There’s another reason I don’t care to get in the weeds figuring out what each twitch from a recruit means. It’s a not-seeing-the-forest-for-the-trees kind of thing for me – what one recruit may or may not do doesn’t matter in the vast scheme of things. It’s the overall quality of the signing class that counts and the consistency of a program’s recruiting that is how success should be measured.
And that’s not something you can get a handle on until signing day, if then. Because some five-stars don’t pan out, while some sleepers do. (Although there’s a reason top programs chase top recruits – the odds for success are better.) Even so, there’s always the chance, as we know, that it never comes together completely: “The only “five-star” teams that never played for a title in the BCS era are Georgia and Michigan…”. Just another reminder that while recruiting counts big, roster management counts bigger and that’s an area where Mark Richt merits all the criticism he’s had lobbed at him over the years.
Happily, that appears to be on the mend. And that’s what I’ll look at in a week. Did Georgia do a good job overall filling its needs, both from a quality and a quantity standpoint? If so, the rest doesn’t matter to me.
So, wake me when it’s over. I’ll get off my soapbox then.
Get The Picture 
“It’s the overall quality of the signing class that counts and the consistency of a program’s recruiting that is how success should be measured.”
I am going to assume, which is fraut, of course, with peril, that you are speaking here of recruiting success.
It seems to me the only measure of recruiting success that matters at all is the wins and losses on the field, there.
I fear Blutarsky has allowed the Newbergians to get into his head, there.
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Yes.
So?
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Ah yes, the exigencies of da marketplace.
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Now THAT was an article from Bill that I really enjoyed. Much more meat there. Kinda sobering that us and Michigan are the only ones from that group that never played for the title. And definitely goes against the argument that Richt hasn’t underachieved (especially since
most in that group not only made it to the BCS Championship, but made it more than once). I’m still on the Richt bandwagon and believe that recent changes both within Richt himself as well as all the other stuff will pay off. But man, it’s TIME for it to pay off.
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Preach it, Rev. I agree on all points.
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What’s the hurry? We haven’t even started Year 5 of the Third Five Year Plan, which – when measured in Bobby Bowden time – is only halfway through the completion of Six Five Year Plans
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LOL, touche’.
In all seriousness tho, when I look at guys like Bowden, Osborne, Paterno, etc, that’s what makes me not buy into the argument some people make that “If Richt hasn’t won a MNC by now, he never will”. For Paterno, Bowden, and Osborne, it took them 17, 18, and 22 seasons respectively at their schools to win a national title. And those guys (sexual scandals aside) are legends of the sport.
I’m not saying Richt is definitely gonna win one for us. Just saying I’ve not yet given up believing that he can.
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Serious question because I don’t have the game logs for these guys, but did Bowden, Osborne, or paterno get blown out on an annual basis the way we do almost every year? I’m not talking getting upset, I get teams aren’t going to play their absolute best every game. I’m talking Florida game this year, south Carolina 12, Boise state & lsu 11, Tennessee and Florida 09, etc. I genuinely want to know.
My father in law ardently believes Richt is the football equivalent of Dean Smith at north Carolina who needed many years before he finally won a national championship. However, when I ask him for a history lesson, he says “no, a Dean Smith coached team might lose but they were not going to beat themselves for you and they rarely ever got blown out.” In fact the only game off the top of his head where UNC just got their ass kicked was against one of the legendary ucla wooden teams in a final four.
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+1,000
This is THE point that the Richt apologists do not get. When they look at other coaches who took a long time to win national titles, often there were close losses, and the teams rarely put up a poop bomb. In the case of Richt, his teams annually shoot themselves in the foot via losing to far inferior teams or by getting bombed due to lack of preparation, or both. And Richt himself brain farts enough to cost us at least one game a year, if not more. And people think this is going to change of a sudden after 14 years on the job.
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And I don’t know that I am an apologist, I’ve been pretty direct in the past of my criticism of Richt when warranted. But I also continue to be impressed by his willingness to adapt and change. Now do I wish he was a trendsetter rather than changing anywhere from 1-3 years too late? ABSOLUTELY. But I still think he has the potential to get us there as he (and now the administration) continues to evolve in the approach.
