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Kirby Smart defends D'Wan Mathis, explains how Georgia offense failed young QB
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Kirby Smart defends D'Wan Mathis, explains how Georgia offense failed young QB
Georgia redshirt freshman D'Wan Mathis made his first career start at Arkansas on Saturday, and while things did not all go well his head coach defended him
Comments
i understand the wrong read by a receiver but correct me if I’m wrong, wouldn’t it still have been an interception because the db was there? Our receiver not being there doesn’t change if their dB would have been there, so even without the int, it was a bad read.
listen, love the possibilities that D’wan brings but without him getting his feet set and making better reads it ain’t gunna happen.
I don't know....I just look back at that one pass where he panicked and blindly threw it towards the sidelines.....They did not call grounding on it but in all honesty
Way too many penalties for sure. Looked so sloppy. QB play made it even worse. Under throws, overthrows, no awareness of 1st down marker, afraid to really use his wheels.
I said last week that I was worried about D'wan's skinny build. This is the SEC and I questioned his ability to take the licks that you will receive. He took the hard pop and got back up but he was never the same afterwards looking like "I don't won't to experience that ever again."
@Vetdawg no if the receiver sat down on the route it would have been a completion it's still not all on the receiver though Mathis still has to use his vision to make sure he can make that throw there. Could have easily have been a LB sitting underneath the zone that's Kirby protecting his guys. I was behind Mathis started because he brings a new skill set to the offense but he was not close to what we need on Saturday.
Costello was in the transfer portal and looking for a home. Kirby went with Newman and JT. Maybe JT will work out at some point, but I'm starting to think maybe Kirby and Co. have a problem evaluating QB's. Mathis is a hard working kid and I wish him well, but he's clearly too inexperienced to run the gauntlet UGA faces through the next 5-6 games. Now that Missy State game looms a lot larger than it looked before. It will be a shame if this stacked defense is wasted on an inept offense.
Got it. Smart's protecting his player, and his player's psyche. But going out of bounds a yard short of the chains, or air-mailing an open receiver, or throwing the ball out of bounds where the receiver can't possibly catch it in the field of play (at least twice) are not on anybody but the QB. SBIV did none of those things. He was playing for the same team. Hey, this is big boy football. You step up or you don't. Babying Mathis is not the answer.
Actually, no. The throw was high and wide either way. Watch the tape.
Cut to the chase....D'Wan is not ready for SEC football just yet. He will get there but not just yet. Stetson is. He may not be Jake or Joe but he is ready and can handle the complex situations presented with a cool efficiency. He fits the Monken paradigm. It worked against Ark. Will it work against Auburn and even beyond....that is the critical question? This also means UGA's offense must step up, and stop creating consecutive 2nd and 15s and 20s penalties. That ruins any QBs day. Come on Dawgs...do I hear 2 and 0?
The question I have is: Why wasn't Beck given an opportunity?!!!!
Forget the individual this or that, Mathis looked like a very poor decision-maker the vast majority of time he played. Stetson scored several times WITH THE SAME TEAM that Mathis had. Whether it was Mathis taking hits he shouldn't have or stepping out of bounds one yard shy of the first down marker when he easily could have gotten the extra yard or his decision to keep the ball and run with it when he should have given it to the RB, he looked exactly like you would expect a QB to look without experience....inexperienced! However, he also looked like a very good athlete that relied on his athleticism the entire time he was in high school. He did not look a student of the game and certainly not a someone who has studied his position. I have no doubt that with two years of experience in the same system that Mathis could be great; but, are we willing to give-up on the rest of the team, the talent we have to lose a few games a season and end the those years in the Belk Bowl to help Mathis meet his potential?! I hoped for nothing more than to see Mathis become our guy but he doesn't have the football acumen to lead this team without making sacrifices that this dawg isn't willing to see, not this year, not this team.
Go dawgs! Thank you Stetson for bailing out Mathis and keeping our hopes alive. If Daniels isn't ready next week, I pray Mathis does not start. Give Beck a shot!
Babing Mathis isn't the answer but neither is quitting on the guy after 1.5 quarters. The QB change was well timed and executed but Mathis is better than his results.
I agree with a lot of what you say @Dawg365, but if your argument is that Mathis showed a lack of experience, I can't see how Beck would be any different. I don't know. I don't believe CKS. I know he's trying to save Mathis' confidence because this year, moreso than any other, you never know who you're going to need, or when you may need them. No need to throw a kid under the bus after Game 1, when you might need him to bail you out in Game 3 or 4. Clearly Bennett was better on Saturday. Will he again be better against Auburn or Tennessee or Alabama? Perhaps. Will Mathis recognize his mistakes, accept good coaching and improve his game? Perhaps. Will Daniels be cleared to play this week and if he is, will he be able to appreciably improve our QB situation? Again, perhaps. We just don't know. What we saw Saturday could be the start of something big for Bennett or just a one-hit wonder against a truly inferior team. (Remember, Bennett will no longer be a mystery to teams; his game tape will be everywhere). Maybe Mathis was just so nervous that he played far worse than he really is. Or maybe he really is totally unready for SEC play. I honestly don't know and most of us fans probably don't really know either, so I don't want rush to too many absolute conclusions. I think we'll know a lot more about what we have and/or don't have after the Auburn game. And don't panic Dawg fans, with the way this season is setting up, one or even two losses won't necessarily mean we're completely out of it. Remember, 50 percent of the SEC is now 0-1. And some of those 1-0 teams currently will be 1-1 after next week (hopefully, we won't be one of them). I really don't expect an undefeated SEC champion this year because there are just too many unknowns. So let's all just keep calm, and carry on. Go Dawgs!
All this blabbering about quarterbacks last season and now it’s starting this season. Why do they even matter? Because we can no longer effectively run the football. I put that completely on the o-line. There were numerous games in 2017 where Fromm threw it fewer than 20 times and we won big because we could RTDB, even when the opposing team knew we’d do it. I hate calling out college kids, but there have been a couple of consistent starters in the interior of the line that haven’t been able to get any push ever since they were put in there, and it seems that new guys are put in those slots, viola, we can run the ball again. I believe both were benched for at least part of the 2nd half on Saturday, and the running game got going. And one of them didn’t play in the Sugar Bowl, and we ran the ball ok in that game, too.
OK, I get it. The moment was a little too big for the kid; especially when the team made mistakes. What concerns me is when he was put back out there in the 4th quarter and continued to make poor decisions.
One thing is for sure; you cannot go into the 3rd quarter with a similar performance and expect Bennett to pull your backside out of the fire against Auburn.