The casino’s sports book posted odds on its 2017 games of the year and Georgia makes the list five times. Unfortunately, the Dawgs are dogs in four of the five:
- UGA vs. ND (-3)
- UGA vs. UT (-1)
- UGA vs. UF (-1)
- UGA vs. Auburn (-10)
- UGA (-2.5) vs. GT
Granted, that’s four road games, plus the Cocktail Party, and the majority are close enough to qualify as tossups, but 1-4 is still 1-4.
That being said, given recent history, the Auburn spread looks too big, methinks.
Get The Picture 
I do not get the love for Auburn. People have figured out the Gus Bus.
We lose those 4 this year as apparently the Golden Nugget believes and throw in a face plant type of upset and the natives will get restless.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Restless? If we lose four games this year, any four, the fans will be storming Butts Mehre with pitchforks and torches.
LikeLike
Will the pitchforks and torches be officially licensed?
LikeLike
No.
But you’ll get bonus Hartman points if you buy ones from the AA.
LikeLike
Gus ain’t a great coach, but Stidham is a real quarterback, so they’ll be a more dangerous team then they have in recent years. Luckily, UGA might also have itself an offense in 2017 after a couple year break.
LikeLike
UGA will have good players. UGA will still have the same HC and OC that the team had last year, though, and that is where the problem is, not with the players.
LikeLike
Wanna bet?
LikeLike
Based on what? Stidham had one great game one mediocre game and one shitty game. That is the entirety of his football career. I’ll believe it when i see him do it against SEC defenses.
LikeLike
this is great, I don’t know the stats but UGA seems to rarely show its capable of meeting Vegas’ expectations. Hopefully some well deserved shade thrown at the dawgs might cause them to play with a chip on their shoulder. I’d rather be the capable underdog than the paper tiger.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yeah the Auburn line does seem high considering how we have done at Auburn over the last 25 years. Beginning in 1992 we have won 9, lost 4 and tied 1.
Of the 5 we did not win, 3 of those Auburn teams were undefeated (1994, 2004 and 2010) and 1 was SEC champs and played in the BCS championship game (2013).
The other loss (2000) was by 3 in overtime to an SEC West champion Auburn team.
We were crappy and Auburn was ranked when we won in 1996. Auburn was 5th and we were unranked when we whipped them in 2006.
Auburn has had to be really good to beat us in Jordan Hare.
LikeLike
The away team has often had the advantage, not long ago the away team had a winning record in the other team’s stadium. Richt’s success may have changed this for Auburn. I am not looking it up at the moment.
Vegas often does not take into account oddities of rivalries, and it would not surprise me if Auburn was getting a home field advantage bump. UGA fans like to say the Gus Bus has been figured out but they were winning last year until White was injured and he maybe the 2nd string QB this year. Auburn has reason for optimism. I expect a close one down on the plains and am just fine with Auburn being the favorite.
LikeLike
The 1960 season was the first season we played in Auburn. Auburn won. Since then UGA has won 16 to Auburn’s 10 (giving it 11 wins, total, in Auburn.) There have been 2 ties, 1978 and 1994.
Our longes winning streak in Auburn was 3 (1966, 1968 and 1970.) Auburn’s longest winning streak was 2 (happened twice, 1972-1974, and 1988-1990)
Wally Butts was 0-1 in Auburn. Johnny Griffith was 1-0 in Auburn. Dooley was 7-5-1. Goff was 1-1-1. Donnan was 2-1. Richt was 5-3.
The only time Auburn had a winning record in Auburn against us was right after the 1960 game.
LikeLike
But does Auburn have a winning record in Athens? That was the question
LikeLike
Got em right where we want em.
LikeLike
Yeah, the Auburn spread looks like easy money. Not sure what people are seeing there.
LikeLike
Everyone thinks we’ll be getting their best shot, of course.
LikeLike
+1 on the pupgrade.
LikeLike
I’m telling you guys, this is classic Ray Goff 2.0
LikeLiked by 1 person
If this ends up right, McGoofy will be shitting gold bricks because the donors will be jamming them down his throat for Hairy Jorehead to extricate.
LikeLike
“Hairy Jorehead” I laughed a little at that….and gagged a little too.
LikeLike
This odds will change drastically as the season progresses. Those lines are comprised of stats that are mostly unknowns and a little fact. A “-1” is basically a push anyway. Three games in will get you a better line. The day before of better, the last 30 mins before kickoff gets a more true line. Untangle your bras some ladies.
LikeLike
Untangle your bras ladies.
Ahem. I find that comment to be misogynistic,sexist and also anti-feminist. It has no place on a football blog where men blog about SEC football, beer, barbecue,sports cars and rock and roll music.
LikeLike
And politics.
LikeLike
…so noted. Carry on hillbilly dog
LikeLike
As many have already said above, the only spread that is unreasonable is the Barn one.