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I honestly don’t know what their losses looked like. I remember FSU was upset big time by Southern Miss one year, tho to be fair the QB was a kid by the name of Favre for So Miss. I don’t know how many puzzling losses those teams had over the years tho. But my guess is that after 15 years, in all 3 cases, there was a segment of the fan bases that wondered if their coach had the goods to ever actually get over the hump. That’s speculation tho, I was pretty young during the 15th year of all 3.
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Yea, Deon Sanders played for that FSU team and said Favre was the most competitive guy he had ever played against and would one day be a great pro. I know Osborne had consistently great teams before he broke through. If you look back at his teams, it is really amazing it took so long for him to win a NC.
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Dream on.
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One thing I hope is clear to folks who really get into this recruiting thing.
There is a direct correlation between a high number of stars and a high level of interest from the top programs.
The Newbergians want us to believe, and to pay money to know that they do all this research into all these players, when in point of fact, the research is done by the folks who have always done the research…the football staff at the various schools.
The recruiting services respond to that and expect the paying public to believe it is honey.
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Yeah, I don’t think the colleges are waiting on the star rankings to decide who they want to go after.
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Pretty sure we don’t. And that’s all good. If our coaches can’t recognize and recruit as to our needs independently of the recruiting services, then we would be up shit creek. Such is not the case.
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Our continual habit of losing to teams who have never had a recruiting class ranked as high as ours shows that recruiting rankings are not an especially accurate predictor of on field success. I’ve only watched college football for about 45 years, so maybe I’m not as knowledgeable as some other experts who write about it, but it seems to me that coaching accounts for about 70% of the results in college football. All of the top 40 or so programs have good athletes. Some have a couple of “stars” that can really affect a game, but I would think a fairly steep bell curve would be a good representation of talent in college football.
I really don’t follow recruiting much at all. If we end up with the #1 or the #15 recruiting class, it really doesn’t seem to matter.
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JC, let me introduce you to the 21st Century. 21st Century, JC.
Did you even read the first article the Senator linked? The evidence is clear that #1 is better than #15.
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Thanks A10, now let me introduce you to Georgia football, Georgia football, A10.
Go back, take a look at the teams we have lost to in the past 10 years and compare their recruiting rankings to ours. We aren’t losing the vast majority of games we lose because the other team has better players.
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The main one that sticks out in my mind is Boise St. They beat us with their 2 and 3 star players. Man that game still irks me. There are few teams that has out recruited UGA the last 10/15 years and we don’t play all of them. Our recruiting success leaves very few teams we should lose to…if it’s all about the talent you recruit that is.
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Missouri, Colorado, UCF, South Carolina, Georgia Tech, Vandy, Nebraska, Michigan State, the list is pretty long. The SEC Championship loss to Bama was not too hard to take, they out recruit us pretty much every year. The 2011 LSU loss was to a very talented team too.
We rarely face a team that has more pure talent than we do.
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I don’t take issue with your pointing out a lot of the exceptions to the rule, of which there have been several, but UGA’s won a lot of more of the games it should win than it has lost.
The evidence is clear that we should expect better success on the field if we UGA had #1 recruiting classes instead of top 12-ish every year.
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Well our star recruits aren’t always on the field when we would like them to be…
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Sad, but true.
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And why is that? Why couldn’t some of these transgressions be made by players that aren’t the high protein of the team? Why is it that the star position suddenly goes from a franchise D athlete to the third stringer for the more important games? Why exactly do the high profile athletes seem to always be the ones who screw up at the worst times? Coaching? Bullshit. Treated differently because they are elite athletes? Bullshit.
Snakebit is the only answer.
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South Carolina is another one…
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I blame the Boise debacle on those godawful uniforms.
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^Truth. Others on this blog may not like it but it is true. For example, last season Georgia was favored at the time in every single game it played, yet lost 3 games. Tech turned out to be a good team, but Florida and South Carolina clearly had teams not as good as the Dawgs.
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Bama lost two games in the same situation, favored both times. Lost, Saban must be a DA.
