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Author Archives: dudeyoucrazy
On Hating, Or at Least Losing Confidence In, Kirby Smart: A Story About Investing
First things first, the Kirby Smart Hater, isn't writing this. It's dude. With that out of the way, I want to talk about Kirby Smart and specifically address his haters, of which there are many—all of whom must be tired of winning [Trump voice].
Bowl season has become, at least it seems this way now, some sort of purgatory. The final destination of this Georgia team is unknown but most Bulldog fans are sitting around debating the works of this team and essentially damning the squad to hell or saying, "You know what, they did enough." And it's impossible to have such conversations without also making a shockingly final judgment on Kirby Smart, a 44-year old man who has not yet completed his fourth season as a head football coach.
I've had dozens of these conversations over the past three weeks, and here's what I've noticed. Very few Georgia fans seem resolute in their conviction that Smart is the coach who can take Georgia back to the pinnacle of college football for the first time since 1980. Quite a few are willing to live in the gray area of "wait-and-see" in reserving judgment on Smart. And a slew seems to already know that he is NOT the man who can get it done at Georgia.
I want to address that last group of Bulldog fans, because, well, they're wrong. They don't know they're wrong and no one knowingly believes something that is wrong, and someday they could be proven right, but right now they're wrong. I know this because I deal with people like this every single day and in the real world I just ignore them. In the real world, it's not worth wasting time on this type of people because I have real world stuff to do. But this is the internet, so I'm going to address the Kirby Smart Haters.
Most people don't know this, but in the previously-referenced "real world," I'm a money manager. I don't push life insurance policies or sell annuities. I don't sell mutual funds for a commission and I'm not a stock broker. I, along with a handful of much smarter analysts at our little shop, pick investments for clients. People hire my company to pick investments that will out-perform expectations. Those expectations can vary – maybe it's beating the S&P 500, maybe it's generating a certain amount of income, maybe it's as simple as growing the total portfolio value – but that's the gig. People pay us money to do it, and it's our job to figure out what strategy most consistently gives us the opportunity to achieve these varying objectives.
This is a challenging vocation as the goalposts are not only constantly moving, but they are also starting from different places for each client and they're abundantly transparent. You know when you miss, and you're expected to make it. All of this is complicated by the fact that every client has a different profile—some are young, some are old; some have hundreds of millions of dollars; some have a few thousand bucks; some want to fund major purchases, some want to minimize taxes…you get it. Our job is the same for every client and yet it's different for every client. In order for our company to succeed, we have to be keenly aware of our clients' needs but also of who we are, what we do well and how we fit into the broader financial puzzle. This means having the utmost confidence in our processes and a healthy amount of self-doubt in our application of said processes. It means firmly believing in what we're doing, while also second-guessing and over-analyzing everything we've already done.
I think being a fan is kind of the same. I'm choosing to fully believe in Kirby Smart's ability to reach new highs while also reviewing what he's done with a decent amount of scrutiny. Others, it seems to me, are ready to rely solely on nit-picking.
A core tenet of our investment philosophy, which bleeds through into every conversation, every statement and every communication with clients, is that we care much more about analyzing individual investment opportunities (for instance: a single publicly-traded company) than we care about making a macro call (i.e. the stock market will be up/down X% this year). We don't ignore economic trends or broad data sets. But we know that we can't act in the ways we want to act by making assumptions that impact the entirety of client portfolios in one fell swoop—especially if we could be wrong. To be clear: we're wrong a lot; I'm not here to imply otherwise. But we'd rather be wrong about 2-3% of a client's equity portfolio than 100% of whole damn thing.
But in our industry, you don't make a name for yourself by getting a lot of little things right (which we also do). You don't make a name for hitting singles. If you want to make a name for yourself, you "call the market." And no one really gets famous for boldly predicting that stocks will go up, because that's just kind of what they do (through last year, the trailing 25-year annualized rate of return for the S&P 500 was over 9%…that's an average annual number and that is historically low…as in the lowest trailing 25-year average number in decades). Stocks go up. That's the expectation. That's why people invest. That's why I have a job. Similarly, no one is going to stand out in a crowd by saying, "You know what, I really think Georgia can win 10 games a year under Kirby Smart." That doesn't move the needle. That's what Georgia has historically done.
But if you want to make a name for yourself in my industry, you call when stocks are going down. If you nail that, you're a hero. You're also usually just as lucky as you are right. Right now, a lot of people are calling for the downfall of Kirby Smart. They want to be the hipsters—the folks who wanted him fired before anyone else. They want to be the market callers who "knew this was coming." The problem with that is you lose a lot if you're too early and in this case being too early is really no different than being wrong.
There are a lot of big-name investors who are currently saying that the stock market is doomed. They could be right. It is, as they consistently insist, at an all-time high. But all-time highs are not in and of themselves a case for a market crash. If the market crashed every time a new market high was hit, the markets would not trend upwards and stocks would just keep bumping their heads on the same ceiling year after year. What's more, many of these market bears have been saying the market is going to crash for years and in doing so they have cost their clients millions and millions (and billions in some cases) of dollars in potential gains, because the market has not crashed. When the market does in fact come down, these guys are going to declare victory, but they've actually already lost. Their clients could lose less money during that pullback than other firms', but the amount of money left on the table over the past five years is greater than that reduced loss.
Those guys have already lost. And the current haters of Kirby Smart are also already losing. He may not bring Georgia a national championship. He may get fired. He may leave the program in a worse position than what he inherited. But at this juncture, there's no evidence to suggest that any of those things are true, and shockingly some people are already saying that. Even more are saying that he "can't" win a it all at Georgia because he has not done so yet. That's like saying, "The market is going to crash because it hasn't done that in a while."
Now, unlike investors following a bad lead, the Smart-Hating Georgia fans probably aren't running the risk of losing assets by being wrong, but they could lose capital in the form of enjoyment. I'll be the first to admit Georgia games haven't been that fun to watch this year (see Tweet above from the SEC Championship Game), but imagine if at some point (let's arbitrarily say, in 2022), Georgia hoists a National Championship trophy, and you aren't even watching because you know now (in 2019) that Kirby isn't right the guy. That would hurt. Or, let's say that Georgia puts together another slug-fest of a season sometime soon but doesn't slip up against a South Carolina and burps through the SEC Championship in a bruiser of a game because it finally gets to play a single quarterback that is not a generational talent. Are you going to complain about how unenjoyable 14-0 has been and thow un-deserving the Dawgs are of the #1 seed in the Playoff?
I'm not saying these things are inevitabilities, for what it's worth. I'm not saying that Kirby Smart is the right guy. I'm just saying that we don't know he isn't.
One of the more positive elements of Smart's brief (and it's still brief) tenure at Georgia is that there is evolution and progress under his leadership. I vehemently disagree with any notion that the Bulldogs are consistently plagued by the same types of problems without solutions (or at a minimum, ongoing efforts) to fix them. AS a function of breadth, some problems (for instance, the entire offense) take longer to fix. But this is not a broken record replaying itself in my opinion. It's hard to quantify this without looking at specific shortcomings, so let's start with some losses.
2016 Losses
In November of 2015 (right after Richt was fired), I noted that Georgia was going to be an 8-4 team at best in 2016 regardless of who coached the Bulldogs. The rationale for this claim was based on personnel issues (unproven QB, offensive line departures, loss of best WR, loss of six members of front-seven on defense) and a tough schedule.
Georgia finished the season 8-5. I'm not writing off any of those losses as if they didn't happen, but I don't think anything happened in that campaign that really negated goodwill towards Kirby. Especially not after 2017.
[Quick conclusion on life since 2015 for Georgia fans: It should be noted (or SCREAMED), that 2015 was the last time Georgia lost more than one regular-season game in a season. Know how many SEC teams have lost more than one regular season game at some point in the past three seasons? ALL OF THEM! Among all Power 5 conference, only four teams have gone each of the past three seasons without losing multiple regular-season games: Clemson, Ohio State, Oklahoma and Georgia.]
2017 Losses
Auburn: Georgia's first loss of the 2017 season didn't come until mid-November when #10 Auburn buried Georgia 40-17. Anomalous to the rest of the season, Georgia was manhandled on both sides of the ball in that contest, and the Dawgs obviously got revenge a few weeks later. Much is made of the fact that Kerryon Johnson wasn't healthy in the SEC Championship Game and as a byproduct his production dropped from 167 yards on the ground in the first match-up to just 44 in December. The more telling number, defensively, is that Georgia reduced Auburn's total offensive output by nearly 230 yards. Further, the adjustments Georgia made on the offensive line are underrated. A backfield of Nick Chubb, Sony Michel and D'Andre Swift rushed for just 46 yards on 32 carries in the first meeting. A few weeks later, the Bulldogs ran for 238 yards. The problem in the first Auburn game were not recurring — not even against Auburn.
Alabama: Georgia's final loss came at the hands of (at the time) the unlikeliest of comebacks in the National Championship Game as Tua Tagovailoa put a dagger into the hearts of the Bulldogs national title dreams. Say what you want about Tua Magic, but Georgia didn't lose to him again.
