Mired in Mediocrity

It's difficult for this dawg fan to wake up the day after a defeat such as was handed to us yesterday by Oklahoma State. Even more difficult to accept what lies ahead for the season.

Let's face it, we won't sniff an SEC East championship, let alone a National Championship, game. But why?
We have talent, don't we? How many of those kids dressed in the Red and Black could have played virtually anywhere? Maybe the Ol' Ball Coach was right. He once famously quipped \"We recruit great players, they [Georgia] recruit great players, but something happens to them up in Athens.\"
Then again, OBC has been right about Georgia all along. How else can one explain the dominance Florida has enjoyed over us, even when fielding supposedly inferior teams? How else can one explain how South Carolina is able to play us close and even beat us every single year. How else can one explain the performance of a team of supposedly talented kids in Stillwater last night?
Georgia has all the ingredients for greatness except one: fire. For that the blame falls squarely on Mark Richt's shoulders. To be sure, Mark lifted us from the abyss of the Donnan years, only to mire us in the mediocrity of his own tenure.
Two SEC championships, you say? Meaningless, unless they are a gateway to the greatness that is the national championship.
10 win seasons? Ditto.
When CMR elevates his need for fair play over that of greatness, he exposes his most glaring weakness, namely the lack of fire needed to take the Dawgs into the top echelon of college football.
Mark won't fire Willie Martinez because of their friendship, even though the most outstanding example of friendship might be to allow Willie to chase his own success elsewhere. He certainly does not have it here.
Joe Cox will play several more games for the Dawgs, even though the better player--and our near future, is waiting in the wings. It's just not in CMR's character to not reward JC's loyalty, even if it means the detriment of our season and future.
Coach, play Logan Gray. I'd rather have a poor season teaching him the ropes than suffer one more next year when he's learning then.
As much as I love what CMR has done for us, I can't help but cringe at what's ahead. Do you think for a second that Mike Bobo or CMR himself ripped Richard Samuel for going down like a cheap whore in a dockside inn? Will any player suffer gassers for that performance yesterday?
Doubtful.
It's not in the spirit of forgive and forget. It would mean bringing heat, fire into the equation and that is just not in the character of this team.
I hope they cut the grass short in Sanford Stadium this week. I'd hate for Richard Samuel to go down after an errant blade of grass brushes against his shoe. It doesn't look like Joe Cox is up to the challenge of lifting the dawgs.
And where does that leave this Dawg fan?
Still wearing the red and black, for sure? But sighing in the face of another mediocre season.
At least on this team, everybody gets to play.

well put. was thinking about the same thing last night - what season did CMR have us playing (arguably) our best football? The year he shed the \"nice guy\" image for half a season - think black out against auburn, the end zone celebration against the gators, bullying hawaii, etc. It showed what we are capable of if, led by our head coach, we get some nastiness and fire in the belly.

I agree with both of you and feel the same Limey. I'm sick and tired of every year knowing that we will be handled like rag dolls in jacksonville which is definite this year. Is anyone else sick of this??? I'm still so irritated at yesterdays results I don't know what to say. I feel like we might get 7 wins.

Limey,

Well said. Sitting here enjoying a morning ice tea reading the blogs and pretty fed up myself. I am tired tired tired of the same old routine.

BUT: Spurrier has no room to talk about something \"happening\" to players in their respective teams hometowns. Spurrier has yet to produce anything worthwhile at South Carolina. Beyond that, very few of his players he coached at FL or SC have done a thing noteworthy in th NFL. He has produced mediocre players out of FL into the pro ranks for as long as he's been a coach. I think the question should be asked of him why he can't produce players with the talent he recruits after four seasons under his tutledge that can't raise so much as an eyebrow at the pro level. It's obvious what is \"happening\" to his players and that is this: Spurrier's nonsensical stupid playbook that is full of tricks and garbage plays works at the college level but not the pro level and he indoctrinates his players into this crap and they bust in the NFL; his players prove this. Ridell Anthony, Jacquez Green, Rex Grossman, et al. I could go on and on. Does anyone ever ask him of this? No. He does not and never will produce players of NFL caliber on a whole because his style of football will never work at the pro level and he proved it. He may have one that slips through the cracks that is a shining star but his track record proves what I'm saying above.

Back to Georgia...

Well said about the fire & intensity. CMR was already apologizing after the Florida game in 2007 for the endzone dance, the stomp on the Vandy star, etc. The most we get out of him is a fist pump or a demonstration to the refs on a blown call. Richt is paralleling Dungy's career in Tampa Bay as the Bucs head coach to a T. It seems like he can get them close, but not close enough and he's content with that. I'm not. I want to have a rebirth of the Vince Dooley days where the #1 priority is a National Championship and the #2 priority is beating Florida. CMR doesn't have that agenda it seems. If he did, after 10 seasons you'd think he'd be fired up and pissed off at what he's seeing go on through his decade at the helm. But unfortunately, it appears he's going to die in battle with his soldiers since he won't make the obvious staff changes.

I give him this season of this same style of football before his seat starts getting scalding hot. I'm not on the fire CMR bandwagon yet, but if I don't see any of the absolutely pathetically obvious changes that need to be made actually happen, then CMR is showing his agenda for Georgia football and he needs to go. I don't want to hear about how great the recruiting was and what kind of good guy CMR is. Yes, he IS a great guy no question about it. But this \"nice guy\" image is exactly why nice guys usually finish last with the ladies. Same thing in football.

Remember the Dooley Shuffle? Now, he had fire and determination.

Yep, LimeyDawg that is what this team needs.

Alabama showed what determination could do for a team. Georgia showed no fire and no determination.

A very disappointing game. These kids are good, but a ho-hum attitude aint going to cut it.

UGAUSFEngDawg wrote:

I want to have a rebirth of the Vince Dooley days where the #1 priority is a National Championship and the #2 priority is beating Florida.

Actually, CMR is following the Vince Dooley (and Georgia coaching model) to a T. He won two SEC Championships in his first five years, just like Vince did. Vince didn't win another SEC Championship for eight years after 1968. It took him 16 years and the greatest player in the history of college football to win himself a national title, and then he couldn't follow it up while fielding the best team in the nation for the next two years.

It is HARD to win the SEC and HARDER to win the National Championship. Hell, at this point I'd say it's harder to win the SEC than the national title. Give Richt credit; we're doing many things Dooley couldn't and didn't:

1) Winning bowl games. Dooley was notoriously bad in January. Richt has only lost two bowl games in nine years.

2) Beating Auburn. It's amazing how many SEC titles Vince lost because he couldn't beat Auburn. Off the top of my head I give you 1971, 1975, 1978, 1979 and 1983. He beats Auburn -- he wins ONE GAME in those years -- and he's looking at 11 SEC titles instead of 6. Say what you want about Richt, but he beats Auburn.

3) 10 win seasons. Even with all of Vince's wins he couldn't boast Richt's consistency. Vince Dooley had 201 wins in 25 seasons. In just nine years, Richt is halfway there.

I'm not saying any of this to denigrate Vince Dooley. I'm just saying that Vince had talent that was, by these definitions, \"squandered\" on no-championship teams just like the ones you accuse Richt of having. 2003, 2004, 2007 all should have been SEC Championship years, right? But that's the nature of the conference. It's a tough bear.

That said, there's no excuse for the way we played against Oklahoma State. But that one game is also not a referendum on Coach Richt. If it were, Vince Dooley would not have made it out of the 1969 or 1970 seasons with his job.