The Smart hire, good part edition

There’s a lot to get excited about with regard to Kirby Smart taking the helm of Georgia’s football program.  He’s a sharp guy who’s trained under the best in the business for years.  He’s regarded as a top notch recruiter. He’s got roots in the Georgia program, which can’t hurt among a certain element in the fan base.

In particular, here’s what I like:

• Recruiting.  There isn’t a candidate Georgia could have realistically considered for the head coaching job who could do a better job of holding on to Georgia’s solid 2016 class than Smart.  Indeed, there’s a likelihood that he’ll be able to build upon that.  The initial reaction from recruits who are in play for Georgia has been quite favorable. And while this isn’t a reason in and of itself to hire Smart, it’s certainly not a negative, especially when you consider how important this next recruiting class is in restocking the talent level at Georgia.
• Xs and Os.  Yes, I know – he’s Saban’s defensive coordinator and Nick really runs that defense.  However true the conventional wisdom is on that perception, there’s still no way Saban keeps a guy around and pays him the kind of money Smart gets just to rely orders and directions from the boss.  Smart knows how to coach defense. Hopefully, he also knows from that what kind of offensive approach works, too.
• Scott Cochran.  Smart and Alabama’s strength and conditioning coach are close – close enough that Cochran is widely expected to join Smart in Athens.  I can’t begin to tell you how big a deal that would be.  Suffice to say it would represent a 180 degree turn from how S&C has been handled here for decades.  Admittedly, things had started to change in the past couple of years.  They’re about to change even more, and that can’t be bad.
• Timing.  He’s going to have a decent amount of time to get things in order with staffing and recruiting.  If he’s as organized as I would expect someone off the Saban coaching tree to be, the transition should be relatively smooth.

Note that everything there is short term.  That’s really all I can judge the move on right now.  Anything longer is speculative until we see how he settles in.  But at least there appears to be some certainty around the program again and that’s not a bad thing.

Although I’m dreading the barrage of bad puns we’re going to be subjected to over the next few years.  I promise to do my best not to add to that.