James Jackson trolls the ‘Cocks.
I was at that game with a good friend who lost his shit when Jackson did that and still gets irritated every time he’s reminded of that ending. Me, I’m amused, along with Jackson. (I save my irritation for Bobo not giving Gurley the ball on first-and-goal in the 2014 game.)
Get The Picture 
What really amuses me is Joe Morrison holding 1 finger up as he really, really wanted to believe there should be 1 second put back on the clock. Even the most delusional SCU fan would admit the clock had long expired when they recovered the ball. Then, Joe protested by not coming over to shake Vince’s hand, and when he finally showed up, he basically scolded Vince as if he was the bad guy and refused to shake his hand. Of course Vince was both shocked and amused over the entire ordeal.
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I guess I’m the only one who thinks the bootleg wasn’t the worst play in the world in 2014
-It was only first down, which means it was worth a shot to run a play that went for a TD earlier in the game. You don’t think everyone in the stadium was focused on TGIII? Had we handed it off there and got stuffed, there would have been just as much criticism for that “obvious” call. Plus, We basically had a tying fg in our pocket
-The grounding penalty was BS. Mason threw it at the feet of the receiver, and I believe that it even may have been tipped by the defender in Mason’s face.
-No one seems to blames Morgan for just shanking a gimmie fg.
I don’t know; I throw this in with the SECC “should have spiked it!!!” and “rings gather dust” stuff as unfair criticisms of CMR
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A naked bootleg vs. an unblocked edge rusher and Mason as qb is DUMB.
The value of that play is the possibility of the qb running it in. That could never happen. There could no plan B once their edge rusher didn’t bite. Mason was too slow. That play shouldn’t have made it to Columbia.
I’m not saying you can’t throw there, I’m just saying not that throw.
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It worked earlier in the game on a TD to Rome
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Not even close to same play call. Other than they were both p/a passes, there’s literally no other comparison b/w those two plays.
They did run a similar play to the one il complaining about in the rz in 3rd and 7 in the second quarter and it got blown up and we kicked a FG.
The Rome play is at 51:25. Gurley chips their edge rusher after the fake. On the shitty play, Gurley is running to the other side of the field and their edge guy is unblocked.
Calling these the same play is a joke.
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No it didn’t. Bootleg and play action drop back are not the same thing.
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I agree with you. It’s hindsight criticism.
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Hindsight? Funny, but I remember being at the game screaming “NO!” as soon as I realized it wasn’t a run call to Gurley.
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Fair enough. I just don’t understand why anyone thought of it that way. The playaction dump in the flat to the fullback works nearly every time it’s called on the goal line, and it doesn’t result in a grounding call but once every, I don’t know, million times.
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Because of what Gurley did earlier in the game to keep Georgia in it.
Dial this clip up to the 3:50 mark:
The Dawgs scored touchdowns on both of those drives.
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I’m aware of how good Todd Gurley was, and I still don’t understand the mentality. Agree to disagree.
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It’s not that Gurley’s good, it’s that he was, out of sheer will, making something out of nothing on his runs that night, when Georgia needed it most.
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It’s a nice run for sure, but you can’t compare a play that starts in the 45 with one that was inside the 5. Completely different.
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Oh, thanks. Didn’t realize there was a rule about that.
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You don’t think the defense changes when they’re on their on 45 as opposed to on their own goal line?
Carry on, then.
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I’m obviously not making my point clearly enough. It wasn’t a matter of what the offense called or how the defense was deployed. Gurley was making plays, pure and simple.
I don’t know if he would have scored, giving him the ball four straight times, but I sure as hell would have liked Georgia’s chances there. Worst case scenario is you leave SC with really bad field position.
Gurley was a rare player. I had the pleasure of seeing him dominate an opposing defense on the road twice: that game in Columbia and the 2013 Auburn game. Sitting in the stands, you could feel the other team shrink. It was palpable.
You give Gurley the ball there because he was a special player, certainly more special than Mason. Screw the yard line.
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I don’t think some Georgia fans have come to terms with the fact that Gurley was not only the best back in college football, he’s the best back in football, period, now the #1 RB in the NFL. We’re not likely to see his like again anytime soon. Where is Hutson Mason? Giving the ball to Mason on the goal line instead of Gurley was almost criminal.
