One problem with airing your management style in the press is that you invite the disgruntled essentially to fight fire with fire. Enter Mark Schlabach:
Over the next few weeks, Richt and Georgia athletics director Greg McGarity will meet to discuss the future of the program. Richt’s supporters want UGA to invest in its football program like other SEC schools are doing, according to multiple people close to the situation.
Earlier this month, UGA offensive coordinator Mike Bobo left to become Colorado State’s head coach. With Bobo directing the offense, Georgia set a school single-season record for scoring in 2014, despite playing much of the season without star tailback Todd Gurley, receivers Malcolm Mitchell and Justin Scott-Wesley and while playing with a first-year quarterback, Hutson Mason.
Despite the results, Bobo, a former Georgia quarterback, wasn’t among the highest-paid coordinators in the country, making $525,000 annually (he’d received a $240,000 raise in 2013 to make his compensation more competitive). Bobo was only the 40th-highest paid assistant in the country, according to a recent survey of salaries by USA Today.
During the past couple of months, Georgia’s assistants have openly politicked for an indoor practice facility, as well as a renovated locker room and recruiting suite at Sanford Stadium. Georgia’s locker room at Sanford Stadium still has cinder-block walls and probably has had only a few coats of paint since Herschel Walker played there in the early 1980s. Without those improvements, Richt’s supporters say, he can’t be reasonably expected to compete with other SEC schools.
The reference to cinder-block walls is an especially nice touch, don’t you think? Well played, “Richt’s supporters”.
What McGarity – and McGarity’s bosses – need to realize is that the side with the poorer PR skills isn’t likely to win the sale of the story. And I think we all know which side that is.
That doesn’t mean ultimately that Richt can’t go, of course. It just means that the school won’t come out looking good doing it. And if Richt isn’t dismissed and the program continues to plateau, as the flaws and complaints continue to aired in public, whom do you think will get the bulk of the blame for that?
As I keep saying, what a mess.
Get The Picture 
Regardless of where you fall with your opinion of Richt, our facilities should be second to none. The money’s there. F**king spend it. Our basketball arena’s a joke as well.
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+1 and even when the soon to be completed upgrades are done our baseball facility goes from being a complete a joke to barely treading water when compared to other SEC baseball venues
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College baseball is a joke of a sport.
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The real joke is that we’ve played for and won more NCAA Baseball championships over the past 20 years than we have NCAA football championships….
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That hurts… 😦
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As I mentioned below, the money isn’t there. 2 mil profit with 120 mil in outstanding debt in 2013 indicates a spending problem, not a tightwad problem. If you or I had a similar fiscal setup on a micro level, we’d be ripe for financial counseling with bankruptcy being a viable option.
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If this were corporate “for profit” accounting I might agree, but the world of accounting for non-profit institutions is much harder to decipher and subject to broad accounting interpretations as some of our CPA friends on here have previously noted. There are a number of hidden transfer payments and other charges that are intended to reduce the true “profit”, which is the sole premise behind a non-profit (on paper) organization. Also, don’t confuse cashflow with operating profit and the ability to service debt. Let’s not kid ourselves, the UGA athletic department is making money hand over fist and they’re about to become a whole lot richer once the additional $15M to $20M a year starts to pour in from the SEC network, CFP, etc.
I don’t think anyone is advocating that we spend like out of control drunken sailors (Auburn, Alabama, Ole Miss), but reinvesting a greater share of the profits back into the football program for things like an IPF, better staff salaries, a larger recruiting budget and/or some facility improvements is a very reasonable request. If I wanted my annual donation to go towards building new parking decks, I’d contribute to the UGA building fund, not the William Hartman Football Fund. Some people are missing the point when we joke about cinderblocks and an IPF – these are more symbolic examples of the greater issue, which is the perceived lack of support for the university’s biggest money making machine. I can’t say if these things make a difference or not, but if the head coach and his staff say they matter and we trust their judgement, then it warrants real consideration. The mere fact this has spilled over into the open public/media alone shows the magnitude of the issue. I’m not advocating for or against CMR, but a football coach and his staff have enough real challenges in doing their jobs effectively, so when you have to “do battle” with your boss to get what you need it seems absolutely ridiculous.
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I have to keep reminding myself that in the P5 world of CFB image is everything. What builds that image? IPF’s, new weight rooms and Hummers to pick up recruits. I can deny that that shit truly matters, but at some level, for 18yo’s, it does.
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And I want a pony.
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Red, if you generate almost $90M a year in revenue I’ll gladly buy you a whole stable of ponies…
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Revenue is not without cost. What we need to figure out is …what is the profit margin??
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Agree completely, but by the same token we know that UGA football has been extremely profitable and supports virtually all of the other athletic programs at the school. Many of the facilities (basketball, baseball) are dated to when I was at UGA in the mid-80s. We’ve taken a “put some lipstick on that pig” approach to many of the venue upgrades. I was in the B-M locker room, CMR’s office and the new weight room not that long ago and they looked nice….until I saw how the other half lives. Our facilities, staff resources, etc. are far less than what some of the other SEC schools with less resources at their disposal can brag about. Even CMR’s office pales in comparison to other coaches when you look at the ESPN series of coaches’ offices. For gosh sakes, give the man some new cinder blocks LOL.
