If you’re wondering what they’ll be saying about the decision to hire Kirby Smart if things don’t click in Athens for him, have no fear. The good football watching citizens of Montana have already been whispering in Stewart Mandel’s ear.
Georgia: Hired Alabama defensive coordinator Kirby Smart. It’s easy to see why Georgia would covet the former Dawgs safety-turned Nick Saban protege. It’s a bit puzzling, though, why AD Greg McGarity put all his chips on a first-time head coach rather than conduct a search befitting a consensus Top 10 job. Smart has all the necessary training. Whether he has the chops to be an SEC head coach long term is unclear. [Emphasis added.]
I dunno. Will “the Dawg ate the search firm’s homework” make for a satisfactory defense to that criticism?
Get The Picture 
McGarity’s job is in Kirby’s hands at this point.
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Do you think anyone gave McGarity the old, “UGA must win the SEC this your or you are gone”, condition?
Any of you see the scary parallels between the Falcons and UGA?
McGarity = Dimetrioff
Schotty = Shanahan
Lambert = this years Matt Ryan
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Not sure, but if ADGM had to lay his record on the line right now it would be tough to justify him still being here. However, if Kirby is good and UGA has a lot of success in football it won’t matter. ADGM will be here as long as he wants to be.
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Funny you mention Schottenheimer and Shanahan. There was a poster here for weeks and weeks who insisted ad nauseum that UGA had hired the wrong coach’s son for our offense. Same post, over and over.
Also funny I don’t hear that argument being made anymore.
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Don Leeburn Jr = Arthur Blank?
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Well let’s hope Kirby Smart isn’t Dan Quinn.
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Amen.
Dan Quinn, accomplished NFL DC who learned under the master, Pete Carroll
Kirby Smart, accomplished CFB DC who learned under the master, Nick Saban.
Lets hope this is not a precursor.
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Quinn is in year one of a rebuilding job. Kirby probably is too.
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Rubbish.
UGA is in no way, shape or form a “rebuilding job”
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Yeah, I thought the same thing. Yes, we’ve got some areas we need to address — name me a team that doesn’t — but UGA is by no means a “rebuilding job” in the sense that term is used in college football.
South Carolina? Now THERE’S your rebuilding job. UGA? Not so much.
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Our lack of quality depth at o-line, wide receiver and quarterback would indicate otherwise. I’m not saying we should be prepared to lose 8 games. But I don’t expect better than a 8-4 result next year. Gonna take a little time to plug the holes Richt’s roster management left.
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That would make it a “filling-in” job then, right?
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There were plenty on here that were willing to give Richt two more years yet now they want instant success. Hell I wanted him gone but knew we weren’t going to be great next year no matter who was coaching. The Butthurt is strong in the pro Richt faction.
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I was willing to give Richt another year because he was winning the last 5 years at a percentage that exceeded UGA’s historical norm. You insinuated that UGA would improve if we fired Richt. If you knew what you were talking about a better coach (Smart) should do better than the inferior coach. If UGA under Smart performs below its historical norm or even lower than the level the past 5 years it is a step backward.
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And you’d love that wouldn’t you?
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Fuck, no, scottdavid329, I would NOT love it if we regressed. I have posted time after time the reasons I want us to win every game under Smart. I will type slowly and use small words if you did not understand my many posts about my desires.
I am emotionally and financially invested in going to the games. I am NOT spending the money and my time to attend the games hoping to lose.
Understand?
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You better believe Kirby needs to win at least 10 games next year. If old staff excepting Schott were back with the class they had coming in would have expected even more. It is not butt hurt it is reality 10 wins is not getting it done.
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You really think that if Richt had been retained with at least one if not two coordinators and a true freshman QB that he would have won ten games next year. I’d have loved some of that vodka laced koolaid you’d have been drinking.
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Quinn’s rebuilding task is to improve upon the Falcon’s performance of the last 2 years. If Smart is facing a “rebuilding” job in the nature of Quinn’s then he likewise would be tasked with improving upon the past few years.
“Rebulding” means improving. Smart is not being asked to perform a demolition job.
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It’s not a great comparison, because Thomas Dimitroff is responsible for personnel and he still needs to be fired. Should have been fired last year, but somehow fleeced Blank into keeping him.
