I had to chuckle a little about this pundit fest, because of the “Kirby went to the Nick Saban school of coaching” bit. How quickly everyone forgets about Alabama’s embarrassing loss to Utah in the 2009 Sugar Bowl.
Actually, I don’t think Kirby’s forgotten that for one second. I wouldn’t be surprised if the team is given a history lesson, either.
But it’s not the coaches you worry about in games like this. They get paid to win, bowl or not. It’s the players’ motivation you never know about until they step on the field.
That being said, this is the attitude I hope the team embraces.
“We just wouldn’t go out there and let anybody beat us,” wide receiver Mecole Hardman said Saturday night. “We definitely are going to have motivation to play because we’ve got to get this taste out of our mouth somehow. Somebody’s got to feel us.”
Bottle that and spread it around the locker room, Mecole.
Get The Picture 
Didn’t Alabama get embarrassed by OK in the same spot a few years later?
LikeLike
That’s a big 10-4. Oklahoma fans still hang their hats on that win, and the one over a bad AU team in the Sugar a few years later. Hopefully, we can stay motivated and close out the year with a win. Can’t hurt when the pre-season pollsters get together and name their top-4 for 2019.
LikeLike
Bama also dismantled a Michigan St in a similar scenario, losses that shouldn’t happen. Teams from Alabama don’t play well in Bowl after loosing a national title shot. They do blow out teams at the end of a disappointing season especially after giving their rival a heckuva game. I think UGA will be ready play as UGA typically gives a good showing after they think they’ve been slighted by the media.
LikeLike
I hope this is the case though I wonder. There is no real way to know unless you are around the team all the time. Getting so close 2 years in a row has to impact some and a letdown chance is real, but perhaps they will not. With Mecole likely leaving and the possibility of Clark, Holyfield, Ridley, Rochester and Nauta to also leave they may play to help potential draft stock. We all know Thompson left pointlessly. I wonder about these 6. What do y’all think about potential Junior exits?
LikeLike
I don’t think any of them would go early enough to justify it.
All could make more by playing a solid senior season.
Trenton ought to be a cautionary tale.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Word on the street is Mecole is already talking it up. The others nothing is stirring.
LikeLike
Godspeed to the kid but he should stay. Unless he’s gonna run under 4.4 in Indy, he’s a mid to late rounder at best.
LikeLike
I agree, but I don’t know his class situation or his money situ and what he might be offered. He is lightning fast and you can’t coach that.
LikeLike
No doubt but that doesn’t make you unique in the league.
He’s not a no. 1 or 2 receiver right now. At best he’s a slot guy without sure hands.
Not a recipe for success in the league. He needs to hone his craft or he’s gonna end up back in Bowman.
LikeLike
We have other speedy options, but agree he should come back. Didn’t think that at the beginning of the season, he cooled off significantly before mid-season. He will get burned if he comes out now, imo. Worried more about Holyfield, Nauta, and Ridley.
Kirby needs to only take those who plan to play for their position next season, and are not leaving for the NFL…let them go practice and get professional training if that is their plan. Would rather play all hungry Freshmen and Sophomores than those wanting a trip to NOLA and to loaf on the sidelines.
LikeLike
Mecole had an off night. Dropped touchdown and muffed kickoff. He was pretty non-existent in the passing game as well. I hope he comes back though.
LikeLike
“Somebody’s got to feel us”
I love this.
LikeLike
Playing Utah means little to most programs back east. Playing Texas is way more interesting
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bama also lost there to OU in another upset. We need to have our minds right because Texas can damn sure beat us if we mail it in.
LikeLike
You got that right. Dawgs lollygag around and Texas will eat our lunch.
LikeLike
Texas fans apparently are looking forward to seeing ‘how far’ they have come. What they do not understand is that they are not playing the 5th best team in the country; they are playing one of the two best in the country and one that feels it apparently needs to ‘educate’ the committee of just how wrong they were.
Georgia 48
Texas 17
And that’s a conservative score – depends on how big of a point Kirby wants to make. Somebody’s got to pay and the Longhorns drew the short straw
LikeLike
We need to give them the Hawaii treatment.
LikeLike
Tom Herman 22-2 ATS as an underdog – assistant & HC.
This game will be tight…regardless of motiviation!
