LUCK

What leaves me saddest is luck.  It seems like we're really unlucky.  Do you make your own luck?  I don't know.  I don't know how you 'make' happen to you what happened on that play Saturday?  I don't know how we 'lucked' into 2 of the most egregious penalties of the last 10 years.

• AJ's celebration penalty single-handedly changed the way the flag was thrown.  You almose never see it flagged anymore.  Almost never.  The ensuing outrage changed the game, but we 'lucked' into being the team it was called against, and it may have cost Joe Cox his moment.  And who knows what happens with that season?
• Ramik's targeting penalty obviously changed the way it's been called in the SEC.  Essentially, they've almost decided to not call it anymore.  We 'lucked' into it being the most egregious call of the season.  It essentially cost us the game in Nashville.  That was on the possession Swann fumbled.  We had stopped the bleeding and made the stop.

Ohio St. won multiple miracle games in 2002, and Mark Richt had no luck.  We don't seem to get the onside kick when we need it (and that's almost all luck).  In 2007, South Carolina, UK and Vandy should have all beaten Tennessee.  They didn't.  No luck.  Still, the improbably happened, with 1 & 2 losing.  We were number 4…but ended up #5 the next day.  No luck.  In 2004, Reggie Brown's toe was out of bounds by 2 inches vs. UT.  Missed FG followed.  No luck.  In 2012, it seemed it was changing.  Oregon's kicker plunked one off the upright.  Aaron Murray stormed us down the field in the dome.  Moseley's tip.  Conley's catch.  No luck.  Have you ever thought about what happens if Conley keeps his feet?  He might score, or he's out at the 1 with 2 seconds left, after which we hand it to #3.  But, no luck.  2013 injuries.  No luck.  A bobbled snap in Clemson.  Bad luck (it was extra point distance).  Auburn's miracle.

That's my sadness for us.  We've got issues to fix.  We need a new DC.  We need to continue to recruit more depth so injuries take less of a toll.  But, Good Lord, it seems we have to earn everything.  I fully expect us to win the SEC at 12-1 in the new playoff format one year and Ohio St, USC, Texas, and FSU will all be undefeated that year.  I don't know the answer.  I don't think praying helps because I'm not sure God cares about who wins games.

We do things right.  We don't oversign and cut kids, a practice I think is abhorent.  We have the strictest drug policies in the country, which I think is noble.  We kick kids off our team when they break the rules, which I think is the right thing to do.  But these things don't equate to luck.

Interestingly, I thought about Corch today.  Foley runs UF much like we run UGA.  They don't oversign.  They kick kids off when they deviate, though their leash is probably a little longer.  Corch left after the 2010 season.  I think he's an arrogant prick.  But, you wonder what it did to him in 2010 watching Cam light up scoreboards while his team languished without Tebow, knowing that if he'd had his way, he'd have kept that kid and won another title in Gainesville.  Meyer cares about winning more than Richt, and you wonder how much of a factor that played.  Like UGA, UF is cheap.  They hired the cheapest coach they could find and got Muschamp, bottom line. 

Mark Richt's a fine man.  I just wish he had a little more luck and fate smiled on him a little more.  Good guys don't always win.  We've got the best man of them all, and it seems like the world (and Penn Wagers) is against him.  That's all hard to figure.  Hard to watch other teams win with kids you kicked off, knowing that we'd never sign a kid that was kicked out of LSU, Miss St, Auburn or Florida or Bama.  We just wouldn't do it. 

In the end, we'll remember this game like Tech 1999.  It was a blown season due to some crazy injuries and circumstances.  We had a brutal schedule that caught up with a young defense.  We lost on a miracle like the 1999 tech game.  One was a tipped pass, one was a referee error.  It probably didn't cost us a championship.  But it cost us some pride and sending Murray out on an awesome note.  And that makes me sad.  Sad for Aaron.  Sad for Richt, who just can't seem to buy a break in a business where it seems like the jerks get all the breaks.