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The other thing, aside from the bad decision to throw the naked boot in that situation with a QB who couldn’t run, it opened the door to a play that loses yardage. Run the ball up the guy with the best RB in football 3 straight times if you have to. Worst case you have a FG from extra point yardage and how often are those missed?
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Yesir. Gurley was a special player and I am happy as heck that I got to watch him in action.
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Mason trying to block…LOL
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As you say, “[you] don’t know”. Advanced stats guys actually analyzed this play and the Seahawks Super Bowl blunder and took into account all the possible outcomes (fumble vs. interception, holding calls, grounding, sack, etc). Although I don’t advocate playing the percentages every time, running was the clear winner in both cases.
But that’s over-thinking it, which I’m guilty of a lot. In this case, however…it is as clear as can be – and even moreso than the Seahawks. Gurley was just too dominant not to give the ball 3 times. It was that simple.
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Got a link for that?
Yes, and I think a slight gamble on first was ok. Had we not received a bad grounding call, I would have been fine with TGIII on second and third downs.
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I looked for it, but can’t find it…I’ll try again and post it if I find it again
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I couldn’t find it…but did find an interesting recap of the Seahawks making the same stupid mistake. Not as heavy on statistical analysis as I’d like, though:
https://www.footballoutsiders.com/clutch-encounters/2015/clutch-encounters-super-bowl-xlix
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I was watching with Got Sr. We both stood up and yelled WTF?! at the TV at the same time.
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Yep, not a bad call. Worked earlier and could have easily worked here. Bogus grounding call plus shanked FG is what did us in.
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No it didn’t. Different play. Not close to the same play.
The play I’m talking about DIDN’T work earlier in the rz and they ran it again anyway.
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If you’re calling a misdirection play that worked earlier in the game you’re doing it wrong. It is no longer a surprise, one of the more boneheaded calls Bobo made.
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It didn’t work Otto. The play that got blown up on 1st and goal in the 4th got blown up on 3rd and 7 in the 2nd.
The play to Rome was a straight p/a pass. The edge rusher was blocked. It wasn’t Mason 1 on 1, on the move vs. an edge rusher.
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Just watched some of Mason’s highlights from that game. I had forgotten just how mediocre he really was. Tipped passes, intentional grounding in the redzone, and he also fumbled on 3rd and 3 from the 8 yard line going in. Smh.
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But STATS!!!
I’ll give him this: he’s no Greyson Lambert.
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That’s true. Lambert set the low bar, but at least he played well against SC.
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it will warm my heart forever to know Spurrier had to limp into retirement with the taste of a 50 point ass whipping administred by the immortal Grayson Lambert, And a record setting performance by GL, to boot. GL deserves a statue just for that, imo.
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You sir, have just made my day. Brav-o!
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With all the bitching an kvetching about the play-call, I have to remind everyone that we didn’t lose the game because of a single play-call. We lost that game because Pruitt’s defense gave up 38 points (as it did fairly frequently).
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4 times: USC in 2014, UF in 2014, Bama and UT in 2015. No one scored over 38 during Pruitt’s tenure.
By comparison Kirby and Mel have given up:
45 at OM in 2016
34 vs. UT in 2016
40 at Auburn in 2017
48 at the Rose Bowl
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We also lost 3 of those 4 because of the defense. You can’t blame Cheney for not putting up 46+ against Ole Miss. Had we lost the Rose Bowl, it wouldn’t have been Cheney’s fault either.
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Damn, I thought we were talking about defense.
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I guess it all comes down to where you draw the line on how many points to give up is too many. I choose 30 points as the cutoff.
Under Pruit games giving up 30+ (8)
2014 – First Year
@ USC 9/13/14 L 38-35
UT 9/13/14 W 35-32
@ ARK 10/18/14 W 45-32
UF 10/1/14 L 38-20
@ UK 11/8/14 W 63-31
GT 11/29/14 L 30-24
2015 – Second Year
ALA 10/3/15 L 38-10
UT 10/10/15 L 38-31
Under Tucker games giving up 30+ (4)
2016 – First Year
@ OM 9/24/16 L 45-14
UT 10/1/16 L 34-31
2017 – Second Year
@ AUB 11/11/17 L 40-17
OU 1/1/18 W 54-48
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I’d say we got a lot better on defense in 2015, wouldn’t you?
He was working with the 2013 recruiting class disaster.
