“I think this Georgia team is capable of being a surprise.”

Mr. Steele explains the case for Georgia being in the national title picture:

“This year my No. 1 surprise team is the Georgia Bulldogs. When you look at Georgia, they had five losses last year. But let’s look at why they lost five games last year. First of all, coming into the year you knew their defense was going to struggle.They had a lot of freshmen and sophomores in the two-deep, and they gave up 29 points per game, which is extremely high for the University of Georgia. Well, now they bring in Jeremy Pruitt, who’s the defensive coordinator, and he’s going to look like a genius. They’re coming off a horrific season for their defense. They’ve got eight starters back. So they’re now a veteran unit and Pruitt knows a thing or two about defense. In fact, he’s been a part of the last three national championships: two with Alabama and one with Florida State. He’s trying to make it four in a row this year. I see Georgia’s defense giving up more like 304 yards per game this year, a big-time improvement. …

“Then you factor in that schedule. They get Clemson at home. Florida, of course, at a neutral site. Auburn comes in at home. As we know, Auburn needed a tipped-pass touchdown to beat them at the end of the game last year, and that was at Auburn. So the only game I have them an underdog all year is at South Carolina, I’ve got them a slight three-point underdog. I think this Georgia team is capable of being a surprise.”

Last year’s defense yielded 375.5 yards a game, so, yeah, lopping almost 20% off of that would be one helluva big-time improvement.  From your lips to Gawd’s ears, sir.

Mark Richt was HUNH before HUNH was cool.

You want to talk about pace and the Georgia offense?  Well, the season Georgia posted its highest average of offensive plays per game was way back in 2003.

GEORGIA’s AVERAGE OFFENSIVE SNAPS PER GAME BY SEASON

2003: 73.1
2013: 72.7
2011: 72.6
2001: 71.3
2002: 70.1
2004: 68.8
2007: 67.2
2012: 66.0
2008: 63.5
2005: 62.9
2010: 62.6
2009: 61.0
2006: 59.1

Over the next three seasons, Georgia’s averaged dropped by fourteen plays per game.  Gee, I wonder what caused that?

Georgia football coach Mark Richt continued the two-year fight for his no-huddle offense this week at the SEC Meetings.

“He and I talked about it for the last three hours,” Bobby Gaston, the league’s director of officials, said Friday afternoon on the second day of the meetings at the Sandestin Hilton.

Since coming to Georgia, Richt has all but ditched the fast break offense he made famous at Florida State because, he says, the league’s officials don’t allow him to go fast enough to make it worthwhile. SEC officials are required to pause for 12-14 seconds between each play, and that’s not going to change despite Richt’s arguments, Gaston said.

“He doesn’t agree with it, but he knows what we’re doing,” Gaston said.

The mandatory pause is to allow the officiating crew to get in position, Gaston said. Richt argued that the officials should put the ball in play as soon as they are set, regardless of how much time has elapsed, but Gaston said that would provide the offense an unfair advantage.

“Mark Richt would eat their lunch,” he said. “He would go straight to the ball and snap it. He’d get in 100 plays. We have about half the coaches who think we go too fast and about half who think we go too slow so we must be in about the right spot.”

Smug asshole.  I wonder how Gaston feels about that now.

I don’t buy conspiracy theories for the most part.  But that decision, more than anything else I can think of, makes me question now and then if somebody in the SEC office was out to get Richt.

The vacay must be over…

… ’cause Corch is back to business.

Urban Meyer dismissed Tracy Sprinkle from the Ohio State football team on Monday after the defensive lineman was arrested over the weekend and charged with cocaine possession after a bar brawl in Lorain.

But don’t get too excited about a transfer just yet, Plainsfolk.  Urban’s keeping his options open.

Now he is completely off the team, though a team spokesman said that Sprinkle’s status could be looked at again depending on the outcome of his legal issues.

Meyer followed a similar path in 2012 with linebacker Storm Klein. He was dismissed from the team that summer after facing a charge of domestic violence and assault. Klein later pleaded to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct and rejoined the team and did play that season.

Here’s Ohio State’s 2014 schedule.  I’ll let you do the math.

Georgia Tech embraces the new paradigm.

Tech’s getting a nice bump in TV money.

The distribution from the ACC increased by 32 percent, from $17.9 million to $23.6 million. The distribution largely comes from ESPN, and the boost is a result of the ACC’s renegotiated contract with the network after the addition of Notre Dame, Pittsburgh and Syracuse, the grant of rights and the upcoming college football playoff. (According to the budget notes, the playoff agreement is worth $3 million in new revenue and the additions to the ACC were worth $2.5 in additional revenue.)

Which is a good thing, because ticket revenues are heading in the wrong direction.

Ticket sales revenue, while budgeted conservatively, is projected to drop from $11.6 million to $9.8 million. It’s the second-largest source of revenues after the ACC distribution. A projected slight drop in season ticket sales, six home games (as opposed to seven) and the even-year schedule without a home game against Georgia are primary factors.

Four tickets, four hot dogs and four cokes can only take an athletic department so far.

And this doesn’t help things on the buyout front, either:

The reserve fund, from which money can be taken in case of budget shortfalls, is at about $2.5 million. The goal for the fund is to be at least $5 million. The department had to draw on the reserve fund in the 2013 fiscal year due to a $1.8 million shortfall, largely due to expenses related to the ACC football championship game and the ensuing trip to the Sun Bowl.

Greg McGarity is laughing at the superior intellect.

Steele ranks Georgia’s position groups.

Just thought you might be interested on where he sees Georgia’s position groups from a national perspective.

• Quarterbacks:  outside top 45
• Running backs:  2nd
• Receivers:  10th
• Offensive line:  42nd
• Defensive line:  15th
• Linebackers:  1st
• Defensive backs:  25th
• Special teams:  21st

Keep in mind, that DB ranking came before Matthews’ dismissal.

The QB ranking may raise a few eyebrows, but keep in mind how inexperienced Georgia is at the position going into the season.

That being said, if the secondary and special teams turn out to be respectable, this has the makings of being a good season.

As a bonus, here’s another set of rankings that echoes Steele about running backs and linebackers.