If you haven’t seen Kirby Smart’s interview with Mark Schlabach, you can watch it here.
For me, this is the significant part:
Smart said his program brought in officers from the UGA Police Department and Athens-Clarke County Police last summer to educate players about the dangers of street racing. Smart said Bryant Gantt, the program’s director of player support operations, suggested it after watching news clips of street racing in Atlanta.
If Georgia’s players didn’t listen to the warning then, Smart is hoping they will learn from the tragedy on Jan. 15.
“I mean, there [are] laws in place for these things, to prevent it for a reason,” Smart said. “And we want to educate our players in every way, every part of our organization. We’re constantly looking for a better way in whatever that is, health and safety included. I talked about drugs and alcohol, talked about gambling, talked about racing in cars and high speeds. You have to educate your players and you have to make sure they understand the risks and dangers of that, and that’s something that we’ve tried to do.”
So… the staff recognized the issue and was proactive in reaching out to the team about the risky behavior. If you lead the horse to water, it doesn’t mean the horse will drink, but it does mean that from a program standpoint, the issue isn’t one of culture, but of individuals who don’t appreciate the level of risk they take with that behavior.
Well, maybe not everybody wants to see it that way.
Probably has something to do with Toppers.
Get The Picture 