Agent Muschamp’s latest move should ring a bell with us.
Multiple sources have told Gator Country that former Texas offensive line and assistant head coach Stacey Searels has accepted an offer to become Florida’s offensive line coach. Searels, who served on the staff with Florida head coach Will Muschamp at LSU, is expected to be announced either Sunday or Monday.
The Georgia part of his resume is presented in interesting fashion.
At Georgia, Searels’ offensive lines gave up only 42 sacks in the 39 games from 2007-09. Dealing with injuries and a freshman quarterback in 2010, the Georgia O-line gave up 25 sacks but the Bulldogs did produce a 3,000-yard passer and an 800-yard rusher despite numerous injuries both on the O-line and the backfield.
From my selfish perspective, 2010 is when the bloom came off the rose. As Tim Tucker put it when Searels left for Texas, “Georgia’s offensive line was expected to be a pillar of the 2010 team but drew much criticism as the Bulldogs struggled to run the ball effectively. Georgia finished 10th in the SEC in rushing.” I sensed that Richt wanted Searels to stay, but I wasn’t exactly torn up over his departure.
The article notes that Searels has been an effective recruiter at Texas. If so, that would be a change from his time in Athens. (Something you’ll note the article glosses over entirely.)
One thing Boom should like about the move, assuming Searels is as taciturn as ever – if he and Roper don’t hit it off, we’ll never hear about it in the media.
Get The Picture 
Love your comment, “richt wanted him to stay.” Of course he did, good for “continuity.” How many assistants has he not wanted to stay?
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His good friend Willie Martinez?
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That’s it, that’s the list
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He watned Willie to stay. It just finally reached a point where even his stubbornness couldn’t resist the inevitable and appropriate action.
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Did Mark speak to you over dinner about his thoughts on Searels? Oh, you didn’t, then you are commenting on speculation. Maybe CMR wanted him on the next train out of Georgia? You have something against CMR? Love how dipshits make comments only so they can feel a part of some sort of community.
CMR has the highest winning percentage in UGA history you inbred corn-hole asswipe!
Keep making fun of him, when he’s gone and replaced by someone like Lame Kiffin, you’ll be praising his tenure…
You should follow Ohio State – They like your kind.
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Add at least 1-2 wins per season to all previous coaches, because the 12 game season and extra scrub free win makes the modern era different from the past.
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Korn, is this comment directed at muck or bluto? Because the “CMR wanted him to stay” line was in bluto’s post and muck merely commented on it.
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Searels followed Neil Callaway, who “moved on to greener pastures” (????)…I seem to remember Searels was offered significantly more money by Texas, and as best I can tell, there is no written proof that Mark Richt did anything to match the offer or at least sweeten the pot…but that certainly does NOT mean there was no effort to keep Searles, or to let him go either, for that matter.
Maybe it is easier to recruit big-time offensive linemen to Texas and LSU, of course most of the kids Searles recruited at least started for Georgia, some for quite a while.
With all the yammering the defense gets, to me, the biggest problem area at Georgia is the offensive line.
I have no explanations for this, but it seems to me to be an obvious problem that has no simple or obvious explanation.
Maybe it is just a down decade in our recruiting area.
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In my opinion only, O-line has been the most consistent weak spot since Dooley retired.
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In your opinion only? What, you mean we can’t share? 😉
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Good one, but I don’t want to share it much beyond my GTP poster buds because I was too small to go anywhere near the O-line folks when I “played” (mostly sat on the bench) from 6th to 12th grade. There was no such thing as zone blocking so I know even less about line play than I do any other part of the game. But I do know when our guys are getting manhandled and to seems to happen a lot, even against some lesser teams. Another reason I appreciate Bobo, he has to scheme around it a lot. I would love our chances if we had a Stanford type line to go along with our current skill players.
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I wholeheartedly agree, and in my opinion, it falls more on the Jimmies and Joes than the X’s and O’s. We have to recruit better. We can cycle in and out OL coaches every few years but that’s not going to magically fix the problem.
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Is that the same Stacey Searels who in 2008 told confused blockers: “Don’t worry, Knowshon will handle it”?
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I feel like Friend must be saying the same about Gurley.