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Agreed.
I love who we have now running the defense now. I also agree Tucker has given up higher scores but I like where we are going.
I will say that I am not sure Pruit would have kept it under 38 in the games in 2016/2017 if he had been here either.
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Chad Kelley, Josh Dobbs as a senior, Jared Stidham, Baker Mayfield >>>> Dylan Thompson, Treon Harris, Jake Coker, Josh Dobbs as a junior
Pruitt was a solid d coordinator, but those offenses don’t even compare.
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Maybe not one play call, but in a back-and-forth game where both offenses are better than both defenses, it comes down to which offense blinks first. This is where Bobo blinked, and a serious of unfortunate events followed that cost Georgia the game.
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That is a much more reasonable opinion than blaming a single call. Blaming the game on not handing the ball to Gurley is like blaming the GT game on the squib kick. Each game is a confluence of events.
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My memory is not that it was back and forth at all but rather we trailed pretty much the whole game and got a pick and a nice return to give us the chance to steal the game.
Then we ran that naked bootleg instead of giving it to the best player in football 4 straight times. And with how the clock was, we would have scored and/or eaten the rest of the clock if we had run it 4 straight times to victory.
Then after the disaster series in the red zone, we somehow got a stop but got rooked by the spot on 4th down.
That game also had a long lightning delay. I don’t know why i keep torturing myself by going to games at W-B
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And a phantom holding call on a TGIII touchdown run
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Yeah that one hurt too
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Coach wasn’t amused, I assure you. He always kept his composure when the camera was on him. Behind close doors he let his feelings be known & amused wasn’t what he felt at that moment.
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He was pissed on tape that night. Shortly after that was cut off, Vince angrily says “the ballgame was OVER!”
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Yeah, Dooley wasn’t laughing. It was a stupid play by Jackson. What if the Sackerlina player accidently kicked the ball while trying to recover it and the falls on it in the end zone? Jackson tried to laugh it off later, but I can guarantee you Vince wasn’t laughing.
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I think the ball was dead when it touched the ground. A “kick” would have been “advancement” under the rules then.
Still a dumb ass play. Fall down. Run out of bounds. Run out of the back of the end zone. Anything but just laying it down. You know he thought he’d messed up when he went back for it too. His revisionism isn’t funny. I still can’t laugh at it either.
I thought I’d had a heart attack when he did that.
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And those were the days when bottled beer was allowed in the stadium. As we Redcoats were exiting a few minutes after the refs confirmed time ran out the unhinged SC folks were pelting us with empties. Good times . . .
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That’s what Jackson must have been thinking, but the ref didn’t blow it dead until it was recovered by SC. That’s why I’m saying a scrum/”accidental” kick/etc that caused the ball to wind up in the end zone would have resulted in a Gamecock win. Just a boneheaded play by the “Thrilla from Camilla”.
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I think technically, Georgia could have advanced it, so not dead when it hit the turf in a technical sense. Stupid rule. Glad they hadn’t gotten rid of it by 1986.
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I’ve been in Columbia every time since the 70s and it has definitely been Georgia’s twilight zone. We’ve often had the best players who didn’t play their best for whatever reason. Maybe that will change on Sat.
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I think it will. My gut tells me that South Carolina is actually the perfect opponent when having an offensive coordinator who doesn’t go out of his way to overthink things. Now, simplicity for too long maybe cost us in Auburn I (and crazy mistakes) and Alabama 2nd half, but Will Muschamp can scream and curse all he wants but that is not going to morph his D-Line into one from the state of Alabama.
South Carolina will lay down after we’ve been beating on their skulls for 2.5 quarters. They better bring extra jock straps.
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I was at that game using Mr Gillis Coleman’s tickets between the 45-50 yard line half way up. Great seats surrounded by older cock fans. Cocksuckers. That crowd was living proof that money can’t buy class. I left at halftime before I was forced to slap the dentures out of the octogenarian who grabbed my neck saying,”Woof woof woof now you sonofabitch!” Yeah I was barking. That’s what i do. But i don’t put my hands on opposing fans. Piss on the lamecocks and all their fans.
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Mark May was more irritated with Bobo than us all.
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Jackson might not be telling the truth when he says he knew the game was over. Why did he go back and try to get the ball if he did it on purpose and knew the game was over? It makes him look better now by saying that but his body language at the time tells a different story.
