David Paschall gets the early jump on what I expect will turn into a torrent as we get closer to June 30th.
“I hope I’m remembered as someone who has helped to create proper balance,” Adams said. “The academic interests at Georgia come first, and I don’t think there is any doubt in anybody’s mind about that, given some of the decisions I’ve had to make through the years. I also hope I will be remembered as a supporter. I think that athletics, if done properly, brings significant advantages to a place of our size.”
Yes, it’s Mikey Adams playing the favorite game of retiring egotists everywhere, Spin My Legacy! Gah.
Paschall’s piece is pretty balanced. And I like the flow of these two paragraphs.
“You don’t have a physics section every day,” Adams said. “You have a sports section, and you’re usually writing about either football or basketball in large measure. I wanted people in those jobs who shared my values and who thought that protecting the name of the university and doing things right was important, and whose ethics were impeccable.”
The first prominent athletic hire Georgia made under Adams occurred in the spring of 1999, when Jim Harrick was tabbed as basketball coach to replace the fired Ron Jirsa. Adams recommended Harrick to Dooley, with Adams having worked as vice president of university affairs at Pepperdine from 1982 to ’88 while Harrick was coaching the Waves to four NCAA tournaments.
In a world where people at the top of the food chain are held accountable for their screw-ups – and make no mistake about it, the Harrick scandal was about as monumental a screw-up for somebody who claims to be all about making sure academic interests come first as you can get – we would have been looking back on Adams’ tenure at Georgia a long time ago. That we’re going to be subjected to three months of ass kissing over his legacy should tell you all you need to know about how serious Michael Adams and his supporters are about academic interests.
Get The Picture 
If we would quit trying to run Tyson Browning off tackle none of this would matter.
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Everyone: go read the book Behind the Hedges if you have not already. It will make you sick.
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Or simply read the Deloitte and Touche audit (which is contained in its entirety in the book as well)
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The fact that Adams wasn’t fired immediately after the Deloitte and touche report came out gave a black eye to the University of Georgia. He also should have been prosecuted for misusing University funds for his own personal aggrandizement. Shame on the Board of Regents and shame on the Georgia Attorney General at that time, Thurbert Baker.
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He hired Harrick. He cut a secret deal to Donnan the year before he was fired. Those are the two decisions that should be his legacy. And I don’t like the way he forced Dooley out, but I know there are people here that don’t like Dooley, so I’ll leave that one out. The other two are hard to argue against.
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I’ll never get over what he did to Dooley. He could’ve easily let Vince retire with dignity.
~~~
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Does the book”Behind the Hedges” explain what Adams and Harrick”s relationship was because I never understood how a man who was even half as smart as Adams thinks he is could not have seen that train wreck coming.?Did Harrick have pictures of Adams with an underage goat ? Other than that why do you both hire a Coach that will draw NCAA attention and simultaneously waive the anti-nepotism rule? Last question, will I ever get the chance to boo Adams one more time? That’s his legacy, a President who could not even be introduced at football games without getting loudly booed. The world and my Alma Mater are run by small minded egotists ,YAAAH.
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In fairness, I’m pretty sure that goat was of age.
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In goat years or human years?
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They apparently had a good relationship, but had a significant falling out over the handling of a recruit Harrick had gotten told specifically by Adams he could continue to pursue, that Adams created a special committee to subsequently deny and put the kids dirty laundry in the streets on the AJC, a kid with dirty laundry that was cleaner than some football players who were enrolled at the time.
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I think what Adams really means is that he siphoned off a great deal of athletic department money to academics and kept the athletic spending “under control”. It’s why we don’t spend like many of our conference rivals.
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Paschall did a good job there. Nice. Hopefully some of the other writers will get in some skilled jabs too.
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DP is a very solid beat writer but he is an Auburn graduate so realize a few well place jabs bring him some pleasure. He does a pretty good job of being balanced until some of the TN fans throw some raw meat his way, then he enjoys joining in and taking a few shots at UGA football. Good guy though. SEC rivalries run deep, so it could be worse.
Russ, while some dislike Dooley I don’t really think that is how this issue should be defined. I hold Vince in high regard (despite the miserable, boring offense we ran throughout his career) but it is hard to defend his role in the termination timing. He sat down and agreed to a scheduled resignation with Adams, then reneged. Succession planning is one of an executives’s roles and when VD gave a date, that should have been it. IMO, all the dirt that came out later was caused by Vince doing the backstroke and stirring up his followers for his own selfish reasons. I am no fan of Adams but I cannot hold him accountable for that messy situation.
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I purposely don’t look to far behind the curtain, so what you say about Dooley reneging on his agreement to retire is news to me. If true, then it obviously puts a different spin on things. But it doesn’t change the fact that Adams is a world-class dick.
