Boom, bringing it

Will Muschamp asked about the last meeting between Ohio State and Georgia, in which he played.

“I saw Herbstreit throw a pass across the room during the pre-game luncheon and I knew we had a chance to win.

Y’all make sure you let him know I said that too.”

— Brooks Austin (@BrooksAustinBA) December 27, 2022

LOL.  He’s back in the fold, peeps.

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UPDATE:

Will Muschamp on his playing days when Georgia beat Ohio State in 1993:

“We had a luncheon. Herbstreit got up & threw a pass across the room & I knew we had a shot to win. Make sure he knows I said that.”pic.twitter.com/kLRwKSPjt9

— Jon Tweets Sports (@jontweetssports) December 27, 2022

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Elite vs. elite and elite vs. really good

Seth Emerson ($$) notes that’s there’s one statistical area where Georgia has an advantage over Ohio State.  It’s the Dawgs’ offense vs. the Buckeyes’ defense.

On paper, this is where the Bulldogs have a clear, although not huge, advantage: Georgia ranks seventh nationally in yards per play. Ohio State’s defense ranks 18th.

The concerning point for Georgia: It has not faced a defense as good as Ohio State, at least on paper, as the Buckeyes have the highest-ranked defense Georgia has faced this season.

That’s true, as far as defensive ypp goes.  OSU’s defense is fifteenth in Bill Connelly’s SP+ rankings.  Georgia’s faced one defense ranked higher, Kentucky’s at sixth.

I don’t mention that to nitpick.  Some of y’all are dismissing Ohio State’s defense, which I think is a mistake.  I’ll keep harping on this, but, while I like Georgia’s chances Saturday, Ohio State is the most talented team the Dawgs have seen this year and if there’s one thing we know from watching Georgia, talent matters in college football.

The Rose Bowl and the apocalypse

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the most absurdly overwrought headline of 2022.

And you think they don’t care about college football on the West Coast.  Guess we should all be a little more afraid now.

Moar Peach Bowl talk

You’ll enjoy this discussion.

I could be wrong, but I think those two really like Darnell Washington.

“If you do that as a business, you’re going to be filing for bankruptcy within a year or two.”

So, people from Joe Fan to Pat Narduzzi are freaking out over NIL.  Nobody seems to be asking if the current pace is sustainable.  Common sense suggests it isn’t.

It leads to the question: Are collectives and their donors approaching NIL with the same understanding of coaches and recruiting staffers that not every player will have on-field success?

“The people that can afford to put this type of money in on a football recruit from a booster standpoint would be bankrupt if they made the same decisions in their businesses,” said a veteran college football assistant, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The obvious problem is that 18-year olds aren’t guaranteed to have success.  In fact, the numbers suggest the majority won’t.

Over the past five recruiting classes, on average, only four of the top 10 quarterbacks in the On3 Consensus have developed into a “hit,” or a productive multiyear starter at their initial school. As On3 recently reported, the top high school quarterbacks can command the equivalent of a seven-figure annual salary through NIL deals.

For collectives, that could translate to hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars mismanaged, depending on how they measure return on investment.

… Through multiple conversations with recruiting staffers and assistant coaches, On3 was able to determine a 60% hit rate for a recruiting class would likely be considered a major success at any program. For some, bringing in a class with that much talent could change the trajectory of a program.

In today’s NIL landscape, collectives can provide the infrastructure to pay top high-school talent.

Many high-profile boosters in the NIL landscape also run successful businesses, as collectives often boast the years of business experience of their board members. So, why would these stakeholders expect their return on investment to be any different in college football?

“What business operates at a 60% failure rate and is viable?” said the veteran college coach with NFL experience.

Yeah, I know fan is short for fanatic, but for almost everyone, there’s a limit on throwing good money after bad.

“I don’t think that paying athletes without any type of business model other than just doling money out is sustainable year over year,” said one collective operator, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “Maybe those collectives view wins and national championships as the gold standard for justifying it. But when you go 4-8 or 5-7 and you spent all that money, you’re like, ‘What good did that do?’”

Georgia supposedly isn’t lining up top dollars when it comes to NIL, but the program also offers two things that most others don’t:  a solid developmental path to the NFL and winning.  So far, anyway, that appears to be working, and I suspect it’ll wind up being more sustainable than the absurd throwing of dollars at recruits and players.

Bobblehead for the CFP

I know that technically we’re just past the giving season, so you may have to settle for getting this for yourself.

There are only 144 of these to be sold, so if it tickles your fancy, you might want to hustle and pre-order.

Rising to the occasion

Matt Hayes on Stetson Bennett:

If we’ve learned anything from this 3-year kaleidoscope of a ride from walk-on to national championship quarterback and everything between, it’s this: When the big game arrives, Big Game Stetson Bennett shows out.

The wildly-hyped season-opener against Oregon was over before halftime. So was the first big SEC test at South Carolina.

Then someone had the audacity to rank Tennessee No. 1, and I know this is going to shock you, but it was over by halftime, too.

The SEC Championship Game? Over by halftime.

Bennett in those 4 big games: 1,183 yards passing, 13 TDs (3 rush), 0 INTs.

His 197.6 QB rating in those games is 21.3 points higher than NCAA season leader CJ Stroud of Ohio State (176.3).

Woody Allen famously said that 80 percent of success in life is just showing up.  This season, it looks like Stetson’s got a pretty good handle on the other 20 percent.

Thirteen

Right before the five-minute mark, you’ll hear Kirby get asked about his tight ends and he discusses how 12-formation football isn’t the norm on the college level.

But it’s at the 5:27 mark that he makes my heart skip a beat:  “You know, we’re excited about 13.”  I know it’s probably just mind games for Saturday, but a blogger can always hope.