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Much like Mike Smith and the Falcons…I don’t believe the core issues are on the head coach. The issues, imo, lie with the people above him. Why not have top level facilities and commitment so there is no one left to blame but the coaches? Yet…we’ve allowed most of our facilities to lag for so long that the convenient excuse of “it cost too much” is, well, convenient. Also, like it or not, negative recruiting is abig thing in this conference and every little thing helps. And the money is there. Fan support is there. No…I don’t care about wireless internet in Sanford.
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“I don’t believe the core issues are on the head coach. The issues, imo, lie with the people above him.”
I think this is a fair statement. As much of a drag a Richt is on our program, McGarity is a far bigger albatross.
C’MON JERE – FIRE MR. MAGOO!
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Time for McGrinch to get the hell on! Grandpa used say ain’t nothing worse than a dog that won’t bite. McGrinch has no bite!
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I once had a dog that didn’t bite, but instead who chewed on everything – shoes, furniture, etc. He always did just enough damage to ruin things like tearing up one shoe, but not the other. He never crossed the line to the point where we got rid of him, almost seemed like he knew just how far to go. Not sure if that’s worse than a dog who does/doesn’t bite….
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No excuse to not have top notch facilities…no matter the Coach.
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+1,000.
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Do we have any sense of the debt-to-reserve fund ratio at some of our conference peers? I know we have data on total revenue, profit, etc. but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything on relative debt and cash reserves.
This seems to be a common BM crutch…the reserve fund is small-ish relative to the AA’s total debt, ergo further investment would be financially irresponsible. For the record I don’t believe that is a constraint, at least at the levels Georgia would be talking about if we loosened the purse strings, but it would be interesting to compare that side of the financial equation in addition to the pure spending piece. My guess is BM would once again come out looking shockingly conservative compared to other power programs…in other words exactly how ADGM and his overlords (unfortunately) prefer it.
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The more we hear, there seems to be smoke to this fire. The first shoe that may drop – What if the Hat offers Pruitt a gig for 1.3? That’s what Chavis was getting. Unfortunately, assistant coaches’ pay seems to be only one tree in this forest.
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I love the techniques journalists use to attribute their speculations to some critical mass of people.”Richt’s supporters”, “Some would say”, “Many Americans”.
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You think it’s just Schlabach speculating? I don’t.
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I feel like I am beating a dead horse but we are still feeling the mismanagement of King Adams and the board of regents over the past 15 years. We are still in a massive hole.
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Adams was a$$hole, but he got a med school and an engineering school to Athens against the stated wishes of the Augusta power brokers and the Tech alumni.
If we are in a hole, it’s b/c of the amount of money we’ve borrowed to build over the bast 15 years.
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+1
Adams was a top notch University president whose accomplishments were overwhelmingly positive at UGA.
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Muckie, this is the final straw. I have sometimes agreed with some of your ideas in the past even when they were overstated, as long as they contained a kernel of truth. I even have agreed to politely disagree with some of your more ridiculous assertions on this blog over the years. But to say that asshat Mike Adams was a good President is so outrageous on its face as to cause total disbelief in your credibility on just about anything you write in the future. Adams was a crook who should have been fired when they caught him embezzling (yes, that is the right word) the first year he was President. The only reason he wasn’t fired is that he was protected politically by then Governor Sonny Perdue and former Governor Joe Frank Harris who was on the Board of Regents at the time. IMHO the guy should have been prosecuted and sent to the penitentiary. Any improvement at the University of Georgia in any way is merely ancillary to Adams’ presence. Adams is like the rooster who crows–then the sun comes up. Only Adams, unlike the rooster, actively tried to take credit for the sun coming up. He split the alumni base and the fan base. He is almost universally reviled as a POS! You would be well advised to not suggest further that Adams’ “accomplishments were overwhelmingly positive” on this blog, as such risks causing you to become a total laughingstock here.
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Sorry, but you’re wrong on the facts.
You want to state, as a fact, that someone was guilty of embezzling, then you better show me a court judgement. Otherwise, you’re just incorrect.
The #1 job as a University president is to bring in money. He more than tripled the endowment. That alone would make his presidency a huge success.
The fact that he took a football program that was in the toilet and restored it to national prominence is a massive feather in his cap.
There are tons of other accolades, like someone else mentioned how he brought a medical school and engineering school to UGA despite being fought by powers-that-be elsewhere in Georgia.
He was one of the best presidents in the history of UGA, and it is only pettiness over things like the WLOCP name and other trivialities that results in all the haterade.
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Read BEHIND THE HEDGES. And last time I checked Adams didn’t throw any passes, catch any passes, run for a single yard or coach a single game. So he didn’t restore the Dawgs to national prominence. At least not in football. Perhaps in siphoning off money, though. He’s all-world at that.
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Does BEHIND THE HEDGES talk about how Mike Adams:
1) Tripled (nearly quadroupled) the endowment of UGA. It was $249 million before he came in, and was at $888 million when he left.
2) Increased the number of endowed professorships from 92 to 220.
3) Established Engineering and Medical schools despite opposition from power players elsewhere in Georgia.
4) Got rid of Vince “program cancer” Dooley.
5) Fired Donnan.
6) #4 and #5 were critical to restoring UGA’s football program to national prominence.
Does Behind the Hedges outline:
Does Behind the Hedges talk about how Adams was one of the first major voice to speak publicly in favor of a college football playoff?
Adam’s presidency was a massive success and was hugely beneficial to UGA.
People butthurt over his dislike of the WLOCP name and sacking of Dooley just can’t get of those 2 issues. It blinds them from seeing the facts.
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Every time I try to reply, the blog eats the comment. No idea why.
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I think because I have 2 large blockquotes, the blog is requiring that Senator approves it.
