Hurtin’ puppies

Well, shit.

Quarterback Jamie Newman has been rehabilitating a foot injury this offseason, according to a report from Georgia Bulldogs Sports Network radio partner 680 The Fan.

Former UGA quarterback Hutson Mason cited an unnamed source on Friday who he said is “very close to the Georgia football program.”

Mason said he did not know if Newman, a Wake Forest transfer, would be “100 percent healthy” when the team starts fall camp next Monday…

Mason said that while Newman’s current status is unknown, he’s sure Newman had been limited, per his source.

“What I do know is that his reps have been limited this summer,” Mason said. “So much that a lot of the other quarterback reps have been evenly distributed amongst the other quarterbacks on the roster.

“When I hear ‘rehab,’ I go, OK, that’s a pretty serious injury. You don’t rehab an ankle sprain. You rehab something that is pretty, relatively serious.”

I repeat:  well, shit.

So, Georgia’s top two quarterbacks are both dealing with recovering from injuries.

To reiterate:  well, shit.

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Want some cheese with that whine?

Bet it would have been fun to be a fly on the wall for this call.

Sources: The SEC coaches call on Thursday became contentious. At least five SEC coaches expressed frustration over the lack of transparency regarding the inability to produce a "formula" for how the two additional league opponents were chosen.

— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) August 14, 2020

Whom would you peg as the biggest complainer(s)?

Pump it up.

Kirby expects noise in Tuscaloosa.

“I know this, they still have a stereo system,” Smart said with a smile Thursday night on a 680 AM high school football roundtable show live streamed on YouTube. “They’ll find a way to crank noise in there. I’m sure everybody in the SEC, you’ll probably still have to have earmuffs without the crowd just because of the sound systems. The home team is going to find a way to make it an advantage I can promise you that.”

If anybody should know, it’s him.

Since it’s artificial noise, though, I still assume SEC rules about cutting it off before the snap will apply.  That should make for some weird moments.

Think they’ll play taped cowbells in Starkville?

Tell it like it is.

So, I’m curious, based on a comment thread I’ve been in this morning — those of you who decry the media for negatively portraying the COVID crisis, or other matters affecting college sports, how would you report things?

I mean, if there is something unduly negative about calling the NCAA an illegal cartel after courts have ruled it and the schools have suppressed the labor market in a way that violates antitrust law, how exactly should I or a member of the media describe it?

I really would like to know.  Maybe enough to change some of what I post here, or at least the manner in which I present things.

“I think that comes with timing in the offense.”

Matthew Stafford aside, after all the years we’ve watched Georgia quarterbacks operate with, um… how shall I put it, less than optimal arm strength (not that there’s necessarily anything wrong with that), it’s interesting to hear Aaron Murray’s critique of Jamie Newman’s game.

… Murray suggested that to run Todd Monken’s version of the Air Raid offense, Newman needs to get better touch on his passes.

“It’s something Jamie needs to work on,” Murray said on Birmingham’s WJOX 3-Man Front program. “It’s a little bit less of him trying to muscle the ball, and I think it’s a little bit more of Jamie needs to loosen up a little bit.”

Murray said it’s an issue for many quarterbacks with Newman’s muscular frame and build.

“A lot of time with quarterbacks, their traps (trapezius) and their side bodies get a little bit tight, so they don’t have the ability to get their arm above their head,” Murray said. “Go back to Tim Tebow, pushing the ball, you get some quarterbacks that are so big and strong, they have a tough time getting that ball up and down and over.

“That’s why he does throw the hitch well and the g- ball well, because you don’t have to get your arm up and throw over an offensive linemen, to get it into those windows in the middle of the field,” he said. “I think for him the best thing would be to get a foam roller, roll out his dang traps and chest and loosen up a little bit so he can get that arm a little bit higher to get the ball up and down for those 10 or 15 yards.”

Murray thinks familiarity will breed better mechanics.

“If you know the offense, if you know where to go with the football,” Murray said, “you can hit that back step, hitch up, let it go, nice and easy, make it catchable for the receiver.”

I think some of this gets back to what Newman will be asked to do in this year’s offense being very different from how Wake’s offense was structured in 2019.  Monken’s got work to do, but at least he’s got talent to mold.

