Crisis mode?

Thought this was interesting…

Umm… what conference would college athletes negotiate with over terms and conditions if they wanted to play at Notre Dame?  But I digress.

Note that the real thrust of Swarbrick’s message there is to bypass the schools completely and allow either the NCAA or individual conferences to set the ground rules.  (As he notes, the former approach wouldn’t work without some sort of antitrust exemption that would have to be negotiated with Congress.)  I’m not sure anyone trusts the NCAA enough to think they’d get the mission right, though.

Letting the conferences call the shots would bypass antitrust and it would be interesting, to say the least, to see if competition leads to some sort of race to the bottom.  (And, if so, whether there would be pushback from at least some schools over that.)

In any event, at least some thought is being given to something other than a knee jerk “Congress, bail our collective asses out” approach to the problem.

A snapshot in time

Via the invaluable cfbstats.com, here’s a picture of Georgia’s receiving stats as they stand today:

Bowers currently leads the team in receptions, total yardage and touchdowns.  That’s a helluva trifecta.  Is there anybody in that group that can replace his production?  Of course not.  But, as Billy Beane said in Moneyball, they can try to replace it in the aggregate.  And not strictly at the tight end position, either.  As Matt Hinton puts it,

… Of the top 5 wideouts, 3 of them (Ladd McConkey, Missouri transfer Dominic Lovett and Mississippi State transfer RaRa Thomas) have more than 1,000 career receiving yards to their credit; the other 2 (Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint and Arian Smith) have averaged 17.3 yards per catch between them with a combined 10 career touchdowns.

Five wideouts have a TD catch from Carson Beck this season — not including McConkey, who’s had the luxury of working his way back slowly from a back injury — with Lovett, a second-team All-SEC pick in 2022 at Mizzou, finally joining the list Saturday against Vandy. But only Rosemy-Jacksaint has 2.

If anything, the “any given Saturday” nature of the rotation almost seems designed to prevent any single receiver from separating from the pack when the entire 2-deep has the potential to play at the next level. Bowers and his unique skill set are exceptions to the rule; even Georgia can’t relegate a talent that big to being just another cog in the machine.

The Bulldogs arguably would not have escaped their Week 5 trip to Auburn without him, specifically. If it comes down to winning a game without their go-to target, or a handful of games, the Dawgs arguably have more viable options at their disposal than any team in America outside of Columbus, Ohio. But then, given UGA’s commitment to sharing the wealth, it might take all of them to make up the difference.

It is unlikely there’s anyone on the receiving corps capable of taking the offense on his back and carrying it the way Bowers did against Auburn.  That’s going to require some rejiggering of the offensive game planning from Bobo, as well as the receivers as a group stepping up.  Can they do it?  Well, that’s what championship teams are capable of.  We’ll soon find out if the Dawgs qualify.

Taking stock

All doom and gloom aside, Matt Hinton’s midseason take on Georgia seems pretty nuanced to me.

No doubt Kirby Smart can elucidate a long list of his team’s flaws and concerns — even before Brock Bowers’ injury. Georgia fans probably can, too. Zero in the loss column notwithstanding, the defending champs have been far from perfect against an underwhelming schedule. Three of their 4 conference games have been competitive well into the 4th quarter, a rarity the past 2 years. But they’ve been themselves, too, extending their school-record winning steak to 24 games and counting with a minimum of drama.

The defense ranks among the nation’s best across the board; Carson Beck’s output to date has barely wavered from the pace that made Stetson Bennett IV an improbable Heisman finalist in 2022; the Dawgs’ reserved seat atop the major polls remains secure in their 17th consecutive week at No. 1. As long as the prevailing question in their bid for a 3-peat is “Georgia vs. the field,” life is good.

The water starts getting deeper on the other side of an open date: Florida’s on deck in Week 9, followed 3 straight games against currently ranked teams (Missouri, Ole Miss and Tennessee) in November. Maybe all without Bowers, too, who is set for ankle surgery. Historically speaking, that’s the kind of gauntlet in which good-not-great legacy contenders tend to get exposed. We won’t really have a good idea of how this version of Georgia stacks up until it’s safely on the other side with championship ambitions intact. In the meantime, it’s enough to know that it will register as a shockwave across the sport if they aren’t.

It hasn’t always been pretty so far, but they’re 7-0, atop the conference still, so it has been effective.

Also, check out this stat:

Stetson Bennett was arguably the best-protected quarterback in the country in 2022, facing pressure on just 18.8% of his total drop-backs, per PFF — the lowest rate among Power 5 quarterbacks. So far this year, Carson Beck has fared even better, facing pressure on 15.2% of his drop-backs, 2nd nationally only to Oregon’s Bo Nix (12.6%).

Yeah, the running game has struggled on occasion — although things look to be rounding into shape there — but the pass pro has been solid and that’s one reason Beck’s off to a good start in his first season at the helm.

It’s the end of the world as we know it.

I was relieved to wake up this morning to find that none of the readership here slit their wrists yesterday over the Bowers injury news.

And then I read Ken Sugiura’s (pre-mortem?) take on the Dawgs, wherein he writes off the rest of Bowers’ collegiate career and Georgia’s chances this season.

Recovery timelines are uncertain, but it’s possible that he has played his last for Georgia. For him to play again for the Bulldogs could require Georgia to make it back into the College Football Playoff – an accomplishment that will be difficult without him – and then for him to make the decision to play.

With so much at stake for Bowers’ professional prospects, maybe the appropriate course for Georgia is to help return him to health, wish him well and count itself incredibly fortunate that he came east to play for the Bulldogs. He has truly been a special player.

This is hugely damaging for Georgia’s chances to win a third national championship in a row, but immediate energy and thought can be best directed towards the young man who has been a model college athlete – a two-time first-team All-American, an academic All-American and someone who has been happy to let teammates enjoy the spotlight – and put his limbs and joints at risk for his team.

For all the disappointment that Georgia fans may be feeling about the impact that the injury will have for the remainder of the season, consider that Bowers’ own aspirations to complete his college career on his own terms and to contribute to a third national title may have been dashed.

Nice while it lasted, hunh?

Maybe it’s just me, but I have the feeling Kirby’s gonna use this situation to rally the troops around the flag.  You want some Georgia disrespect?   There will be plenty to go around, methinks.

My Week 7 2023 Mumme Poll ballot

  This week, I limited myself to the five teams that are undefeated and have net ypp numbers of 2.0+.  They are:

• Georgia (2.74)
• Michigan (2.52)
• Ohio State (2.94)
• Penn State (2.11)
• Washington (3.16)

And you?

Waving the white flag

Dabo, tell us your team is 4-2 and out of the race for the conference championship without saying your team is 4-2 and out of the race for the conference championship…

Dabo Swinney on the unrealistic expectations of fans for Clemson football…

"We're at a point where If you don’t go undefeated – you are losers, you’re terrible… and that is just such a terrible mindset. And honestly, maybe we need to lose a few games and lighten up the…

— Clemson247 (@Clemson247) October 17, 2023

Yeah, you never want to have too many fans on the bandwagon.  That would be bad.