LikeLike
Tennessee lost a lot. I know it is in Knoxville, but I don’t understand that one.
Georgia has athletes that are at least as talented and experienced as anybody we play. Over the years we have had plenty of true freshmen who have stepped in on the offensive line as well as the “skill” positions and none of those on this list recruited as well as we did this year.
No excuse for at least 1 game better than Richt’s average of 10
LikeLike
It’s a road game. Tennessee has won the last two. UGA was awful last year. Saying “Georgia has athletes” is an evergreen comment that hasn’t exactly proven fruitful in a wins/losses perspective. Tennessee has athletes, too.
Also, not sure Richt averaged 10 wins a year. I think it was more like 9.5 wins a year, but agree this year it will take 10 wins to be considered a success barring a fluke run where UGA backs into the SEC title game and wins it.
I think UGA is 9-3 at its best as there are still too many outstanding concerns, but hope springs eternal.
I’m entering this season covered in skepticism, though.
LikeLike
Of course Georgia has lost the last 2 and it is a road game. Yes Georgia has always had athletes and Tennessee does too. This year Tennessee lost a first round pick, two third round picks and 3 4th round picks and Georgia returns more players and picks up what should be a better class. Georgia has as many athletes as any team in the SEC except Alabama and we don’t play them. I share your skepticism and hope but I do not see how a lack of performance can be justified.
I do not consider 10 wins a success. Mark Richt averaged 10 wins his last 5 years. As you pointed out that was an improvement from the average before that. He was fired. Why would you call his successor ‘s season a success at 10 wins when 10 for Richt was cause for firing???
Kirby has all the resources he needs to produce. No excuses.
LikeLike
GATA!
LikeLike
UGA all but won it last year with what was supposed to be Butch’s championship team. Turnover in Knoxville no longer has Tenn as a favorite to win the East. I don’t get the optimism for the Vols, they have under performed their FPI predictions the past 2 years as well.
LikeLike
McGarity said. “What I was trying to do was to create an environment to where we could have a great football program. I felt like we had sort of maxed out. We had reached a certain plateau. Our conversation on that Sunday morning … I struggled more than he did.” So, even McGarity does not consider 10 wins a successful season.
LikeLike
“All but won” might as well replace the Georgia Way
LikeLike
10-2 would be a success. I’m a bit surprised anyone could say otherwise with a straight face. Richt had 5/15 regular seasons with 10 wins, the last coming in 2012.
If UGA goes 10-2 in 2017 under no circumstances could someone say it wasn’t a successful season.
LikeLike
You aren’t including bowl wins. I do. Why do you not think performance after the regular season is not important? A 10 win regular season followed by a bowl loss is 10-3, which is what Richt averaged his last 5 years and it got him fired. 11-2 would be good. 10-3 would disappoint me.
LikeLike
ignore the double negative
LikeLike
I’m more of a championship guy than just number of wins guy. Did the Dawgs win the East? Did they win the SEC. Those should be our goals. Natties are too much to expect but if you win the SEC you will be invited to the big dance and get to play for it at least. The real problem historically is getting past FU. If we lose to FU we probably won’t win the East, can’t win the SEC and likely won’t be invited to the big dance no matter what we did in the rest of the season. That is why we have to make beating FU a top priority no matter what it takes. NO MATTER WHAT IT TAKES.
LikeLike
National titles are not too much to expect. We were 1 play and 4 seconds away from playing ND for the National Title in 2012 instead of Alabama, and that was a game we likely would have won.
Wayne McDuffie was widely credited with changing the attitude of the team before the 1980 national championship year by challenging the offense to start believing they could do it. Any team that does not believe they can do it will not.
Whether Kirby can put us over the top remains to be seen, but under Richt Georgia came close on 3 occasions: 2002, 2007, and (especially) 2012. It seems to me Georgia is recruiting better than ever under Kirby and time will tell if he can coach. We were terrible last year. Richt went 8-5 his first year too and 2002 we were SEC champs and really close to playing for the title.
I am in the mode of last year was a disappointment and Kirby needs to produce but let’s see what happens
LikeLike
Very good post, all good points. I also like to add that in the ’12 game…Bama was extremely lucky. It does not get talked about much, but the Bama linebacker that broke the pass up at the end, was in the wrong position. He should have been back in coverage rather than rushing…this was by Saban’s own admission.
LikeLike
I’ll take 10-2 and call it a successful season. Bowl games (non-playoff) are a crap shoot on whether a team shows up. That record likely gets us an invite to a New Year’s 6 bowl, which would be a good reward for the team and would show the class of ’18 and ’19 that the program is trending upward.
LikeLike
Excuses in 3, 2, 1
LikeLike
I like there $5 crap tables & the aquarium bar.
LikeLike
Carrot Top’s Variety Show is pretty cool too.
LikeLike
Forget the barners, I’m not getting the love for ND. Sure, its in South Bend, but weren’t the 4-100 last year?