He doesn’t do a good job recruiting OR coaching. Richt’s biggest weakness, IMO, is that he overvalues continuity to the point that accountability is borderline non-existent. Recruiting is also about half the gig, but we have Will Friend employed in Athens for some reason. Too many hires are made using the buddy system, it seems.
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Searels got 4 4-stars in 2007, 2 in 2008, 3 in 2009, 1 in 2010. And some of his 3-stars are playing on NFL rosters. His problem was never recruiting. He couldn’t get enough out of his guys, so that points to coaching. He never got anything out of his linemen here in Austin either, and they were ranked even higher than the UGA kids. I’m not concerned in the least about this hire.
Fwiw, I think our problem on the line has been strength and conditioning. Outside of Cordy and Sturdivant, I can’t think of another lineman in the last several years that wasn’t out of shape.
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Effective recruiter? Alan Greenspan could be an effective recruiter at Texas. They get the pick of the litter every year in Texas
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Searles’s players hate him. Same as Willie Martinez. He treats them like crap and they feel that he doesn’t give a crap about them. Kids don’t play hard for coaches like that. You have to be tough but you have to know how to balance it. You can only kick a dog repeatedly for so long before he turns on you.
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That’s a pretty harsh statement. Do you have any reason for saying that, or is it just observation?
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Yeah my basis is guys I know that played for both. They absolutely despised Searles. He wasn’t just tough on them in practice. He was totally unapproachable away from practice if they needed to talk to him. Martinez was the same way as DC.
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Obviously, we took a step backwards with Will Friend. Our OL recruiting has suffered for years as the game has changed. We recruit private school kids, who are dominant in their class. Once they get up against real competition, you can see the difference. Having an ex-video coordinator as S&C coach doesn’t help.
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The S&C staff at Bama is more than 3 times the size of ours (4 vs 13, I believe). That plays a big part.
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The pro style offense puts a huge premium on the OLine, especially the Tackle position. For whatever reason UGA’s left tackles have been too slow and right tackles haven’t been road graders. That’s why the spread has become so popular, any 5 big guys will pretty much do.
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The UoG infiltration and total destruction of Florida takes another step forward.
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Now that Searles is on board at Florida, UGA is assured a 4th straight victory over the Gators to compliment a stellar 7-5 season.
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Wow. What a country! Amazing how barely competent assistants can get hired and re-hired so easily. I guess any warm body will do. Doesn’t appear boom has learned shit from his previous poor hires.
Didn’t any of these HC’s notice the success of Bill Walsh as they were growing up? I mean, he built a staff of very good assistants, many of whom went on to be good HC’s too. And because of the legacy Walsh built, SF continued being successful after he retired from coaching.
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I’m actually going to stop reading this blog. It’s full of individuals that haven’t the slightest clue. Hilarious that Searels is being called incompetent and that we are assured another victory over the Gators. Here’s a thought… Not a SINGLE person who has commented could come anywhere close to do the job at any level, especially the NCAA… Go tell your wife and kids you love them or call your grandma… at least that something productive.
Pathetic.
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I don’t even know how to make a poached egg, but I can tell the difference between a kobe beef steak and a big mac.
I don’t think anyone here making very logical, rational observations is claiming they could be the coach.
You don’t need to be an SEC caliber coach to observe things that aren’t working. That’s the beauty of sports – clarity of results.
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Expected to be a strength but turned out a surprising weakness as the healthy, experienced, but somehow worst performing unit on offense?
How is the 2013 OL different from 2010s? It’s amazing how we’ve seemingly been in this “OMG they are so young” followed by “not a bad season” followed by “they should have been great but sucked as seniors” followed by :”OMG they are so young” cycle throughout Richt’s entire career it seems starting with 2003.
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Exactly.
As much as Callaway whiffed on identifying talent when he was the o-line coach, it amazes me that Richt went to him for a recommendation on Searels’ replacement.
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Wasn’t Searles a Callaway protege also?
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Where did they cross paths?
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I believe Callaway was with Pat Dye at Auburn from 1981-93. Searles senior year at the Barn was around 1990. If correct, our O line coaching tree resembles family trees in Alabama.
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Mike Summers it is. So much for the internet rumors.
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Saw that. He’s a better choice than Searels for you guys, IMO.
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Agreed.
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