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Georgia football winners and losers following 2019 SEC Championship game defeat
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Georgia football winners and losers following 2019 SEC Championship game defeat
Welcome to Good Day, UGA, your one-stop shop for Georgia football news and takes. Check us out every weekday morning for everything you need to know about Georgia football, recruiting, basketball and more. Georgia football winners and losers following 2019 SEC Championship game defeat Winner: Jackson Smith Jackson
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Thank the Lord Pittman already had the hay in the barn with this year's OL recruiting class!
Teams like Baylor and Texas need big wins in bowl games to promote their programs and engage their fan base. Teams like Georgia need to use the 20 practices and the game to give the players who will be carrying the torch next year extra reps and a game atmosphere to evaluate their talent and plan for their improvement in the off season. The win is not nearly as important as the preparation for next year's title run. I hope we win but I understand the sky is not falling should we lose. The prophets of doom this year were the same prophets of doom last year after the Texas loss proclaiming, "Texas is back!" and Kirby and the Dawgs were in a hopeless decline. How'd that work out?
I was watching the postgame video, Conner, and you had to step away. I figured you had some bad news. I'm sorry for your loss.
As for the article, Kirby did accept responsibility for not having enough receivers, something BA has talked about for a long time on the podcast. In his defense, I don't think any of us expected all of them to leave for the NFL and for Holloman to be off the team. Hindsight is 20/20. Also, we do have several receivers that have a hard time actually catching the ball. I heard something about Calvin Johnson the other day on why he was so good. Before and after every practice, he was practicing catching balls from the machine over and over. He was already great but he was never content and wanted to improve his craft and look where it got him.
I'd argue that this game against Baylor is very critical. They are #7/#8 and a solid win (by any means necessary) shows that we have/had a good team and a great program. LSU showed us that we did not belong in the playoffs (or at least couldn't compete with them). Win here, take a Sugar Bowl win (not sure why they are called a "loser") against a #7/#8 team and feel good.
It's the other SEC programs that are feeling down right now (except for Tenn for climbing their way back). Alabama against a #17 Michigan in the Citrus bowl? LOL, even if they dominate, their season is a failure. Auburn vs #16/#18 Minnesota? Haha, not what you were going for. The best? Florida. 10-2 with only losses against the #1 and #5 teams playing unranked Virginia on a December 30th bowl. Ha!
"This is a significant loss given the work Pittman has done with the group."
I get that Pittman is an excellent recruiter, but does Georgia's offensive line look like an elite or dominant group to anyone? Yes, they are good, but the "Great Wall of Georgia" stuff was heavy on hype but a little lighter on results. Not to cherry-pick a stat, but Joe Burrow just rushed for as much as Georgia did (more or less). I wish Pittman the best, but I think the Georgia football program will be fine without him.
Also, in regards to the wide receivers, I also understand that one of Smart's priority for that position is they be able to effectively run block. I humbly submit to Kirby and the staff that they may also want to add some receivers WHO CAN CATCH A THROWN FOOTBALL.
Honestly UGA needs some momentum going into the offseason. A win against Baylor, a solid Offensive coordinator hire, and finishing top 3 in recruiting would help that.
Sugar bowl win would be lowest item of concern, as we saw what a sugar bowl win did for Texas last year......”weeeeee’re baaaaack!!” 🤦
You are right on the mark with this take. I count four 5 stars among our top 7 linemen, and two 4 stars. And we can’t get 100 yards against a team that gave up 400 rushing yards against Ole Miss. How many times have we been stuffed on short yardage? I’m so sick of hearing about the receivers while ignoring fact that we can longer depend on a running game. And I agree that hopefully catching the ballwhile be a key evaluation point moving forward.
Why did we lose to LSU? Because just like most other games this year we could not execute the offensive game plan. I can't fault Coley on this game plan. Fromm didn't execute, the receivers dropped or were beaten for catchable passes. After being able to really think about our performances this year several things are crystal clear to me.
Jake Fromm regressed pretty significantly IMO, number one key. He looked shaky at times, lacked confidence, you can't be an effective leader if you lack confidence and I think this team lacked real leadership. I truly believe they lost confidence in Fromm. His fundamentals were off, that's on coaching. The experts all said when Fields transferred that Fromm might actually benefit, he no longer had to share time, or look over his shoulder. That didn't work out.