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You chose the analogy.
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Well, not really. I responded to it.
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Would an Open Records request get to the bottom of all this?
I know the ABH has received access to McGarity’s emails in the past by requesting this way.
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Frankly, it is done..what is the use in looking at his emails to see what happened?
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Because I like a good soap opera.
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Carry on then, me, I am too old for shit like that.
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McGarity was willing to share quite a bit of info about the state of the program before Richt was fired through open records requests:
“McGarity and/or UGA president Jere Morehead received 38 emails or letters relating to Richt and the football program between Oct. 3, the day Georgia lost to Alabama 38-10, and Oct. 14, four days after the Tennessee loss, according to an open records request by the Athens Banner-Herald and OnlineAthens.com.
Of those, 28 either wanted Richt fired (“When the season is finished, perhaps we should make an offer to Kirby Smart of Alabama to be our next Football Head Coach,” one alum wrote), changes to be made or expressed unhappiness with the team’s performance. Four wrote to express support for Richt.
Others wrote about the way players acted in a pregame incident with Alabama, complained about the Sanford Stadium atmosphere, or the condition of the field at Tennessee.
“You know probably starting Saturday night into Sunday into Monday, your inbox is going to be full of people expressing their thoughts,” McGarity said.
Some can’t wait, sending them at halftime.
“I read emails,” McGarity said. “Sure, if someone has time to write, I’ll read it. I have to decide on my own decisions, things of this nature. People vent. I get that. People compliment. I get that. You kind of read everything.”
http://onlineathens.com/dogbytes/football/2015-10-24/emails-follow-losses-frustrated-fans-let-uga-decision-makers-know-how
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“You kind of read everything.”
So there’s a chance Greg was kind of reading Get The Picture!
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I’d say the advantage to some open records digging is it might clear up whether one story of how this happened is real or fiction – the story goes like this:
One or more prominent boosters, who have pledged a good chunk of the IPF are very unhappy about the colossal turd in the punch bowl that was everything about this year’s Cocktail Party. The team keeps winning after that, but looks bad. Meanwhile, SCar gets rebuffed by Herman at Houston, and starts looking seriously at UGA alum Kirby Smart. At the same time, hated rival UF, with a new coach from the Saban tree, goes undefeated in the SEC East and wins it in said coach’s first year there. So said boosters say “we can’t let Smart go to SCar and beat us too,” tell McGarity “no $$$ unless you fire Richt and hire Smart” and a small number of boosters is not only why Richt was fired, but also why Smart was pretty much hired 2 days later.
Because if it’s true, 1. it’d be nice to know who’s really running our football program and 2. if that is how it went down, McGarity has even less ground to justify his continued presence at B-M, regardless of how the team does in 2016.
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I’d say this is the likeliest sequence of events.
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Yeah, that’s essentially what happened. And the donors in question are liquor magnates, one an heir to his daddy’s business and the other somewhat more self-made.
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Pretty sure an unnamed, hand written note, showing remarkable resemblance to the hand writing of one Jimmy Sexton, randomly showing up on Greg Mcgarity’s desk reading, “Market is wide open. Kirby is ready. Open the vault.” is not going to show up in an open records request.
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Yes. But why?
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He wanted Mullin. Leeburn wanted Kirby. The Georgia way indeed
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yep
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Mullin would have cost more for sure…I am glad we hired Kirby.
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Source?
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About 99% reliable.
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Leebern didn’t have to send McFlunky an email, or a letter, or a postcard. He just picked up the phone and told him what to do. No record, no muss, no fuss. I guess we’ll see if Big Don is any better of a GM than Bobby Lowder was, or Jerry Jones has been since Jimmy Johnson decided he’d had enough.
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In all honesty though, Kirby has what maybe a 10-20% chance of being better than CMR?
I really dont get the we might lose 5 games next year but at least it isnt CMR losing those games mindset you hear on the radio and read around here.
Kirby needs to win the east next season. Anything short of that is a giant failure and everyone in BM should be fired immediately. From the AD to the janitors. Everyone. Gut that place and start all over again.
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I disagree, totally.
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Not sure if you’re being facetious…. if not….
