Thoughts from the Bluegrass

-The Parkette Drive-In is a must for future visits to Lex
-Keeneland is awesome. They must love good weather, a night game and the Dawgs in town because we covered that place up.

-Commonwealth Stadium's concessions are just a notch up. I got good, and I mean GOOD, sweet tea at a concession stand.
-The sound system is out of control there. It was ear piercing. I just don't get it. No one, in red or blue, was enjoying the 17 videos they showed during pre-game.

-Does Kentucky know they're in the Big 10?
-Their fans were very mouthy before kickoff. I've never heard them talk so much smack. I'm going to give them the business next year in Athens. Don't worry, though, I held my own. I just kept asking them, "You guys have a football team? I thought we were here for basketball. Who knew?" They didn't find this particularly funny.

-The UGA fan in front of me pointed to the program to his UK buddy at the Joker Phillips bio and said, "is that really his name?" No, it's a massive misprint and all season announcers across the nation have been getting it wrong. He was only head coach in waiting for 17 years.

-I got in a near argument pre-game w/ an acquaintance from college about the new scheduling philosophy. He said, and I quote, "I don't care about winning a national championship. I want to go to some good games and have good experiences. I'd rather lose to Michigan than beat Charleston Southern." -AND- "I don't think it affects the rest of the season whatsoever." While Florida is playing 7 home games and Auburn is playing 8…I, for the life of me, can not understand his logic. It actually disturbs me that we have UGA fans that are that dense. There's no rule that says you can't go to the Rockies in May with your family. Why do you need UGA football to provide you with opportunities to travel? It just baffles me. If you have that attitude, then you can never expect to win big, and you can never judge your coaches win/loss record on the right manner. The truth is, it is impossible to judge CMR vs. Urban since 2006. Richt has been asked to play against schedules that no one else in America is playing against starting in 2006 with Colorado. Urban's playing Charleston Southern and Troy. Hmmm…everything was fine w/ Richt at UGA through 2005, right? Wonder what changed…

I have no idea what's going to happen on Saturday. Who knows what to expect from the Gators? I think we'll play loose, though. We have no reason not to. It's going to be a strange environment down there, and I can't wait.

Couple of tidbits. Last week I heard Dantzler talking about this after the Cocks lost to UK. I lived there in '84 and remember their great season, but had forgotten the timeline of that season. They were 9-0 and lost to Navy. And that was a bad Navy team. They beat Clemson the next week. BYU won the national championship that year because no one else was undefeated. They beat a 6-5 Michigan team in the Holiday Bowl. Thing is, Cocks were independent, and most certainly would have gotten an invite to San Diego to play the Cougers for all the marbles if they'd have beaten Navy…of all teams. They lost the Gator Bowl instead and the curse continued.

If they lose 2 more and we end up in the dome, it will be a collapse of epic proportions.

Go Dawgs!
Beat Florida!
Gators eat boogers and wear jean shorts!

Dawgs in the Dome?!

The craziest scenarios ever. Let's get this straight, I'm not predicting anything, but I'm just saying 'what if'. And, frankly, in some crazy way, we're playing about as well as anyone in the Conference right now outside of Lee Co., Alabama. We're definitely playing the best ball in the East the last 2 weeks. So, we HAVE to beat UK & UF. We just have to. Those are Eastern Division games and crucial to the whole race.

Also, there is no scenario that will work that doesn't include South Carolina losing 2 more games. They have to. Even if we win out and they lose once, there's no one we can tie with to end up in a 3-way tie with them outside of UT or Vandy, which would mean UT beating Bama and SC or Vandy beating a whole bunch of people they ain't. So, knowing that, the 'Cocks, for 4 straight weeks are @ Vandy, vs. UT, vs. Arkansas, and @ Fla. No matter what, for them to lose 2, one of them will be a division game, which is good for us. There's a very good possibility they lose 2 more. They are very pedestrian w/o #21 in the lineup.

Okay, so the easiest thing is for that to happen and we just win out and we win the thing outright. That's crazy. Here's the thing, though. It doesn't really matter as long as we beat UK and UF. Losing to Auburn won't matter. That's the formula. Win the next 2, cheer for the Cocks to lose 2 more (now, this is under the assumption that one of the Cocks' losses is in the swamp). Because…

UF TIE:
We do our part but lose to Auburn. UF regroups after our game and wins out. Cocks lose 2, including Fla. That puts us in a round robin head to head w/ the 3 teams. So, you go to Eastern record. We'd be 4-1, Fla. Would be 4-1, Cocks would be 3-2. Cocks eliminated, back to head to head w/ Gators…we win.