2018 Losses
LSU: Much like the Auburn loss in 2017, the loss to LSU in 2018 was not a byproduct of recurring problems for Georgia. The Bulldog offense was quite potent in 2018 (doesn't that feel like a million years ago?) and at that point in the season was averaging nearly 43 points per contest. The Dawgs came out completely flat offensively—not scoring until 36 minutes into the contest. Georgia scored within the first eight minutes of every other regular season game and would not have gone 11-1 in the regular season with first half drive sequences like this: Punt, Fumble, Punt, Punt, Punt, Punt.
Alabama: Take what I said about Tua Magic and reverse it. Tua did not beat Georgia again. With that narrative off the table, it's easy to say that offensively, Georgia let off the gas too much again (if that was in fact the problem in the National Championship bout), but think a little bit about it:
- Georgia led 21-14 at the half. Georgia's first touchdown of the second-half was a 23 yard pass to Riley Ridley after the Dawgs racked up 28 yards on two carries. Was Georgia letting off the gas then? I think not.
- Leading 28-14, Georgia's very next drive featured 62 yards worth of passes and an incomplete pass attempt on 3rd & 3 that set up what would ultimately be a missed field goal. Foot was still on the gas.
- Georgia's next drive was a boring 3-and out (three runs in which Georgia racked up just nine yards), but the following drive saw Fromm scramble twice (not designed runs), complete a downfield pass for a first down and another attempt was broken up. The Dawgs punted. Maybe the foot was off the gas, or maybe Georgia just changed the pace in an inopportune way.
- Georgia's next drive also resulted in a punt. But this drive opened with a 7-yard completion followed by a 12-yard run by wide receiver Jayson Stanley. On first down, a Fromm pass was broken up. On second down, Georgia threw for a gain of six. On third down a pass fell incomplete. It's easy to say Georgia was letting off the gas, but I don't usually equate that verbiage with a five-play drive featuring four passes and an end-around.
- The Bulldogs' penultimate drive saw a first down gained on a 26-yard completion followed by a short run and two incompletions before the infamous Justin Fields fake punt. The drive stalled out, but Georgia wasn't in cruise control
- Georgia only threw the ball on its final drive, save for a two-yard sack.
The reality is Georgia was beaten by an incomparable one-two punch of quarterbacks but in reverse order. As I said last December:
If Alabama only has Jalen Hurts or Tua Tagovailoa, Georgia is either 1-1 against the Tide or (more likely) 2-0 over the past 12 months. I truly believe that. The Bulldogs beat Hurts in January when they prepared for him but couldn't fend off Tua in the second half. Tua was obliterated by Georgia on Saturday (when Mel Tucker and his staff brilliantly prepared), but Hurts found ways to beat Georgia. Never before has college football had a team as generally talented as Alabama and that almost didn't matter against the Bulldogs. Unfortunately, never before has a college football team boasted two such supremely talented quarterbacks with such differentiated skills. The uniqueness of this situation can't be overstated.
Texas: Georgia was un-focused, un-disciplined, under-coached, under-staffed and generally unready. There is no excuse tied hereto, but Georgia lacked the motivation it needed to win without key defensive players out. That was not a recurring problem for the 2018 Georgia Bulldogs.
2019 Losses
South Carolina: If you think this game is typical of the Bulldogs under Kirby Smart, you're insane. But if you want one stat that drives that home, consider this: Georgia is tied for 63rd nationally in turnover margin at 0. Meaning, Georgia has lost 13 turnovers and forced 13 turnovers. If you remove this game, Georgia moves to 38th. So one out of Georgia's 13 games played could move the Dawgs 25 places in the national rankings on a statistic that measures two different stats (turnovers lost and turnovers gained). That's an outlier. It's atypical.
LSU: LSU was the better team. I'm not sure how one could make a different case before, during or after the contest. But Georgia tried to open up the game more offensively than it had in prior contests and the defense actually acquitted itself better than it gets credit for. As great as Joe Burrow was (he is the best college quarterback I've seen play in-person), this was his 10th best performance of the season as measured by passer rating. Georgia was one of only three teams to hold Burrow to under 10 yards per pass attempt and only three teams forced a lower completion percentage. The point is this: The Georgia offense tried some things that it hadn't tried before and the defense didn't roll over. Georgia wasn't better than LSU. Sometimes that happens.
On the Direction of the Program
I think it's important to remember, what I mentioned earlier: Georgia is in elite company in terms of single-loss regular seasons over the past three years. Uncoincidentally, Georgia is in the same company among teams who have played in three-consecutive Power 5 Conference Championship Games. That list is Clemson, Ohio State, Oklahoma and Georgia. That's not all that bad seeing as Georgia plays in the strongest conference in football (as measured by everything) and the third-best division per Bill Connelly, the brightest college football mind around (present company excluded).
Georgia finished third in the final College Football Playoff ranking in 2017 before advancing to the final. Georgia was ranked fourth in the next-to-last ranking a year later before falling to fifth on the heels of a one-score loss to Alabama. From a ranking perspective, the exact same thing happened to the Bulldogs in 2019. For further context, Georgia is one of just eight teams to be ranked in the final College Football Playoff Poll in each of the past three seasons. Under previous coaching regimes, that may have been touted as a victory, and it probably shouldn't have been. After all, Georgia should be a Top 8 program based on funding, in-state talent and reputation. But note where Georgia has been situated within such polls over the past three seasons relative to those elite peers:
|Ohio State
|Penn State
|Notre Dame
If you believe the College Football Playoff Poll to a be a proxy for "contending" for a National Championship (and you really, really should seeing as the National Championship is the result of a four-team playoff consisting of the top four seeds from this very poll), then only two teams have more consistently been in the hunt for a national championship than Georgia over the past three years: Clemson and Oklahoma. Further, if you know what we know about the Playoff it shouldn't be appalling that Georgia has been this close to winning it all but has not actually won it all. After all, we are now entering the sixth year of the playoff, and only 11 different programs (Alabama, Oregon, Florida State, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan State, Oklahoma, Washington, Georgia, Notre Dame and now LSU) have been represented by the 24 total Playoff slots. Further, only five teams have ever won a College Football Playoff game. Oh, and Georgia is one of them – along with Oregon, Ohio State, Clemson and Alabama.
I guess I'm just confused as to what part of this implies that Georgia is trending in the wrong direction. To be sure, 2019 was not a repeat of 2017. But there's not evidence that 2017 was a flash in a pan, either. Talk to Wisconsin, which fell from 6th in the final poll in 2017 to unranked in 2018, about how Georgia's inconsistent product sucks. Talk to Southern Cal, which was ranked 8th in 2017 before going unranked last year and settling at 22nd this year, about how your coach can't right the ship. Talk to Notre Dame, who snuck into the playoff as a 3-seed in 2018 but is 0-2 against the Bulldogs over this time period, about how Georgia can't get out of its own way.
The Outlook
Who knows what's going to happen in the Sugar Bowl next week, but the one thing that's likely is an overreaction from fans. A convincing beat-down of Baylor shows that last year's problems in the bowl game (remember: un-focused, un-disciplined, under-coached, under-staffed and generally unready) may be fixed from a cultural standpoint, but that doesn't mean this team is better than we thought. Another loss in the Sugar Bowl probably means "more of the same" in defeat for arguably the first time in Smart's career…but it would be coming in one of the least meaningful games of his career.
I'm not going to hypothesize on personnel in terms of early NFL departures, because I don't know anything that you don't. Hell, I might know less. But I do think people want to talk about the offense and changes that could be coming, so we should do that.
The most disturbing trend on the offense has certainly been the passing game, but I'm not sure who should get the lion's share of the blame: The coaches (Smart and James Coley), the receivers (or lack thereof) or Jake Fromm.
Fromm is downright puzzling and without giving him a free pass, it's shocking (and almost inexplicable) to see someone with his skill-set and experience regress so much not only in completion percentage (down more than 7% from a year ago and a career-low as a third-year starter) but also in yards per completion (down nearly 1.7 yards per completion versus the total for his prior two seasons). In other words, he's completing fewer passes than before and when they are complete they're not going for much. It's hard to believe, at least at surface level, that he's just taken that much of a step back. It's even harder to reconcile that slide in production being a byproduct of his own shortcomings with the fact that very recent NFL Draft reports have Fromm as a very hot prospect. Scouts Inc. has Fromm rated as a the #4 QB in the Draft (assuming he comes out this year) and the #27 overall prospect. ESPN's Todd McShay has Fromm as the #4 QB in the Draft and Mel Kiper has him #5…this is in an article that was published LAST WEEK. If Fromm is to shoulder the blame, NFL experts haven't picked up on it.
