What's wrong with the Georgia Bulldogs?

[Carter]

"The meeting of the Mark Richt Fan Club is called to order." (AJC photo by Brant Sanderlin)

Mark Richt’s teams use to have all the answers. Whether it was P-44-Haynes in Knoxville or 70-X-Takeoff in Auburn, his Georgia Bulldogs would win the sort of breathless games that stamped Richt as college football’s next great coach. But it has been a decade, and Richt hasn’t taken Georgia to the pinnacle — got close a couple of times — and nobody sees him that way anymore.

If you’re looking for what has gone wrong with this program, there it is: Mark Richt never quite finished the drill. Georgia was No. 3 in the final polls after the 2002 season and No. 2 according to the Associated Press after 2007 and No. 1 according to everybody in preseason 2008, but the Bulldogs could never do as Florida and LSU and Alabama did — they couldn’t get to the BCS title game and win.

And now they’re 1-4 and Richt isn’t the sleek young man just in from Tallahassee; he’s a 50-year-old who has been on the job a decade and who seems at a loss to arrest the slide. This isn’t to say he’s a bad man or even a bad coach, but it is to say that in college football the blame must always fall upward: There’s a reason head coaches are multimillionaires.

It’s convenient to say that Georgia in Year 10 under Richt resembles Florida State near the end of his mentor Bobby Bowden’s reign. Convenient, and also true. Attention to detail has slipped. Players appear to be coaching themselves. Players also seem incapable of conforming to team rules and community laws.

A college coach can override almost any embarrassment so long as he wins 10 games as a matter of course, but Richt’s team is but 9-9 over the past season and a quarter. And you simply cannot play .500 ball and have 10 players arrested in one offseason.

The belief here is that Richt will not be fired this season or in its aftermath. The belief here is also that Richt stands before us a damaged coach. There was no reason for Georgia to lose to Mississippi State or Colorado, no reason other than that these Bulldogs no longer expect to win. They’ve seen themselves caught and passed in the SEC. They’ve seen their gimmicks — the blackout against Alabama in 2008, the black helmets in Jacksonville last season — fall flat. They’ve seen teams with lesser talent being coached up.

There was a time when we would have expected Richt to solve any problem, but that time is gone. The slide of 2006 — four losses in five games — was halted by three rousing victories at season’s end, but come 2009 the Bulldogs were back in the same place, needing to beat Georgia Tech and win a bowl to salvage a season.

This winter Richt steeled himself and fired three-quarters of his defensive staff, but nothing much has changed. Tackles are still being missed. Coverages are still being blown. The whole operation comes off as disjointed, distracted, dysfunctional. It’s as if the Georgia Bulldogs awoke one morning and found themselves reinvented as the Kentucky Wildcats. (Who, not incidentally, beat UGA in Sanford Stadium last season for the first time since 1977.)

The effect has been stunning. How long since we’ve seen the Bulldogs so inept? (Even Ray Goff’s otherwise lousy 1990 team managed to beat Alabama.) It would be one thing if Georgia wasn’t good enough to compete, but nobody can seriously believe that a roster including A.J. Green, Justin Houston, Branden Smith, Aaron Murray, Orson Charles and Washaun Ealey is without talent. Ask Mississippi State’s Dan Mullen if he’d trade rosters with Richt. Heck, ask Paul Johnson.

Rule of thumb: If it’s not the playing, it must be the coaching. What worked for Richt for five years and two SEC titles has stopped working. (He lost 13 games those first five seasons; he has lost 18 in the four-plus seasons since.) This team of 10 returning offensive starters and the new 3-4 defense hasn’t won a game in a calendar month.

The optimum course would be for the man making the millions — that’d be Richt — to seize the wheel and steer this program back to excellence. But if he could, wouldn’t he have done it by now? It’s the age-old question: What do you do when you’ve run out of ideas?