Dude, I love CMR and did not think we should’ve fired him. But I think it’s ridiculous to say that Kirby must win the East next year or else he’s a “failure.” I give the guy three years to win the East before I start questioning whether he was the right guy to take over. I think almost any coach deserves at least three years….. unless his first two year are sub-.500…..
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Agree, Jared, except I thought it was time for a change with CMR. Kirby will need some time, and 3-4 years isn’t unreasonable. If he doesn’t win the East next year, then all is not lost, especially if he beats FU, plays physical football, and avoids the sort of cluelessness that has plagued our program at least once a year. As we saw in October, we’ve got a ways to go to catch Bama, and FU and TENN are progressing. Hopefully his new coaches can recruit OL and DL impact players, and Eason can help bring a group of receivers in. I get the sense that Kirby will play close attention to every phase of the program, which should be helpful. He’s just gonna need some time.
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I agree that he should get at least three years, but I also think we should win the East next year. But then, I think the same thing every year.
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That’s some great comedy writing. St. Mark the Mediocre hasn’t won anything of consequence in 10 years (5 yards short doesn’t count, that’s celebrating a loss in a game we were up by two scores in the third quarter), that’s why he was fired. Richt was still making the same bonehead mistakes in year 15 he was making in year 1. Richt didn’t win the East in his first season, he went 8-3 and lost the Music City Bowl by punting with under 2 minutes to play down by 4. I think Kirby should be given that as his benchmark for his first season.
Unless Kirby can’t recruit worth a flip, and he is supposed to be one of the best recruiters in the country, he will do no worse than Richt did. Also, thankfully, the fan base probably won’t fall in love with Kirby because he is so “good” off the field like they did with Richt. If Kirby doesn’t produce in 3 or 4 years, he will be easy to fire.
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Richt in 2001 produced the same record Donnan produced in 2000. If you set Richt’s 2001 improvement over Donnan’s 2000 as the benchmark then Smart’s floor for 2016 is 9-3 after the Sunday after Thanksgiving.
I will buy that.
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Yes, this is exactly correct, DawgPhan. 10%-20% chance of being superior to Richt. All you have to do is look around at hires at comparable programs over the last 20 years. What percentage of them won near a .750 clip? Probably right around 15%, or a little over 1 in 7.
Of course, we’re not hiring a proven head coach, the rate for coordinator hires is probably closer to the 10%.
Sadly, the chances of Kirby at least seeming to be as good or better than Richt for a few years is probably close to 50/50 (e.g. Muschamp’s 11-2 in year 2, or Malzahn’s rabbit’s foot year), so there is a decent chance nothing will be learned from this experience.
We’ll just continue to believe that because Mark Richt didn’t win a national title in 15 years, that he would never have won one, because most of the fans that advocated this move don’t understand math well enough to get why that argument is nonsense.
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…I think a lot of Dawg fans underestimate how hard it is to win….even in the SEC East.
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You guys should form a support group where you can deal with the pain of a head coach being fired. Or fuck it, just hash it out here.
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They can also exchange stories about their favorite moments from the Blackout and the 2012 SEC Championship Game.
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Would you like to share stories about any of the 145 wins?
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And behold! The unranked Tech and Louisiana-Monroe players were shaking in their boots, after winning so many games against them who could say that Richt twas not the greatest coach ever? Those few losses each year were irrelevant compared to the overall W/L record. Nevermind that the losses were pathetic blowouts and were against the 1-2 teams that would have to be beaten for the Dawgs to be champions. Richt twas given a lifetime contract and the Dawgs never won less than 9 games for eternity, they also never won a championship of any sort either. Now let’s all get in our Red ford truck, and truly become GA Tech by bragging about team morals, because we have no team accomplishments to brag about.
In all seriousness, we are going to take a small step back next year and that’s fine, CKS gives this team a hope of championships, which like it or not would never ever happen under Richt. I will be perfectly content with the team next year regardless of record as long as the pants-shitting against decent opponents stops. It was an annual occurrence for any Richt team and it’s what made me sour on him as a coach. I’ll be upset, but I can tolerate losing after putting up a good fight.
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As I have typed many times, Richt’s losses are carved in granite and his wins written in invisible ink. The only coach in history to finish 0-51.