So maybe the problem is schematic and starts with Coley and the coaching staff? Kirby Smart made it very clear that the offense would be evaluated after the bowl game. I don't know why we wouldn't believe that. Assuredly, part of that evaluation will focus on player-level personnel, the potential departure Fromm and Swift in particular. But I don't think a change in play-calling is out of the question—even though it hasn't happened yet. With the regular season (including the SEC Championship Game) winding down so close to the Early Signing Period, an immediate overhaul at the top of the offensive staff (starting with James Coley) never seemed likely for a team in the position Georgia was in on the field (one game away and one spot away from the Playoff) and on the recruiting trail (another Top 5 class…more on that in a moment). It seems more plausible that a change would come 1. After the bulk of a recruiting class is "in" (Georgia has received signed letters of intent from 17 of its 19 current pledges) and 2. When there is more time to re-recruit existing commits (Georgia will have 35 days between the Sugar Bowl and National Signing Day, as opposed to 11 days between the SEC Championship Game and the Early Signing Period).
Point being: If Coley is to blame for the offensive shortcomings, I still think he could be replaced, reduced or otherwise mitigated. I think Smart is committed to making hard choices and forcing change. If such change is necessary, I think he'll make those changes and if there's a "right" time to do it after the 2019 season, I think it will be in early January (as opposed to a few weeks ago).
Some of my confidence in that stems from Smart's ability to recognize issues and address them. Whether it's re-emphasizing physicality in the second match-up with Auburn in 2017, adjusting to Baker Mayfield mid-game in the Rose Bowl, scheming to beat Tua in 2018 (remember: he was the Heisman front-runner until he went 10 of 25 for 164 yards, 1 TD and 2 picks while getting sacked three times in the SEC Championship Game) or finding a way to rebuild the defensive coaching staff and actually improve without a star in 2019…Smart has found ways to fix things. I don't think he gets enough credit for winning 35 (possibly 36) games in a three year period in which the following occurred:
- His defensive line coach and a top recruiter (Tracy Rocker) left after the 2016 season.
- His returning starting QB went down with an injury in Week 1 in 2017.
- The Butkus Award winner (Roquan Smith) went pro early after 2017.
- He had to replace the second- and third-leading rushers in program history after 2017.
- The Thorpe Award winner (Deandre Baker) went pro early after 2018.
- Both the Coordinators (Mel Tucker and Jim Chaney) left after 2018.
- Pretty much all the receivers and tight ends left after 2018.
Oh, and all of this happened really quickly after a total overhaul of the coaching staff that included:
He's worked through more than he probably gets credit for, but some would still say that his biggest failure thus far as a head coach was his inability to "fix" Georgia's offense in 2019. I'd argue that a fix may be coming. I'd also remind you that Georgia went 11-1 in the regular season and out-scored opponents by 270 combined points in those 12 contests. If you believe there are three phases to the game, it's hard to hate out-scoring opponents by an average of 22.5 points. Toss the LSU loss in, and Georgia's still out-scoring opponents by over 20 points per game. It's hard to say a great Georgia defense was "wasted" on a bad Georgia offense when the Dawgs gave up more points to South Carolina than renowned defenses from Missouri, Texas A&M and App State. And Georgia's largest defeat came in a contest in which 37 points were allowed.
As a broader trend, Georgia is 17-1 against the SEC East over the past three seasons and has out-scored its divisional foes by 408 points. That doesn't happen with a recurringly non-existent offense.
And yet the offense struggled in ways that were new to Georgia in 2019 but not terribly new nationally. The Athletic's Seth Emerson wrote an interesting piece about wide receiver attrition referencing research by the aforementioned Bill Connelly. The theme: if you lose a lot of production in the form of receiving yards, your offense is going to struggle.
Georgia lost a ton of receiving yardage production from a year ago – 76% to be exact. I didn't know this trend, even as an avid reader of Connelly's work (formerly with SBNation and now with ESPN). Maybe someone else did. And maybe Georgia should do something about the receiver position. But maybe someone already was/is doing something about it and there's just not a "Wide Receivers On" switch at the Indoor Practice Facility. After all:
- Lawrence Cager was unarguably the most important cog in Georgia's passing game in 2019. When he was lost to injury, the offense stalled. He was snagged from the Transfer Portal last spring. At the same time, Georgia signed two of the nation's Top 5 receivers (George Pickens and Dominick Blaylock). Pickens hit his stride late-season as told by his maddening statline over the past two games—two games (Georgia Tech and LSU) for which he was suspended for the first two quarters: 5 catches, 95 yards, 2 touchdowns. He leads all Georgia players in receptions, yards and TDs. Blaylock ranks fifth, fourth and third in those categories respectively.
- Georgia has received three signed Letters of Intent from Top 15 Wide Receivers for the class of 2020: Marcus Rosemy (#7 WR in the class), Jermaine Burton (#8) and Arian Smith (#14). Further, the Dawgs are very much in the mix and the favorite according to most pundits to land Darnell Washington, a massive tight end and #10 overall player in the country.
Obviously, none of these guys fix the issues of 2019. But if you believe in the attrition theory as posited by Bill Connelly, re-told by Emerson and recapped by me, then you have to at least recognize that Georgia is aggressively turning the page via recruiting.
Given that, Georgia could have arguably its most talented core of receivers ever (as measured by recruiting class rankings) in 2020 (all the guys mentioned above plus Demetris Robertson, the #1 WR in the class of 2016). And the Bulldogs should return 55% of its receiving yardage production and 63% of its touchdowns (and that's assuming Swift goes pro, which I would bet he does). And if you don't think maturity and tweaks in the coaching staff can lead to more production from young receivers, then explain to me why Ja'Marr Chase (the no. 15 WR in the class of 2018) went from 313 yards receiving as a freshman to 1,498 this year.
My assertion is that Smart is working on personnel shortcomings on the field and still has an out to make adjustments on the sideline.
Philosophically, there's a widespread theory out there that Smart's commitment to "Man Ball" and a run-heavy offense has ruined the team. If true, it doesn't matter who's calling plays as the buck will stop with Smart. Again, it's hard to call this team "ruined," but I will yield to the presiding complaint nonetheless. I don't know where that logic comes from. Georgia might not be throwing the kind of passes people want to see, but in the three "good" years under Smart, Georgia has increased its pass attempts annually by nearly five attempts per game:
- 2017: 20.3 attempts per game
- 2017: 25.5 attempts per game
- 2018: 29.6 attempts per game
And none of that is a reflection of variation in play count. Over this three-year period Georgia averaged a low of 65.2 offensive plays per game and a high of 66.5. What does this mean? Well, in simple terms Georgia threw the ball on 31.1% of its plays in 2017 (a year in which the offense was celebrated and beloved by all) and threw the ball 44.5% of the time in 2019 (and everyone hated it). Again, the efficacy of the passing game can be debated, but the notion that Georgia is not throwing the ball enough to win is a bit odd to me and the notion that this is a recreation of 2008 Alabama (a team that literally ran the ball 63% of the time) is silly. Georgia isn't running 2019 LSU's offense. But Georgia isn't running 2008 Alabama's offense either.
For context, if Fromm stays for his senior year and matches the production he's had over the past three years, he'd likely rank:
- Ninth in SEC History in Pass Attempts
- Ninth in SEC History in Pass Completions
- Seventh in SEC History in Passing Yards
- Third in SEC History in Passing Touchdowns
He'd be surrounded by a bunch of Man-Ball quarterbacks like Danny Wuerffel, Eli Manning, David Greene, Aaron Murray and Peyton Manning.
Kirby Smart: Buy, Sell, Hold
Look, you can sell all the Kirby Smart stock you want. I don't care. Georgia is at an all-time high based on the trailing three-year win totals as shown above. I choose not to sell, because I think fandom, much like investing, is about wanting and expecting more. Of course we want more, but we also expect more now as Georgia fans. And I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
If you're dissatisfied with the 2019 season and think Georgia football has plateaued and are therefore butt-hurt and ready to complain about losing Justin Fields for the next decade and you're one year away from wanting to start a coaching search…please sit back and remember that you're bitching about a team that has finished in the Top 5 in the only poll that matters each of the past three seasons. You're whining about playing in a second-straight Sugar Bowl because your team had to play in an extra game (the SEC Championship) against a good team and for the second-year in a row and it lost to a better team and therefore missed the playoff…oh and the reason they had to play that extra game was because your team dominated its division. You are upset about a team that is continuing to recruit at an unparalleled level (at least at this institution) and you may be saying that the talent isn't translating into on-field success but that's patently false as evidenced by the win chart above.
Think about it: A win over Baylor will make this year's senior class the winningest group of seniors in Georgia football history. That is absolutely staggering considering they began their careers with a first-year head coach who was replacing the most-tenured coach in the SEC.
You can sell the stock because the stock is trading at a higher price than it used to. Go ahead. Or, you can look at the underlying fundamentals, the value being created within the organization, the ability to still adapt the management structure, the desire to raise expectations not lower them, the ability to deliver consistent success without solely relying on a single product (player); and you can say, "You know what, this thing could go higher."
That's what I'm doing.
You could sell Kirby's stock and eventually if he's fired I'm sure you'll e-mail me (if e-mail is still a thing) and tell me you were right. But you might miss out on some new highs over the next few years. And we all know what one of those highs could be.
That's all I got/
Is Georgia the Best Team in the Country? A Theory Explored
In the wake of Georgia's 23-17 victory over Notre Dame, two narratives emerged.