Richt and Bobo should have been left in Columbia and told their personal belongings from their offices would be sent to them for the 2014 game in Columbia. In reality, they shouldn’t have been there to screw up that game because Richt should have been fired after losing to UCF.
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Spurrier ate Pruitt for lunch that game and you’re blaming Richt and Bobo?
Mike had one brain fart late, but otherwise did okay.
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In fairness to Pruitt he didn’t have a lot to work with in the defensive backfield in 2014. Perhaps some of that was his fault.
There was a significant turnaround the next year and Pruitt dialed up one of the best covers vs. SOS you’ll ever see on the Swann pick.
27 first downs in 2014
16 first downs in 2015
447 yards given up in 2014
258 yards given up in 2015
Not pulling for success in Knoxville, but dude can coach some defense.
If I had the choice between Pruitt as DC and Bobo as OC, setting the baggage aside that might tip the balance, that’s an easy call. (Of course, your damn journalistic integrity won’t allow any well-informed judgment on Pruitt’s off-field issues.)
Bobo has a problem with being too cute by half some times. The bootleg call was one of those times. I’m sure the thinking was: no way does the DE/OLB think Mason is keeping it. The DE/OLB will chase Gurley. Not a bad thought, but if the kid just does what he’s taught you’re screwed.
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Problem is; Bobo’s brain fart pretty well cost the game, Pruitt did the best he could with yet another Mark Richt team with huge holes in the roster. Also, assuming Richt knew the play called, he either is complicit in the brain fart or totally negligent as a head coach in letting that brain fart happen. Of course, I’m pretty well convinced Richt’s headset played contemporary Christian music or Air Supply’s greatest hits the whole time he had them on.
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But it didn’t cost the game, or at least we don’t know that for sure. If the defense could have gotten a stop after that, the offense would have gotten the ball back one last time.
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We got the stop. We got screwed on the spot/measurement (or so i was told by people who saw it on TV)
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This is correct, the spot was off by a full yard.
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Keep effing that “long con” chicken, JC
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LOL!
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We’re all out of love……
Air Supply LOL….I can believe it.
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It was LRB.
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I had forgotten about that play. Made my sphincter tighten when I first saw it, but then made me laugh when I realized the rule. Of course, even if that rule was still in effect, current SEC officials would throw a flag on us for taunting, and then figure out a way to give uSC one more shot.
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A friend of mine who somehow had acquired tickets in the South Carolina student section invited me to go to that game. Early on it looked like UGA would smoke them. At halftime some of the students sitting around me were bemoaning the fact that the game was too close for them to leave and start partying. Things got crazy in the student sectin in the second half as the game got closer. Carolina had driven down inside the UGA 20 needing and the UGA defense was reeling when the play of the game happened. A DL (Andy Dotson I think) intercepted a pass and UGA took over ball deep inside Carolina territory with a couple of minutes left. After a first down or two the and the clock winding down James Jackson left us with the most unbelievable finish to a game I have ever seen.
The whole stadium thought that carolina won the game for about five minutes. The atmosphere went from Jubilant to what in the heck just happened to anger. I was just glad to get out of there with my life.
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That whole season was nuts. A few games later the firehoses came out at Jordan-Hare.
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Cue it up to 8:15
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Amazing. Not the best, the most decorated or the most successful one, but Gurley’s the most talented back we’ve had. Best combo of speed, power and athleticism I’ve seen.
He reminds me of Jim Brown.
Now don’t get me wrong. Herschel is the best college football player ever and there’s no close second. But 34 wasn’t as gifted athletically as Todd. 34 was stronger, meaner, tougher, better conditioned, faster at top speed and bigger than most of the LBs he ran over.
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If we judge him by Hershel’s standard, we might not appreciate how special Gurley was in college (and is in the NFL, although he could surpass him as a pro).
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It’s hard to accurately praise Gurley without someone thinking you’re going there. So I always want to be clear: I’m convinced there will never be a better college football player than #34. I’d be shocked if one comes around worthy of any debate about it.
Likewise, Jim Brown is the best pro player ever. And Todd reminds me of him. I hope Todd becomes the best NFL back ever. Pretty deep bench there and it’s a totally different QB centric game since Brown, Payton, Smith, Sanders etc, etc…. played. If it happened we’d have the best ever at both levels. I’d take it.
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