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It’s really not that hard, Biggus. There is no problem whatsoever with being a fan and hoping that this new direction works out. If anyone (including me) says otherwise, they’re a dick.
But if you want to argue that Mark Richt was a mediocre coach and that Smart is likely to be better, then you should expect some pushback, because it’s a silly thing to say.
Being a fan can mean rose-colored glasses, hopium and Kool-Aid, but it doesn’t have to. Some of us prefer reality.
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I agree that Smart could be worse than Richt, especially early Richt. I doubt he’ll underperform the last ten years, but that’s also a possibility. I’m absolutely a realist. I wanted Richt gone fully knowing that things could get worse. Your incessant harping on this being a huge mistake is not “realism”, however. It’s whining because you liked Richt. And holding Smart to the standard of winning the SEC his first year is not even close to realism. It’s setting the bar at a level you will very likely get to claim failure in 2016.
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Insert “East” and “where” where appropriate.
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I have no interest in claiming to be right if Smart fails, and I will argue to keep him around as long as he wins at a .750 rate. If he does, he very likely will get a national title in the first 15 years, because Richt was unlucky and we are unlikely to have two consecutive excellent coaches suffer such a drought in the face of that level of success.
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I feel bad in saying this, but if there is any reason to let go of Richt is he had been having tough luck here at UGA.
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Well, is it 15% or not? Is it 10% or not? You can’t use math to defend your thesis and then say “probably.” Well, I guess you can, but it totally undermines the argument.
Perhaps it was Richt that “seemed” good, but really wasn’t. He beat one team in 2015 that had a winning record, and that game went to overtime. That team lost by 27 points to Georgia State. Not all 9-3 seasons (75%, ftw!) are created equal. Beating no one of consequence, looking incompetent against the three teams worth half a shit on your schedule, and having no answer for how this program is going to get better except, “perhaps we should try hiring another OC” is no way to go through life.
Look at it another way. If neither Pruitt nor Schottenheimer were going to be around in 2016, why not just clean house? You are going to rely on Richt hiring two new coordinators when three of his four hires have been failures? How successful have coaches been that had to replace both coordinators in the same season? If Richt were to hire two coordinators, is he going to force the coordinators to keep the assistants he has in place, or allow them to bring their staff with them? If nearly everyone is going to be gone except Richt, why not just go ahead and make a full change and see if you can stimulate the program beyond the funk it has been in for the last decade?
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Well, if we’re going to get preachy about math, technically Richt hired 7 (not 4) coordinators in his time in Athens. 4 of them were pretty good (BVG, Pruitt, Bobo, Callaway) and that’s not including Grantham, who actually put out some pretty good production at times.
Why not just say “three of his three hires were failures.” It would sound even more dramatic than the blatantly false garbage you just threw out there.
Honestly though, as a huge Richt supporter and somebody who was disappointed with firing him, can I just say that I wish all of you guys would STFU already about Richt. It’s time to move on. Get over your narcissistic selves and stop bitching at each other. It’s over. Done. He’s gone. He ain’t coming back. He’s not coaching in Athens and yet he landed on his feet and is happy. Everyone in the discussion wins. Except miserable UGA fans who want to bitch and moan for the sake of bitching and moaning. God this comment section used to be soooooo much more educated and insightful. Now it’s just a bunch of brainless zombies spouting the same thing over and over and over and over. Everyone who stoops into that conversation looks liked a pointed fukcing moron. I would rather read Dog if FL’s seventeen degree humor and spend 35 minutes connecting the dots on the punch line than spend another minute reading why one side or the other needs to get a grip.
Thank you and have a nice day.
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…three of his last four hires…
Sorry for my blatantly false garbage. As an aside, you remember the Callaway years much differently than anyone else I know.
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Here’s the thing Puff, as annoyed as you may be about any comment defending Richt, I am far more annoyed at absurd comments suggesting that these hires were ‘obvious’ improvements.
I can’t stand to read them. You can’t stand to read the responses to them. I see no middle ground for either of us other than to simply stop reading the blog.
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You could just stop responding to them, and not do the good Senator wrong by deciding to quit reading his wonderful blog anymore.
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Puff, you are correct that Richt appears to be happier than he appeared in a while at UGA.