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Thank God!
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I don’t care if 99.999999999999% of the people on this blog think he sucks. They are wrong on the facts. They are just bitter about the WLOCP thing and because they worship at the altar of the mediocre coach and program cancer, Vince Dooley.
I am very comfortable defending Mike Adams because the facts indicate he was a spectacular University president.
He was also one of the most important early proponents of a college football playoff which, thank god, is finally here.
Incidentally, he was also a spectacular University president at his prior position, Centre College. I live in Kentucky now and he is as beloved there as he should be by all UGA alums.
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He also called the cops on our basketball team when they went over to his house to talk to him about his decision to pull them out of the tournament when the Tony Cole thing went public. It was the right call about the tournament but he wouldn’t even talk to Jarvis Hayes and those guys. I will NEVER forgive him for that. He is a gutless coward and a shameless career opportunist. F#&k him forever.
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Um, if a bunch of angry kids show up at my house uninvited and won’t leave, I’m calling the cops.
If they wanted to talk to him, they could go by his office.
You’re saying he made the right call – which was ballsy as hell – and then say he’s a gutless coward. Sorry, that’s not consistent or logical at all.
Making the call to pull them out of the tournament was far more gutsy. Letting a bunch of angry kids into your house to yell at you is not gutsy, it is foolish. Nothing good can come from that.
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Why? All he was doing was covering his ass because he was the man behind the Harrick hire.
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That doesn’t change the fact that it is a more gutsy call than the foolish call of letting a bunch of angry kids into your house who inappropriate show up uninvited.
That’s the comparison being made.
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Revisionist history, dude.
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Not sure what I am revising.
Most everything involved in Harrick was an embarrassment of epic proportions.
And like I said, it was extremely predictable and thus avoidable.
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And I hated that hire. I think it was definitely an embarrassment that could have been avoided and predicted.
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Pulling them out of the tourney wasn’t gutsy at all, but I’m not criticizing him for it. It was the right call and the obvious one. He does not get a cookie for it. What I don’t forgive him for is calling the cops on kids he knew, who were not being violent in anyway. Instead of talking to them like a man he called the damn cops. Adams is a piece of shit, which practically anyone you talk to who worked for him and has first hand knowledge of him agrees with. I know trolls got a troll but I’m with the Mayor on this one.
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I don’t think that is correct.
Outside of sports blogs, every single other UGA alum I know loves Mike Adams and respects the tremendous things he did to improve UGA in many ways.
The endowment. Number of endowed professors. Rankings of various schools (like the law school). Addition of medical and engineering schools, etc.
And here in Kentucky, he is revered for his work as President of Centre College.
It is really only in the sports blogosphere that people hate him, which is largely because he sacked program cancer Vince Dooley and came out against the WLOCP name.
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Don’t know many people, do you?
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Incidentally I lived in Kentucky less than 100 miles from Danville(See Danville, KY home of Centre College) played tennis at Centre College facilities and NEVER heard one positive word from UGA alums in KY like myself much less any others in the know in Danville. I lived there 10 years, having just moved December 15 and Centre college is a typical rich folks Liberal Arts school with some very wealthy alums. In fact it is one of the most expensive schools to attend in the USA. Danville folks in general care nothing about him. They care about UK.
University president’s biggest responsibility is not to raise money(I’ll admit it is high up there) it is to LEAD a university, its’ students, faculty and alumni TOGETHER to successful goals related to CLASSROOM education research and community. Granted he helped research, added some community like the Med School, but he screwed unity, the classroom emphasis, morale and the “University Experience”. The Faculty and Employees in high majority hated him. A leader DOES not do that!!
Aladawg (Albany, KY)
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Mayor
This guy just doesn’t get it.
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Say what you want about Adams, he massively brought home the money.
He also finally got rid of the massive boat anchor/cancer known as Vince Dooley.
He was vital in getting rid of Donnan and restoring our program to national prominence.
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Muckie, you are in rare form tonight. Bad-mouth VD some more, why don’t you, and see how many folks agree with you on that. You’re about to lose whatever limited respect you had on this blog–if you ever had any.
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Mayor, maybe you don’t remember, but a majority of the fan base wanted Dooley out as AD in the mid-90s.
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I remember it vividly as that is when I was attending UGA law school.
It took a while, but finally Adams showed up and made it happen. And what followed was the rebirth of UGA football on the national stage.
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Richt was a Dooley hire. Adams wanted Chan Gailey or Terry Donahue. Don’t be so quick to hand out praise to a man who didn’t exactly have the Midas Touch with Georgia’s athletics.
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I definitely don’t give Adams all the credit – not by a longshot.
Dooley also didn’t want to get rid of Donnan. Adams forced that.
I stand by the fact that a University president’s #1 job is to bring home the bacon. He tripled the endowment. ‘Nuff said.
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Donnan was the guy to whom Adams passed a quarter million dollars under the table in violation of University rules.
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I have a lot of trouble considering that whole incident to be anything but de minimis.
The details of the whole “scandal” amount to little more than a failure to notify someone UNDER him about an action it was totally within his power/right to do.
Should he have notified Dooley about the additional severance pay? Probably. Does it really matter? Very little.
This is much ado about nothing, and the exaggerated way Adams haters throw it around is evidence of desperation.
