One of Georgia’s greats is gone.
RIP, sir.
Daily Archives: October 19, 2022
Promises made, promises kept.
This year, they finally did get the tight ends involved in the offense.
At tight end, Bowers, last year’s SEC Freshman of the Year, has produced a team-high 393 receiving yards and two touchdowns. He has also had help from 6-foot-7, 270-pound Darnell Washington, who is third in receiving yards with 285.
This season is that “this season”.
Filed under Georgia Football
Jax surrender, or merely a strategic retreat?
Kirby Smart sounds like a man who’s been on the receiving end of some significant pushback ($$).
But Smart, who has played and coached in the game, which has been played almost continuously in Jacksonville since 1933, reiterated that he appreciates the tradition, as well as the money that it brings in.
“There’s really quality benefits to both,” Smart said. “When it comes down to it, there’s a very, very basic element of everything comes back to, number one money, and number two recruiting and getting good players. I firmly believe that we’ll be able to sign better players by having it as a home-and-home because we’ll have more opportunities to get them to campus. But, I also think there’s a financial factor that factors into that, with having the game there, and being able to make more money for the university, possibly, there. You have to weigh both those and make really good decisions.”
“Possibly” is doing some heavy lifting there, Kirbs. That game would likely be out of Jax but for the financial considerations. But you can keep fighting the good fight for ‘crootin’, aight?
“It’s really not a big debate for me. It’s been made really big by the media because they’ve made it out to be a really big deal,” Smart said. “I enjoy the pageantry of going down there and playing. I enjoyed playing there as a player, I enjoy tradition. I enjoy all those things. …
“But, I promise you, I have not thought about that one second since the start of the season. And I’m not going to think about it for one second because I got to worry about coaching our team, and I’m not fighting the fight in the public forum. I’m not fighting the fight for anything. I’m worried about our team and us playing well and how we block and tackle of what plays we call it, how we play special teams. That’s just not a priority for me, where that game is right now.”
Or not.
Kirby’s toughest SEC opponent is Butts-Mehre, where money is a perennial Heisman Trophy candidate.
Filed under Georgia Football
TFW you lose to Tennessee for the first time
Jermaine, Jermaine, Jermaine…
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UPDATE:
Nick Saban doesn’t have time for that shit, Jermaine.
Filed under Alabama
Sacking the sackers
Currently, Georgia is tied for 123rd nationally in sacks, with seven. Obviously, while you’d like to see more, so far that hasn’t really had a negative impact on the defense, which is second nationally in scoring.
That doesn’t mean the coaching staff isn’t paying attention. Check this out ($$):
Georgia’s staff did a game-by-game breakdown this week of the average snap-to-throw time, and Smart said it was the fastest the Bulldogs have ever measured it at this point of the season. Auburn was the only game that averaged more than three seconds before the ball was thrown.
So what can Georgia do? Try to get to the quarterback faster.
“We studied that really, really hard, in terms of looking at ourselves. We told them hey, it’s 2.6 (seconds) you’ve gotta get there by,” Smart said, with a chuckle. “You’ve got to get there by 2.6 or affect the throw. We’ve had several good rushes where we affected throws in terms of bull (rush), batting balls … making the quarterback affect his throw. But tough to be where we are sack-wise and not just getting many opportunities.”
I wonder how much that complicates some of the exotic blitz packages Georgia likes to run that take some time to develop.
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UPDATE:
Filed under Georgia Football, Stats Geek!, Strategery And Mechanics
TFW branding is more important than coaching
The perfect epitaph to Coach 404’s career on the Flats ($$):
… While Key and everyone else remain complimentary of Collins, it’s clear finer details were getting missed. The reason Key chose Semore for the task of overhauling that group is that Semore is “a ball coach,” which is one of the highest compliments Key can give someone. “At the end of the day, that’s what we do,” Key said. “A lot of people get caught up so much in everything else that they lose sight of actual football.”
There’s not enough Waffle House coffee in the world to fix that.
Filed under Georgia Tech Football
Third and Gator
Shot.
As you may have heard, Florida’s defense is last nationally in third down conversion rate at 52.6%. Their rate is buoyed slightly by only giving up 44.4% to Eastern Washington, though the Eagles were a perfect 4-for-4 after UF ran up a 52-3 lead. The Gators only allowed 4-of-14 (28.6%) before that, which is more than fine against an FCS opponent.
Anyway, if you take out FCS competition, UF is still last at 54.43%, though they’re virtually tied with No. 130 Arizona State’s 54.41% rate and not far from No. 129 Washington’s 54.22% rate.
The Gators have allowed more than 50% conversions five times in seven games this year. Only EWU at 44.4% and Kentucky with their future first round quarterback (insert laugh track here) at 30.8% haven’t converted at least half of their opportunities.
For perspective, the Gators allowed 50% conversions four times in the last coaching transitional year of 2018. They then allowed it three times each in 2019 and 2020, and, somehow, just once last year. Four of those 11 instances in the Todd Grantham era came against either Alabama or Georgia, and one bizarrely came in a shutout of Towson in ’19.
Even if UF solved enough of its issues to avoid allowing 50% conversions again this season, they’ve already allowed that rate the most times of any season since ’07. The previous high in that span was four in 2007, 2010, and 2018.
What this means
You should’ve picked up by now that third down conversion rate by itself is not the most informative stat.
Chaser.
Variance, meaning variability in outcome, is a key concept here. Take, for example, the No. 129 team in overall third down conversions defense, the Oregon Ducks.
Oregon is about two percentage points better on third down conversions than UF is both overall at 50.60% and against FBS competition at 52.73%. Yet, the Ducks are 5-1 and ranked No. 10 overall instead of 4-3 and unranked. Why?
The teams are mirror images of each other in consistency in a couple key ways. The Duck defense has had some bad showings — allowing 90% conversions to Georgia…
Maybe I’m missing something, but that doesn’t bode particularly well for a certain defense garbed in orange and blue in a couple of weeks.
Filed under Gators, Gators..., Stats Geek!
Stat of the day
Not missing a beat there.
Since we’re on a ‘Bama fan roll right now, how do you think they’d react to Georgia holding Tennessee under 30 points? (Not a prediction, just a hypothesis.)
Filed under Georgia Football, Stats Geek!
Scenes from a meltdown, part three
‘Bama man, by Gawd:
Can’t wait to see how they react if there’s a second regular loss this season.
Filed under Alabama
Scenes from a meltdown, part two
Totally normal reaction to a tough loss:
These people are gonna be awesome after Saban retires.
Filed under Alabama
Get The Picture 
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