Yeah, the news on the injury front ain’t good.
“Tray isn’t even attempting right now to do any football-specific drills,” Richt said. “Todd’s at least doing some things that were football-related.”
Obviously, being down an all-American talent isn’t what you want to see, but Matthews’ absence likely means we’re looking at another week of Mauger and Moore deployed in the 4-2-5. Vandy’s offense isn’t as potent as Missouri’s, so maybe they can staunch the bleeding a little better against the Commodores. But from where I sit, it’s hard not to pencil in Georgia needing to score at least 35 to win.
Get The Picture 
Without the turnovers, we wouldn’t have needed to score 35 last week. Take care of the ball, get some 3rd down stops, and everything else takes care of itself.
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How do you figure? The first int was near the 50-yard line. That’s not on the defense, giving up a TD there? I think most folks felt the defense was responsible for 34 points.
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(It was the 33. Still on the defense to give up a TD, IMO).
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The defense gave up 34, if you exclude the scoop-n-score, so they would have needed exactly 35 to win last week.
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Agree, 34 on the D last Saturday. There is nothing wrong with an occasional 3 and out is there? Or limiting someone to a FG could come in handy. As I have watched the receivers for other teams run free all year, I kept thinking when they get into the RedZone our guys will be able to get close to someone simply because of the lack of real estate to be responsible for but that hasn’t worked so well either. I will admit teams seem to prefer to gash our middle with the run when they get inside the 20, but we haven’t had many pass breakups either.
Matthews could have a career night if we don’t get some pressure on the QB. And that really is our pass defense: get to the QB, or hope he throws an uncatchable ball, or pray the receiver drop it. Makes you feel like a person whose hands are tied behind him in a fight, you have a few options but none are very good unless your opponent has limited skills. I don’t like them having a week to rest/heal/plan and think we are their number one target for the rest of the year. As with UT we will face a desperate team, I think we need 35.
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The most damning indictment of Grantham and his defense is how poorly they played when the game was manageable (mostly the 2nd quarter) and when the game was on the line (4th quarter). Mizzou had 3 huge scoring drives in the first half and was getting 6 and 7 yards a play (it seemed).
Worse than that was how they buckled like a belt in the 4th. I had no faith that they were getting a stop late in the game…back up QB or not.
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I guess AJ Turman isn’t ready to play?
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I don’t see how Vandy is going to “easily” put the same kind of pressure on Murray. I’m curious to see how Mizzou plays against FU. Will they be able to stop the run and contain Murphy? Seems like they should be able to pressure him pretty well.
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Does UF ask him to take deep drops? I have no idea what kind of QB he is, but I think a pro-style offense with 5 and 7 step drops plays into Mizzou’s strength on the D-Line
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Why are we having trouble admitting that if our defense has a better day they are likely to give up at least 28? That’s a lot with a depleted offense.
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It is indeed a sign of how bad our defense is when we all are seriously worried about VANDY putting a whuppin’ on us. Vandy.
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No shit, Spike +1….and I am certainly not saying I ain’t worried.
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The last horrible game our OL had before Mizzou was against Clemson and they made corrections the next week and were solid in the SC game. Let’s hope Friend has an answer for this week because the Vandy crowd’s noise factor will not be an acceptable excuse. The OL should be motivated by the Vandy comments about how easy it is to get past our guys (not disagreeing with their assessment but it doesn’t seem to be very smart to pop off in advance. Can thank Coach Franklin for their smart mouths.
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Matthews is going to be a Heisman candidate by Saturday afternoon.
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Mathews won’t play but our secondary covers Vandy like the dew. Georgia will be +14 over the Dores…everything starts to click and our injured can rest another week. Bet on it! Go Dawgs! GATA!!
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Top RB who has impacted RB recruiting sits out another game due to injury. That would be 3.75 games in middle of your SEC schedule. Prior to that one came, got gippy, and left school. Now how did someone like Walker come in and play all those downs, quarters, and games. Someone had better recruit a top RB b ecasue ther are only 2 on campus.
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What??? Put that in English next time…
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Are you accusing Gurley of being soft?
Also, yes, there are a couple of really good tailbacks on their way to Athens next fall to stock the one part of our team that has real depth.
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You are right up there with joy as one of the strangest posters here.
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It would amuse me greatly for Todd Gurley to read this and show up to your doorstep.
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“Now how did someone like Walker come in and play all those downs, quarters, and games.”
He’d be the first to tell you that he basically handed it off to another personality.
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And the ball wasn’t as heavy back then.
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A young secondary will struggle early against sets, formations, and personnel like a MIzzou But you can not have your O have 4 turnovers at home, give away 14 points, and expect to beat a team that sits a top the East and does not have a loss and won 2 games on the road..
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The senior QBs we’ve been seeing week-in and week-out are sooo accurate that defenses must have a terrific pass rush or the QBs will pick them apart. Since I enjoy seeing opponent QBs getting sacked, I say we should go all out with our pass rush. Heck, we’re something like 105th nationally on D. How can it possibly be worse than what we’ve been doing so far.
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I agree. If the secondary can’t cover the receivers don’t give the QB time to throw the ball. Blitz early and often.
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I suspect, although I don’t know exactly why I think this, that’s exactly what you will see.
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SJ III, I fully expected to see Grantham and the D to step up last weekend and carry their share of the load. Needless to say, I was left disappointed. I hope that your expectations are met in spades this weekend. As for me, I am officially done with Grantham and have little to no faith in his abilities. That guy is one heck of a snake oil salesmen.