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I do remember. I was one who wanted VD to retire as AD. But he wasn’t a “massive boat-anchor/cancer.” He was (and still is) the most successful football coach in Georgia history with 6 SEC Championships and 1 MNC to his credit as well as a winning percentage well in excess of 70% before cupcakes were allowed in college football. And while he was AD UGA won several national championships in sports other than football. I believe VD was AD when the baseball team won the College World Series. Plus the golf team. Plus the tennis team. Plus Suzanne Yoculan and the GymDawgs. Women’s basketball was great then, too. I just felt like the time had come to hang it up for VD. But I didn’t want him run off like what happened. That was really all about power hungry Mike Adams wanting to control everything. Adams got his puppet (Red Panties) in the AD’s office and how’d that work out? (I can’t believe I am having to defend Vince Dooley on this blog.)
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I don’t read or post on blogs to earn respect. I get plenty of that from things that have actual meaning in my life: like my career.
I also don’t think anyone who matters would have less respect for me because I take a position (one that is based in pure facts) they disagree with.
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“I don’t read or post on blogs to earn respect.” That much is certain. 🙂
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Glib and foolish, since the facts are on my side in this case.
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Oh yea, a lawyer. You call being a professional liar respectable?
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I am not an attorney. I started a video game company and I bring joy to millions of people. I also employ many people who get to do their dream job because of my company.
That said, there’s nothing wrong with many (most?) attorneys. They aren’t all ambulance chasers advertising on tv.
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Bad mouth VD is nothing to take lightly.
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VD was an overrated hack.
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Bluto do you really believe there is anyone in the athletic department or the administration who has any inclination to fire Mark Richt?
I get that you don’t think the AD is doing a good job. But do you really think there is going to be a meeting soon where the AD is going to offer Mark Richt a free ticket to somewhere else?
Of course Schlabach is just speculating…
For instance, was Mike Bobo complaining about his salary? No doubt he was worth more, but did he ask for more? Did Richt ask for more for Bobo?
I have no idea and I daresay anybody outside the staff and AD know the answer to this.
Of course “Richt’s unamed supporters” want to upgrade the facilities and I dont doubt the AD does, too.
Having read your stuff today I am really afraid the wheels are coming off the program and that Mark Richt is packing for Costa Rica or somewhere.
This kind of speculation, both informed and not, happens at the end of every season where the writers see an opportunity to generate readership with the next big expose of what is wrong with Georgia football.
If we were getting ready to play Ohio State in the Sugar Bowl this kind of speculation would be held off a couple of weeks but it would still be there.
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“Georgia tight ends coach John Lilly might have been auditioning for the offensive coordinator job during the Belk Bowl, and former Florida offensive coordinator Kurt Roper might also be a candidate for the job.”
No speculation?
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Scorp, I have felt for quite some time that McCheap has been trying to get rid of CMR ever since McCheap arrived on campus. First, what was the reason, coming off a 6-7 season, for McCheap scheduling Boise State as Georgia’s first game in 2011–knowing that the next game after that would be a powerful South Carolina squad? If the Dawgs lost the first 2–which they did–everybody would be screaming for CMR’s scalp, and McCheap knew it. If the ’11 season went into the crapper I think McCheap would have fired CMR mid-season. Also, remember how McCheap acted post 2011 season–not wanting to acknowledge the 10 win streak and giving no raise to CMR. McCheap even removed CMR’s buyout clause making it EASIER for CMR to leave. What was that all about? I have not always been a CMR supporter but all that looks awfully underhanded to me.
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Mayor if McGarity is scheduling what?… five or six years ahead in hopes that he will be able to fire his football coach he is way to crafty to be one of the lower paid ADs in the SEC.
He ought to be governor of New Jersey or some shit.
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Scorp–look it up. McCheap made the deal to play Boise in the Georgia Dome AFTER the 2010 season.
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That is correct, but I’m not sure I buy the conspiracy theory on this one. We were already scheduled to play Charlie strong’a Louisville squad, which is a p5 team. I really thought is was more about national exposure for the team and it was a big deal that Bama was playing the cfa Classic on a yearly basis, infringing on our recruiting territory.
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Oh yeah, Alabama never recruited Georgia until they started playing in the Dome.
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Blutarsky I was probably taking my customary cheap shot at journalists.
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Now, I certainly resent such a stance!
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WTF did I start?
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Was it your turn to give a ____?
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It’s not only Richt’s supporters who want UGA to invest in it’s program like other SEC schools are doing, but the rest of us as well.
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+1,000.
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The whole “facilities” issue is sort of silly really. I don’t remember ever hearing a recruit pick another school over Georgia saying “so and so had a much nicer stadium locker room, so that’s why I picked them”. I can’t be certain, but I’m also pretty sure the paint scheme and wall construction of the locker room in the stadium have never cost the Dawgs a game. I don’t ever recall Richt saying in a post game press conference “if we had nicer locker rooms in the stadium, we would have won the game”. The whole demonization of McGarity seems like a diversionary ploy by those who don’t want to be honest about the real problems in the football program.
I’d hate to see Pruitt leave and I think McGarity should keep an eye on the situation if Les comes calling. Pruitt is still a relatively new as a DC, but I like what I see. If he’s a job hopper like Van Gorder, there’s not much anyone can do to keep him around, he’ll follow the highest offer. I get the feeling he wants to be at Georgia for a while and sees himself as an unofficial head coach in waiting.
Richt should give McGarity a wish list in order of what he thinks is most important to the least. How McGarity handles that request will show a lot about McGarity’s attitude toward spending money. The Georgia AA is famously cheap, and they have been for 30 years and probably aren’t going to change any time soon.
