Andy Staples, in response to a question about which football school has the best setup for media coverage:
… That said, the best setup is Georgia. Claude Felton is the best sports information director in the business, and his staff is top notch. Claude understands that it’s usually possible to protect the school’s interests and help us do our jobs at the same time. It probably helps that Mark Richt isn’t a complete control freak like many of his colleagues. Georgia allows more players to be interviewed than most programs of that stature, and they do a good job trying to make sure those interviews take place in relaxed settings, which typically produce better questions and answers. All the Bulldogs assistants are allowed to give interviews, which is kind of a big deal these days. The Nick Saban/Bill Belichick “one voice” philosophy is filtering through college football. And it’s fine when your team is winning national titles. When it isn’t, all you get are boring stories about mediocre teams.
So, I guess at least Georgia isn’t boring. That’s something. (Although it sounds like Richt is letting his inner control freak flag fly a little more this offseason than he has in the past.)
Get The Picture 
The Alabama SID had a reputation as being pricks before Saban got there, so I can imagine it’s much worse.
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OK, great. How come Georgia doesn’t get better press then? Until every article about the team quits being negative in some way or another I would adopt the same approach as Bama and have the HC as the only voice speaking for the program.
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“Every article”? Seriously?
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I would never even begin to speak for Claude Felton, but its possible Claude understands that nothing the media says really matters.
Claude slogged through some tough times in Athens, dealt with coaches and staff who actually hated “them lyin Atlanta noospapers”, people who remembered Furman Bisher and the Saturday Evening Post. I am glad to see Claude getting some love…Staples is right. For once. 🙂
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“Claude Felton is the best sports information director in the business, and his staff is top notch.”
So we’ve had a whole f#&king staff of media reps for years, and no special teams coordinator until a few months ago?!
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Claude’s “staff” is considerably smaller than the football staff.
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No shit.
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‘…the best setup for media coverage:’ I assume that does not include Auburn’s world class skill in media spin-control. No school even approaches Auburn’s investment in media and PR firms, lawyers, accountants, ‘inside sources’, and authoritative sports voices in covering up misdeeds and inventing fairy tales about their FB program. Just watch how fast published stories about Auburn disappear from all forms of media if they suggest illegal, immoral or unsavory behavior. Hell, if Nixon had been an Auburn grad. Watergate would have never been reported. We would have never been told about the Iranian hostage crisis if Carter was an Aubie.
That’s why the next most popular war cry from the Auburn faithful (after ‘War Dam Eagle’) is ‘PROVE IT”.
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I think the infrastructure Staples is talking about and the massive Auburn cover-up machine you are talking about are 2 different things. With the AJC and their penchant for covering everything Georgia related from a negative perspective so close by, I doubt UGA could ever cover anything up or spin something like the Cam Newton fiasco was spun. The AJC would have utterly crucified Cam if he played at UGA. Hell–I wouldn’t be surprised if that was part of their recruiting pitch (and negative pitch against UGA).
Seems like Claude gets the uphill battle with the AJC and tries to keep things light and easy–fun even.
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Nice to hear this about Felton.
My question is how does the school that gives out the Peabody Award for broadcast excellence produce such amateurish promotional videos? The one with REM was well done, but beyond that, they look like a class project from a freshman.
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