Thoughts on Tray Matthews

There is a lot of talk on many of the boards that are concerned with the University of Georgia's football team. One topic that seems to be gathering a lot of steam is the recruitment of Tray Matthews. Board has been a bit quiet this week, thought I would throw this out.

There are several members on this board that have expressed their opinions on players commiting and then reversing their stance. Much of this in my opinion has been brought on by some of the so-called sports writers that are looking for all the traffic they can get. Called job security.

Give me this. All of us are strong willed and treasure our ties to the University of Georgia. Some snotty nosed beat writer that rode up recently and makes an effort to tell us how we should think, does not work from what I have read in the posts on this board.

Case example goes something like this on Tray Matthews, in my mind. Tray played the media game hard, thought he had a group of athletes that would follow him to UGA. What Tray missed was this . . . the folks that he was trying to lure to Athens are stong minded individuals and they had their own game plan.

I am one of those that thinks college football has it ups and downs. Don't mean to be ugly, but I am associated with a University that has allowed me to think that way.

If Tray Matthews comes to the University of Georgia, have said this before, those of you that live north of where I live will hear my loud approval. The other side of that coin goes something like this. If your decision is playing with friends . . . I encourage you to do that. My thinking there is that you are not putting my University down, you are simply more comfortable with your friends. Hell, I am guilty of that. I don't particularly look forward to certain shindigs that I attend, reason for that is usually I am not in a comfort zone that allows me to be the best I can be.

Most of you know, I tend to say what best describes the way I feel. Think it was thriller and Dawg With Style that came down the hardest on the subject of either be a part of UGA or hit the road jack. Agree with that. The Southeast is full of really good talent, guess several National Championships residing in the SEC prove just how good SEC teams are.

Stop with this. Tray Matthews, do what best fits you. From what I gather, your Mom and Dad are aligned with UGA. Your Mom and Dad will not be putting the cleats on. JCH went through the same battle that I think you are going through. Those in authority wanted JCH to attend either FSU or UF. Caused a bit of a stir, but JCH did the right thing. He went to the school that "HE" wanted to play for. Do the same, and understand that you can control what you do, not what others do.

Good luck to you and hope that you get a really good education. You seem to be a bit emotional, but you don't have a patent on that, many of us have traveled that route before you.

Go Dawgs . . .

Getting away from Tray Matthews, the presser by Mark Richt was interesting. Swear to you, brought back memories of watching Bobby Bowden in his hey day.

Richt has definitely changed his way of discussing football with the media this year, compared to previous years. What I gather from that is he KNOWS that he is very deep in talent and much is going to be expected this season. This group of athletes give Mark Richt as good a chance at glory as any team he has had. Few things are still being tweaked, but the overall performance of this group seems to back up some of the ratings in the different polls. Rated anywhere from fifth to ninth. That to me is pretty lofty when I look around at the talented teams in the nation.

One part of the press conference that caught my attention was Richt mentioning overall records of 8-4, 9-3. Anyone that has watched Mark Richt over the years knows that he usually avoids numbers when discussing UGA football. Interesting.

Many of the stats can be thrown out of the window. These guys have been bumping heads for a couple of weeks and it appears to me that they are ready to get after a team that wears different colors. These guys pick up on tendencies in pre-season so it is not a true mark of where either the offense or defense stands. We will know a lot more when we travel to Missouri and play the night game. Most encouraging thought in my mind at this point is Jarvis Jones saying earlier that he loves playing at night. When this guy is happy, someone is in for a long night. Franklin, you have not played against the kind of speed that you are going to see this particular night.

Quote from AM . . .
“I didn’t really have two hands on the ball in the pocket. The guy swiped it away from me, and I’ve gotta be more careful,” said Murray, who has had a couple of costly fumbles in his two years as a starter, most notably during last year’s South Carolina game. “There’s big bodies are flying around, and I’ve gotta have two hands on the ball to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

The frustration that I see with Richt comes from the fact that his quarterbacks are putting the ball on the ground. He was not happy with that. AM, know that this was the last scrimmage, but let us not fall back into old habits. Maybe Mike Bobo needs to speak with his quarterbacks, that seems to be his area of expertise, and it was the one area that Mark Richt was po'd about the most.

Below link has Mark Richt's press conference, see what you think about what he has to say.


www.georgiadogs.com/allaccess/

I think he's telling his team that (with this schedule in particular), 8-4 or 9-3 won't get it. The only reason he couldn't say 10-2 is that for most people, that's a good record. But in this case, he's trying to keep down any excitement with EVERY SINGLE RB averaging over 6 yards per touch, some of whom were running against the number 1 defense. I think that has him concerned/angry - me too.

Just reading between the lines I believe CMR is trying to avoid the "BIGHEAD" syndrome that some could get, and at the same time trying to light a fire under others. I'd be concerned that backs were getting good runs against the first team D, and real concerned that the QB's are putting the ball on the ground,but, these are things that need to be ironed out in practice and not in the games. Coach em up! GO DAWGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think CMR is just talking about worst case here. We open in 2 weeks against an inferior team and that should be enough for the D to get the kinks out. The O side of the ball make take a little longer to get into the flow and I do have a concern about our QB's not holding on to the ball. Was a huge cost to us last year.

Murray must hold on to the ball and not force anything into coverage like he did last year. It is his year and he needs to up his game MENTALLY, he is the key to the O.

The D will be fine, just look at some of the stats from yesterdays scrimmage. Few young guys stepping up and showing that they are not just a flash in the pan.

Bottom line is this, Murray is a must and Bobo needs to prove that he is indeed a big time OC and is open to change. With the talent we have there is very little room for any excuses as to why this team cannot win and compete with Alabama and LSU for the SEC title and NC.

Started a couple of times to post the link below. Pulled back as I sometimes do, don't want to step out too far without cause. Again, not trying to start a "stink" . . . trying to get a foothold on where we and our competition are at. I spend a lot of my computer time looking at what other universities are doing and how they are going about getting to where they want to be.

Personally, never have thought Charlie Weis was all that. His time at UF pretty much proved that he was bringing nothing new to the party. Little wonder that Jeremy Foley touched this particular part of Muschamp's selection process. Charlie is gone and Charlie was hand picked by Muschamp. Grades out to an "F" for Muschamp. Charlie knew that Foley would not allow him to continue, especially with all of the talent that was on campus. Don't wish Charlie any bad luck, but sometimes ones head gets too large and it is not caused because of gray matter, more like "ego".

ogredawg said:
Bottom line is this, Murray is a must and Bobo needs to prove that he is indeed a big time OC and is open to change. With the talent we have there is very little room for any excuses as to why this team cannot win and compete with Alabama and LSU for the SEC title and NC.

Foley knew what he had to do and did it. ogredawg totally agree with your assessment in the above bold paragraph . . . "open to change". That has been the single loudest outcry that I have read about our offensive play calling in the past "several" years. Maybe with all of the talent that appears to be on that side of the ball, we see some of what is discussed in the article below.

We made a huge change on defense and Todd Grantham's results speak for themselves. Not really worried about our defense being scored on in practice. Motors will be running at higher RPM's come game days.


www.alligator.org/sports/football/articl...74-001a4bcf887a.html