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Did you notice coach bone-head holy-roller won the game last night? Without his OC, QB, RB, possession WR? Some might call that a damn good example of coaching.
Actually, 85% would call it a great job.
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Geez, you obviously never took any debate or logic classes. You go from the specific to the general, that is backwards logic. No one says Richt ALWAYS does a poor job, he is more than capable of doing a good job, for some reason, he decides not to a few times a year. That is fine for someone who is volunteering or being paid a little stipend to coach, but when a man makes $70,000 a week to be a football coach, he needs to do a really good job every single game.
Also, last I checked, he had an OC (Lilly), his starting QB for half the game and a capable backup, a record setting RB (Chubb, in case you didn’t see the game) and Conley has been the go to receiver all season so he wasn’t exactly playing with the walk ons. Richt generally does a very good job when the heat is on him after a WTF? game like tech.
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“demonization of mcgarity seems like a diversionary ploy”? I sincerely hope that no company pays you to provide an assessment of organizational problems/needs, not so much for the company’s welfare as for the damage that would be done to innocent employees. You sir, are clueless. If you think it is time for Richt to go, fine, that is your opinion and you are entitled to it whatever your reasons, but to ignore the obvious ineptness of a man who can cause more damage than any HC could ever do is truly strange.
Now mcgarity’s incompetence may not be the total problem, some of the short sided directives may come from those above him and his hands are tied. But his “lack of a sack” is on him, and him alone. A leader would find some way to fight for his department, and they damn sure wouldn’t throw their most widely recognized, face of the program under the bus regarding salaries. The man lied, publicly, and put the knife in Richt’s back…..and you defend that? Says all I need to know about you.
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“The whole demonization of McGarity seems like a diversionary ploy by those who don’t want to be honest about the real problems in the football program.”
Other than not winning enough football games to suit you, what, in particular do you view as problems in the football program…not saying there are not any, just wondered what you see?
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Well, the not winning is a pretty big problem, especially the not winning games we should easily win. Continued coaching mistakes and calls, etc. no need to really go over it again. The coach worshipers excuse those problems away but want to act like not having an IPF or the stadium locker room having concrete block walls (oh the humanity!) or not throwing millions at every asst coach and giving them long term contracts so they won’t ever leave is evidence of the AD somehow destroying the football program. I find it interesting that the folks who love Richt give him a complete pass when he performs his job poorly but demand McGarity be fired when he does his in a way they don’t like.
They don’t need to worry, Richt’s not going anywhere until he is good and ready. McGarity is doing what his overlords direct him to do, make as much money as possible and will continue to do that. I wonder if they really think if Morehead fires McGarity, the new AD will be radically different? I don’t think so. I’m not a big McGarity fan, but he is not really different than Dooley or Evans was when it comes to spending money. The Georgia AA is cheap, always has been always will be.
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So what I hear is that there are no problems with the football program that winning more games won’t cure. Which, not that it matters in the grand scheme, I absolutely agree with.
Hell, if we had beaten Tech, most of this blabber would not be happening.
Since McGarity came of age working for Dooley I would expect him to have some of Dooley’s attitudes about spending money.
It may be worthy of note that McGarity, his own self, is one of the lowest paid AD’s in the SEC, which would seem to add credence to your argument Georgia is ah….value oriented? (In today’s college football, nothing is cheap.)
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Which means that the problem is actually higher up than McGarity. McGarity is a symptom, not the disease. I’ve been saying that for quite some time. But that doesn’t mean we should give McGarity a pass.
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You are an asshole Mac, to put in nicely. JCDAWG states his opinion and you call him names and question his intelligence and integrity. Meanwhile you are just a parrot, good for nothing but repeating whatever happens to be the Senator’s favorite opinion at anytime.
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Remind me how he lied and put a knife in Richt’s back. I really don’t know. I think he has been very generous and patient with Richt. I don’t really defend McGarity, I’m not a huge fan of his but he’s not really different than Dooley or Evans was as an AD. I think Dooley was actually more damaging to the football program than the other recent ADs. The whole BM crowd is all about money, always will be.
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” I think Dooley was actually more damaging to the football program than the other recent ADs.”
Mmm, that’s pretty hard to prove, considering Dooley dragged the football program, kicking and screaming, into the upper echelon of the SEC. But that was a different time in a world long gone.
Dooley may have made some mistakes, but he was inches away from changing the institutional culture at Georgia to more resemble Alabama than will ever likely be possible in my lifetime. For this if no other reason Vince was Public Enemy Numero Uno on the Mike Adams hit list.
For what its worth JC, I don’t completely understand the McGarity-bashing my self, although El Jefe has sure got him in his sights. Maybe Blutarsky knows or has heard something we have not.
Like so many other things in Athens, if we were getting ready to play Ohio State in Nawlins instead of driving back from Charlotte, any number of things would look a lot better.
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You could always ask Gurley’s counsel why we’re not. (in the Crescent City, that is).
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I don’t remember ever hearing a recruit pick another school over Georgia saying “so and so had a much nicer stadium locker room, so that’s why I picked them”
Actually I think Rico McGraw talked about the IPF at Bama and their superior facilities when he fliiped from UGA last summer. I’m sure he had other reasons also, but he did mention it.
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I’m getting pretty pissed reading these posts today Senator. Its about pitchforks and torches time. Getting rid of Richt would be the stupidest move ever. Being a little passive aggressive bitch about it is even worse though.
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huh??