LikeLike
If we play a focused, clean game, we will win by 2 TDs. But Texas has a good team. Ehlinger doesn’t pass as well as Fromm, but he’s a better runner and a big kid. Sort of like if Nick Fitzgerald could pass. Plus, they have two big receivers. Defensively, we should be able to pass on them which will make running easier. They have a good kicker (“Dicker the kicker”) but not quite as good as Hot Rod.
But yeah, Herman has his team playing much better this year. We need to be ready.
LikeLike
“But it’s not the coaches you worry about in games like this.”
Sorry to disagree Brother Bluto, but I think the players have done everything a coach could ask. On the other hand some coaching decisions have been questionable if not awful (Holyfield’s 9 carries @ LSU, ST gafs).
LikeLike
Don’t get your point here. I’m talking about motivation for the bowl game.
LikeLike
I understand Ohio State goes to the Rose Bowl, but how about making a compelling matchup since the Dogs got screwed out of the playoff. West Virginia really deserved the Sugar Bowl from the Big 12. Heck, put UCF in it. But 9-4 Texas? Seriously?
Georgia 56
Texas 10
LikeLike
The Sugar is contractually obligated to that match up.
The one that blows is the Peach. Matching Florida and Michigan again is lame. Michigan-LSU and Florida-UCF would have been much more compelling, but I’m betting the Gators were too chickenshit to risk the embarrassment of losing to UCF.
LikeLiked by 2 people
No doubt. There is no way the Gators would play UCF!
If we are going to only have four teams in the playoff then I think the traditional contracts should go out the window so we can see some compelling games in the other bowls.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I like this match up. If Kirby wants to prove a point, UT may be in for a beating.
And for Pete’s sake, Ed, please shut the UCF National Champ clowns up. OK?
LikeLike
Boy, I hope LSU puts a whooping on them, but I’m not certain it will happen. If they don’t, we’ll have to listen to the UCF crap again.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Florida will get killed by Michigan, which is fine by me.
And don’t sleep on Texas. They are better than that record. They are a young team gaining focus/confidence. They will use this game as a measuring stick.
LikeLike
Disagree WVU maybe better but Texas is a year in, year out media darling who is either back or on their way back. I want Texas and want to send Herman into the next season on the hot seat. Yes my top 4 most disliked teams nationally are USCw, ND, anOSU, and Texas. WVU I view as more of a no real win game. If you win it is only WVU and if you don’t then the media is singing UGA was a pretender.
LikeLike
Texas? What time is it?
LikeLike
Ten to nine, kiss my behind!
LikeLike
The risk is that key players are interviewing agents and getting their draft prep schedules ironed out. Distractions. Outside noise driven the prospect of millions of dollars. One or two guys, ok. Several? That’s a different story.
LikeLike
Hoping LSU ends the UCF pipe dream.
LikeLike
I have my doubts about it. UCF is going to play lights out like they did against the sleepy Auburn squad. They are desperate for respect.
LSU has little to gain and isn’t exactly built to win a shoot-out.
I think it will be decided by the level of enthusiasm by LSU’s defense.
EO is an emotional guy, so maybe he’ll have them up and ready.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Agree.
LSU is such an undisciplined feast or famine team that this is a bad matchup for all the sane CFB fans that are sick of hearing about UCF.
LikeLike
UCF hasn’t seen a defense in the same universe as LSU’s and LSU should be plenty motivated after losing to Texas A&M to end the year. This game reminds me of the Louisville-LSU bowl game 2 or 3 years ago when Lamar Jackson of Louisville won the Heisman. LSU dominated them, winning something like 27-7.
UCF gave up 600 yards to Temple and needed big comebacks to beat Memphis both times…the same Memphis
team that was down 62-27 after 3 quarters to Missouri. Mizzou could have laid 90 on Memphis if they had wanted.
I’ll finally give UCF their due if they beat LSU, but I think they’ll lose by at least 2 TD’s.
LikeLike
Change LSU to Auburn and that’s exactly what everyone thought last year.
If LSU doesn’t show up in Arizona with bad intentions, they’ll get beat.
LikeLike
(crack) pipe
LikeLike
Play to the standard and Dawgs beat Longhorns by 3 touchdowns.
