“The continuity will be good for Georgia.”

That quote won’t go down in history as being in the same class as Jim Donnan’s infamous  “I’ve been waiting 55 years …” pronouncement, but I don’t think this is exactly what Mark Richt had envisioned for his team when he made that observation.

Advertisement

At least you can’t lobby a computer.

Kevin Scarbinsky wildly overstates the impact of the verbal jabbing going on this offseason about the SEC from the likes of Bob Stoops and Rick Neuheisel, but I won’t say there isn’t a grain of truth at the heart of the point he’s trying to make.

College football’s postseason has always been a subjective thing from a selection standpoint and anything that’s arrived at through a subjective process is something that third parties can try to influence.  Human nature being what it is, if you can try, you’re gonna try.  In the case of the BCS, we saw coaches lobby furiously.  We watched Herbstreit and Danielson go at it at the end of the 2006 regular season.

That was in a situation where computers drove some part of the selection process, at least.  Now that the entire choice of the semi-finals pool is in the hands of human beings, it’s not logical to expect less lobbying of the decision makers.

Will it work?  That’s hard for me to say.  I suppose if there were some enormous crest of public sentiment about a particular team getting in – or, more to Scarbinsky’s fear, a certain conference being denied a second choice – I could see the committee members perhaps being swayed by that.  But the likelihood is that when it comes to public sentiment, there will be all kinds of cross currents swirling about that will undercut a specific position. There will simply be too many agendas in play.  (ESPN loves multiple agendas.)

That’s not to say that I don’t have a concern about lobbying.  But my worry is about the internal kind, the in-the-arena types on the committee pushing the others by using their resumes to advocate a choice.  For some reason, I haven’t found myself assured by Jeff Long’s reverence for transparency.

You can’t tell the players without a mug shot book.

You know things have gotten pretty sad when they’re posting snark about Georgia’s player arrest situation at 7:45 this morning and the snark is already out of date.

“It’s our job to teach them how to make a living at the university and not to give them their living at the university.”

Brian Cook does a nice job skewering David Shaw’s company man defense of the collegiate model here.

The system has been very good to David Shaw. It’s time David Shaw and the others that have profited so extravagantly off the enterprise of college sports stop acting like it’s a failure if the athletes actually playing those sports get the living they’ve earned, not just some vague promise that it’ll all pay off eventually if they stop complaining and keep playing for the millionaires.

But allow me to take things a step further.  In a world in which Auburn just finished shelling out almost $9 million in buyouts of the contracts of Gene Chizik and his staff – and ran up an operating deficit of close to $1 million in doing so – why is it a given that the schools are any smarter handling the money than the players would be?

Suffer the consequences

Meanwhile, over on the Plains…

The triumphant return of Driving Mudcat’s Car…

… starring Davin Bellamy.

Under Georgia’s athletic policies for DUI arrests, Bellamy is facing a suspension of 20 percent of the season, which would be two games.

Spurrier quip coming in 4… 3… 2… 1…

***********************************************************************

UPDATE:  Give Bellamy this much –  at least he’s stepping up and accepting responsibility for his mistake.

Would like to apologize to #dawgnation for my immaturity. I have embarrassed myself, my family, & my brothers. I will gain your trust back

— DB(XVII)™ (@DavinBellamy17) July 26, 2014

That’s more than we’ve heard from others.