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I try not to judge the competence of coaches, which is not to say they don’t deserve judging, just that I don’t think I am competent to say….”This guy is good….this other guy here, he is bad”…at their jobs.
I was disappointed last weekend, too. But what I saw was that Missouri is a whole lot better football team than any of US thought.
Who knows what the coaching staff thought about Missouri? But apparently whatever they thought, they were mostly wrong.
I think Vandy is a much more known quantity, and I seem to remember we blitzed a lot last year….sooooooo I think we will blitz a lot.
I am really, interested in seeing how Missouri does the rest of the season, cause there is always the possiblity I am wrong and Missouri ate us for lunch cause Todd Grantham is a complete fraud.
That there, to me is what makes this interesting…I just hate the thought the big corporations are going to ruin this stuff. 🙂
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Help me – why are big corporations to blame for what’s happening to CFB? If you mean ESPN, aren’t they simply responding to the demands of their viewers? So, aren’t the fans themselves responsible?
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I am a viewer, they sure as shit are not responding to my demands…Brent Musberger is still working, right?
I should have noted the snark…are not big corporations responsible for everything.?
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Were the big banks responding to the demands of their customers? Or even their shareholders?
The idea that infallible market forces guide all of the decisions made by corporations and create in the aggregate the best long-term solutions seems rather far-fetched to me. ESPN isn’t following the demands of viewers. It is trying to shape viewer perceptions and create viewing habits. Chicken-and-egg debate, I know, but to me the difference seems crucial in terms of who is setting the agenda and why.
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Damn, I knew I shudda saved this, but it is appropo.. again….
“The armies of the night are faceless and mindless, and the modern equivalent of the Visigoths, but when they have a leader, their time in history rolls around again.” The Right Rev. James Lee Burke, New Iberia, LA.
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Now don’t go messing around with my favorite coon-ass…the most descriptive writer in current literature!
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Mine, too OD, but man, his new tale is dark, dark, dark, and I notice he no longer lives in coon-ass country. I have no doubt Burke sees the same darkness in the ESPN control of college football I do.
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Forgive me ASEF – it’s late and I hope I make some sense with my reply.
Not every company understands its customers, you are right. But if ESPN is gambling wrong, then in the long term they will suffer the consequences.
My guess is that even if most fans say they are split on the idea of a cfb playoff, ESPN will let them bitch until the cows come home **as long as they watch the playoffs anyway** – the customers may say one thing, but they secretly probably want more football, period. And some of ESPN’s customers are cable subscribers like us, and some of ESPN’s customers are advertisers, who probably like the playoffs.
I’m one of those who thinks market forces are indeed 99% “infallible”, when they are allowed to operate as the free exchange between two free people. But that doesn’t mean human judgment is infallible, just that the market will sort out the bad managers and bad investments from the good managers and good investments and distribute the resources in an optimal manner.
I think the banks probably were in some sense responding to the demands of their customers – shareholders who wanted higher profits, unqualified home buyers who wanted loans, etc. But when the banks and their customers over-reached, the market tried to correct the problem, and would have, if the govt. had not prevented the necessary correction. So yes, the market would have been infallible in that situation if it had been allowed to act.
(and a side note – the govt., not the market, created the problem to begin with – it encouraged many of these bad activities with cheap money and regulations that forced or created incentives for banks to loan to at-risk home buyers, created the FDIC which insulated depositors against risk while allowing their deposits to finance risky adventures, etc, etc. The worst incentive, of course, was bailing the sombitches out.)
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While I am certainly not qualified to be the DC at Georgia, much less my kid’s pee wee football team, I do feel as if Grantham is working on borrowed time. We have seen issues the past two year under 2 completely set of circumstances with very little adjustment from Grantham. What that says to me is that he is either 1) unwilling to make the necessary changes based on personnel or 2) he does not know how to makes the necessary changes to improve this defense. As for Mizzou, I am thinking we will not get see the real Tiger football team due to their QB injury. And for Vandy, we have seen stronger, more complete, UGA teams struggle in Nashville. My major concerns this weekend are the offensive injuries derailing potential scores, the defense and their inability to stop the pass (Jordan Matthews), and the teams mindset following last weekends loss. The last two items have me REALLY concerned. I am actually ok with the BCS in matching #1 vs #2. They get that right (mostly) and each week is an exciting playoff week for the top 5 or 6 teams as the season progresses. As for everyone not 1 or 2, well…
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I understand how betting lines work, balancing the books and all that. But, how are we 7.5 point favorites? Who are the books trying to draw in? Vandy fans aren’t playing this line, apparently, and who among us thinks we cover?
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Vandy is a pretty bad team, and the people who set the lines don’t get doom and gloom on Georgia like the fans do. Injuries or not, bad defense or not, road game or not (heh), Vandy does not match up well with us.
I could still see us losing, of course. I believe we were around a touchdown favorite last week as well.
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ME!! You can take the line and make money!
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Not sure we see much 4-2-5 on Sat … Vandy rarely goes 4WRs … If they go 3WRs we stay in base 3-4 and JHC goes back to FS with Muager at SS
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Can we just tell the safeties that your only job is to stay behind the deepest corner?
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That implies they will recognize that, and will take the proper angle once it is determined (neither of which I am comfortable with frankly). I say we alternate which one blitzes, pre snap, via a lone hand signal from the sideline. It couldn’t be any worse than having them stand out there in the middle of the field whiffing on people, right?
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