LikeLike
Somebody explain to me how the fake punt lost the game for use…..and yet we missed a critical FG, Swift had only 3 carries in the 2nd half and we were completely ineffective converting on 3rd downs in the 2nd half.
LikeLike
It lost the game because football is a game of inches and we gave away 30 yards (maybe 50) of position on a play with a low probability of success.
Yes, trick plays are brilliant when they work, but our team has been dreadful at them this year and runs them in very few circumstances. W/ the LSU exception, we haven’t been dreadful on Defense or Offense over the course of 60 minutes all season.
Play the averages and we have a much better chance of putting the ball in Hurts hands on the 20 than in Fields at the 50.
LikeLike
I understand. But what is 30 yards. They only needed a FG and got a TD. I agree it was a very bad risk and executed poorly and was obvious with Fields in the game. But we couldn’t stop them and all they needed was a FG. The bigger issue is we couldn’t convert 3rd downs, we didn’t give the ball to our best player and we missed a critical FG.
LikeLike
Yeah, I don’t see how anyone could not see how lousy the fake punt call was. Just awful. We had been close to pinning them on at least two punts – at worst, they have to go those 50 yards with their back-up QB to give their not-so-great kicker a shot. What sort of demon takes over Kirby’s brain in these situations because he makes these idiotic decisions that run contrary to everything he seems to be about. Fuck Bama.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The issue isn’t that Georgia trotted out there with the intention of running it. It’s that no one called a time out before hand when Bama started calling for the fake, coupled with how poorly the play was actually executed.
If the fake had worked but come up a yard or two short, that’s different. If Kirby calls a time out and flips back into regular punt formation, that’s different as well. Side note: Georgia ended the game with an unused time out? Di I have that wrong?
LikeLike
Should have never come down to that. Rodrigo’s missed chip shot FG and Fromm’s slide on what should have been a first down run in Bama territory changed the momentum and we couldn’t get it back.
One thing the pundits all said before the game was that UGA had to keep scoring. We did that for the first 40 minutes, not the last 20. No excuse for the fake punt call, but we should have never been in the position to even consider that call.
LikeLike
The fake had zero to do with us losing. heck, we couldn’t keep a punt out of the endzone the entire game.
Rodrigo’s miss shifted momentum but should have been easy to overcome.
Chaney’s inability to adjust was the deciding factor. Alabama made a defensive adjustment and Chaney was clueless.
LikeLike
Zero? C’mon, what are you, a Tech troll. I’ll grant that other factors were a part, but this was the valet opening the proverbial door…………..
LikeLike
It didn’t lose the game on its own, but it damn sure was the decision that made it likely. I would have taken my chances defending 80-99 yards for overtime over defending 50 yards. The decision was as bad as a turnover because it was sudden change.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ledbetter said yesterday, in effect, that they will play their best game in the Sugar Bowl. He also said that Tech was getting our best. I believe Ledbetter.
LikeLike
New Orleans…now there’s a city who loves trick plays.
LikeLike
With Texas consistently topping all schools in gross revenue, rest assured that this game is VERY VERY important to us. In fact, we will be heading down even earlier to have powerpoint meetings with croissants in hotel lobby rooms to discuss revenue maximization.
In the meantime, both UGA and UT have teamed up to have a premium seating fundraising competition for the Sugar Bowl with 300 premium seats up for bidding. Watch your emails for a link to the auction site—and let’s show these Longhorns who’s #1 when it comes to fundraising.
LikeLike
Texas in the Sugar Bowl is a pretty nice bowl game if you arent going to the playoffs.
I can’t wait to see this game.
LikeLike
I agree, and the fact my wife went to Texas adds spice to the game. I’m trying to figure out how to get her to go to the game.
LikeLike
Better brush up on “ All my Ex’s live in Texas” 😜
LikeLike
I bet Kirby is aware of all these issues and also that Toneil Carter will want to make his case.
LikeLike
I don’t do any social media but I think I am going to start something here. Senator could you please spread this around? Regarding getting that bad taste out of our mouths…..
#TAKEITOUTONTEXAS!
LikeLike
#MESSWITHTEXAS
LikeLike
If we lay an egg in N’awlins, it will be because the players didn’t execute! Amirite?!
LikeLike