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Elsewhere in unrelated Chattanooga news, Georgia Senate prepares irredentism resolution for invasion of Tennessee with primary effort to divert water
http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2013/mar/25/georgia-senate-passes-resolution-move-state-line-c/
and secondary effort to capture and destroy special facilities that support Muslim prayer rituals
http://www.tennessean.com/viewart/20130325/NEWS02/303250057/TN-lawmakers-confuse-mop-sink-Muslim-foot-washing-sink
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The Georgia-Tennessee water issue is actually pretty significant.
If we (Georgia) can just divert a % of water that flows North then I’m content to keep the line where its at. But if the Volunteer state remains as intransigent as it usually is, then we shall have blood!
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I agree, leave the line but allow water to be diverted as compensation for the error. It costs TN nothing and makes the issue a molehill.
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Georgia’s already whipped Alabama and Florida in water wars, so why not Tennessee? After that falls, on to South Carolina.
http://www.ajc.com/news/news/local/high-court-grants-georgia-water-wars-victory/nQWmm/
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Those sons-a-bitches renamed Clarks Hill Lake for that dotering fool Strom Thurmond. You’re damn right they’re next!
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Since it’s in the hands of the Corps, don’t expect anything earthshaking from them. They will try to be buddies with everyone including themselves. Water from L. Lanier will only begin the journey, it won’t spell out the estuaries and ecosystems that water eventually satisfies, but are controlled by the Corps. All the way to Appalachicola Bay and the best oysters in the country.
Separate people local to my area began enticing me to join a private citizens group intent on having a voice in the matter, but as explained to them, they appear more greedy for moneyed power in the situation than for the environment. Their paid membership reflects about 10 times more people from Al and Fl than Ga.
Hope water is available from such a large source as the Tennessee R. for people, but someday soon all cities will have to craft a future resource usage for cities like Atl that will displace building in some areas. I’m surprised that water usage forces haven’t clashed with the Ga St Wilderness areas set aside by Gov Carter so many years ago.
It doesn’t disturb me at all if they move the state line to where it legally should be. In fact, you could start lining up old workable Civil War cannons in territory now claimed by Tenn and give them until CFB season to get the hell off our land. 🙂
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You Damn right! On to Tenn! HQ will be the lobby bar in the Peabody. Then on to SC! They started the late unpleasantness that left both sides of my family broke for two generations so it’s time for them to pay. Hilton Head Ga has a nice ring to it.
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“the lobby bar in the Peabody”
Only if we can watch the ducks shit in the lobby just like they shit in the yard at Nick’s lake house
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“Appalachicola Bay and the best oysters in the country”
Velma from Bon Secour would kick your ass if she heard you say that
http://blog.al.com/live/2012/01/bon_secour_oyster_shucker_goin.html
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“territory now claimed by Tenn”
Why stop a little north of the state line? Dollywood and Pigeon Force are easy targets offering little resistance as long as we can get past Bar Knoxville on Ladies Night
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Boys, don’t fire your muskets til the glint of the Sunsphere is in yer eyes!
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You head on north, I will lead a RECON patrol on Beale. Never underestimate the value of intell. If Stuart had been at Gettysburg on time the yankees may have been speaking the Kang’s English today.
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We still are still flushing turds with potable water. WTF? I’ve moaned and groaned about greywater ect. McKillips’ may have lost his spot but he forced some sense into how we deal with that subject.!!!
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His athletic legacy is parlaying the huge fundraising, recruting, and goodwill advantage this institution has into sixteen years of losing in the big three.
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Dooley is right up there as an icon that Adams rubbed his shit onto. The worst that Dooley was guilty of in a few UGA fan’s eyes was that he was from Auburn. Adams made him ask publically to stay another year and Adams didn’t blink when saying “No!”. There are a few who would feel the same way if Richt was treated poorly and disrespected. Dooley hired Richt, not Adams. And Adams politically tried to paint Dooley as hiring Harrick, the ahole.
Adams thought he had some hick southern university that he could politically entwined into his vision of better academics through his individual politics. Didn’t work. Besides, the Sciences, in particular the Biological Science Dept was held in high esteem in the late 60s heading into the mid 70s. That was determined by the NSF reviewing segments of the U.S. to render extra funding to make the best universities as meccas in biological science. Using a criterion of accomplishment of biological sciences alums in areas of academia, industry and individual interprise, UGA, Cornell and Stanford received extra millions in biological sciences grant money. Professors from differing disciplines within Bioscience contributed to outstanding lecture series in moderate depth of individual disciplines given to Freshman Biology students, i. e., it was high-powered.
Other departments were also achieving recognition by hiring internationally known professors in those fields and with life experiences to match their scholastic credentials (i.e., former U.S. Sec of State[Dean] had lecture series on International Law at Law School). I can’t remember all the significant changes in many depts, but needless to say Adams didn’t have crap to do with any of this academic ramp up which was in place long before he set foot on our academic campus.