UK TIE:
We do our part, but lose to Auburn. Florida implodes and loses to Darth Visor, too. Kentucky regroups and beats MSU, Vandy & UT (finally). Cocks lose to Arky & UT. Same thing w/ the round robin between Cocks, Dawgs and UK. Goes to East record. We're 4-1. UK would be 3-2. Cocks 3-2. We win, book it for Peachtree St.

The crazy 4-way-tie world scenario:
We do our part, but lose to Auburn. Florida regroups and wins out after our game, beats Vandy & Cocks, going 4-4 in the SEC. Kentucky regroups after our game and goes 4-4, beating MSU, Vandy & UT. Cocks lose to Arky and Gators. 4 way tie between UK, UGA, UF and FakeUSC. Head to head. Cocks are 1-2, Cats are 1-2, Gators are 2-1, Dawgs are 2-1. Cats and Cocks eliminated. Dawgs win out over Gators.

It's about to get crazy. You know, if there is karma in college football, we'll win this thing and sneak in, and we'll play undefeated and #1 ranked LSU in the dome…and Adriel Jeremiah Green will catch a last second fade route to seal the deal.

Oh, and get this, in all those 4-loss scenarios, do you realize how crazy it could get. This ain't that far fetched. We could literally win the next to and lose to Auburn and Tech and play for the Championship at 6-6. Heck, we could tank it against Idaho St. and go 5-7 and still get there.

About Saturday.....and AJ

Hard to figure out what to think today as there are about eleventy-million thoughts swirling in my head, but this one is hard to stomach and argue. Take a look at games 2,3, & 4 in 2009. These are AJ Green's stats from those games:

South Carolina
6 rec for 86 yards, 1 TD (including several acrobatic catches)
We win 41-37

Arkansas
7 rec for 137 yards, 2 TDs & a 2-point conversion
We win 52-41

Arizona St.
8 rec for 153 yards, 1 TD & a late blocked FG to save a tie and set up our FG winning drive.
We win 20-17

Guys, we're 0-4 last year heading into the LSU game w/o him. With him, we're 3-1. There are many people to blame for where we're at, but AJ Green put our young QB and our struggling offense at a huge disadvantage to start the year. I'm thinking that we've simply forgotten how good he is. Yes, we won some games w/o him last year, but that doesn't mean we should have been forced to. The funny thing is that I was thinking this today. Really, no matter what happens as this season plays out, AJ is going to be a public enemny. He sold this season out. If we win out with him, then we'll see him as sabotaging what could have been a truly special season. If we lose a lot, he simply got the derailing of the train started, especially mentally and emotionally. But…BUT…I thohght today that AJ has one shot at redemption. Come back in 2011. Make an announcement that UGA has been too good to him and he doesn't want this to be his legacy. That he owes the Bulldog Nation, his team, and his coaches his best and he still has one season to give it to them. Every junior we have considering leaving would return, and the Bulldog Nation would love him in a way we haven't seen since #3 was taking snaps. It's really his only shot at redemption. Me thinks there is a part of him that might do it.

The bottom line is that when we have all our bullets, I think we'll be a pretty good team, but we're not elite. And pretty good teams have a hard time losing their best players. And there might only be one elite team (the Tide) in the nation right now. Just take the best players on some of the best teams.

Arkansas - Mallet
Ohio St. - Pryor
Boise St. - Moore (QB)
South Carolina - Lattimore
Auburn - Newton
LSU - Peterson
TCU - Dalton (QB)

How good would those teams be to start the season w/o those guys? Do you think Ohio St. beats Miami? Do you think Arkansas beats us? Do you think Auburn beats Clemson? Do you think LSU beats UNC? Do you think Boise drives the field to win the game vs. VaTech? The answer is unequivacolly, no. Bama seems to be in a different league. They lost the trophy winner and didn't miss a beat. Most teams can't go all summer thinking they'll have their star and then not. Remember the clip of Mark Richt in practice saying, "When in doubt, just throw it up to #8…it's almost not fair." So now, what have we done on offense when there has been doubt? I'm not sure we know.

Mark Richt has a lot to fix. We've got to tackle better. We've got to stop making bone headed calls. We've got to play w/ emotion for four quarters. But I want to see us w/ #8 on offense. Bama is uber talented and loaded and beat a decent Penn St. team w/o Ingram. From the looks of yesterday, they've have beat them by 40 if he'd have been playing. Ingram's better than Richardson. Period. Jimmies and joes make a difference. It wouldn't hurt to have #1, #4, #38, and #79 all join in the fun, too. And on that note, the biggest piece of work Mark Richt, IMHO, has to do is to get more and better jimmies and joes. Guys get suspended. Guys get hurt. Have talented guys behind them. Recruit, recruit, recruit. We need Isaiah Crowell in a bad way. In a way, not to make too much out the whims of an 18 year-old, but if that kid chooses Bama over us it might be the sign that we need another direction. We have to get him. We simply have to. We need a RB to go w/ Aaron Murray the next 3 years. The kid grew up a UGA fan. We HAVE to get him. If we can't, I shudder to think about what that means. We'd be playing against Bama and Crowell his sophomore and junior years. That wouldn't be good.