The first gets us essentially nowhere. That trope is that this was, in fact, a heavyweight title fight. Two big, bad teams fought each other; there could be only one winner. Yahoo (Pat Forde), CBS (Barrett Sallee) and ESPN (Kirk Herbstreit) all referenced the heavyweightedness of the game as something of a qualifier or even definer of the matchup.
With all due respect to Narrative One: Duh.
Notre Dame and Georgia represent the only two programs not named Clemson, Alabama or Oklahoma to make a Playoff appearance over the past two seasons. Both Notre Dame and Georgia entered the game ranked in the Top 7. It was a big game. Got it. HEAVYWEIGHTS!
The second narrative to emerge has been a bit more surprising: Georgia is not quite ready for primetime, but Notre Dame proved its place as a national power. Somehow, Notre Dame has managed to gain more in defeat than Georgia gained in victory. Somehow, Georgia was disappointing in victory but not so disappointing so as to invalidate the mounds of praise being heaped on Notre Dame. Georgia was just bad enough to be exposed by a Notre Dame team that was just good enough to merit playoff consideration without beating a Georgia team that was exposed. Makes sense, right?
Herbstreit finds himself in both narrative pools, but really shines in his duplicitously stupid defense of Narrative Two.
Herbstreit, does not have Georgia in his Top Four after the win over Notre Dame. That is truly baffling—especially in light of the broader consensus for the media. For context, 61 of 62 AP Poll voters have the Dawgs in the Top Four; the 62nd voter has the Dawgs fifth. And yet, Herbstreit had these things to say about then-No. 7 Notre Dame's loss to allegedly not-top-four Georgia:
- SO IMPRESSED by Notre Dame football tonight!!
- Did NOTHING to hurt their case-only strengthened their position.
- Irish on the road gained some national respect!
For what it's worth, Herbstreit isn't the only one pushing this theory or some watered-down version of it. The Athletic's coverage (admittedly from a Notre Dame beat writer), as another example, lauded the "worthy reward" the Irish found in the fight, noting, "Notre Dame was good enough to scare a Georgia team that doesn't scare easily." Was that really the takeaway? As I'll point out later, I think it may have actually been a lack of fear that actually played a hand in the final score.
Reading game recaps on Sunday morning actually made me question my own sanity. Had Georgia not won? I know it wasn't as pretty as some wanted. But didn't the Bulldogs pull it out? Hell, didn't the Bulldogs lead for a longer period than Notre Dame?
So while we're over-reacting with things that may not quite make sense, I'd like to join the cause with this third narrative: Georgia is the best football team in the country.
Let's start with a simple defense of this claim.
Ultimately, the College Football Playoff Committee cares about resumes. Voters (be it coaches or the media) may have differing motivations in their polls (Who would win a hypothetical match-up? Who has the highest ceiling? Who's playing best right now?) and formulas are often used for projections. But we're kidding ourselves if we think the Committee doesn't care, first and foremost, about who has won the biggest games while displaying the fewest blemishes.
No one in the country has a single better win than Georgia's win over Notre Dame. Contrary to popular belief, Georgia —not Notre Dame—was the big winner on Saturday night. I know, because I saw it with my own two eyes. Georgia scored more points than Notre Dame.
Given that radical revelation, let's dig deeper. No one in the country has defeated a team that was ranked higher than Notre Dame (then ranked seventh by both the AP and the Coaches polls). What's more, nobody has defeated a team currently ranked higher than Notre Dame (10th in both polls). This is the best win of the season…for anybody.
- LSU beat Texas when the Longhorns were ranked ninth (when Notre Dame was ranked 8th, by the way) and the Longhorns are still ranked lower than Notre Dame. Georgia's 6-point win over Notre Dame was more impressive than LSU's 7-point win over lower-ranked Texas.
- Auburn defeated Oregon by six points when the Ducks were ranked 11th and Texas A&M by eight points when the Aggies were ranked 17th. Neither of those wins were more impressive than Georgia's win this past weekend. Though in terms of volume, sure Auburn has two better wins than Georgia's two best wins.
- Southern Cal beat Utah by seven points at home when the Utes were ranked 10th. Is that supposed to mean more than Georgia's win?
- Cal beat Washington when the Huskies were ranked 14th. Sure.
- Wisconsin dismantled a Michigan team (then ranked 11th) that is now ranked 20th.
No one in the country has a better win—as defined by rankings—than Georgia. That's indisputable.
As for blemishes outside of Georgia's win over the Fighting Irish (which made Georgia look irreparably broken to some), I'm not sure what would detract from the Bulldogs. There obviously aren't any losses. Beyond that, Georgia defeated Vanderbilt 30-6 in a game that was paced quite differently but every bit as uncontested as LSU's 66-38 win over the Commodores. Nobody has beaten Vanderbilt worse. The Dawgs beat Murray State by 46 points (the Racers largest deficit this year). Georgia handed Arkansas State, a team riding an 8-year Bowl streak, 55-0. The last time the Red Wolves lost by 55 points was in 2003 (a 55-0 loss at Ole Miss). Since that time, the following ranked teams failed to hand Arkansas State a 55-point defeat.
- 2004: #18 Missouri (52-20), #6 LSU (53-3), #25 Memphis (47-35)
- 2006: #6 Auburn (27-0)
- 2007: #4 Texas (21-13)
- 2008: #2 Alabama (35-0)
- 2009: #22 Nebraska (38-9), #13 Iowa (24-21)
- 2010: #22 Auburn (52-26)
- 2011: #13 Virginia Tech (26-7)
- 2012: #5 Oregon (57-34), #25 Kent State (17-13 WIN)
- 2015: #8 USC (55-6), #21 Missouri (27-20)
- 2018: #1 Alabama (57-7)
Arkansas State isn't an elite team. But nobody in the country has hammered the Red Wolves this way over the past 15+ years.
If a resume is built by signature wins without setbacks, Georgia has to be at the top of the list.
But for a bit more nuance on just how good this Georgia team might actually be, let's revisit the Notre Dame game itself. I don't think most Georgia fans felt the Bulldogs played all that well on Saturday. Dawgs247 graded Georgia's position groups as follows:
- Quarterback: B+
- Running Back: A-
- Receivers and Tight Ends: B
- Offensive Line: B
- Defensive Line: A-
- Outside Linebackers: B
- Inside Linebackers: A-
- Defensive Backs: A
- Special Teams: C-
- Overall: B
If anything, I'd peg the team a tick lower. Seemed like low-B / high-C execution to me. Credit to Notre Dame for forcing some of the hits to the GPA, but not all of it (terrible punts, the muffed punt, a refusal to commit to the run early, a refusal to throw the ball downfield early) was a byproduct of Notre Dame. And these problems aren't necessarily recurring.
But let's presume, just for a moment, that this report card is accurate and accurate solely for one performance. If that's the case, then a B-effort from Georgia, playing much of the game without two starters on the offensive line and down three guys in the secondary, was driving and in a position to go up by as much as 17 points with under seven minutes to play against the nation's seventh-best team.
If the portion of media that thinks "Notre Dame is for real" is in fact right, then Georgia is the scariest team in the country—as least based on what we've seen so far. After all, with a less-than-stellar performance, the Bulldogs damn-near ran away with this thing. So why didn't they? Some (myself included) have accused Kirby Smart of being too conservative and "playing not to lose." That could be it. In particular, some (see: me) question:
- His decision to kick a field goal from the 26-yard line on fourth-and-one after the spot was close enough to mandate a video review. I hated that.
- His refusal to call a timeout as Notre Dame marched down the field on the ensuing possession. That was maddening.
But given the B/C-level performance from everyone not named Rodrigo Blankenship, maybe the field goal was the right move. What do I know?
Hear me out on this, though. It seems like if the two teams' best performances were truly on display and as evenly matched as the game's final score and final statistical line ended up, there would have been a larger premium placed on getting seven points (as opposed to the three the Bulldogs got). In other words, if the best effort from Georgia was truly only six points better than the best effort from Notre Dame, don't you think you'd chase points any chance you had?
Georgia was not terribly opportunistic on Saturday, but the Bulldogs didn't have to be (failing to cash in on opportunities still yielded a win). Maybe the urgency to create an opportunity for seven points didn't exist because it didn't need to exist.
Perhaps there was insecurity in Smart's faking of the field goal. Or maybe the field goal actually had a bit of confidence behind it—confidence in recognizing that a sub-par effort was enough to beat a Top-7 team. Get the win and move on. After all, that's what Georgia did.
Or maybe Georgia doesn't belong. Believe what you want.
That's all I got/
Georgia Bulldogs in the NFL: Complete List for 2019 Season Including Roster Status and Salary Info
Here's a list as of end-of-day on September 2. This includes "final" cuts but cuts don't stop in the NFL. Neither do signings.
A few things of note:
- Davin Bellamy was cut by the Texans and NOT signed to the practice squad. Mr. Humble Yourself may lose this one to Baker Mayfield.
- Rookie WR Terry Godwin is not on a roster. I'd expect that to change.