(Take the guys swimming? Nope. Tried that already.)

http://blogs.ajc.com/mark-bradley-blog/2010/10/04/whats-wrong-with-uga-sad-to-say-it-starts-with-mark-richt/

Another article/opinion-piece that doesn't really do much to offer any solution or focus of energy through these trying times as a Bulldogs fan. I thought I would share it though, along with a quote (and link) from an interview with Vince Dooley regarding Mark Richt:

Times-Enterprise: Georgia has gotten off to a slow start this year. Are you confident that they can get it turned around this year?

Dooley: Any coach that stays in the business long enough is going to go through some tough times. Certainly, Bobby Bowden right there at Florida State, despite all the incredible success he had, he had some tough times. Joe Paterno, if you recall about four years ago, he had three losing seasons in four years. Bear Bryant did it. I certainly did it at Georgia. One year, I started 0-3. At least Mark (Richt) has a better record right now than I did ... Sometimes coaches are victims of their own success. Coach Richt is kind of that way. He’s had an incredible run at Georgia. I’m confident he will analyze the problem and solve it.

http://timesenterprise.com/sports/x1327131021/Q-A-with-coach-Vince-Dooley

[KeepItDownHomeCuz]

IMO opinion and I think this is the opinion of every outside football fan this team has ZERO discipline and I think this can be traced back to the '07 UF game. It seems like this team does whatever they want to do on and off the field not meant as trash talking just giving the opinion of an outsider. I think this article hits the nail on the head

[CrimsonKat]

IMO opinion and I think this is the opinion of every outside football fan this team has ZERO discipline and I think this can be traced back to the '07 UF game. It seems like this team does whatever they want to do on and off the field not meant as trash talking just giving the opinion of an outsider. I think this article hits the nail on the head

I think you are right millejb on the discipline issue. A lot of outsiders saw those issues coming into the season but it is always more difficult for those fans within a program to see the shortcomings until they become painfully obvious.

[KeepItDownHomeCuz]

I think you are right millejb on the discipline issue. A lot of outsiders saw those issues coming into the season but it is always more difficult for those fans within a program to see the shortcomings until they become painfully obvious.

I can speak from experience having been very vocal about Tubs needing to leave amongst friends and and long time fans in Auburn and nobody agreed with me until the end of the '09 season.

[Carter]

IMO opinion and I think this is the opinion of every outside football fan this team has ZERO discipline and I think this can be traced back to the '07 UF game. It seems like this team does whatever they want to do on and off the field not meant as trash talking just giving the opinion of an outsider. I think this article hits the nail on the head

I can certainly appreciate the outside perspective. But answer me this. Has this perspective always existed amongst Mark Richt's teams at Georgia? Or is this just something that has come into being within the past 3 years?

[Andrew]

I can certainly appreciate the outside perspective. But answer me this. Has this perspective always existed amongst Mark Richt's teams at Georgia? Or is this just something that has come into being within the past 3 years?

Of course not

I think you are right millejb on the discipline issue. A lot of outsiders saw those issues coming into the season but it is always more difficult for those fans within a program to see the shortcomings until they become painfully obvious.

Of course these issues just arose in the past 12 months. The funny thing is, no one notice shortcomings when you're winning, but all the sudden when you go through a down period it becomes easy for people to pick you apart.

[Gritzblitz 2.0]

This is what happened to the Dawgs.....

[SacFalcFan]

This is what happened to the Dawgs.....

OMG i laughed soo dang hard.. that was hilarious GB.

[SacFalcFan]

Basically the writer has no clue what is wrong. I have talked a number of family members of players and to guys who have talked to coaches and players the answer isn't as simple as saying they are undisciplined, which is not even close to our issue. First remove this crazy notion this has anything to do with florida 2007 because it doesn't. When you are losing it's one thing fans point especially outsiders and they say undisciplined and it's an easy thing to point to when you have off the field arrests. You don't hear it about teams like florida being undisciplined who have off the field arrests, but when you lose everyone has this great insight. You don't hear that when teams like florida and lsu are the worst in the country in penalties and they win national titles, but when you aren't winning it's an easy copout.