Spurrier and Boise

Is Spurrier serious about this QB situation? Is he really thinking about starting a true freshman against UGA? How can he be so confused about his QB situation in this year, of all years, with all the cards in his favor and he's got his most important game on Sept. 11? Me thinks CTG has a little surprise for the OBC. Spurrier thinks it's going to be the same ol' Georgia D. It's not. It's going to be the Dallas Cowboys' D. I guess Spurrier forgot how well his offense worked against NFL defenses the last time around.

If you didn't hear Bob Davie on Cowherd Tuesday, you missed a gem of an interview. Cowherd was bashing Boise, which I'm a fan of doing. He said that they're 6-7 in their last 13 games dating back to 2002 vs. BCS opponents and their 2-4 in their last 6 bowl games. He posed the question: If Boise had Florida's schedule, would they be national champion contenders. More importantly, he posed the question that if Stanford, Kentucky, or Indiana had Boise's schedule, would they be national championship contenders, stating that they'd be favored in every game but the VaTech game.

Davie pointed out the biggest problem with all this. He said that you can't just think about the physical beating you take in the BCS conferences, it's the emotional toll. He said there's nobody in the press conference in Moscow, Idaho or Los Cruces, New Mexico after a Boise game, but the places are jam-packed in Columbus, Gainesville, Tuscaloosa, and Austin. He talked about the mental wear and tear of every detail being scrutinized at a big time school. "If you win a close one at Florida, it's a crisis, it's like a loss." And it's just not the same if you don't deal with that every week. You just don't have to deal w/ those environments if you're Boise. He said, "It takes you 2-3 days to get over a trip to Athens, GA because you're emotionally exhausted, you forget about Moscow, Idaho by the time you get on the plane." I'm pretty sure VaTech is overrated, but here's hoping the Hokies lay a beatdown on the Broncos on Sept. 6.

Turnovers

I'm sure some of you saw this the other day over on Blutarsky's blog, but it's mind boggling. As you know, we ranked 118 out of 120 in Turnover Margin last year. Numbers 119 and 120 went 3-9 and 1-11. For the life of me, I can't figure out how we won 8 games being that wretched in the most important category. But this is the kicker:

In games we were even in TO margin, we were 1-1.
In games we were negative in TO margin, we were 4-4.
In games we won the turnover margin, we were 3-0.

Those three games were Auburn, Tech, and A & M…the 3 best teams we beat.

It's not rocket science. Just don't turn it over. Aaron, we're wearing the red helmets (usually). Just throw it to our guys. Punting isn't bad. FGs aren't bad. TO's are bad, bad, bad. Don't turn it over…beat good teams. It's quite simple.

Gators

So…I saw on ESPN about the Gators opening camp. They're playing w/ more unity this year and they don't have any rock stars. They're going to be better because it's more of a team. I remember us saying how much better we were going to be w/o Stafford and Moreno. I remember that, don't you? How Joe would be more accurate than Matthew, like Brantley is a better passer than Tebow. Funny thing is they don't call the position "Passer", they call it "Quarterback." Let me get this straight…you beat UGA, UT, FSU, LSU & South Car. By an average score of 27.6 to 11.4 (more than 2 TDs), but you're going to be better this year because you don't have all those stars.

ESPN said it's the first time the Gators don't have a returning All-American since 2007. Funny, I remember what happened that year…

BTW, their schedule was a joke last year. We played 3 bowl teams from the West, they played 2. We had to go to Arky, they had to go to Miss St. They played FSU (a very bad ACC team) and UT at home. We played GT (ACC champs) and UT on the road. They played Charleston Southern, Troy & FIU all at home. We played Cotton Bowl bound OSU on the road and Arizona St. and Tennessee Tech at home.

They were light years better than us last year, but I'd bet my bottom dollar that given our schedule, they weren't 12-0 and given their schedule, we ain't 7-5.

Just sayin…

Man I can't wait for it to start.

Freshman Numbers

Alex Ogletree (Zander) - 46
TJ Stipling - 44
Ken Malcome- 24
Alec Ogletree - 9
Derek Owens - 20
Brandon Burrows - 41
Marc Deas - 26
Michael Bennett - 82
Garrison Smith - 56
Mike Thornton ? 96
Kenearios Gates - 72
Dexter Morant - 92
Demetre Baker ? 52
Brent Benedict ? 74
Hutson Mason - 14
Jakar Hamilton ? 23
Kolton Houston - 66

per ugasports.com