- Rookie RB Elijah Holyfield made the initial 53-man roster at Carolina, was subsequently cut and then later added back to the practice squad. Welcome to the NFL.
- Garrison Smith, one of my favorite former Dawgs, is not on a roster after 5 years in the league.
- Marlon Brown and Taverres King remain MIA and Brown seems unlikely to resurface at this juncture.
- Orson Charles is currently without a team after being cut by the Browns and later the Broncos.
- A few other names not on rosters (after playing last year): Corey Moore, Ramik Wilson (shocking), Maurice Smith (somewhat surprising) and Tyler Catalina.
The data is below. Salaries are from Spotrac. Note that career earnings includes this year's cash earnings (which assumes a full season at current status).
In total, former Bulldogs will earn more than $150 million this year. This crew has taken home career earnings of nearly $895 million.
Good on ya, boys.
Georgia Football: Fans Should Take Courage in Disappointment – This is What We Came For
Let's start here: Georgia did not belong in the playoff. Hear me out.
Was Georgia a Top-4 team on Saturday? Absolutely. Were the Dawgs a Top-4 team down the stretch, when they cruised by Florida, Kentucky and Auburn? Probably. But Georgia wasn't a Top-4 team all season long, and that shouldn't be too hard for you to wrap your mind around. After all, up until last Tuesday (we're talking literally six days ago), the Bulldogs weren't a Top-4 team in the College Football Playoff Rankings. This was not an unjust travesty or failure by the system. It just wasn't.
I hear all the arguments for putting the Dawgs "in" loud and clear and I agree with most of them. But the reality is no man-made committee will ever appropriately reach a consensus on something as subjective as who the "best" teams are. That's why the BCS system was created in the first place. So, a panel of experts retreat into a room and do what boards tend to do—act in the interest of self-preservation. Anyone with a lick of common sense knows it would not have been a politically popular move to put Georgia into the playoff. And that "anybody with a lick of common sense" qualifier applies to Kirby Smart, who contrary to the bad fake-punt call he may never live down, does in fact have a functioning brain.
Smart did his best to lobby for Georgia but he knew the odds were stacked against the Dawgs after Saturday's heartbreak. That's probably part of why the aforementioned punt call came to be in the first place. It's certainly why the Dawgs played like a team with no margin for error down the stretch of the season, because after the LSU game two narratives were abundantly clear as it relates to the Playoff:
- Georgia did still, technically, control its own destiny.
- Georgia had zero room for mistakes.
And to be clear: Georgia wasn't in any greater of a predicament than any other team in contention.
Ohio State couldn't afford another mistake after losing to Purdue. The Buckeyes completely checked the big boxes thereafter (crushing Michigan for arguably the most impressive win of the entire college football season and winning a conference title by 21 points). But my guess is the committee perceived lackluster performances against Nebraska and Maryland as mistakes. If you lose a game you shouldn't lose in ugly fashion, you get a second chance, but you have to be perfect.
Oklahoma couldn't make any mistakes after losing to Texas. And though you may not like how the Sooners won games, they won them all. And ultimately, Oklahoma was more deserving, from the standpoint of accomplishments, than Georgia. Oklahoma lost only once, to a rival away from home during the regular season and avenged that loss in a conference title game. If that sounds familiar, it's because that's how Georgia got into the playoff last year. We're kidding ourselves if we think the committee was going to eliminate a team for style of play. That's not how the committee operates.
Georgia is probably one of the four best teams in the country. But Georgia doesn't belong in the playoff—at least not in this current reality. If we're being honest, the playoff is a lot less about the nit-pickiness of who the best four teams are and a lot more about ensuring with certainty that the best team comes out on top. And frankly, that's how it should be. That's the point of playoffs in general. The BCS formulas weren't about the gap between number 17 and number 18, they were about making sure the best team was standing at the end. The same is true of the playoff. That's part of why I'm opposed to expanding to eight teams, even though doing such a thing would have benefitted Georgia this year. I don't think the wrong champion has been crowned in the Playoff Era (and I don't think the wrong team took the crown during the BCS Era either for that matter).
The SEC Championship Game was a playoff game—at least for Georgia. And though we might think we know how Oklahoma (or later Notre Dame or Clemson) will hold up against the Crimson Tide, we do know (precisely) how Georgia would do against Saban & Co., because we just saw it. We know—concretely—that in a one-game, must-win setting, Georgia lost to Alabama. Because of that, I see why the committee felt compelled to put Oklahoma in. Because we don't know that the same would be true of Oklahoma—at least not yet.
That's a bitter pill for Bulldog fans to swallow, but it's a pill I'll take nonetheless.
Because this is what we came for.
Georgia didn't swap Mark Richt for Kirby Smart for anything less; that's for damn sure. But why, exactly, was the change made and how, specifically, has it already been validated? Surely, no one really misses the Richt Era at this juncture, but still, how do we know this is working? Let's take a step back for some context.
If Georgia wins the Sugar Bowl, it will mark the program's 25th win over a two-year period. The Bulldogs have never done that. They'll have accomplished that partially with Richt's guys and partially with the youngest roster in the country. But that's not what we came here for.
We came here, quite frankly, to be disappointed, by that figure. "Georgia should already have 25 wins over a two-year stretch," we should be saying. "Or maybe even 26." Georgia should be in the playoff. Georgia should already have its first National Championship since 1980.
We came here for disappointment in anything shy of perfection. Whether we like it or not, that's what we chose with Kirby Smart and that's where he's taken us—already.
I happen to love it, and I don't know how you could not.
Heading into the SEC Championship Game, I was disappointed in the demeanor of Georgia fans. I talked to a handful who felt the Bulldogs had an outside chance. I heard a few podcasts that kept the Dawgs in the game. But that was about it. Most seemed to embrace the national narrative. Nobody—and certainly not Georgia—was going to dethrone Alabama. That bothered me to my core. I was, after all, somewhere between confident in the Dawgs and misguidedly confident in the Dawgs.
But now that the smoke has cleared and I've had time to reflect on a game that was closer than almost anyone would have expected and that somehow went largely how I anticipated, I realize I've been a hypocrite. I'm as guilty as the next guy of not thinking Georgia is really there.
I watched the National Championship Game at Miller's Ale House in Orlando. I was down there for a work thing I couldn't get out of (booked shortly after Georgia's 2017 loss to Auburn), and because good things don't happen to Bulldog fans, the first Georgia national championship game appearance of my lifetime occurred in my backyard and I was in another state listening to investment pitches from small cap retail & consumer companies. It is what it is.
I had at least three drinks that night. It was a rare occasion in which I got to have one-too-many drinks in celebration and one-too-many drinks in mourning on the same damn day.
When the game ended, everything got really dark. Not in a blackout kind of way, more a macabre kind of defiance. I was sitting on the floor at Miller's commiserating with some recent Georgia grads. They were in Orlando for training with KPMG or Ernst and Young or something. Not long after I sat down (again, on the floor of Miller's Ale House in Orlando), I grew testy. The tone of the conversation from all other participants was: We'll never get back here. This is the worst. Being a Georgia fan is the worst. This is unfair. Woe is me.
How dare they! I'd seen worse. They weren't at Georgia in 2008. They weren't fans yet in 2012. They hadn't blogged millions of words about this program like me. They didn't have the right to be disappointed!
In hindsight, no one has the right to be disappointed in a college football team—not even me. But as Georgia fans, we now have that privilege. And oh, what a righteous indignation it is to be disappointed. And that, my friends, is the new state of Georgia football.
We're not pissed off just because Florida is running over us time and time again anymore. We're not annoyed by our Dawgs' inability to get past Tennessee in a meaningless mid-season game. We're not bitching about trivial woulda / shoulda / couldas. We're not wondering why the Bulldogs can't show up for big games.
Nope. That's not what we're disappointed by. We're bummed out that our team outplayed Alabama for 119/120 minutes of regulation in two meetings and we have no wins to show for it. We're hot and bothered to not be repeating as SEC Champions while the most dominant dynasty in the history of the sport is happening across the aisle within the conference's other division. We're pissed off that we're not going to play for a second national championship in as many years despite boasting the nation's youngest roster. And we're downright irritated that we keep running head-first into a problem that is literally once-in-a-generation.
Think of it this way: If Alabama only has Jalen Hurts or Tua Tagovailoa, Georgia is either 1-1 against the Tide or (more likely) 2-0 over the past 12 months. I truly believe that. The Bulldogs beat Hurts in January when they prepared for him but couldn't fend off Tua in the second half. Tua was obliterated by Georgia on Saturday (when Mel Tucker and his staff brilliantly prepared), but Hurts found ways to beat Georgia. Never before has college football had a team as generally talented as Alabama and that almost didn't matter against the Bulldogs. Unfortunately, never before has a college football team boasted two such supremely talented quarterbacks with such differentiated skills. The uniqueness of this situation can't be overstated.