This team has zero confidence right now. We have olinemen playing injured this entire year and people want to ask why aren't they dominating? Well when you are having soo many guys play hurt that's a big part of it. Our defensive guys are having big problems with the 3-4 transition. Our ilbs aren't big enough and our safeties are lost. CTG has had to back off and do a base defense because our defensive players are having to work hard to undo year's of poor coaching. We are shooting ourselves in the foot and making mistakes. This team needs to get that win and gain some confidence and that has zero to do with being undisciplined. The only coach who may go is Bobo, but CMR is here to stay and won't be leaving unless he decides to give it up. We have been in every game this year unlike past years when we were blown out by lesser teams. We have a number of issues that led to this 1-4 start, but CMR is capable of turning this around imo.

[Carter]

Richt said on a radio show that today was the first time the team practiced in full pads on a Monday in Mark Richt's time as head coach.

[Gritzblitz 2.0]

Richt said on a radio show that today was the first time the team practiced in full pads on a Monday in Mark Richt's time as head coach.

That could explain the inability to block or tackle and the general lack of physicality on this team. They're soft.

[SacFalcFan]

Richt said on a radio show that today was the first time the team practiced in full pads on a Monday in Mark Richt's time as head coach.

yeah because they use Mondays for special team's practices. he has done that the entire time he has been in athens. Belin has our kick return coverage pretty dang stout right now (thank goodness that was fixed with no more directional kicks). i just hope we don't get any additional injuries.. thanks to a hit by alec ogletree it looks like one of our best cbs may miss a lot more of the season in branden smith. branden smith not being in the game has hurt us.

“I look at like coach Richt said, we’ve been doing the same thing and getting the same result, so throw the curveball and try something different,” said senior cornerback Vance Cuff. “We got after it today and when it came up to the team guys were like, “Yeah, we’re about to get after it.’ Because everybody feels like we’ve got to tighten down and change up and do some stuff. That was a nice curveball to comeback out on Monday and be able to hit. I mean, we are football players, guys like to hit.” Richt said players displayed, “very good tempo,” and called the session a, “high energy practice.”

The reason cmr is doing this is to change things up. The same program just isn't working so he is changing things. CMR is trying to get this turned around.

[SacFalcFan]

That could explain the inability to block or tackle and the general lack of physicality on this team. They're soft.

that's highly doubtful since he has been doing this the entire time in athens.. he has never used monday for full pads and previous teams haven't been soft at all. he has used monday for special teams for a long time. rarely do teams do full pads tackling to the ground during the season. most will do thuds to allow guys to work on technique and not injure each other. he is really just trying to change things up in the weekly schedule to see if it helps.

[Gritzblitz 2.0]

that's highly doubtful since he has been doing this the entire time in athens.. he has never used monday for full pads and previous teams haven't been soft at all. he has used monday for special teams for a long time. rarely do teams do full pads tackling to the ground during the season. most will do thuds to allow guys to work on technique and not injure each other.

But this is the first time he cut out two-a-days and eliminated hitting totally in pre season practices. I have talked several people who make their living coaching football and they nearly unanimously agree that this team is soft and there is a culture problem in Athens. There's something more going on here than just x's and o's.

[SacFalcFan]

But this is the first time he cut out two-a-days and eliminated hitting totally in pre season practices. I have talked several people who make their living coaching football and they nearly unanimously agree that this team is soft and there is a culture problem in Athens. There's something more going on here than just x's and o's.

he didn't elimininate two-a-days. we didn't have the same number of two-a-days as in the past, but that was a staff decision and something CTG wanted so the defense could work on learning their assignments. we had as physical of a preaseason as we have had in the past, just less two-a-days. yep everyone has an opinion on knowing what is wrong in athens as I said in my above post as do uga coaches, our players, and our player's families. we have had some very physical weeks in pads and tackling to the ground (talk with boo and branden smith on that). it's a good way for cmr to change up the schedule. it will also help us continue to get more physical which there is no complaint at all especially since we didn't get anymore injuries, but the big fear is we will have injuries like in 2008. cmr will move the special team's practice to another day, but i love it he is changing it up. we only be a better team for it. now let's get a win..