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The point was Georgia isn’t losing to teams with better athletes. When Bama lost the 2 games to which you refer, 1 was to Ohio State which, as we know now, won the National Championship. I’d say that, ipso facto, that means tOSU has some pretty good athletes itself and likely really was a better team. Bama didn’t lose to any 7-5 or 7-6 teams though. The loss to Ole Miss was a fluke. Bama let the best Ole Miss team of this century hang around too long in that game and at the end, when Bama was going in for the winning TD, an Ole Miss DB made a great play to intercept a pass and keep Bama from scoring, effectively winning that game. Those were Bama’s only losses. So, no Saban isn’t a DA. I reiterate, Florida and South Carolina had teams clearly not as talented as the Dawgs were. Do you disagree with that statement?
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The deal is for him to take a shot at UGA, any shot that he comes to mind at the time. Doesn’t matter what the post here is about..a shot at UGA is necessary for him to comment. I suppose it makes this fellow feel good about himself…”Hey Man, Nice Shot!”
Now you know.
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The article documents the 2010 – 2013 timeframe where UGA won the SECE twice losing to 2 other 5 star, repeat BCS appearance champions. Michigan never even won their division.
It’s not been Richt can’t recruit talent (5 star classification). It’s not that he doesn’t develop that talent (see NFL rosters). It’s not even that we don’t win the SECE (we do, more than any other SECE opponent in the Richt era).
We just don’t win the damn Championship game against better teams. I don’t see that as my being a Richt apologist…just a belief that he can get this team damn closer to winning the SEC than switching to a new coaching regime now. More than happy to revisit this position in 2 – 3 years.
I no longer care about the BCS / CFB Playoff / whatever. We can only control our schedule.
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SEC Championship is the only one that counts to me. The winner has to win to get in and then win the game to be the champion. There is no “committee” to vote on who gets in. The BCS and playoff are both nothing more than beauty pageants or figure skating or gymnastics competitions. Win the SEC and the rest will take care of itself.
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If Georgia wins the SECCG it will be in the playoffs.
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Is there ANYONE in Dawg Nation that doesn’t think WE will find a way to be the first to win the SECCG and NOT get in the playoffs?
I didn’t think so…;-)
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The only way that could happen would be to lose to Tech in the last game of the regular season and that never happens….wait…
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Need reassess ranking after couple years because we lose a lot of players for not doing it the Ga way.
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+1. We have had a great deal of success in recruiting, but lose players to what some might consider minor violations. What good does it do to secure a great recruit and then kick him off the team or out of school for minor infractions that other teams don’t even punish? It also hurts the kid. Let me be as specific as possible on this: I don’t give a rat’s ass if some player smokes grass, particularly in the off season. When they start testing the entire student body (and faculty for that matter) then the Georgia administration might have the moral high ground to do what it has been doing to athletes–but not until then. And it really hurts the team. The pot policy is the very first thing that needs to be changed.
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Ok, I tend to agree our weed policy is a bit strong considering the competition… HOWEVER, it is what it is, the kids absolutely know it – and they don’t get kicked off the team for a first (or second) offense. If a kid is so stupid to keep smoking when he has already been caught AND KNOWS HE IS GOING TO BE TESTED AGAIN, then I think he is too dumb to be on the team. Here’s looking at you JHC….
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Another thing (since I am on a roll…) I think that is one big reason we lose a number of recruits…. they know they can go to Auburn, South Carolina, etc…. and get away with pretty much whatever they want to get away with. They want to party and have a great time and have no repercussions for their actions. At UGA they will pay a price if caught, other places not so much.
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Agreed, test ALL the Faculty…randomly….until then UGA is just blowing SMOKE!
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There is a direct correlation between success in recruiting and success on the field, both in the SEC and nationally. It’s not hard to locate supporting facts.
“Our continual habit of losing to teams who have never had a recruiting class ranked as high as ours shows that recruiting rankings are not an especially accurate predictor of on field success.”…..doesn’t really jive with””’ “I really don’t follow recruiting much at all. If we end up with the #1 or the #15 recruiting class, it really doesn’t seem to matter.”
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It does in the sense that a person can be aware of these things without subscribing to the services and following each recruit’s moves. You can hear/know that a class is ranked X without knowing any of the recruits’ names. (I’m largely in this camp.)
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I am not completely unaware of how our recruiting ends up. I generally know if we are top 5, top 10, etc but I don’t keep up with high school kids and where they are “leaning” or if they are a “soft” or “hard” commit.