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Richt’s not going anywhere anytime soon unless he decides to go on his own. While our facilities might not be the very best (I haven’t seen all of them or any of our rivals to compare them), I don’t imagine they are decrepit and embarrassing to the point that they are costing us recruits. The IPF seems like it should be a fairly cheap project. We are talking about a metal building that would be used about 10 days a year at most by the football team. I think it will be more useful to the band.
The recruiting room in the stadium seems more important to me than the stadium locker rooms. The team only uses the locker room 7 days a year, counting the G day game. Recruiting is the life blood of the program.
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Agreed. We just beat a good team in a bowl game with our backup QB and a true freshman RB, and all the haters can’t even give it a rest for one day.
Methinks some people are only happy if they’re unhappy.
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i didn’t know our stadium locker rooms sucked. talk about low hanging fruit…
perhaps (!) i am naive, but i find it surprising that mcgarity is as patronizing and dismissive as he has seemed to be in the press. what the hell has he done to excuse that arrogance? he hasn’t been around athens long enough to claim any accomplishments i know of, and before that he was chief lickspittle to the head of lizard athletics.
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not to defend his management as AD, but he graduated from UGA and worked under Dooley for several years.
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And…as I recall, everyone was very happy to get him when he came. We thought we finally had a guy who knew how to be an AD and wasn’t only there for the money.
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i hear ya, i was happy with the hire for sure. the man needs to wor on his manners among other things.
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Dooley was an incompetent cancer.
Goff. Donnan. Did I mention Goff? Sticking with Goff?
And even as a coach, he would basically have been an average at beast coach were it not for the greatest college football of all time showing up – even though Dooley didn’t really want him in the first place.
Also, Dooley blew it when the USFL was coming after him. He did a shit job holding onto Herschel, who a day after signing his USFL contract regretted it and tried to undo the whole thing.
If Dooley had been a little more persuasive, Herschel would have played a 4th year and put all RB records completely out in the stratosphere.
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And Georgia might very well have won another Nattie.
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That said, Dooley can’t be held accountable for what Herschel did in secret.
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Dooley did a terrible job managing the whole situation. With even the slightest bit of effort, Herschel never signs that USFL contract.
Maybe Dooley never got over how WRONG he was about Herschel. Who knows.
Point is, Dooley was a mediocre coach whose entire legacy was handed to him on a silver platter by a titan among men: Herschel Walker.
And Dooley was a disaster of an AD. Thank god Adams had the balls to fire him.
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Well, I for one am not a Dooley fan. The whole Jake Scott blowup let’s you know what Vince was all about.
10 minutes at a cocktail party watching him with the ladies and listening to his inane small talk about who has the most money and power in the 70s/80s turned me against him as a person.
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Ah hell, Mayor, of course he can…logic is so far out of this discussion (?). Dooley shoulda know what was going on, right?
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Yep. He had a crystal ball, you know.
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“And even as a coach, he would basically have been an average at beast coach were it not for the greatest college football of all time showing up – even though Dooley didn’t really want him in the first place.”
This is correct.
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+1
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McGarity has thus far panned out a bit differently than many of us expected. At the time of his hire (2010?), he seemed like a logical, if not excellent, choice. Who wouldn’t have wanted to be adding trophies to the case at the rate UF was in the 2000s? But (for me, at least) the perception of the UF Athletic Dept has changed since that time. There was rot going on inside the football program during the Meyer regime. Muschamp proved a bad hire. And UF has been reluctant to keep up with the arms race and build an IPF. Had we to do it all over again in 2015, I’d look to another university, and someone groomed there, for an AD. I’d also make sure he had the PR skills necessary to handle image maintenance with the fan base. Just like we can all stand to improve in 2015, ADGM could certainly dedicate some attention to improving there.
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I actually campaigned with the search committee to hire McCheap. One of the biggest mistakes I ever made.
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Don’t be too hard on yourself. Given what we knew at the time, he seemed like the right choice. And who knows, he may improve as an AD this year.
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I’d like to wait and see his “full body of work” before making any decisions…said with tongue in cheek. Nice post WF in capturing the thoughts many of us have about McFrugal as we reflect on his past 5 years as AD.
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So, if we want to let our feelings be known, should we address the Athletic Board or Pres.Jere Morehead? Again, I am not sure anyone will care, but it will make me feel better to do voice my concern.
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Morehead is a Dawg’s Dawg. have always heard very, very high praise for him as ffar bac as in the late 90’s when i was actually on staff at the school. and i believe he’s a double-dawg as well as a former US Attorney.
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Assistant U.S. Attorney. And he went to Georgia State for undergrad before UGA Law School.
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and what did you do prior to your appointment as a US Attorney?
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You seem to be under the mis-impression that being a low level government attorney is some sort of big deal.
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I blame Adams ………..
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For what?
For saving the football program?
For more than tripling the endowment?
I get that he did some things hardcore fans, like us, find really annoying: the WLOCP thing, some of the tailgating things, etc.
But he saved the football program and did great things for the University. Blaming him for anything is just ignorant.
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adams brought shame and disgrace to the university (harrick, etc etc) while feasting on the spoils of the now eroding HOPE scholarship, all the while raising tuition. ignorance my ass
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Friend, if he was so great then why did the NCAA pass on making him president?
He was a crook. All the statistics in the world won’t change that. They started a bunch of building projects when I was a student. He passed up on local architects to give the job to an old buddy of his from Pittsurgh. Costs ballooned from $8.6m to $50m. That buddy of his was later fired by the UGA Real Estate Foundation after it was found that he was pocketing and misusing taxpayer money. That’s one example among many of the selfish unethical way Adams behaved as university president.