[Carter]

That could explain the inability to block or tackle and the general lack of physicality on this team. They're soft.

Haha, of course! No... I mentioned this because as Sac said Richt has always used Mondays to work on special teams. This isn't some new phenomenon. When we were kicking tail and contending for the division and conference, guess what.... our boys weren't wearing pads on Mondays.

This is a perfect example of the fan attitude right now. Every single thing Richt does in regards to this team is negative and to the complete detriment of UGA's future. I knew someone would respond to that message saying "OF COURSE!!!! THIS TEAM SUUUUXXXXXX!!!11!!one!"

[Andrew]

Basically the writer has no clue what is wrong. I have talked a number of family members of players and to guys who have talked to coaches and players the answer isn't as simple as saying they are undisciplined, which is not even close to our issue. First remove this crazy notion this has anything to do with florida 2007 because it doesn't. When you are losing it's one thing fans point especially outsiders and they say undisciplined and it's an easy thing to point to when you have off the field arrests. You don't hear it about teams like florida being undisciplined who have off the field arrests, but when you lose everyone has this great insight. You don't hear that when teams like florida and lsu are the worst in the country in penalties and they win national titles, but when you aren't winning it's an easy copout.

This team has zero confidence right now. We have olinemen playing injured this entire year and people want to ask why aren't they dominating? Well when you are having soo many guys play hurt that's a big part of it. Our defensive guys are having big problems with the 3-4 transition. Our ilbs aren't big enough and our safeties are lost. CTG has had to back off and do a base defense because our defensive players are having to work hard to undo year's of poor coaching. We are shooting ourselves in the foot and making mistakes. This team needs to get that win and gain some confidence and that has zero to do with being undisciplined. The only coach who may go is Bobo, but CMR is here to stay and won't be leaving unless he decides to give it up. We have been in every game this year unlike past years when we were blown out by lesser teams. We have a number of issues that led to this 1-4 start, but CMR is capable of turning this around imo.

Sac, you keep me sane bro, nice post and it brings some perspective from the inside.

[Gritzblitz 2.0]

Haha, of course! No... I mentioned this because as Sac said Richt has always used Mondays to work on special teams. This isn't some new phenomenon. When we were kicking tail and contending for the division and conference, guess what.... our boys weren't wearing pads on Mondays.

This is a perfect example of the fan attitude right now. Every single thing Richt does in regards to this team is negative and to the complete detriment of UGA's future. I knew someone would respond to that message saying "OF COURSE!!!! THIS TEAM SUUUUXXXXXX!!!11!!one!"

But the team does suck. And has sucked for the last two seasons.

[slamee101]

I don't buy the whole, "It started in Florida in '07" nonsense. Like Sac said, now that we're down people are trying to point to something and be extra critical.

That said, this team does lack discipline on the field (they're no more out of control than any of these other programs off the field) and I think that some decisions with staff, etc. have come to roost with Richt and this program. It'll be real interesting to see how this team performs moving forward with nothing to play for other than pride really.

[KeepItDownHomeCuz]

I can certainly appreciate the outside perspective. But answer me this. Has this perspective always existed amongst Mark Richt's teams at Georgia? Or is this just something that has come into being within the past 3 years?

Let me answer your question with a question, if there is a problem 3 years in a row do you consider that a problem because I do, three straight years is a trend to me

[Carter]

Let me answer your question with a question, if there is a problem 3 years in a row do you consider that a problem because I do, three straight years is a trend to me

Well you're the one who ridiculously traces our problems back to UF 2007. I certainly don't trace it back that far.

