Mike Griffith ranks this season’s schedule in order of difficulty:
- Oregon (in Atlanta)
- At Kentucky
- At South Carolina
- At Mississippi State
- Florida (in Jacksonville)
- Tennessee
- Missouri
- Auburn
- Vanderbilt
- Georgia Tech
- Kent State
- Samford
Quibble about the order some, if you like, but overall, that has the feel of a repeat of last season’s slate. Yeah, as I said in the comments this morning, it’s a long way ’til September, but show me a single game there where you’d expect Georgia to go in as an underdog. I sure don’t see one.
Nice touch, by the way, on ranking Tech below Vanderbilt, Mike.
Get The Picture 
If SC survives Arkansas in week 2, you’ll need ear protection for the cannon shots in week 3.
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I haven’t followed UT’s recruiting but if Heupel gets a second year bounce that’s the only game that semi-worries me.
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Agreed on that. Otherwise, I guess I need to catch up on what’s going on over at Auburn that would put them just one notch above Vanderbilt. That seems weird to me.
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They’re a cowflop program under a 2nd year coach who fired both coordinators, has to replace a quarterback and ranked 7th in the SEC in recruiting.
Some cute ladies in the stands, tho.
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UT’s coaches tend to bounce off the road into a ditch in years 2+
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Color me offensive minded, half of the schedule could be 20 point favorites…only after the G-Day QBR comes out…GO DAWGS!
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Kent State and Stamford are gonna be pissed when they see Bees ranked higher!!
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Kent State’s had three straight winning seasons and played for a MAC title last year. I’m not 100% sure Tech would beat them on a neutral field.
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Couple of things in response: 1) you’re not wrong, but 2) it’s Mike Griffith and besides being Mike Griffith, he also writes for an Atlanta newspaper, so maybe he thinks that Tech could beat Kent State (he is Mike Griffith after all) but even if he doesn’t think that there are limits that his bosses will allow him to go.
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Any random home game is, for all intents and purposes, a neutral field at Tech. And our game? Heh.
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Judging by how Tech fared versus Northern Illinois last year, Kent might not need the neutral field.
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Oregon is just like Clemson from last year. If we win, we will more likely than not be 12-0 entering MBS for a 2nd time. Since Bama will likely be 12-0 as well, it’s going to be a war because who knows if the loser makes the playoff.
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Who in their right mind would have EVER thought you would see Auburn as our eighth toughest game?!? Only above Vandy in the SEC games?? Geezeeel
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I replied to californiadog above before reading your comment. I don’t know if our minds are great, but they’re thinking alike.
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Pretty easy year to hit all the games if that is your jam….
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The transfer portal really muddies the water these days. A team can either gain talent or lose talent between seasons so quickly that you won’t recognize them when the season starts.
When the transfer smoke settles, it will be interesting to see who the beneficiaries are and how it changes the teams.
Teams like Georgia and Alabama will maintain there consistency but the second tear powers could increase or decrease in power by leaps.
I haven’t decided if the transfer portal is a good thing or not, but it sure adds to the excitement and uncertainty of CFB.
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I’m not surprised Tech was ranked behind Vandy. I’m surprised they’re ranked ahead of Kent St and Samford (who almost beat Florida last year). 🙂
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I’d flip Fl and Tn. Not sold on Napier and he’s year 1 with little time to recruit.
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I too am more concerned with HILLBILLIES than the TURDS
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Two or three teams I honestly do not know what to make of. Might be a little too much credit to Beamer going into his 2nd year. Yeah, I know they got the QB; that kid didn’t like getting hit by Big12 teams, wait until he gets a taste of SEC linemen and linebackers. Then again, they are the only team that catches Georgia early in the season, as the defense works to figure a few things out.
Auburn feels low; but changing both coordinators (strongest part of the coaching staff). and losses in the portal? And we have ‘0’ ideal of what to make of Florida. Weakness to that team has and will be for a while is the O-Line. Say what you will about Mullen, he could call an offensive game, watched Billy coached against Ga State. They were solid, but not the most creative play calling I’ve seen. He just had better personnel, lined up and executed. He doesn’t have that in this game; nor will he have that against Kentucky. Gators have Utau, A&M, LSU and the East – plenty of pitfalls. The play Utau, and LSU before Georgia.
The good news is that Georgia doesn’t see Kentucky and MSU, Florida or UT until a little later in the season. This time around, I think it bodes well for Georgia, giving the defense enough time to find it’s own identity and to be playing on all cylinders.
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I agree with your defensive concerns .
But I have to think we may have a pretty good defensive coach hung staff.
I kind of think we may be outscoring folks this year too. This offense could be special
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I seriously don’t know if our defensive staff is hung. I hope they all are.