I say it really doesn’t seem to matter because we continue to lose games we should win regardless of what our recruiting ranking is. I say the recruiting rankings aren’t an accurate predictor because I see us lose to teams with lower ranked recruiting classes than ours much more than I would like.
Trot out the stats all you like, they don’t seem to apply to Georgia football.
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That’s fine if your intention is to shit on Richt and UGA (Lord knows some of the criticism is warranted), but my God do you miss the point. Nobody, NOBODY, is saying that having highly rated recruits guarantees national championships or wins over less talented teams. Weirdly shaped ball bouncing funny and whatnot or shitty coaching decisions or whatever myriad ways that a team can underachieve.
However, the evidence that you are purposely obfuscating in your efforts to continuously point out the shortcomings of Richt and UGA (again – nobody disputes shortcomings exist, but MAH GAWD it gets really damn old that people come on here to do nothing but inject their pro-Richt / anti-Richt agenda into every freaking topic), is that while top-rated recruiting doesn’t guarantee top-rated results, there is very high correlation between teams winning / playing for national championships and having top-flight recruiting (UGA and Michigan being the obvious exceptions). Sure – Georgia has underachieved, but that doesn’t change the fact that recruiting matters whether you want to believe it or not. However, I suspect your mind is already made up and all the logic in the world isn’t going to sway you.
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That’s why the term “outlier” exists. 🙂
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I guess we’re an “outlier” every season then? Maybe we should consider a coach who can get us to the statistical norm? Statistically, and based on the given probabilities, we should have more SEC championships and at least one national championship in the past 14 years. Highly talented teams have come and gone, schedules have varied in difficulty and balls have bounced in our favor and against us. The common element for those 14 years is Richt. Just sayin’.
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/facepalm
I learned something today. No matter the topic of discussion, some folks around here will find a way to make it a referendum on their stance on Richt. And honestly – there’s nothing wrong with having whatever stance you choose, but jeez it’s one tired and boring conversation that for whatever reason folks feel the need to continue interjecting into every topic the Senator posts here. Frankly, it’s the same, boring talking points from each side on the Richt debate and nobody is changing their minds on where they stand. The horse is pretty dead from where I stand yet ya’ll just keep on beating the damn thing. I can already tell it’s gonna be a long offseason around these parts.
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I always have to think twice with “ctd.” “Continued,” or “Coach Todd Grantham”? Good thing the Senator knows the proper use of capitalization or I’d really be SOL on these things. Especially if it were also a recruiting post. 🙂
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Jeebers, if my son, who’s a high school senior, would make his college decision by next Wednesday, I’d be thrilled. One day he likes one school and another day, it’s another school. I will say once he makes a clear declaration of commit, I know my kid will stick to it, but he’s only dealing with a few academic schollies, not big name football coaches and nubile hostesses.
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Ah, roster management!! I think you nailed it. Remember all those years with Neil Callaway as the OL coach? All those years of being one injury away from disaster on the OL? Callaway had final say on OL recruits and his “standards” were so high, we always passed on guys that turned out to be studs elsewhere. Never had enough OL. Of course there’s always the attrition issue, i.e., discipline and how/why it’s handled so much differently here as opposed to other schools in the SEC.
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A few things that should be obvious:
1) Any college team’s success is going to be directly tied to the quality of players acquired through recruiting. You wanna know why Alabama is so good? They are about to sign their 5th No. 1 class in a row.
2) Recruiting is silly and stupid mainly because 18 year old kids are silly and stupid. I know I was.
3) Given that what leads to the big trophies is silly and stupid should we not focus things other than the big trophy? I mean it would be nice to get, but going through life being happy or sad based upon whether you have or haven’t won it is both silly and stupid.
I’m not saying that I don’t want one, I’m just saying that in the grand scheme of things, I’m not going to allow it to effect my life either way. What I don’t ever want to see is compromising integrity, academic or otherwise, or putting public safety at risk so that we can get the dumbest and most dangerous criminals possible as a means to obtain that trophy. If you have to be like Alabama or Auburn to win, I’ll just as soon let them have it.
Do things the right way and live with the results.
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I agree with you about Auburn, not so sure about Bama. I don’t recall, maybe there are incidents I don’t remember, any stories about Bama players being in trouble. I was surprised to see Saban take Taylor, I don’t imagine they were lacking in D line talent and were desperate to get a guy with that kind of baggage.