UGA didn't become a "ZERO discipline" program until last year when we didn't win 10+ games, even though "only winning 10 games" is a travesty to some of our fans.

The self loathing within the UGA fanbase is reaching sickening levels.

[KeepItDownHomeCuz]

Basically the writer has no clue what is wrong. I have talked a number of family members of players and to guys who have talked to coaches and players the answer isn't as simple as saying they are undisciplined, which is not even close to our issue. First remove this crazy notion this has anything to do with florida 2007 because it doesn't. When you are losing it's one thing fans point especially outsiders and they say undisciplined and it's an easy thing to point to when you have off the field arrests. You don't hear it about teams like florida being undisciplined who have off the field arrests, but when you lose everyone has this great insight. You don't hear that when teams like florida and lsu are the worst in the country in penalties and they win national titles, but when you aren't winning it's an easy copout.

This team has zero confidence right now. We have olinemen playing injured this entire year and people want to ask why aren't they dominating? Well when you are having soo many guys play hurt that's a big part of it. Our defensive guys are having big problems with the 3-4 transition. Our ilbs aren't big enough and our safeties are lost. CTG has had to back off and do a base defense because our defensive players are having to work hard to undo year's of poor coaching. We are shooting ourselves in the foot and making mistakes. This team needs to get that win and gain some confidence and that has zero to do with being undisciplined. The only coach who may go is Bobo, but CMR is here to stay and won't be leaving unless he decides to give it up. We have been in every game this year unlike past years when we were blown out by lesser teams. We have a number of issues that led to this 1-4 start, but CMR is capable of turning this around imo.

Come on Sac when did this oline get injured in the ULL game is that the explanation because unless your entire Oline got hurt during the ULL game that's a not a valid excuse for their performance especially being one of the most experienced lines in the nation.

Edited October 5, 2010 by millejb

[Billy Ocean]

Come on Sac when did this oline get injured in the ULL game is that the explanation because unless your entire Oline got hurt during the ULL game that's a not a valid excuse for their performance especially being one of the most experienced lines in the nation.

T/G Chris Boling is the only healthy, experienced o-lineman able to contribute.

G Cordy Glenn got mono during summer.

C Ben Jones had knee scoped in August.

G Chris Davis has a degenerative hip condition going back several years and his playing days should have already ended.

T Josh Davis has a long history of shoulder issues that persist.

G Tanner Strickland is returning this year after missing the past year w/ health issues.

T Trinton Sturdivant is coming off of tearing his ACL in August '08 and tearing it again in the first game of '09.

Our freshmen and sophomore o-lineman are either injured, not ready to contribute, or both.

Back-up C Chris Burnett dislocated his kneecap this summer.

T Austin Long is coming off back surgery.

T Brent Benedict is coming off ACL surgery.

There are probably more but it's late and I forget.

[AutoMax]

Wow, when there's blood in the water I guess you really can expect all the sharks to show up.

[sirlot]

Wow, when there's blood in the water I guess you really can expect all the sharks to show up.

That's just it. Everyone is upset about this season (and others to boot), but it's complicated. This team has been one - two plays away from winning, or at least in position to win, all four of these games. I'm personally staying loyal to CMR. You stay any where long enough, you will have adversity. Many great football coaches have been through this. Our own Bobby Cox has missed the playoffs the past five seasons. We all agree football can be related to life. Nothing in life stays great forever. A dream job will have its pitfalls, a marriage will have its trouble, and kids won't always be precious little angels. Point is, the answer isn't just scrap away our commitment and start over. Why, b/c eventually the rd leads right back down the same path.

CMR has been good for UGA for many years. As long as he has the drive, he should be afforded the chance to turn this around. Yes he needs to make some changes, and I think he has/is, but they take time. Why not show some loyalty as he has shown us some! Many programs and coaches don't show loyalty, and as long as everything works out, everyone is happy. But it's when things take a downturn that we see who is truly loyal. Now that UGA is losing, EVERYthing is under a microscope. Becarful what you wish for!