Everybody’s got their preseason happy talk game going.

Even Ole Miss.

Spoke w #OleMiss staffer>Said FRI's team workout was the best of summer. "Kids are out to prove that this is not gonna splinter the program"

— Bruce Feldman (@BruceFeldmanCFB) July 22, 2017

If the NCAA slaps a two-year penalty on the program, I wonder how many of those same kids are going to hightail it for greener pastures.

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We’ll always have Reggie Ball.

While I appreciate he’s matured since his college days and acknowledge that this is a nice story, I can’t help but notice that even when somebody tries to shine a kind light on the only non-Dawg worthy of consideration as a member of the UGA Football Hall of Fame, reality keeps intruding.

Ball never will escape his pass on fourth down later that season against Georgia, a pass thrown intentionally out of bounds as Ball escaped heavy pressure by running out of the pocket. He’ll never live down his interceptions in key moments, such as on Tech’s final play on offense in each of Ball’s final two games against Georgia, both decided by a touchdown or less. In the game that Tech fans want to win most every season, Ball never captured the moment in the chances he received.

He had two wins against Clemson, two wins against Miami — including a massive upset when the Hurricanes were ranked No. 3 in the country — and two wins in two tries over Auburn. But fair or not, he’s still mainly remembered for those games against the Bulldogs.

Oh, it’s fair, dog.  In fact, you may not be giving him sufficient credit for that part of his legacy.

By the way, there’s such a thing as a season when Tech fans don’t want to beat Georgia?  It’s a real shame for Reggie Ball that he never played in one of those.

Today, in why we need the media

As far as Dan Wolken’s advice goes about coach-worship, I can take it or leave it, because that’s not the world we live in, but his think-piece is totally worth reading just to find this out:

Whatever Freeze was doing to make enemies across the Southeast, it was often hard to distinguish what rival coaches saw as the greater transgression — the program’s loose relationship with the NCAA rulebook or his in-your-face piety.

Coaches who recruited against Freeze didn’t merely roll their eyes at him, and they certainly didn’t laugh, except when it came to the nickname a few called him behind his back: Jimmy Swag.

Jimmy Swag is an awesome enough tag that I wish its creator would step forward and claim every accolade due him.

Methinks he doth protest too much.

To paraphrase a familiar expression, when someone says, “it’s not a distraction”, it’s a distraction.

Second year’s the charm?

I’d mock this entire piece as primo preseason happy talk, except it’s a big reason I’m counting on a resurgence from Georgia football in 2017.