Third and… ?

I know this is likely nothing more than talk to the hand type stuff, but, damn, Georgia, you’re up against Todd Grantham this week.  You need more cowbell… er, tempo ($$).

As Hutson Mason, Georgia’s quarterback that year, remembered it, they knew Grantham liked to make the “perfect play call,” by matching defensive personnel to the offense and then getting signals in late once he got the best idea what the offense was doing. Georgia’s answer: Go up-tempo.

“We felt like if we went fast that he wouldn’t be able to get his calls in and guys would either be misaligned or not aligned already,” Mason said. “So we felt tempo really hurt him as a play-caller and was one of his deficiencies. Instead of just calling the play and letting his players do the job in execution, he almost tries to get the perfect play. So that’s why teams with tempo would kill him.”

Remember, Bobo was gone for that Belk Bowl.  The game plan was so obvious, it didn’t matter.  And, by the way, they ran the crap out of the ball.

You know the guy.  You know what he likes to do.  There’s certainly a time for manball, but there’s also a time to avoid letting yourself get played like this:

Don’t be that dude, James Coley.  Do more, as your head coach likes to say.

Your first Cocktail Party stat of the week

Georgia opened as a six-point favorite over Florida and the line quickly dropped to 3.5.  I get it — the South Carolina loss left a mark and Tennessee’s asswhipping of the ‘Cocks didn’t help that perception.  (Although why it didn’t affect the perception of Florida, which struggled to a win in Columbia, I have no idea.)

Anyway, let me start with a stat that should make you sit up and pay attention:  net yards per play.  Against FBS competition, the Dawgs lead the SEC on the defensive side, at 4.26 ypp.  Florida is sixth and comfortably behind, at 5.51 ypp.  At 6.71 ypp, Georgia ranks third in the conference in offensive yards per play and Florida’s 5.95 is next.

Here’s how that looks from a net perspective:

• Georgia:  1.45 2.45
• Florida:  .44

That’s right, Georgia’s net is triple better than five times the size of Florida’s.  That’s… kind of big.

Yeah, I’m worried about turnover margin and just general showing up, but if the Dawgs get to play their game like they can (and should), that has all the flavor of last year’s meeting, when Florida kept it close until the dam broke in the fourth quarter.

My Week 9 Mumme Poll ballot

As you might guess, Oklahoma is no longer on my list, which looks like this now:

• Alabama
• Clemson
• LSU
• Ohio State
• Penn State

So far, no one-loss teams have graced my ballot, something I expect will be tested in a couple of weeks when Alabama and LSU face off.

Ballot took less than ten minutes to slap together.

The new gold rush

The way things are going, pretty soon we’re gonna reach a point when we’re counting the state legislatures that aren’t chasing California’s Fair Pay to Play Act.

Bend but not break, on steroids

Georgia’s defense has one job…

The five FBS defenses in 2019 that are allowing opponents to score TDs less than 10% of possessions.
1. @OhioStateFB………..6%
2. @GeorgiaFootball….. 7%
3. @PennStateFball…….9%
4. @HawkeyeFootball…9%
5. @ClemsonFB…………9%

— SportSource Analytics (@SportSourceA) October 28, 2019

… and it’s doing it.

One huge reason for that is the Dawgs are limiting other teams’ big plays.  Against FBS teams, UGA is second nationally in opponents’ plays of 10+ yards.

Another significant reason is that Georgia has only allowed FBS opposing offenses 11 tries inside the red zone, the fewest in the country.

Kirby’s making er’rybody work.

SEC Power Poll, Week Nine

The top of the conference is stable, but below the top five… whew.  It’s like nobody wants to be crowned king of the dipshits.