The fact that you gripe constantly about Richt but put this guy on a pedestal says a lot about you and your values.
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Crook? LOL.
NO facts support that. Keep hating and worshiping at the altar of mediocre Vince “Program Cancer” Dooley.
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Could you clarify a few things for me, muck?
Would you say that the facts are on your side?
Do those facts include Michael Adams being good at fundraising?
Is Michael Adams “beloved” by people at Centre College?
Would you say that the Michael Adams “haters” are “butthurt” over the loss of the WLOCP nickname and the firing of Vince Dooley?
Would you say that Vince Dooley was a “program cancer?”
Sorry. I’m just kind of slow and wasn’t quite clear on these points THE FIRST MILLION TIMES you posted them.
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I blame Muckie. 🙂
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Yeah, recruits don’t care about shiny stuff like cool helmets, IPFs, and fancy locker rooms.
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Do you ever read or listen to why kids pick schools to go to? I’ve never heard one comment on the uniforms, locker room or IPF. I think as long as the facilities are not a true negative, they really don’t enter into the decision process too much. If facilities were the key, Oregon would have the #1 recruiting class every year.
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The first article on my google search says facilities are more important than tradition:
http://espn.go.com/college-sports/recruiting/football/story/_/id/8156262/what-recruits-looking-school.
Yes, I read and listen…do you? The #1 factor is location…I’d have to find the studies to link for you but to say that facilities aren’t important to kids these days is absurd.
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OK, so I understand that you are saying the reason we lost to Florida, tech and SC and haven’t won a championship in 10 years is because we don’t have the best facilities in the SEC.
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I didn’t say that. I said facilities matter. And I didn’t say they’re more important than coaching, recruiting, etc.
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They aren’t THE factor, but they are an important part of making an impression on impressionable young men and their families. If the choice is between having top notch facilities or not, we should have the top notch facilities.
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Alabama does. Seen the facilities there?
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I think the championships are more of a draw than the facilities. I know the facilities matter, kids are very impressionable. The location of the school, the coach, the feeling the kid has on his visit, how the kid will fit in the system and the prospect of playing time are all more important than the facilities unless the facilities are a serious drawback, and I don’t think ours are hurting us…yet. I’m not arguing against upgrading facilities, I’m saying the facilities are not causing us to lose recruits or games.
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I understand your position.
But Jeremy Pruitt seems to disagree.
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When Pruitt’s mother was pregnant with him, she visited a construction site and was nearly killed by a falling concrete block. He’s had a morbid fear and hatred of them ever since.
Your post yesterday showed that we’re spending as much as the teams in the playoff. And the AA spends as much as it takes in. So I wonder if Pruitt leaked a list of proposed cuts as well as his wish list of new toys.
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Here are a couple other informative links. Uniforms and facilities aren’t #1 but they matter. The first link has a quote from Jeb Blazevich.
http://espn.go.com/college-sports/recruiting/football/story/_/id/9523357/college-football-recruiting-uniforms-selling-point-schools
https://footballrecruiting.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1495950
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Anyone else see this ending with Richt as the AD and Pruitt the HC? <<<<that's speculation, what Schlabaugh(sp?) is doing is reporting. Someone is telling him these things…otherwise he doesn't cite any source, even an anonymous one.
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I hadn’t considered that but….yeah. The last 10 years or so of his tenure, VD was AD and HC. I could see McCheap gone and CMR as both AD and HC for some period.
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Maybe, but not really. I regularly deride in these comments the opinion that Richt is on the verge of leaving his job to pursue mission work every year. However, I DO think that is exactly what he will be doing when he does retire. I just don’t think that is going to happen in the next decade.
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I read the article twice, I still don’t find the part where the AD is even contemplating firing Richt or where Richt says he is considering leaving. Maybe I’m missing it?
I don’t remember Bobo ever lobbying for a raise or Richt saying anything about Bobo needing a raise. Maybe it was all hush hush, but secrets are hard to keep in an organization the size of the AA. I think Bobo left to get HC experience and I can’t really blame him.
I guess if the coach lovers can’t logically defend the poor decisions on the field, they divert attention to the new “demon”, McGarity. I wonder what they would say if McGarity handed Richt the checkbook and he got new locker rooms, a recruiting lounge in the stadium, an IPF, a new office, gave the assts all raises and generally spent all the money on whatever he wanted and still went 9-3 with WTF? losses every season? My bottom line is; I don’t think the facilities are costing us games and McGarity is not the reason we lose games we should win.
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LMAO. People who criticize McGarity are “demonizing” him. You’re criticizing Richt at every turn, but that’s just you being honest and realistic, I expect.
I admire your intellectual consistency.
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It seems, Senator, that the Fire Richt crowd, since not being able to seethe and demand a crucifixion for a loss, have settled on coming to defend the athletic department management.
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A notable observation Irish. (You wouldn’t happen to be from Augusta, would you?)
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No, raised in south Georgia, currently in Atlanta. With quite a few stops in between.
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Are you from Dublin?
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Irwin County. Which makes Dublin, GA, look like it’s namesake.
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So you would agree that the coaches won UGA 10 games, too?
So the question begs..what’s the more likely path to 11 or 12 wins? Giving these guys more resources or hiring a new staff and giving them the same resources? To me…if a IPF brings in 1 or 2 more higher caliber recruits, that’s an easier way to cover the margin of our losses this year than finding a coach that makes perfect calls in every game. For example, if UGA has an indoor facility and that was the difference bw having Tunsil and Theus at OT or Theus and Houston instead…anyway, some folks don’t want to hear that competitive advantage is a real thing but there it is.