Zen and the art of leadership

I don’t think Mark Emmert has quite mastered the whole concept of coordination.

“I get that people want simple answers,” he said. “I get that it’s frustrating that some conferences are playing and some aren’t right now. That’s just the way it has to be to do this inside college sports. It’s not right or wrong, or better or worse. When people say, well, if we just had a czar to come in and say, ‘We’re going to make a decision, that’ll be it,’ history, if it’s taught us anything, people love the concept of a czar, but they hate czars. Authoritarianism is a really fun concept, it just sucks when people actually have to live under it. Sure, it’s fun to talk about, but nobody who actually advocates for it has actually lived inside it.”

At least not when it doesn’t suit him.

He’s more than happy to direct all the traffic when it comes to a cartel suppressing the labor market, but when it’s about finding common ground with regard to managing college athletes’ health and how that impacts a football season, we shouldn’t expect him to be Hitler.  Or something like that.

“The implications are huge economically.”

Small college towns:  Shutting down college football is going to kill our businesses, financially speaking.

ESPN/FOX:  Hold our beers.

The postponement of much of the college football season could disrupt the flow of more than $1 billion from advertisers to the television networks that count on a slate of game broadcasts every fall.

The return of the college game — a reliable ratings draw — might have helped the TV industry salvage a year of declining revenues resulting from pandemic-related cancellations and production delays. Now that the Big Ten and the Pacific-12 conferences, two of college football’s five powerhouse leagues, have pushed back their seasons amid concerns about the coronavirus, media companies are preparing for more pain…

Last season, college football brought in nearly $1.7 billion in spending on television advertising, according to the research firm Kantar…

For Fox last year, college football was responsible for nearly 6 percent of ad spending and nearly 10 percent of all TV ad impressions, or viewer exposure to ads, according to the ad measurement company iSpot.TV. ESPN drew 9.5 percent of its impressions from the sport. ABC, also owned by Disney, racked up 7.5 percent of its impressions thanks to college football.

Yeah, that’s gonna leave a mark.

Random note of normalcy

Fall camp is upon us, Dawg fans.

“We should be Monday-Tuesday helmets only,” Smart said. “Wednesday pads, which is for us, shoulder pads and shorts, and then we’ll have another day of shoulder pads and shorts and our fifth day under NCAA rules allow us to put full pads on. I think they’ll end up being the following week but we’ll be in pads next week.”

The Dawgs have been considered a consensus top-five team this offseason by most outlets and polls and Smart knows the bar is set very high for his program on an annual basis.

“There’s a lot of expectations,” Smart said. “As coaches, you go through kind of a speech every year we read some notes that you do once a year. You talk about loyalty on staff, doing things the right way. But our expectation is always the same. To get the most out of this team that we possibly can. And I really don’t know what it is. I don’t know those possibilities. We got some unknowns at some positions and got some talented competitions that I’m excited about. We have been able to have some little mini-camp time. We are going to have some hellified competitions at some positions and we got some good talented young players that are going to help our roster.”

Close your eyes, and that pretty much sounds like any preseason in Athens.  Hellified!

Today, in I heard it on the Internet, so it must be true

Take it from somebody who’s been there a few times himself — before you embrace as gospel some social media story you find compelling, make sure it’s for real first.

A ‘cruiter’s gotta do what a ‘cruiter’s gotta do.

Kirbs be Zoomin’.

“For us, it has been finding new ways to reach people,” he told the 680 roundtable program. “For us, everybody started using Zoom (video conferencing) and we wanted to be the first to get on there because we knew it was going to wear everybody out. You had to get creative. I think this year has redefined all recruiting.”

Well, everything and then also everyone. It meant enlisting possible asset he could find to convey how great it would be to be a Georgia Bulldog. Smart used his human resources.

“People started using their roster,” Smart said. “People started using their players more. They started using their support staff more. The parents of current players started reaching out. You had to get creative and so everybody has. As competitive as the SEC is in recruiting, they are going to find a way to try to reach out to kids, get in touch with them and develop that relationship.”

Smart said he’s spent more time on the phone and on Zoom than ever before.

“Even talking ball on Zoom,” he said. “The kids like that. They enjoy learning the defenses and the offenses.”

ABC, baby.