The receiver group never grew up, injuries hurt for sure. Lot of dropped balls that were catchable, that's on the individual. Lack of imagination (IMO) with some of our schemes, poor routes at times, Fromm missed seeing open receivers during his progressions, mostly coaching. Not using the tight ends more, again coaching, offensive scheme.
The Oline underperformed, didn't reach their potential.
Kirby Smart will have to do his best coaching this year, beginning last Saturday night. Losing Pittman, having to access how to fix the offense, does he replace Coley, or Hankton, who replaces Pittman. Can he and the staff sustain the mostly great recruiting results we have witnessed the last three years. My opinion is we need to rebuild our offense from the ground up, use the LSU program as a road map. The process and standard continue to change. Mark Richt failed to adapt, I hope Kirby can.
Jake's 2 interceptions were really bad throws, he under threw the deep ball and eyeballed the short out pass all the way, he missed open receivers on a couple of other occasions. All in all he had a lousy game. Not good for a 3rd year starter who has been to this game 3 times. He was hamstrung with 3rd string receivers in Landers and Simmons and with those injuries but the difference in Jake and Burrows was miles apart in leadership, determination, and execution. Jake never has been able to put the team on his back and it's because he's a game manager. When the game becomes unmanageable and the QB needs to do more than just manage, he falters. Great kid though. Just talking about his skill set.
I'm sorry about the loss of your friend, Connor.
I disagree somewhat with your take that Kirby should have expected all his receivers to bolt for the NFL. I doubt that. I doubt anyone really saw that. Except for Godwin, who was a senior and had to leave. But the other three, Hardmann, Nauta and Ridley, at this point last year were all borderline NFL draft picks. Both Nauta and Ridley were late-round picks and Hardman was what, a third- or fourth-rounder. In any case, none of these are what you would call "locks" for the NFL. I think it was a tough decision for them and the way things shaped up, it would have been difficult for Kirby to recruit that many top-ranked receivers with those guys still on the roster (and Holloman, too). The numbers just would not have added up. Think about it, if he keeps say either Ridley or Hardmann, and then Holloman isn't kicked off the team, now there's not nearly as much pressure on Pickens and Blaylock to come in and play well right away. And Lawrence Cager, instead of being Fromm's security blanket, is simply a nice additional luxury. I'm not leaving CKS blameless on this, just saying that it's hard to anticipate four underclassmen from the same position group all deciding to leave school at the same time, plus a fifth guy getting kicked off the team for something he did more than a year before.
On the subject of receivers, though, I can't help but wonder if the receivers we did have would have looked better if say, Joe Burrow had been THEIR quarterback. I mean, with his ability to create and extend plays with his legs, that can't help but open up more plays for the receivers. Plus, when he does throw, he is very accurate, hitting guys in stride instead of making them reach or fall to the ground just to make a catch. I'm not here to knock Jake Fromm. For all of the criticism the kid has taken, the FACTS are that he has led us to 3 straight SEC championships, he stepped in as a RAW freshman and took us to a Rose Bowl victory and was two plays from being a National Champion. No matter what, he has played well for us and been a DGD.
But there is no mistaking that he regressed a great deal this year; why, we may never know. And had he been better, perhaps our receivers would have seemed better, despite their youth and obvious lack of skill.
And finally, still on the matter of UGA receivers, no one has mentioned it, but I think that tweet from Marcus Rosemy is HUGE. At this time, when we're looking for any ray of hope, for a top recruit (from the state of Florida, no less) to come out and boldly reaffirm his commitment to UGA, at a position of need, is huge. He's not ducking and dodging and going all quiet as some other commits are suddenly doing. He hasn't set foot on campus yet and I already admire him. We need 20 more like him. Go Dawgs!
Cut to the chase...is Carson Beck the next UGA QB? Scenario 1: Fromm stays at UGA. Scenario2: Carson Beck signs early and gets to work for the slot against Fromm. Scenario 3: Fromm leaves and Carson Beck takes over. There really is no other scenario as the two current back-ups are just that....back-ups. You guys know more than I do....?