I believe he knew for at least a year his boss was looking to fire him. That is stressful for anyone in any field. His new boss sought him out and is thrilled to have him. That alone would relieve a huge amount of stress.
I am happy for Richt that he is not working for The J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics any more. I am optimistic that UGA ascends to unprecedented heights under Smart. Since Smart has zero track record as a HC, all I have to go on is hope. I am hoping for brilliance from him.
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That team lost to GASt. at HOME by 27 points, and took us to overtime in Sanford. They’re an 8-4 SunBelt team that was also soundly blown out by AppSt and a WVa team that put their coach on the hottest of seats.
It was a softer set of 9 wins than a James Franklin Vandy team.
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If your point is that significantly more than 15% of new coaching hires at similar programs win at that rate, then I am wrong: I couldn’t agree with you more.
And you are right, I haven’t collated all the data, but that’s because it seems pretty obvious that very few hires, even at schools like UGA, win at the rate Richt did over the long term. Sometimes obvious thinks are false, though, so I would be thrilled to be corrected.
There may be a reason, though, that other quantitative authors like Bill Connely espouse the same opinion on Richt as I (and he does do the research).
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My point, with apologies to Puffdawg for even continuing this dialogue, is that a winning percentage is nice and all, and it may even be likely that Kirby cannot surpass Richt’s truly great 75% as you suggest, but the true measure of success for UGA should be championships. UGA went a decade without one. The hope is that Kirby can break that drought just like Richt broke the 30-year drought. I hate it that it didn’t work out with Richt. I hoped he could hang on and have more success with a new OC, but if he needed to replace the OC and DC, I understand the move to let him go as well.
Sorry for adding more garbage to the heap.
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I know that’s the theory, that there are coaches that win at a high level but can’t win championships. I’ve never seen any evidence that such a phenomena exists anywhere in sports.
Winning percentage is a sensitive variable with lots of data. Championships are noisy, random beasts. Great coaches that don’t win championships occur at exactly the rate you’d expect by random chance. That’s why a list of the greatest of coaches of all time is littered with coaches that didn’t win their first title until after their 15th year.
I don’t think any more will be added to that list, though. The internet has spoken: no matter how good you are, if you are a bit unlucky and don’t get the ring in a timely fashion, you’re gone.
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Certainly, Trey, I respect that for many “the true measure of success for UGA should be championships” rather than winning. Rick’s point is that if there is a high correlation between a coach winning a high percentage of games and coaches who win championships. Looking back on my personal frame of reference, which would be about to 1966, I cannot think of any coach who won an SEC championship who did not win games at a high percentage except maybe Chizik, who cheated. I did not pull out the record books to review all the SEC championships, but maybe Mike Dubose is the other exception. The guy at UK got a co-championship in 1976, but UK was on probation and was nailed for cheating, too.
If there is a significant sample of coaches who win championships without building high winning percentages I would like to see it.
Can you name any group of coaches who won at a 75% rate who did not win a conference championship during the period in which he was winning at a 75% rate? I cannot. You may be right; Richt may not have ever won an SEC championship at UGA in the future, and I concede I cannot prove you wrong. I do suggest that if you are wrong he would be a statistical outlier.
Thank you for a calm and reasoned post about this topic.
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Richt had an exceptional first five years. He won 80% of his games (52-13). He won the East three times. He won two SEC titles. He had four consecutive top 10 finishes and 10-win seasons. He beat Tech 51-7 in my last game as a student. He won 75% of his SEC games (30-10). He lost only four games in a season once, and that was his very first season. After Jim Donnan’s 35-13 record (73%) over the previous four seasons (including the worst home game I’ve ever attended vs. Auburn in 1999), I was ready to immortalize the man forever.
When last he won an SEC title, Jacob Eason had just turned 8. In the next ten years, he won 71% of his games (93-38), though just 66% of SEC games (53-27). He had five 10-win seasons. He won the East twice, no SEC titles, and finished ranked in both polls (consensus top 25, if you will) five times… three top-10 finishes. He lost four or more games five times.
