losses and a whole lotta trash talking coming out of Columbia this year. My money is on the HBC if it’s “personal.”
    FOR ME, if we’re talking strictly teams, it begins and ends with the Gators-(Richt is 3-8 vs. UF)

    Like

  24. Eddie

    I agree with all of the above.

    Like

  25. Zdawg

    I guarantee it has very little to do with what you hear publicly and everything to do with what goes on behind the scenes on the recruiting trail.

    Like

    • gatriguy

      Zdawg, I couldn’t agree more. Which makes me think the comments are directed to our neighbors to the West, specifically Kirby and da Trooper.

      Like