1. Alabama.  Mac Jones notched a 216.55 passer rating against Arkansas, which makes me suspect that Nick Saban could pull a 150 passer rating against Arkansas.
2. LSU.  Since 2016, Ed Orgeron has 8 wins against top ten teams.  Nick Saban has nine.
3. Georgia.  I don’t know if I’m supposed to be elated that Kentucky dominated Missouri or deflated that South Carolina got blown out in the second half by Tennessee.
4. Florida.  Outsourcing the snark to Bill Connelly:  “Two months ago, UF fans were complaining that SP+ had them too high. Now, after a comeback win over a team Tenn just smoked and a bye, they’ve got the best 1-loss team in the country.“
5. Auburn.  The defense is championship level.  The quarterback isn’t.
6. Texas A&M.  They won a game they were supposed to win, which is more than you can say for what follows.
7. Missouri.  Undefeated at home and 0-3 on the road.
8. Kentucky.  I didn’t see that ass kicking coming and neither did you.
9. Ole Miss.  That bye week looks pretty good by comparison to some.
10. Tennessee.  The Vols still have to win three of their last four to reach bowl eligibility.
11. South Carolina.  I’m old enough to remember when the ‘Cocks thought their season had positive momentum.
12. Mississippi State.  I’m not sure where the bottom is for this group, but MSU’s next game is against Arkansas.
13. Vanderbilt.  The ‘Dores only wish they could play Arkansas.
14. Arkansas.  Four turnovers against Alabama.  It’s almost as if the Hogs went out of their way to insure the outcome.

Fabris Pool results, Week 9

Welp, we had our first repeat winner of 2019.  IMOPEN won this week with an 8-2 mark and didn’t need no stinkin’ tiebreaker to do it.  My hat’s off.

The seasonal race is thinning out.

“The message was that, ‘We’re going to be champions…’”

Easier said than done, Gus.

Auburn (6-2, 3-2 SEC) is not mathematically eliminated from the SEC Western Division race, but winning the division seems impossible. The scenario is simple, but improbable. Auburn needs to win its remaining SEC games against Ole Miss, Georgia and Alabama; Undefeated LSU, which owns a tiebreaker against Auburn, will have to lose three of its final four SEC games; and Alabama will have to lose two SEC games, including one at Auburn in the Iron Bowl.

Auburn is having exactly the year that many foretold:  a good team stuck in a division with better ones.  There’s only so far you can go with a true freshman quarterback in the SEC.

Sooth me, baby, sooth me.

Why can Georgia beat Florida?  Let Jake Rowe count the ways.

HISTORY…

Speaking of Fromm’s experience, history indicates that UGA’s best play is ahead of it. The Bulldogs are 10-2 in the month of November under Kirby Smart with a loss to Georgia Tech in 2016 and at Auburn in 2017. They’ve also won six November games in a row dating back to that 40-17 loss on The Plains two years ago. When you look at the 2017 and 2018 regular seasons, Georgia is 7-0 after dropping its first game. Kirby Smart also has a tremendous record against Florida’s Dan Mullen as a coordinator and a head coach and he’s quite familiar with Gus Malzahn/Auburn in addition to the rest of the teams on the schedule.

It’s not like they haven’t done it before.

The Corch abides.

Holy crap, the asshole is still fixated on The Celebration.

Meyer, who was the Gators’ coach at the time, infamously called two timeouts in the final minute to make sure then-UGA coach Mark Richt got a good long look at the 49-10 scoreboard.

“We had two (timeouts); I wish I had three, but we had two,” Meyer told The Buddy Martin Show this week.

“The one thing I want to add is that we came down in the pre-game meal. I’ll never forget. Usually I come in and I speak to the team before we get on the bus and go.  I came down, and as I walk into the room, all the players stand up and start going (wild). You could tell that team was on fire to play that game.

“And (the game) started, if you could remember, from the first snap (when two Florida defensive players) hit (UGA running back Knowshon Moreno), that this was going to be a long day for them (Georgia).”

Why did Meyer want to get payback at Mark Richt? Because the year before, Richt allowed his entire team to run on the field after UGA’s first score to celebrate together in the end zone in what was dubbed “The Gator Stomp.” The No. 20-ranked Bulldogs upset No. 9 Florida by the score of 42-30.

Meyer said he’s never discussed that end-zone celebration directly with Richt. But the former Florida coach admitted he obsessed about it for a long time:

“My biggest fear was that when your manhood gets challenged like that, are you going to do something to retaliate? The biggest thing was … I talked to our players non-stop about ‘Do not get involved.’ Every reporter was asking our players ‘What was going to be the payback?’

If only he’d spent a tenth as much of the time worrying about Zach Smith’s behavior…