Jalen Hurts was the SEC's Offensive Player of the Year in 2016. As. A. Freshman. And that wasn't lip service. He accounted for 3,734 yards and 36 total touchdowns that year. Georgia has fielded some pretty good freshman QBs in recent history, too. For context, here's how they compare to Hurts (SPOILER: They're nowhere close):
- Jake Fromm: 1,040 fewer yards of offense, nine fewer TDs
- Jacob Eason: 1,349 fewer yards of offense, 19 fewer TDs
- Aaron Murray: 518 fewer yards of offense, eight fewer TDs
- Matthew Stafford: 1,794 fewer yards of offense, 28 fewer TDs
- David Greene: 904 fewer yards of offense, 18 fewer TDs
That's the guy who beat Georgia this past weekend.
And he only really beat Georgia this past weekend because the Dawgs were consumed by preparations for another, completely different quarterback: Tua Tagovailoa. Were it not for the curb-stomping (or should I say, Kirb-stomping) Georgia put on Tua this past weekend, he would surely have won the Heisman Trophy while posting the highest passer rating in the history of college football. As it stands at this moment, the Heisman may go to Kyler Murray and Tua may have to settle for the second-highest passer rating in the history of the sport.
And here we are as Georgia fans. We're frustrated that Georgia is somehow 0-for-2 against this dynasty and those quarterbacks—not just both of them individually, but both of them at the same time.
THIS is what we came for.
We came to be disappointed. Not because we're masochists. Not because we're delusional. Not because the expectations are too high. But because we're ready to watch a football program transcend. Because we know it's doable. Because we know the expectations are exactly where they should be—our Bulldogs have just set them a little early.
That is what we came for.
I've talked a few times with a particular reader of this site about Georgia's early success under Kirby Smart. This guy is a Mississippi State fan and someone I know personally. His point, and it has merits, is this: Georgia fans will be spoiled by early success under Kirby. They're going to come to expect this year-in and year-out and that's going to doom Smart and his staff as such levels aren't sustainable.
To be perfectly clear: This guy could be correct. Maybe only time will tell. But there's a certain relative-to-Richt-ness or relative-to-history-ness about that narrative. In other words, the narrative seems to still involve the old guy. Yeah sure, Kirby is winning a lot now and it seems better than what you had. But if you start to expect that you're only going to be disappointed because it can't be sustained as evidenced by Richt at Georgia and others elsewhere.
To be clear: I don't know if the Richt angle is intended in the narrative above or if I'm contriving it, but either way, I would counter with something like this:
You're exactly right. Georgia—the program, the administration, the coaches, the dozens of analysts/personnel directors, the players themselves and even the fans—have come to expect a hell of a lot more under Kirby. And he's damn right that pressure is a privilege. But the pace with which Georgia has gotten here isn't merely fortuitous instant gratification or fool's gold. It's actually proof of concept.
This is what we came for. And we're not leaving.
Immediately following the National Championship Game, I legitimately wondered if Georgia would ever get back in the playoff. As I said at this article's onset, I never thought the Dawgs would be in the playoff this year and they're not. But the fact remains that just 11 months after rock bottom for Georgia fans, Kirk Herbstreit and countless other pundits were lobbying for a playoff spot for an allegedly-rebuilding Georgia team.
Can you swallow that pill?
Eleven months later, we're second-guessing Kirby Smart about a fake punt at midfield in the SEC Championship Game against the team some were calling the best in college football history. That's the level of nit-picking we've reached as a fan base. And no, I don't think that's wrong. I don't think it's unhealthy. I don't think it's misguided and I don't think it will be short-lived.
This is the new normal. The expectations are now oppressively high, and the program has proved that they should be.
Perfection or bust. Or, as a wise philosopher once said, "Anything less than the best is a felony."
I'm here for that.
That's all I got/
Kirby Smart Won't Beat Nick Saban on Saturday…But Not For The Reasons One Might Expect
I think Alabama has clinched a spot in the College Football Playoff. I don't think that's a hot take, and I also don't think it has anything to do with Georgia. Bama could beat Georgia by a ton and get in. Bama could barely beat Georgia and get in. Bama could lose by a small margin and get in. Bama could lose by a billion and get in. Honestly, that's not a gripe. Alabama is undoubtedly one of the four best teams in the country. They're favored by way too big of a margin against Georgia. They'd be rightfully favored against everyone in contention even if they got blown out be Georgia.
It also goes without saying that if Georgia, currently #4 in the College Football Playoff Rankings, beats the top-ranked team in the country during the last week of play, the Bulldogs will be in the playoff. At that point, the Bulldogs would be favored against whoever they draw (likely Notre Dame in a #2 vs. #3 matchup).
If/when that comes to pass, Georgia and Alabama will be on a crash course for a re-match with Alabama seeking revenge. But Kirby Smart isn't going to let that happen.
I re-watched the national championship game last night and it's as painful as it was in January. Georgia lost the game in truly unique fashion. It's not as simple as "Tua came in and did magic things." It's not as simple as "Tyler Simmons was onsides." There were freak plays (the Fromm pick on the first drive wouldn't happen again if he threw the same ball nine more times; the Raekwon Davis interception off a helmet was one-in-a-thousand), missed calls (not just the Simmons thing but also a flagrant face mask missed on the ensuing drive, etc.), atypical blown coverages (Malkom Parrish is noted for being beat on the game's final play, but he was beat several times—including Tua's first TD pass—despite a stellar career in Georgia's defensive backfield).
It hurt. Bad.
Kirby isn't going to let that happen again. There is no way he's going to lose to Bama in the National Championship two years in a row. He won't do that to Georgia. He won't do that to his players, his coaches or the program's fans. He just won't.
But he's also not going to end Nick Saban's career, and beating his former mentor twice in a matter of six-and-a-half weeks would surely be the end of Saban's career. It might literally KILL Nick Saban to lose twice to the same team on such little turnaround. And I don't think Kirby Smart wants Saban dead. At least not yet.
So if he can't rip out the hearts of Georgia fans in the National Championship Game and he can't let Saban die on the field, his only other option will be to lose to Notre Dame. That's obviously not an option because Notre Dame is still Notre Dame dammit. That would make the entire SEC look bad.
So there's really only one option: Kirby has to remove himself from the situation as a whole. And the only way to avoid this whole godforsaken scenario is to lose to Alabama on Saturday in the SEC Championship Game.
If—and this is a big if—Georgia loses to Alabama this weekend, it's because Kirby did the noble thing. He refused to decapitate his washed up mentor. He refused to let the conference down. He refused to break his alma mater's heart. If Georgia loses Saturday, it's because Kirby says, "This is more than a game, and there's always next year."
And what's more Georgia than that?
That's all I got/


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Cavit Schempp of the Olympia FFA chapter was selected in June to compete for national recognition in a career development event at the 92nd National FFA Convention & Expo in Indianapolis, Oct. 30-Nov. 2. The Olympia FFA will send six members to Indianapolis as Schempp vies for national honors in the area of extemporaneous public speaking. American Farm Bureau Federation sponsors the event. Other FFA members who will attend include Noah Reber, Josie Litwiller, Elizabeth Davis, Rebekah Magee, and Kailey Little. Bryce Hoffman is the chapter advisor. Extemporaneous public speaking is one of 25 career/leadership development event areas, covering jobs skills in everything from communications to mechanics. Event participants are given 30 minutes to prepare a speech on a general agricultural topic. The speech must be four to six minutes in length. At the conclusion of the speech, the judges may question the speaker for five minutes. Finalists are selected based on speech delivery, content and responses to the questions. National participants will advance through preliminary and semifinal rounds with the top four speakers competing in the final national event. CDEs and LDEs help students develop the abilities to think critically, communicate clearly and perform effectively in a competitive job market. The National FFA Organization provides leadership, personal growth and career success training through agricultural education to 669,989 student members who belong to one of 8,630 local FFA chapters throughout the U.S., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The organization is also supported by 459,514 alumni members in 2,236 alumni chapters throughout the U.S.
About National FFA Organization: The National FFA Organization is a national youth organization of 669,989 student members as part of 8,630 local FFA chapters in all 50 states, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The organization is supported by 459,514 alumni members in 2,236 local FFA Alumni chapters throughout the U.S. The FFA mission is to make a positive difference in the lives of students by developing their potential for premier leadership, personal growth and career success through agricultural education. For more, visit the National FFA Organization online at FFA.org and on Facebook, Twitter and official news page of the National FFA Organization.
About National FFA Foundation: The National FFA Foundation builds partnerships with industry, education, government, other foundations and individuals to secure financial resources that recognize FFA member achievements, develop student leaders and support the future of agricultural education. Governed bya 19-member board of trustees composed of educators, business leaders, individual donors and FFA Alumni, the foundation is a separately registered nonprofit organization. About 82 percent of every dollar received by the foundation supports FFA members and agricultural education opportunities. For more, visit FFA.org/Give.


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15 Elite goes over the block for a kill at the SCVA Boys Invitational!
ANAHEIM, CA - For the first time in club history, three boys teams qualified at the Boys Invitational, securing their place at Junior Nationals in Dallas, Texas in July! Those teams are:
18 Elite won 7 straight matches to start the tournament, suffering their only loss in the champion ship match against Balboa Bay 18 White (25-10, 21-25, 9-15). Their incredible run earned them a silver medal and a USA Division bid—and they could have never done it without competitiveness and grit.
