Adios, Joker.

So, Joker Phillips is out at Florida, ostensibly for the standard “personal reasons”, although there is a mysterious hint that it has something to do with NCAA recruiting violations.  His replacement to coach the wide receivers is former Gator quarterback Chris Leak.

You can choose to focus on different parts of the story – what Phillips did, how Florida fills the gap on the recruiting front, Leak and Tebow jokes – but the part to me that’s most significant about this is that it marks the second time in three years that Boom has turned to a graduate assistant to coach his receiving corps.

That’s why you can’t have a nice passing game, Gator fans.

20 Comments

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20 responses to “Adios, Joker.

  1. JG Shellnutt

    Anybody worried we lost Daryl Jones for the same reason UF lost Joker?

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    • Seeing as UGA wears its recruiting violations on its sleeve and we haven’t heard anything publicly like that about Jones, I kind of doubt it. To me – and this is pure speculation on my part – it seems like Jones lost a power struggle with McClendon on how recruiting would be managed.

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    • Mr. Sanchez

      Absolutely not. If Joker got busted on a “bump”, Jones wasn’t allowed to recruit off campus so he’d never be in a situation to do that.

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  2. Spike

    Not intending to steal the thread, but Coach Jones is a good man. UGA was fortunate to have him. I’m sorry he left. I wish I knew why.

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    • DawgPhan

      If he couldnt do what it takes to stay a Georgia Bulldog then good riddance. We need coaches who are going to do it the Georgia Way. The problem with these coaches today is that everyone is fawning over them, bending over backwards to give them crazy job titles and salaries. They show up on campus with a sense of entitlement. They dont want to work hard.

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      • I’m not sure who you’re talking about. No one on the current staff meets that description. And Jones is a good man, also, as Spike said. Doing it the ‘Georgia Way’ had nothing to do with it.

        Whatever it was, was done to effect change, and Jones was caught on the wrong end. I seriously doubt it was anything Jones did that anyone could point to.
        ~~~

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  3. Lrgk9

    Joker Phillips is also a class guy. Find the departure of both these guys a little troubling. More likely in Joker’s case- he wouldn’t engage in some type of borderline activity that he felt was not right. Guy is a first class individual and has been well respected everywhere he has been. He’s also independently wealthy after being a HC.

    We’ll probably never know the real skinny on either.

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    • Macallanlover

      I agree with your opinion of Joker and what probably led to this split. I disagree with the statement he is “independently wealthy” by virtue of a brief tenure as a HC. While he will not have to eat beenie-weenies every day for a while, once you begin living the lifestyle of a person in the upper income brackets it takes an inordinate amount of money to not drift into the area of financial troubles. And it doesn’t matter that you didn’t just continue to live in the fast lane, if had saved a couple of million dollars (unlikely) he would be in trouble in a short number of years.

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  4. DawgPhan

    Love that folks are quite sure that twice shit canned joker was fired for doing what’s right.

    Yes, I am sure that is what happened. Florida shit canned their top recruiter because he wouldnt cheat.

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  5. Will Trane

    Auburn andLouisville do not have recruiting issues with their recruiters. They simply wait for Mark Richt and company to transfer them in.
    No doubt Mark Richt has lost control of his recruiting.
    But if you want to hunt you have to go thru the dogs. Just because the dog has papers does not mean he can hunt. Trouble with Mark Richt he can not keep enough dogs in the run and the kennel.
    Many wonder what is going on with the football program after the season.
    Like Florida, Georgia is a program in transition. The rest in the East seem to be strapped in.
    Hopefully the staff is getting their game plans and practice in order. But they are standing in front of their depth roster in bewilderment.

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    • There’s some truth in what you say. But there’s no “bewilderment”.

      There’s nothing mysterious about why Georgia’s roster is where it’s at, and you don’t have to get into things like policies, cheating, or other secondary stuff that impacts recruiting.

      The new staff know exactly why things are the way they are. And they know what to do about it. They are, in fact, doing it, as the Senator is pointing out.
      ~~~

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  6. Spike

    DawgPhan.. You have amply demonstrated you have no idea what you are talking about with your comments about Coach Jones.

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    • DawgPhan

      I thought the appropriate response when someone was shit canned was to bad mouth them. That is what UGA fans have been doing all spring.

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  7. The tone on the Gator message boards is that UF will by fine because Chris Leak is a former Gator QB.

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  8. Spike

    Thank you for illustrating my point perfectly.

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  9. Mike Cooley

    Florida fans always think they are going to be fine and that everything is going to go off without a hitch. Despite sucking since Boom showed up, and please don’t point out that they were ranked second when we played them two years ago, they still think they have a say in the NC race every year.

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