The last ten years of Richt’s tenure had been Jim Donnan with better output vs. Georgia Tech. If Donnan had beaten Tech in ’98-’00 when they were deploying the ineligible Joe Hamilton, he would have amassed a record of 38-10 over his last four years (79%). We would have still been looking up at Florida and Tennessee in the division. In reality, though, Donnan won 73% overall and 69% of SEC games in the four years that don’t count the rebuilding year after Goff (and we shouldn’t because he left the program with waaaay more talent than he inherited).
I say all of that… and none of it is an answer to your question. Is there a coach that wins at a 75% rate who didn’t win a championship? Who is this 75% coach you speak of? Richt has only recently been a 75% coach. He was an 80% coach from 2001-2005, and glory hallelujah for that. He’s not been anywhere close to that in the decade since. Over that time, he’s averaged 9.3 wins and 3.8 losses. That is 71%. The 2012 season (2.7 wins above his 10-year average) helps to bolster his winning percentage over the last four years to that magical 75%. His best four-year during the ten-year drought was 2011-2014 (40-14, 74%, 2 SEC East titles).
None of that, though, should be the deciding factor for letting go someone as ingrained into the program as Richt and his family. And, while I know nothing, I have heard it repeated enough times to believe that Don Leeburn wanted Richt gone, and so he is gone. He wanted Smart hired, and so he is hired. I don’t know that I should spend an ounce of virtual ink trying to justify the decision of the decision makers, especially the Don.
Was firing a coach with the track record of Richt irrational? Probably. It may even be short-sighted, ignorant, come from an overly high estimation of one’s self-worth, and just plain dumb. I don’t know. All I know is my personal feelings, and for me, the Richt that I loved, the Richt that gave me the best four year stretch of UGA football in my short life, the Richt that I thought was the greatest coach in all the land… that Richt hasn’t been ’round for ten years now. I thought Stafford and AJ and Knowshon would be the guys to break through. It didn’t happen. I though Aaron Murray and heisman-caliber RBs and a new DC would do it. It didn’t. I had grown tired of placing my hope on new stars and new coordinators. I had lost faith that Richt could single-handedly steer this program back to the upper echelon. He needed coaches under him to do the heavy lifting… like Pruitt being enough of an a-hole to get the IPF thing back on the table. Then Schottenheimer came along. If Richt had fired him after the Florida game, he might still be here today… who knows. I know catharsis is needed, and unfortunately true catharsis won’t happen until the fall when we next get to enjoy UGA football in Sanford Stadium. When that happens, I know everyone will put aside whatever bad feelings they have, whatever pain they still may be feeling, and will root like hell for Kirby to lead UGA to a championship.
Sorry, Puffdawg. I can’t help myself.
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I agree completely with dog pan, no need to start making excuses to start with.
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His job is in your hands, dude. He asked me to repeat that; his job is in your hands. His job is in your hands.
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Always remember that Mike Bobo is getting the necessary experience Abd
will be waiting in the wings If Kirby does not meet expectations. Go Dawgs.
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I was just thinking yesterday about what Bobo would end up doing if both he and Kirby are successful.
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Bobo takes Tech job as soon as they can afford to r-u-n-n-o-f-t The Genius
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HA Wait. That’s not funny.
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I’m still wondering why UGA is considered such a great job?
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It will be a great job when we fire the AD, and the new HC can come in without the expectation that they have to win more games than Mark Richt or get canned. No wonder we couldn’t hire a proven candidate.
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It’s not in Montana?
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Oh hell no dude. Keep your constant running- down of the program over at your pathetic little dawg run board that you’ve personally managed to ruin. If you aren’t bright enough to see why the majority of experts consider this a top ten job, then just keep wondering.
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In no particular order.
1. Athens is a beautiful city…classic actually
2. Top 4 recruiting state
3. Top half team of the best conference in NCAA
4. Southern belles
5. School rich in tradition…top 15 all time winning program
6. Great looking colors
7. Awesome mascot
8. Fanatic fan base
9. Best fight song in all of college football
10. It’s NOT Georgia Tech…
11…or Auburn
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Wait now we are a top 10 job? But nobody has heard of us!
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The HC with the best winning percentage in our history is gone. The best DC and best recruiter we had in a decade is gone. We’re paying our OC $1.9 mil to walk away. There’s no IPF. Our new HC is helping another team in our conference win a national championship. McGarity is still here. We’d all be pointing and laughing if this were any other school.