( piss on bad eyes and predictive spell)
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I predict a season not unlike Bama’s 2021 regular season — we will be favored in all of our games, but we won’t boat race all our conference opponents like we did this past year. We will gradually get better over the course of the season, but we will have one head-scratching loss, where we are a double digit favorite, most likely in a mid-September 3:30 CBS game in the blast furnace otherwise known as Billy Brice.
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If we crap the bed it will be against Rocky Flop. Their offense actually has a pulse.
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No. USCJunior will be a much improved team, but Beamer won’t only be at a huge talent disadvantage but he will be out coached
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It warms my cold heart seeing Auburn football as an afterthought
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Oregon loses a ton of talent and has a complete change in staff.
I say South Carolina and Mississippi State are the scariest one. Carolina because they are looking at the year two bump and an influx of talent and it will be an early game in the season with a lot of unknowns for us on defense and what they can do offensively.
MSU because it is later in the season and their offense will likely be clicking by then and we should be living high on the idea of repeating as sec East champs and looking at going back to Atlanta against Bama. Could be a bit of a trap game.
If Tennessee finds a defense that game too could be interesting, but we have it at home, we saw what they can do last year. We will have time to be ready. It will be closer, but still a win.
Auburn and Florida should both be enjoyable for us. I see 20-30 point wins for both. Auburn will likely fire their coach after the iron bowl and Florida won’t have enough to keep it respectable after half time.
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Love where Auburn is listed. Fuck Auburn.
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It’s the end of the road for Gee-Off, that’s for sure.
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Well, we need to make sure he leaves with a record-setting beating.
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So long as we break 50 and set the record for winning margin, I’m good.
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Can the trade school sumbitches buy out his contract??
Cheap, fiscally unsound bunch over there!!
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I’d say the game at UK won’t be a pushover. I’m not sold on Napier either. UF’s recruiting class was the worst in the SEC besides Vandy if my memory serves. They were a train wreck this season and is there any real reason to think they are going to be that much better? They got one great 5 star recruit and think they are going to be world beaters.
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I have a feeling UF will do some work in the portal. Napier’s goal doesn’t have to be to build a team of world beaters… just contribution guys who can keep a game close. If you can keep a game close and make a play, you can win it – no matter who’s on the other side of the field.
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I’m not anywhere near as worried about Oregon as I was about Clemson. Nix in a new offense? Best RB transferred to USC? New HC, OC, DC in their first game together, 3,000 miles away from home? That line will be between 7-10 points.
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I expect Florida to be our most difficult game. They were a lot better than their final record. The team just gave up after the coaching debacle at Kentucky. I saw that debacle coming and Napier will have the ready to play when we face them next season.
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If Napier can do some serious work before the traditional signing day and does a lot of work in the portal then they’ll be much tougher than last year. We had a serious edge in talent last year and there’s a chance it could be worse next year. But I tend to think Florida’s going to give us a heck of a game next year.
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They probably would have given us a better game if Mullen hadn’t started Richardson. The QB wasn’t ready and that led to the implosion.
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Yeah, when you start letting the fans make your decisions for you, it’s over. And it certainly was for Mullen.
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I’ve got a lot of respect for Kentucky, but if they in fact actually end up as our second-toughest game behind Oregon then I’m going to go ahead and reserve a few flights to next year’s semifinals. In reality, I expect Florida to be much tougher than Griffith is thinking here.
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Depends on whether we win the SECCG and what the rest of the field looks like.
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Mike does not believe that we should play Tech at all.
I agree
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Now, THAT’s blasphemy if I ever heard it!!!!!! Not play tech?!!?! Repent and be saved, sinner!!!!!!!
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He’s a moron.
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This is an interesting exercise, but looking at how the schedule falls, I feel like the back-to-back weeks on the road at Mississippi State and then Kentucky coming after Jacksonville and Tennessee games are the two toughest spots.
Week one game vs Oregon is one I would set behind those two because: we’re deep on defense and will still be really really really good and they have Bo Nix. And, we’re going to be solid on OL with good skill players and a playoff MVP QB (or someone who beat him out). We’re going to smoke the Ducks.
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So I’d have it: @Kentucky, @Mississippi State, Oregon, Tennessee, Florida and the rest. I know historically an early game in Cola is worrisome, but if Rattler couldn’t get it done at OU, what makes anyone think he’ll work out at Carolina? C’mon.
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Rattler isn’t going to have the supporting cast around him that he had in Norman.
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“We’re going to smoke the Ducks.”
I could do with some smoked duck right about now!
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You can just tell how addicted to the camera Griffith is. I don’t pay him any attention.
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Looks about right
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