"There were a bunch of times in the tournament where we'd be down by three or four points and we never gave up. We just chipped away. One time we were down more than 5 points late, and won. It really says a lot about these teams determination and grit. They're never out of a match. Can't wait to see what we can accomplish in the second half," said head coach Taase Mose.
16 Elite beat Wave to finish second in their second-day pool to collect their Open Division bid! Their only losses came at the hands of eventual winner Balboa Bay and medalist Rockstar in the quarterfinals.
"We passed well and sided out at an extremely high rate. It's rare you get a team that passes as well as we do and can also be terminal. Those kids have worked hard the entire fall and it was great to see it all pay off. Couldn't be more proud of them and the work they've done," exclaimed head coach Hugo Ayala.
16 Elite finished 5th in the tournament and will resume competition after their high school seasons.
15 Elite survived not one, but two three-way ties in their pools to shock the field and steal an Open Division bid. They finished the tournament 5th overall with a 5-3 record, behind a never-say-die attitude and excellent serving.
"I think I almost had about four heart attacks," head coach Kendall LaCivita joked after the tournament, "They sure don't make it easy, but that's a team that knows how to win. It was such a great way to finish off the fall—the finish they deserved. I learned a lot from them this year and I'm proud of every point. Can't wait to see what they do at Junior Nationals at Dallas in July," she finished.
Tag(s): Home


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When I became a graduate student at OSU, I was asked to teach in return for free tuition. With that ka-ching ka-ching offer and the opportunity to get a degree in something I loved, I couldn't say no. Being what is basically a spy on the inside, the truth is I have the best advice for how to navigate a class with a TA vs. a class with a regular Instructor. So listen up, undergrads, because class is in session.
First, let's delineate the responsibilities each "position" has.
Students: Show up, do the work, pass the class, etc.
Teaching Assistant: For the most part, TAs do most–if not all–of the grading in big lecture classes. We may or may not be responsible for teaching small breakout sessions in class. We're ultimately in charge of your grade.
Instructor: This is our class. We make the syllabus; we call the shots. Of course, you have to ultimately achieve the learning outcomes of the course, but how your students get there is up to you.
Now, let's go over every student-to-instructor interaction that you could benefit from hearing perspectives on both sides.
As a Student: Honestly, these are my favorite. Opening my email and seeing that sweet, sweet message from a professor saying they're canceling class feels like a gift.
As a TA: You're shit out of luck. Even though you can sometimes miss the big lectures, canceling the labs or recitations you're in charge of probably won't happen. If there's an emergency and you can't teach your course, the professor in charge of the large lectures will sometimes step in. All-in-all, this is a rare instance.
As an Instructor: Shiiiiiet. If we're being honest here (and I am, which is why I didn't publish this under my name), I have canceled class for dumb as fuck reasons. Sometimes I'm legitimately dying, or my anxiety has me on the border of a panic attack/breakdown (we can definitely talk more about anxiety in another article). Other times, I can sense that my students are drowning under the weight of midterms. I may have also canceled classes 'cause it was too cold or I had a paper due. I will neither confirm nor deny these last two. What I'm trying to say here is that instructors are not terrible people. And when your instructor happens to be a graduate student, trust me when I say that we get it. Sometimes we push through the pain because there's work that needs to get done. Other times we feel the weight of the pressure and need a breather, too.
As a Student: I hate participation grades with a passion. Sometimes I just don't want to talk, man. My strategy for participation is basically making sure I have at least one or two smart things to say about the readings that week and looking like I'm interested in the lecture and taking notes, even if I'm doodling on my notebook or iPad. Another pro-tip is sitting in the front. If you sit in the front, you'll automatically look like you pay attention. If you sit in the back and are hesitant about talking or don't look to the teacher, you'll probably get called on.
As a TA: Honestly…I don't care. At some point I was in charge of over 70 students. The Instructor wanted me to take attendance every single class and assess whether or not each individual student paid attention. I ended up passing all of my students on participation because I only knew some of their names. I was also kind of angry that I was being asked to assess over 70 peoples' attention in a class. Can anyone truly do that? Unless you were absent often enough that I noticed you weren't in my class most of the time or went out of your way to not look at me or engage, you're fine.
As an Instructor: I don't know, man. Participation grades are something I struggle with. I don't think you should be forced to participate in a class for a grade, but lecturing to a room full of people with empty looks on their faces hurts my soul and makes me feel like I'm wasting my time. Not to mention that If you don't talk, I don't know if you're following anything I'm saying. Lately what I've been doing is allowing students to "participate" in any way they choose: group work, Carmen discussion boards, meeting with me in my office hours… Basically anything that shows me that you understand what the class is about and what you have to do in the course. But for the love of Pete, TALK AT LEAST ONCE.
As a Student: For me, it depends on the class. In graduate classes, the policy is don't skip unless you're dead or in the process of dying. In undergrad, a lot of classes didn't have an attendance policy. I still tried to not skip too much. I mean, if I'm paying to be here, I'll be here, y'know? There are days where I just cannot deal with life and have to stay in. Probably the dumbest reason I ever skipped class was to go to the Luke's pop-up shops that Netflix set up to celebrate the Gilmore Girls revival. I didn't even try to go to class. I woke up early and took a bus down High to the closest coffee-shop-turned-Luke's and got a cup of coffee. It was great and I don't regret it. That said, I didn't skip the class again the rest of the semester.
As a TA: Unless the class has a strict attendance policy, I didn't really care if my students didn't show up to every class. This particular professor didn't have a strict attendance policy but also asked us to take attendance every day. If there were serious cases for why students were not coming to class, I would take note of that and make sure they came to see me when they came back to class. That said, I wasn't necessarily keeping tabs on everyone.
As an Instructor: I think that the smartest thing a student can do is read the attendance policy and take advantage of it. For example, if you can skip three times, skip around midterms. Take care of yourself, you know? I am pretty chill about attendance. If I notice you haven't been coming for a while, but you haven't told me if you have an emergency, I'll usually reach out, but only if you're past the max number of classes you can miss. Emergencies are more than reasonable to miss class. Your instructor will understand. However, if you're constantly skipping class and don't talk to your instructor, don't come crying at the end of the class because you're 2% away from an A-.
As a Student: I've always been pretty anal retentive (ha ha, shut up) about grades. I still curse the ground the teacher who once gave me an A- walks upon. I guess there's not much here to say that can help you other than to say, I get it. Grades are important. They either make or break your GPA.
As a TA: We are in charge of your grade. If you are having a hard time with the material or with writing an essay, or developing an idea, come see us. We are more than willing to help you out, it's our job. Of course, you can also talk to the instructor of the course, but more often than not for assignment-related questions, we're the person you want to see. Most importantly, if we know who you are, we will bat for you. I've gone head-to-head with a professor regarding a student who was having a very difficult time in class. I worked with that student and they managed to pass the class. We're not here to fail you. We're not here to waste your time. We got your back. It's our job.
As an Instructor: Like I said before, I understand. I understand needing 2% to get the A. However, if you're a student who has consistently done the bare minimum in class and never came in to talk to me for something other than being worried about your grades… I'll stick to my initial ruling regarding your grade. This is where making a good first impression matters the most. If you feel the grade you received was undeserved, instead of angrily emailing me, sit down, and take a breath. Read the feedback you received carefully and ask about a potential way you can improve your work. Nine times out of ten, I will offer to meet with you and work with you to make sure you ace my class.
I don't know how to end this piece other than by saying that I absolutely love what I do. I love my students and will bat for them in any and every sense of the word. If I can give you one piece of advice to take with you it's this: every teacher you will ever have was once a student. Not everyone can be as cool as me, and that's okay. Read the syllabus, pay attention, don't be a sh*t person, and your instructor will help you succeed. It's what we do.


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Can you avoid escrow? Some lenders will allow you to pay the taxes and insurance on your own, making you responsible for saving the funds and paying on.
Have questions about your escrow account? Our FAQs will help you understand how escrow accounts work.
Avoid buying a cut and shut by looking closely in the door. If that's not to hand, walk away. Fake escrow accounts – These accounts allow buyers to deposit cash with a third party until a.
Steps To Closing On A Home Remembering some close calls from New England NCAA lore – Jackson hit a jumper to tie it inside the final minute, then – after Chambers had to force a long 3 attempt late in the shot clock – jammed home the winning bucket. to let go of how close they came.
Is it Okay to Not Use an Escrow Account? You can avoid an escrow account after a home sale (having an escrow account active while the home sale is completed is mandatory, however), but only under.
An escrow account is essentially a holding tank during a real estate transaction for all important documents and deposits. Here's what you need to know.
Below you will find some creative tactics on how to avoid closing costs as much as possible: Negotiate A No-Closing Costs Mortgage In some cases, the buyer can negotiate a mortgage that does not have any closing costs.