I’ll hang up and listen.
LikeLike
4-8 with some close losses…I expect them to be better this year.l
LikeLike
Shirley we’ll get their best shot too
LikeLiked by 1 person
Weren’t we preseason favorites in all but one game last year? Didn’t turn out great for us. Maybe we’ll see the opposite in 2017?
LikeLike
We’ll be favorites by the time the UT and the UF games roll around..book it. Home stadium is usually worth 3 poimts, so if antthing to me, the GT lines looks skewed…
LikeLike
Guess they did not look at our recruiting rankings the last 5 or so years …. or maybe they did : > )
http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/roster-talent-rankings-college-football-teams-with-the-best-players-entering-2017/
LikeLike
Looking at the CBS article… the ACC still sux and we need to score a lot more points. That is all.
LikeLike
We no longer have a rookie head coach and rookie QB….gonna break all kinda records.
LikeLike
we broke a lot of records last season.
LikeLike
Losing to Vandy, UT, UF and GT all in one season was a first…I believe. Surely it won’t happen again….nowhere to go but up. Gonna beat that “mediocrity” rap, will be over the hump this year….will win 10 plus.
LikeLike
Oh no….lots of space left to go down. 8 wins and 5 losses. How about 5 wins, 4 wins, 3 wins. FU had an 8 loss season 4 years ago.
LikeLike
I really do not know what to expect….I’m just not confident either way. Still too many question marks with this staff.
LikeLike
Lines aren’t there as a predictor to see who wins or loses. It’s numbers created by the casinos to get equal betting on both sides. It has nothing to do with who they think will win (they couldn’t care less actually).
LikeLiked by 1 person
Really??
LikeLike
https://n.rivals.com/team_rankings/
Not to worry?
LikeLike
BAH!….gonna get “The Zeus” committed tomorrow and barn door opens up for others. We are going to skyrocket….
LikeLike
Ghostdawg, is that you?
LikeLike
Nah…but he is probably ROLHAO somewhere. Loved his posts, DGD.
LikeLike
AU is the most overrated team in the SEC year in and year out. They rarely live up to their potential and never live up to the hype unless you count 2010 during that pay-to-play debacle involving Scam Newton.
Recent history clearly shows that UGA has pretty much had their way with the tiggers lately.
They will not beat us this year just because they desperately signed some guy that couldn’t hold onto the starting job at Baylor, another Big XII team who doesn’t even entertain the concept of defense, much less put it into practice. I strongly suspect that Mr. Hot Shot QB from Waco will get an abrupt awakening as well as a rude introduction to defense in the SEC this year.
Stidham is just another Jeremy Johnson, a totally over-hyped flop, and merely the latest gimmick brought in and touted to be the answer to Auburn’s # 1 problem…the glaring inability to contend in the western division under their current coaching regime.
Malzahn will never beat or even compete with Alabama and LSU consistently, nor will they be able to beat UGA with any regularity.
I just hope AU doesn’t decide to fire him when he gets his a$$ handed to him again this season by us and the others I mentioned.
Without him and Booch, who will probably be gone before the end of the season, we won’t have anybody to make fun of.
LikeLike
Dawazilla burnin’ down the barn!
LikeLike
Reality check: Georgia beat Auburn last season because the Aubie starting QB was hurt and they didn’t have anyone to put in the game at QB so they played him anyway. He had no arm. Now he’s healthy and a backup and they have reloaded a new QB who is pretty damn talented no mater what other people say. Whether it is an experiment or not they will have that worked out by the time they play us.
LikeLike
Despite the injury Auburn still finished 2nd in the West but… they’re overrated
LikeLike
Early lines are always pretty bad and will vary a lot as reality over takes perception when games are played. And there is very little money bet in the Spring and Summer because that money is tied up for so long so the lines are soft, but move very little.
I cannot blame them for looking at all our question mark area coming in badly, look how many here are glass half full, or worse. But those who know better than Mr. Joe Average should know we won’t swing and whiff on each area, and realize we finally have quality depth across the board. If every single thing falls through, we could lose 4-5 games, but that is very unlikely to happen so money bet on those should produce positive cash.
I bet UGA on the over 8 at -115 and feel it is as close to a lock as you can get since UGA would have to go 7-5, or worse, for you to lose one penny. I like that better than the individual games since anything can happen on a particular Saturday but the bottom has to fallout for us to lose 5 games.. Only bad thing is I cannot get paid until December, but that will just in time for ordering Christmas gifts. I am tempted to jump that AU bet though. Stidwell is pretty light in the credential area and he didn’t face a defense like he will that Saturday night.
LikeLike
PLEASE LET US BE THE UNDERDOG IN ALL GAMES FOREVERMORE
LikeLike
Las Vegas never loses. They just change the spread. The house can make a fortune on a very slim margin, that’s why the Wise Guys loved it so. Never bet on UGA and never will.
LikeLike