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That said, it’s kind of sad that the “best DC” we had “in a decade” gave up over 600 yards rushing to bad UF offenses over only two seasons.
Not saying Pruitt sucked, but I will not miss his performance in the Cocktail Party.
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No fanbase ever misses their excellent DC’s poor performances. Tennessee fans were happy to see ‘Third and Chavis’ run out of town.
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As a good football watching citizen of MT, I don’t like Mandel’s argument. There are only a few proven head coaches that would be an upgrade over Richt–Saban, Meyer, maybe a Gary Patterson or Chris Peterson (based on UW, that’s debatable). Since we’re not getting any of those 4, why not get the longest tenured assistant from the best coach on the list who also has UGA ties. Nobody needs a search committee. This was a natural decision. If it doesn’t work out, I still think that McGarity played some pretty decent odds.
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As a famous philosopher from the West once said, “It was a no-brainer…”
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Peterson inherited a mess at UW. The problem there is the same as here. There is a portion of the fanbase that wants a NC and wants it now. Not three or four years, but now. How much time will Smart get , before fanbase goes ballistic on him? Hell , I have friends that already wanting to fire Peterson after two years. To paraphrase Lennon, give Smart a chance.
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Was it Uga X who ate the search firm homework?
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Smart is taking over one of the top 15 programs in all of college football at one of the peaks times in its history and some of you think that we need to give him time, that there are going to be missteps like with every new coach, blah blah blah.
We handed the keys to a Ferrari over to a kid with a learners permit. Everything about firing richt and hiring smart was the lazy amateur way to do things. It represents everything that is wrong with the athletic department and nothing that is right. We doubled down on the same stupid philosophy that has seen athletics drop farther and farther down the standings in nearly every sport.
I mean did we really fire one of the greatest coaches in UGA history to sit through 5 loss seasons while some goober from Alabama figures out if he even knows how to win?
The Smart hire was a mistake at this point. The hires that Smart has made at this point are mistakes. Smart will likely win enough to satisfy the people that just want to hang their hat on Smart <> Richt The odds of him winning a title are pretty slim. Only Bob Stoops has won a national title with no head coaching experience in the last 20 years. So on 1 side you have 1 guy that did it and on the other is the pile of coordinators that got head jobs that have won jack shit. Gee I wonder which one our great mush mouthed AD found on his long and in depth search.
I guess he found the giant pile of jack shit and dove right in. Hell diving is about the only thing we are good at.
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We are all goobers now
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If only hires who have head coaching experience win national titles then I guess that explains Richt not winning one. What the hell was Dooley thinking?
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It didn’t seem like a good move at the time, and not a move Dooley wanted to make. Sure enough, coordinator hires at big programs have been shit ever since (ask Florida how Zook and Muschamp worked out).
Richt was the one lucky exception this century. Check out how Dooley feels about firing Richt for not winning a title in his first 15 years.
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I would not call Smart “some goober from Alabama.” He apparently has achieved a great deal of respect in his profession. I do agree that he is “a kid with a learner’s permit.” I contend we have zero data upon which to conclude he will be a great head coach and The J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics is asking us to take his future brilliance on faith. I am willing to do that. I want to be optimistic about our future. There is nothing to be gained from not being optimistic.
That said, the odds are against it. If we assume that all head coaches were, at one time, coordinators, then the success of coordinators as head coaches should mirror the Bell Curve. The vast majority would be in the average range, a few would be lousy and a few would be great. At this point Smart is most likely to produce in the average range, just due to the odds.
I am hoping he is the greatest ever, but that is just on faith and nothing else.
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Guys who still insist on bitching about Richt getting fired and Kirby being hired remind me of a 16 year boy who just got dumped by his girl. That is what you sound like. You sit around and mope and complain to your friends, making them miserable, and hope her new guy turns out to be a loser so she will either come back or at worst you can gloat.
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Quote for me where the post to which you reply expresses any hope that Smart becomes a loser.
I explicitly wrote, “I am willing” to take Smart’s success on faith. I wrote, “I want to be optimistic” about our future. I concluded that I hoped Smart is the greatest coach ever.
Those comments are the opposite of hoping Smart becomes a loser.
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Patients people patients. At least wait until our coach starts to work full time for us.
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