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Yes, I would agree they won 10 games. Facilities didn’t cost us Tunsil, that is a well known story of money passing and giving a girlfriend an “academic” scholarship. I’m not arguing against improving facilities, my point is that our facilities are not the reason we lose games. Again, I’ve never heard a kid say; “I liked Georgia a lot, but that IPF at Auburn is what made me choose them”. I’d rather spend the money on coaches and staff than on facilities if there is a finite amount of money.
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I’ve never heard a kid say that the reason they chose school a over schools b and c is because of a profitable meeting with a bagman but we know that those happen too.
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” Again, I’ve never heard a kid say; “I liked Georgia a lot, but that IPF at Auburn is what made me choose them”.”
No, but at the same time if you don’t think shiny new toys is at least a subconscious motivating factor for 18 year olds then I don’t think you know kids very well. Locker rooms and IPFs aren’t ever going to have a direct link to wins and losses, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t important. And it also doesn’t mean they don’t influence the wins and losses in some ways. You’re looking at this way too black and white.
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I agree with the above. We can all feel good about winning the Belk Bowl. But, basically we finished second in the SEC East behind Missouri this year, with no championship or championship game appearance. This cannot be the ceiling at UGA, and it should be okay to question the direction of our program and the decisions of our coaching staff without being condemned and insulted.
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The coach lovers permit no dissension or questioning of the Perfect One.
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No, we just get tired of hearing the same dead horse beaten again and again. Still, it’s a long offseason, so sally forth, dear friends.
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And we get tired of seeing the same crap year after year from this coach while the defenders keep saying that he’ll learn or that it’s all just a fluke. As if people change their stripes after 5 years.
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Playing devils advocate a bit, but what the hell. UGA’s overall profit in 2013 was 2.2 mil, with 120 mil in outstanding debt. Just under 10 mil in debt payments was made. With that in mind, how is the AD being stingy? Their overall profit margin was under 2%, which would get almost any CEO fired unless it’s a startup.
Yet we’re complaining that ADGM is being cheap. I don’t get it.
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I’ll say this about facilities. They matter to recruits, but they also matter to players. It’s easier to focus and get the most out of workouts in a first class weight room. Hell, I would trek across the base in Korea to go to the good gym rather that lift in the leaky shit hole right near my unit. I go to a nice gym now rather than the cramped one at my office now. Big weight rooms get more players in lifting quicker. FIrst class treatment facilities get injured players back on the field faster. They matter. These kids are not the Spartans training for war against the Persians.
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Nicely put.
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Is ‘Richt dismissed’ really an option, or just social buzz?
In this day and age, I wouldn’t be surprised (last 2 at AU, Nebraska), but I would be shocked.
I’ll feel sorry for you guys if he gets run off.
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Just utter nonsense to stir up recruiting trail fodder. Only reason it exists is because commentors from rival schools keep “innocently” asking about it.
Hey wait a minute…
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I got skewered on here somewhat when I mentioned what Rashaan Evans told my brother about UGA’s facilities during his recruiting trip. Evans told him that Bama and Auburn have elegant in-stadium “recruiting rooms” filled with trophies, comfy couches, displays of players that went pro, etc. He said the recruiting room inside Sanford Stadium is just a plain cinderblock room (his words, not mine). If you don’t think that kind of stuff matters to recruits, you’ve got another thing coming. It was a major turnoff to Evans (though we probably had no shot at him in the first place). Too me, it would be an easy fix that should’ve been taken care of years ago. And don’t think Pruitt hasn’t noticed. He knows other schools use it against us on the recruiting trail. He would know since he has admitted to doing it himself.
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Even if it’s just a subconscious advantage/disadvantage, it’s one we should make work in our favor.
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No reason in the world for something like that to continue to exist at the University of Georgia. None.
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personally, i would love for God to call CMR to do something else. but, muck, if you think mike adams was a prince among mortals, go to epps field and ask the pilots who fly UGA planes. i have. adams was a pompous ass. nothing more, nothing less!
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I can’t say I really know Michael Adams but I have been around him in social situations and the description by the pilots is dead on.
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How are the facilities at Missouri? That stadium is the pits.
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They have a stellar coach, which helps them to offset their facilities problem. In our case, we have slightly-above-average Mark Richt.
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What could Richt do to move from “slightly above average” to “above average”? Do you realize this program would have the highest winning percentage in the country if it were only 14 years old? The stellar coach you identify couldn’t beat us at home when we had the nation’s best player yanked away from us 2 days prior to the game. Oh yeah, that stellar coach’s team couldn’t even score a point against us. I take nothing away from Pinkel. His team won the games it needed to win, but I’ll take our guy over him.
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I think folks should look at the record in the 14 years prior to Richt’s tenure. He has had three teams that were very good. Hasn’t always had the best of luck but that’s sometimes controllable so a debatable point. His record is good and as a fan I would be worried that we would go back to 8-4 with a change in leadership. I like the fact that our coach seems to have some morals, He runs kids off when its called for. If you like the school I think he should get some credit for representing UGA well. If you don’t keep bitching and imparting negative vibes around the program. Sure to help get us over the hump!
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Fire Greg! The attitude of the program reflects its leaders. Think of CMRs conservative mindset and how penny pinching Greg is. Come on. I’ll give more when you show me more.
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