Adams’ academic apple has been bobbed.
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Sorry- “Dean” Rusk.
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Very true. My pathogenic class was taught by a prof from Cornell. He was great. I had classes like Environmental toxicology and Industrial Hygiene taught by profs with very impressive pedigrees. My son currently has a cell biology class that by the third lecture had lost almost 1/3 of it’s class size. I asked him what he thought about that…. his reply- “Either man up or move on.” Georgia has a very impressive science program.
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“Dooley hired Richt, not Adams.”
But didn’t he do so because Adams told him Vince that Donnan couldn’t stay on for another year?
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Donnan was gone by then, sitting in front of my tv screen on ESPN and the whole bunch whining about the shitty fans at UGA who fired a “winning” coach (for two friggin’ yrs).
The articles I read back then said that Dooley was beside himself when Richt, after talking to Bobby Bowden, called and said he was available. He was hired almost instantly by Dooley. Adams’ only say was in approval of what had taken place.
I’m old and more apt to be wrong than used to be the case, so accept this all from memory. Don’t have a problem if anyone points out i misunderstood or misinterpreted from back then.
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I’m no Adams fan but don’t try to revise history. Dooley wanted to keep Donnan but was overruled by Adams.
I’d also like to point out that Dooley kept Goff around 1 year too long.
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So…Adams want to be remembered as an athletic supporter, huh? Ehh, that pretty close to what I think he is.
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Damn, I need to hire an editor.
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I thought it played very well. Can’t worry about little typos like that since there is no edit feature on WordPress. You weren’t the only one who thought that when we read the quotes, but you drew and fired first. Bravo.
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Thank you, sir.
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“My Alma Mater is run by small minded egotists”. Yes, hell yeah, I think I agree with those comments 100%. Fools, and we paid for that. Could be we are just as bad for putting up with that stuff for years. Somewhere, sometime, somebody has to give the Boards a kickoff…off the board.
Example…how long is the AD going to put up with his men’s baseball program…a coach who has a solid losing record within the conference.
We pour all this money and support into these programs for what…not even mediocrity!
Then you have a number 15 seed advance to play in the men’s round of 16 against our old time rival and nemisis…the Gators. How can an AD who spent years in that program not get the freaking “balls” rolling in Athens!!!
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“small minded egotists”
If we don’t think of ourselves, who will?
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So…when we finally bid a fond adieu to Mike Adams, does this mean we are finally beyond Jan Kemp?
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Does it mean we are beyond Harrick and his son?
“Harrick’s son fired by Georgia
In the most serious challenge of his 23-year coaching career, Harrick is fighting to keep his job after former player Tony Cole accused the coach’s son of paying his bills, doing schoolwork and teaching a sham class on coaching.”
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“No one can accuse Kemp of not liking either the university or its football team, the Bulldogs. Born in Griffin, outside Atlanta, Kemp earned all three of her degrees—including her 1979 doctorate in English education—from Georgia, and she met her husband, Bill, a high school teacher, in the student union’s Bulldog Room in 1969. In 1980 she attended every game the Dawgs played, including the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, the farthest west she’d ever been. Nor did she have any objection to tutoring athletes in the school’s remedial “developmental studies” program, of which she became coordinator at a $16,000-a-year salary in 1978. Herschel Walker, the star running back of that era, “had a near-photographic memory,” she would remember. “And his poetry was magnificent.”
But what Kemp did object to was that other promising athletes—or the children of wealthy donors and prominent politicians—were allowed into the school despite miserable test scores and then given extra quarters to pass the required work, or given passing grades in courses they were failing—at least until they exhausted their usefulness in sports. “Then the lights dimmed, and the crowd faded,” she says, “and they were left with nothing.”
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“Then the lights dimmed, and the crowd faded,” she says, “and they were left with nothing.”
Heck, that’s every day for me…at least, the first and last parts 🙂
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Too bad the administration did not take her seriously and quietly give her her job back….Oh well…guess it had to happen, just wish it had happened at Awbun.
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Adam’s handling of things is pretty typical of educational leaders. Get rid of anyone who may be perceived as a threat even when aligning with them may make your job easier. Adams will still be running UGA after June 30 but from afar.
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I think so too.
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Not that far. He’s taking one of the classrooms in the new Special Collections building on Hull St. and turning it into his office.
Because, you know, academics.
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He’s going to call himself a “Special Collection”? I hope the rest of the collection is of animal scat (as in Scatological Studies) by the wildlife groups. They could have a Scathead bust made in clay at his office entrance with a sign outside that says “Boo!!! instead of honking your horn”.
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It will be just like having two Popes
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