Georgia’s opener has a scheduled time now.
Daily Archives: May 17, 2022
Pay for (academic) play
This is tucked inside Chip Towers’ piece about Georgia’s next athletics budget (scheduled to increase about 8%, in case you’re wondering):
The Bulldogs are budgeting for an “academic achievement award” that will be provided to all student-athletes for successful progress toward a degree.
No details provided, so there’s no way to know if this is simply a straightforward cash award for maintaining academic eligibility or otherwise. Still, it appears that, in some form or fashion, UGA will be following the lead of a number of other conference schools that are now providing education-related stipends, per Alston.
Filed under Academics? Academics., Georgia Football
Not done yet
Wayul, if you follow Georgia’s recruiting, I have some bad news for you. One of the commits from the ’23 class (at the top of the 247Sports Composite, by the way) has dropped out.
Just kidding about the bad news!
The Georgia Bulldogs were not done with the 2022 class after all. On Monday night, Marcus Washington confirmed to Dawgs247 that he plans to forego his senior season and enroll a year early at UGA. He will be on campus in a few weeks with the rest of the Georgia signees following graduation.
The four-star cornerback from Grovetown began the week ranked as the nation’s No. 69 overall prospect, No. 8 cornerback, and No. 5 overall recruit in Georgia per the industry-generated 247Sports Composite for the 2023 class. On 247Sports, he came in as the No. 91 overall recruit, No. 12 cornerback, and No. 6 prospect in Georgia. Now Washington will see his ranking adjusted for the 2022 class as he prepares to head to Athens and begin his college career this summer.
“I just wanted to get there to that amazing program they have and just continue to build on that relationship with the coaching staff. I am just ready to be a part of it because it is an amazing thing going on up there,” Washington said. “I can train and develop right now, who would not want to be a part of that?”
I hears ‘ya, Dawg.
Washington is a legacy whose dad was recruited and signed by Mark Richt. More importantly, he adds to a ridiculously talented secondary class that looks like this:
I don’t know about best in history, but best group Smart has ever signed? Yeah, that’s pretty much true.
- Defensive backs rated among nation’s top 100 players signed by UGA (2016-2021): 7
- Defensive backs rated among nation’s top 100 players signed by UGA (2022): 5
- 5-star defensive backs signed by UGA (2016-2021): 3
- 5-star defensive back signees at UGA (2022): 3
- 5-star cornerback signees at UGA (2016-2021): 2
- 5-star cornerback signees at UGA (2022): 2
The reclassification puts the class of ’22 at 30 players, so there’s a little more roster management coming. I can’t help but wonder how much of this is driven by Georgia not finding quality secondary support in the transfer portal. Regardless, it appears Smart is going to deal with rebuilding the back end of his defense by throwing enough talent at it that somebody’s bound to stick. Given what he’s giving himself to work with, I can think of worse ways to approach the matter.
Filed under Georgia Football, Recruiting
The best of intentions
Of course this happened.
Despite taking a 20% pay cut during a portion of 2020 because of financial concerns connected to the pandemic that included cancellation of the Division I men’s basketball tournament, NCAA president Mark Emmert’s total compensation for the year increased by just over $80,000 compared to what he made in 2019, according to the association’s new federal tax return.
The new returns show that Emmert was credited with $2.99 million in total compensation during the 2020 calendar year, including $2.58 million in base salary.
And why the hell not?
The association’s cancellation of the basketball tournament in March 2020 resulted in a $600 million drop in revenue for the 2019-20 fiscal year, which ended on Aug. 31, 2020. That drop caused a $365 million decrease in the amount distributed to Division I schools and conferences that fiscal year.
Okay, so he had one job to do and did it poorly. You really gonna hold that against the man, especially when his heart was pure?
On March 31, 2020, USA TODAY Sports reported that Emmert had sent a memo to the association’s membership saying that he and members of the association’s senior management were cutting their pay by 20% and the association’s vice presidents were cutting their pay by 10%.
The real mystery here is why they decided to force Emmert out. I mean, if you can do that and still get a pay bump…
Filed under The NCAA
Seventh time’s the charm.
Man, between Connor Bazelak leaving the program and Mizzou’s prize QB recruit at risk of jumping to major league baseball, I knew Drinkwitz was beating the bushes for another body at the position this season. I just wasn’t expecting it to be someone who hasn’t played for more than a season.
After months of searching for a transfer, Missouri may have found its quarterback for the 2022 season. And after an even longer and more circuitous college career, Jack Abraham has found a landing spot for his seventh and final season of eligibility. Abraham, a graduate transfer who spent last season at Mississippi State, committed to the Tigers on Monday.
He’s not coming in with a scholly — that’s something he’ll be granted, presumably, if he wins the starting job — so it’s not a particularly high risk move, but it does show that Mizzou has issues at the most important position on the field. How bad do coach and player need each other? This bad: “He has not met head coach Eli Drinkwitz in person yet, but has had phone conversations with the Tigers’ head coach in the last few days.”
Sounds like Mizzou’s about to embark on a whirlwind fall practice.
Filed under SEC Football, Transfers Are For Coaches.
“It’s a race to the bottom to some extent.”
And nobody wants to get left behind.
Gregory relayed the memory last week as an inspiration after rushing at the last minute to push through an amendment that would relax the state’s name, image and likeness law in hopes of further compensating athletes. In a move that should resonate from the SEC to NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis, a proposed bill would allow any athletic department official — including coaches — to assist with NIL deals.
After passing both the Missouri house and senate on Friday — less than a day before the end of the legislative session for the year — SB 718 now awaits only Gov. Mike Parson’s signature to become law.
“I want Missouri to have the best players,” said Gregory, now a farmer who grows corn, soybeans and wheat on 1,100 acres in the western half of the state.
Especially in the SEC.
That about summarizes the blink-and-you-miss-it climate. Missouri is poised to become the latest state to expand NIL opportunities beyond the NCAA rulebook.
Late last month, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed a bill that significantly broadened NIL rights. It allows interaction between collectives, coaches and athletes. That could not have been well-received by the NCAA, which singled out collectives last week. Specifically, that law means the Knoxville-based Spyre Sports Group, which is overseeing the $8 million contract of a prospect believed to be quarterback Nico Iamaleava, would no longer be banned from interaction by the state.
Existing laws in Louisiana and Illinois are undergoing amendment conversions that would allow booster involvement…
In February, Alabama repealed its NIL law when it was deemed more restrictive than the NCAA’s meager standards. You’re not alone if you’ve noticed a lot of this activity is bubbling up from SEC schools.
“[The Missouri amendment] was more in response to looking at some other SEC state schools either a) just completely repealing their language or b) really the catalyst was when Tennessee made the same change that we did,” Gregory said.
He added: “When you have millions upon millions of dollars being thrown around and TV contracts and advertising and ticket sales and donors, the reason that [money] happens is the performance on the field. And the performance on the field comes from great coaches and great players.”
You have to think at some point in time Georgia joins the queue.
Filed under Political Wankery, SEC Football
TFW all the NIL money’s run out
Oops.
Some hapless TAMU staffer is getting their ass reamed out about now.
Filed under Recruiting, SEC Football
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