Will I Get Preapproved For A Mortgage Know This Before Getting Pre-approved for a Mortgage. – How to qualify for a mortgage. In order to get preapproved for a mortgage, you first must qualify for one. potential borrowers interested in a conventional mortgage are generally expected to meet the following requirements: Provide at least a 3% down payment.
You can pay an escrow shortage in full. Your lender must give you that option when it sends you the annual escrow analysis statement as required by law. The statement tells you how much is required to bring your escrow account into balance and what adjustments will be made to your monthly escrow payment for the next year to prevent another shortage.
Escrow accounts are a part of the mortgage process homebuyers typically cannot avoid. With mortgages, home buyers typically pay extra money into escrow accounts every month, along with their home.
To avoid the requirement for an escrow account you must make sufficient down payment on your mortgage to get your loan-to-value ratio below the requirements of your lender and state regulations. Lenders may charge a one-time fee for setting up your mortgage without an escrow account.
How Do I Calculate My Mortgage Payments Cash Out refinance seasoning requirements purchase & Cash-Out Refinance Home Loans – VA Home Loans – The Cash-Out Refinance Loan can also be used to refinance a non-VA loan into a VA loan. VA will guaranty loans up to 100% of the value of your home. About the VA Home Loan Guaranty. Most VA Home Loans are handled entirely by private lenders and VA rarely gets involved in the loan approval process.How Can I Calculate My Debt To Income Ratio What Down Payment For A House Down Payment Assistance In Arizona – Pima/Tucson Homebuyers Solution The Pima/Tucson Homebuyers Solution down payment assistance program offers up to a maximum of 5% based on the loan amount towards your down payment and/or closing costs in the pima county area.Debt-to-Income Ratio Calculator | Zillow – Zillow's Debt-to-Income calculator will help you decide your eligibility to buy a house.Mortgage Calculator – Estimate Monthly Mortgage Payments. – Use this mortgage calculator to calculate your monthly mortgage payments quickly and easily. Enter your home location and the desired home price in the fields below. In seconds, you will have an.
How to Remove Escrow From Your Mortgage and Save Hundreds Each Year. May 24, 2017 May 20, 2019 Noah Churning, Financial Independence, Are You Eligible to Remove Escrow From Your Mortgage?. I go through a little more of a hassle to avoid the 2.5% interest.


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Whippets Drop Pair To Patriots, Cozad
The Minden Whippet softball team hosted Adams Central and Cozad on Sept. 5 at Augie Nelson Park in their second straight home contest of the week.
Minden was unable to secure its first win dropping both contests to fall to 0-9 on the season.
Minden opened against the Haymakers and were defeated in five innings by the score of 13-0.
see September 11 Courier for full story


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Five Movies That Inspire Young Creatives
Academy Gold interns share their picks
This summer, the Academy launched the Gold program, an industry-wide diversity internship initiative. Nearly 70 interns worked across 20 Los Angeles-based companies, ranging from studios to talent agencies. These students are the future of film. Here, they share the movies that motivated them to pursue a career in the industry.
Frances Ha (2012)
Jocelyn Contreras, Sony intern
As for many aspiring writers and directors, film has been the constant in life that I take solace in. Sometimes it's just cosmic timing, when I stumble upon a character that illuminates exactly what I need in that moment, but through and through, the power of this medium goes far beyond entertainment. I would always leave the movie theater in a daze accompanied by a longing to one day helm my own film. But the odds terrified me.
Once I started college, everyone around me was studying a subject they were passionate about. Why wasn't I letting myself do the same?
Then along came Noah Baumbach's featherlight touch in Frances Ha. What is most beautiful to me is that Frances, an aspiring dancer played by Greta Gerwig, finds success — just not the exact kind she envisioned in her youth. Watching her confront all too familiar struggles and forces out of her control made me realize that, while nothing in this life is certain, my passion for film is unwavering, and I'm ready to let it guide me through the obstacles that are yet to come. It may not happen exactly the way I plan, but that actually excites me now. Thank you, Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig for creating something so dear to my heart.
High Noon (1952)
Angie Villafañe, Academy intern
Growing up, movies were an entertainment ritual in my family every weekend. But they became something more when I saw Fred Zinnemann's High Noon for the first time in 8th grade English class. Through it, my teacher taught us about the concept of duty, and I became fascinated with how it affected Kane and Amy's moral struggles. It was the first time I studied the human condition, something I became passionate about and continued to do through my humanities degree in college.
I began working in an archive and studying archival science in graduate school. Then I heard a terrifying statistic:
More than 90% of American films made before 1929 are lost.
It was the first time I felt in my core the importance of my future field. I became overwhelmed with urgency and an intense moral pull I could not describe. Then I realized what I was feeling: duty — a concept I understood for the first time while watching High Noon as a 13-year-old.
I am now interning at the Academy Film Archive, and hope to become a film archivist or librarian. As someone who is training in the science of preserving cultural heritage, and whose life has been shaped in numerous ways by film, it is my duty to become its custodian. I owe it to movies, and I owe it to the next 13-year-old who discovers their own humanity and passion through a film made way before they were even born.
Up (2009)
Nicholas Sy, HBO intern
When I first saw Pixar's Up during its opening weekend, the story left such an impression on me. I found the emotional montage of Carl and Ellie moving, and the action sequences were clever in their use of flight and great heights. But it was the ending that inspired me most.
The final image of the house sitting next to Paradise Falls was surprising and satisfying because, at that point in the film, both Carl and the audience had already accepted that the house was lost. Then, the film closed with the image that Ellie had imagined all along — the goal that Carl was constantly chasing.
This unexpected yet emotional ending helped me realize the power of filmmaking.
After several repeat viewings, I learned how well the film uses different elements to tell its story, including caricatured character design, immersive sound and a poignant yet sweeping score. As I became more curious about the craft of filmmaking, it eventually led me on a path to editing, which I am pursuing today — in part because of this imaginative, whimsical and heartfelt story.
The Apartment (1960)
Eliana Pipes, HBO intern
I first saw The Apartment when I was about nine years old. Something about the colors on the cover drew me in. Little did I know, it was only the cover that's colorized. The actual film is in black and white. I felt cheated through the opening credits but I stuck with it, and I'm glad I did, because The Apartment became the film that made me want to be a filmmaker.
It's just over two hours long — but Billy Wilder needs every minute, because The Apartment somehow manages to take a viewer through the complete range of human emotion in one sitting. As a writer, I'm interested in works that traverse genres, and in this respect, I think The Apartment is the Holy Grail. It's a warm romantic comedy that has a suicide attempt: it contains elements of psychological manipulation, corporate commentary, steamy New York nightlife and everything in between. The film deftly draws the viewer in, and guides them through such a wide range of feeling and empathy.
Watching that film, it was hard to imagine anything that could be more important than making others like it.
I'm not alone in feeling inspired by this film; dozens of filmmakers cite it as one of the greats. But one of the many joys of the Academy Gold program has been that, just last week at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, I got to see one of the Oscars that The Apartment won in 1960. I can't help but feel like The Apartment followed me full circle — but that's how it crumbles, cookie-wise.
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Dora Palmer, FOX intern
No art, no soundtrack and no film melts me more than Walt Disney's 1937 Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I remember watching it over and over as a child, reliving the warmth, terror and redemption every week, occasionally several times in a single day.
The frame-by-frame animation is so complete and delicate that even the still settings take on personalities of their own.
The soundtrack is combined so seamlessly with the artwork that I can remember growing emotional as a child, spellbound by the imagination and tenderness with which the film unfolds. These qualities moved me to begin illustrating and composing music, but it was Snow White's characters that inspired my greatest passion of all.
The dwarfs, each representing a human frailty, evolve into heroes of the highest caliber without deviating from their true selves. Snow White isn't an active hero; rather, she is kind and humble to such an extent that she inspires those around her to act with similarly dignified softness and humility. Her message encourages the audience to soften their hearts. These are the types of heroes I have always dreamed of becoming, and why I aspire to pursue my course as a filmmaker.
This world is not as charming as one with helpful woodland creatures and singing wishing wells, but that does not mean it should not foster imagination so vivid and kind as to stir compassion on a global scale. Filmmaking possesses this ability, whether in 1937 or 2017, and it is my hope that I will be able to do the same using the most effective method I know.
Learn more about Academy Gold, including how to apply or get your company involved, HERE.


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Xfire 2.4Free
Old versionsSee all
Xfire is an instant messenger application for Windows. Unlike instant messaging giants like MSN or Yahoo!, this application is targeted at gamers. It is a simple application that does without all the unnecessary features of those messengers. The main window has information that resembles the friends tab of Xbox Live! You see all your friends in your friends list and what game they are playing. If you have the game they are playing, you can simply join your friends instantly from the messenger. It will launch the game and find your friend. The application completes the package with support for in-game messaging and voice and video conferences. There is also a server that warns you about new patches and files related to your games. Xfire supports more than one thousand games and you can go to the Servers tab to look for multiplayer servers at any time. One nice feature about this application is that it automatically keeps track of how well, or badly, you perform in your games, so then you can boast about it or be ashamed.
Review summary
- Great gaming application
- None