“Kirby Smart has his own way of doing things at Georgia.”

This tweet got a lot of attention yesterday.

If I am UGA AD, I get the UF game out of Jax as soon as I can.That game means so much in recruiting especially if a home game every other yr

— Rusty Mansell (@Mansell247) December 1, 2016

As we all know, by agreement between the two schools, no hosting of recruits occurs at the Cocktail Party… which is stupid on Georgia’s part, but I digress.

The idea that bringing the Florida game home and away would pay dividends in recruiting sounds reasonable, until you consider this:

By my count, the Bulldogs hosted a total of four official visitors during the entire 2016 season. Georgia will have more than that this weekend and will have tripled that total after next weekend.

Smart wants to win games first. The staff would rather focus on 1-2 official visitors and their families at the most on Saturdays. That’s one specific season.

Recruiting is also a year-round sport and yet the reality is the weeks that will define the program start this weekend. This is recruiting season.

Given the quality of the 2017 class he’s putting together, I tend to give Smart the benefit of the doubt regarding his priorities.  Regardless of your stance on where the Georgia-Florida series should be played, then, it doesn’t seem like recruiting is a factor.

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“Now the GAs have GAs.”

In light of my post yesterday about Saban, this piece about Tom Herman looking to remake the personnel staff at Texas is fascinating on a number of levels.

For instance, see if this sounds familiar:

There are several areas in which Texas lags behind national powers that Herman would like to fix, as he expressed to Dan Patrick this week when discussing recruiting.

“We need to stay competitive with the elite teams in the country — the Alabamas, the Ohio States, the Clemsons of the world — in terms of our facilities and our resources and support staff and recruiting staff and all that,” Herman told Patrick.

The last two areas are the most important in the short term, as the lack of a large support staff and recruiting staff contributed, at least in some part, to Charlie Strong’s failed tenure in Austin.

And the failed tenure of Mack Brown before him.

In fact, Texas was one of the last two schools in the Big 12 to hire a Director of Player Personnel in 2013. At the press conference to create that position, Brown admitted that “we’ve kinda been mom and popping it around here for a long time.”

The ‘Horns also didn’t have a football-specific strength and conditioning coach or a nutritionist until that time. Mom and popping it indeed.

Under Strong, it was much of the same, though there were some reports that former athletic director Steve Patterson wasn’t always willing to give him the resources he needed.

It’s going to be interesting to watch and compare where Georgia and Texas go over the next few years.  Sort of a massive controlled experiment.

Insomnia

Danny Kanell is overwrought.

@SECbooger knowing that teams that don't even win their conf get a chance to play for title keeps me up at night

— Danny Kanell (@dannykanell) December 2, 2016

Can’t sleep, Danny?  Take two Herbstreit rationalizations and call me in the morning.

If you’re a college sport’s postseason, you expand. It’s what you do.

Gotta love the perspective here.

Mike Krzyzewski on his Sirius show to Mike MacIntyre: "I don't understand why you don't go to 8 (CFP teams)." MacIntyre: "Me too."

— Jon Solomon (@JonSolomonCBS) December 2, 2016

Five years after they do, he’ll be asking some other coach the same question about 16.

There’s lobbying and then there’s lobbying.

Gotta love the consistency between this and this:

Kirby Smart says on radio on bowl for UGA: "We have no clue. I know Greg (McGarity) is working really diligently on it with the SEC office."

— Marc Weiszer (@marcweiszer) December 2, 2016

The cynic in me says most of that’s about making sure Georgia doesn’t play Miami.

At least we know McGarity has some priorities besides the reserve fund.

While we’re talking what-ifs…

In the recent history of Georgia football, is there a bigger what-if than this?

1. Alabama 32, Georgia 28 (2012): Good luck finding many better games anywhere. This back-and-forth classic between No. 2 Alabama and No. 3 Georgia determined a spot in the BCS championship game. There were future NFL stars ( Todd Gurley , Amari Cooper and Eddie Lacy ). There was controversy ( Quinton Dial ‘s hit to the head of Aaron Murray ridiculously didn’t draw a flag). And there was late-game drama. Murray’s tipped pass with 15 seconds left was caught by Chris Conley at the 5-yard line, but the clock expired. Mark Richt was 5 yards away from playing — and likely beating — Notre Dame Fighting Irish for the national championship. Instead, Richt got fired three years later. That’s life in the SEC.

I can’t think of one.  Discuss.

Muddle-huddling

Two thoughts I had reading this:  (1) this is what I love about college football, the creativity that comes from doing more with less; and (2) it’s kind of funny to hear a coach declare, “You want to put people on their heels” in the context of PATs.

Though I must say after watching Georgia’s offense this season, I’m a little jealous to hear a coach talk like this:

“We look at numbers and how people line up to us and if it’s a good look we run it,” UNH offensive coordinator Ryan Carty explained. “I’m in the booth so I get a good vision of things and I count numbers. I can see whether it’s man or zone. Things like that.

“We’ll have some plays that we practice throughout (the season), but when we use them we have to go on to the next one. There’s some plays based on what we see defensively that they do that we’ll put in that week. A lot of them are ways to get our best players in space.

“We have our aggressive operations, and then we have our, ‘This is when it has to happen.’ We have our chart, just like everybody, and we follow that chart to a T. That’s a little different.”

UNH has made five of its nine two-point-conversion attempts this season. The Wildcats are 1 of 2 when they have run the ball on conversion attempts, and 4 of 7 when they have passed.

Carty said UNH will go for two at any point in the game as long as the coaches feel like they have an edge.

“There’s definite forethought to it,” he said. “There are plans. It goes along with our overall philosophy on offense, which is attack.”

I guess there’s a difference between attacking the day and attacking the defense.

“Good afternoon, everybody. Nothin’ going on here!”

Nice, classy tribute to Verne Lundquist from ESPN here, with a few Georgia touches.  It’ll make you smile.

It’ll also make you a little wistful that we’re losing another voice that is part of what makes football in the South special.