It looks to me that Ole Miss is going the Auburn route, going “all in” on winning. I’m not sure they have the long term professional cheaters Auburn has to pull it off. They could easily end up in trouble soon.
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Issues with Bama just off the top of my head:
doubling the number of medical redshirts relative to the entire country
Darius philon
4 involved in two armed robberies on campus; one allowed to return to Alabama
jonathan taylor – (Auburn wouldn’t take Taylor.)
These are just under the current regime. There is not a line that Bama won’t cross in order to win. None. They are to football what a 350 pounder is to an all you can eat pizza buffet. Remorseless and insatiable.
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Not true. A 350 pounder eventually will get filled up at the buffet if he eats enough. Bama will always be remorseless and insatiable.
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Us Vonnegutian Bokonists understand that Star ratings are mere Granfaloons and thumb our nose to the ratings until after signing day.
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True, but they just got Buster Douglassed (yes that’s a verb) by OSU. The showed up fat and happy instead of hungry and mean. Here’s to hoping that their career path will take a similar trajectory in response to that beating.
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What? I agree in principle with what you’re
saying but this is a multi billion dollar business that is fueled by winning. If you want to watch real student athletes play for the love of the game you need to watch Div. 3 ball. What is that saying in the Good Book about the love of money? Well there you have it.
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Call me an idealist. I’ll live with that. I’m not wrestling with pigs over dollars. Not going to do it. Even if it’s lots of dollars and everyone is doing it, etc…
And yes I do want to watch student athletes play college football. I’m sure we have some. Conley for sure. Malcolm certainly wants to be. There’s more light there than you think.
Glittering prizes and endless compromises shatter the illusion of integrity. Someone should write a song about it.
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Very good quote. It describes much of life. Was it from a Rush song? I agree Conley and Malcolm are shining examples of what student athletes should be. But we know that many of the great athletes come from a thug culture where “disrespecting” someone can cost you your life. All of life would be better if everyone shared you ideals. But it’s a free country where various assholes, bullies, dickheads, and in the case of PSU child rapists, are tolerated in the name of winning. What can I say, it’s a fucked up world.
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Quite. “Spirit of the Radio” from the prog-rock trio.
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Along these lines .. just heard Joe Montana say on the Dan Patrick Show that if he hadn’t gone to Notre Dame, Montana would have signed with Georgia.
How did we not get Montana here as a QB? I guess it is Garner’s fault or CMR or maybe we should blame Bobo.
Doesn’t this completely disprove Stewart Mandel? Clearly Montana would recognize the helmet immediately since he almost signed here.
😉
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Well played, sahib.
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That……..made me smile.
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We used to recruit pretty well in that area of the world. I think that the ladies made quite the impression upon them. Zippy Morocco, Tereshinski, Trippi were all from that area. There are a lot more if you start looking into it. Once we started recruiting ALL of our homegrown talent, our focus in that area of the world faded a bit.
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Once Tech left the SEC and began its long slide into anonymity, Georgia did not have to go to Pennsylvania as much or as often. Do people realize we used to compete with Tech for players, other than Brendan Douglas. 🙂
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They beat us this year and have won a NC since we have. But you are correct, they still suck.
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No they haven’t. We only recognize Colorado winning it in ’90. 😉
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Sounds good to me.
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That was a Mexican National Championship, and UPI promptly coughed its cookies.
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You’re a nihilist.
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Didn’t even know he was religious.
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BATMAN, COME TO GEORGIA!!!!!
WE NEED YOU!!!!
(<o^^o>)
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At least based on the article of this post, GA and Michigan will be the Cinderellas for next season’s National Championship Final.
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During the tenure of CMR, it’s all about that children story about the race between the hare and the turtle. With patience and continued hard work, the time will come that GA will be on top when everybody is just taking a nap and sitting on their laurels. When? let us see the first Sat. of Oct. 20115.
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20115??
DATELINE: Athens, GA, USA
Entering his 18,115th season as head of the Georgia Bulldogs, Mark Richt is optimistic that THIS is the year his team will win the CFB Championship. The first of 64 games begins this Saturday…
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At least CMR is sure to break Joe’s record of 409 wins.
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