Cherry on top of the sundae

Just what we wanted to hear:

Freshman Sony Michel suffered a shoulder injury during the first half, and early indications were it would keep him out more than just a week. A source said it looked like it could be a month or more.

Michel left the game after carrying it three times for 17 yards, and a week after leading Georgia with 155 rushing yards and three touchdowns.

“We’ll find out more about (it) later on,” head coach Mark Richt said. “We don’t really know about him.”

Oh, yeah, we do.

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Look out, Vandy.

If you look at today’s game as Georgia’s shrewd way of marketing Todd Gurley for the Heisman, it makes a lot more sense.

“This football team is brand new, over half of it, and it’s the same thing with Georgia.”

Photo by Associated Press /Chattanooga Times Free Press

Aaron Murray is gone, but the series goes on.

All the back and forth we’ve had this week about the game – in the end, I think it boils down to whether Georgia shows up today.  Not in the Woody Allen sense, but in the Aaron Murray sense.

I don’t think there’s any question that on paper, Georgia’s been the better team so far this season.  Or that Tennessee comes in hoping that a whole bunch of green players grow up in a hurry on the road.

In the loss to the Sooners, Tennessee faced 11 plays of third-and-10 or longer, and that’s a bad formula for any offensive line, especially one as young as Tennessee’s.

That’s a lot to ask, especially if the Dawgs don’t offer any help.

If it’s likely that Georgia scores 40+ points today, and recent history tends to support that premise, I have a hard time seeing how Tennessee keeps up.  The Vols have yet to score forty in a game this season; I don’t care how shaky Georgia’s secondary may be, if you can’t hang forty on the likes of Utah State and Arkansas State, it’s not a good sign for huge offensive success today.

Georgia just needs to show up.

Have at your game day thread in the comments.

This one’s for the optimists.

Brian Fremeau pegs Georgia’s chance to win today at 97.1%, calls for a final score of 36-12.

This one’s for the pessimists.

Shorter Barrett Sallee:  True freshman wide receiver getting his first start will outplay fifth-year senior starting quarterback who hasn’t thrown an interception this season for the upset road win.

Name that caption, animal cruelty edition

Yep, it’s a rare twofer name that caption day.

I simply couldn’t lay off this one.

Uga, do you know where that nose has been?

46.333333333

45.

56.

48.

51.

37.

45.

42.

41.

45.

44.

26.

45.

59.

45.

66.

Those are the points scored by Georgia’s offense in every home game since Todd Gurley’s been on the roster.  With Aaron Murray.  Without Aaron Murray.  Day games.  Night games.  Against cupcakes.  Against SEC powerhouses.  Games when Georgia’s showed up.  Games when Georgia hasn’t shown up so much. SEC on CBS games.  Pay per view games.

Games with Todd Gurley and games without Todd Gurley, for that matter.

It’s remarkably consistent, isn’t it?  Fifteen games, and only two when less than forty points were put up on the scoreboard.  (The header is the average of Georgia’s scores for those fifteen games.)

So tell me what your score prediction for today is.

Name that caption, G thang edition

Last night, Snoop Dogg sported the Georgia G:

Your witty captions are welcomed.

This is easy.

Okay, if you’re looking for Tennessee’s version of the wheel route – the can’t miss play call against Georgia’s pass defense – here’s my candidate:

All Hitch Concept

The all hitch concept is one of my favorite Butch Jones concepts – and, really, favorite plays in my playbook.

The reason I love this play so much is that it is easy. The throw is predetermined before the snap, so, really, the QB just needs to take the snap, rock and fire. The read is simple – pre-snap – find the deepest DB away from any of your WR and throw it to them. It really is that simple. The QB is directed to make the easiest throw possible. In the play below, UT exploits Oklahoma’s soft quarters coverage for a quick 12 yards.

I bring this to your attention because against SC and some against Troy, Georgia still has the tendency to bail out of their pre-snap positions a little soon and show the rolling coverage too quick. If Jones sees the ability to get quick throws for Worley and get him into a rhythm without much pressure, they could have a lot of success.

That call will eat an undisciplined secondary alive.  And it’s going to come too quickly for a pass rush to affect it.

Inside the Clemsoning

I don’t think I’m going out on a limb here to say that going 9 on 11 with your goal line defense isn’t likely to be a successful strategy very often.