Credit for the Win today

RonJohn

Helluva Engineer
Messages
4,492
Agreed. This place is a long way from what @John and @Eric started back in 2013.
The Internet in general is a long way from what it was in 2013. Outside of sports, many if not most comment driven places (Twitter, YouTube, etc) devolve into vulgar name calling and attempted mic drop moments. GT sports related, I would still say that in my opinion, this site is still more informative and less vulgar than any others I have looked at. (However, that might have something to do with the 100+ people I have ignored)
 

Augusta_Jacket

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
7,875
Location
Augusta, Georgia
I will tell you where I am. I enjoy GT FB and expect to do so until I am on the other side of the dirt. I am excitedly looking forward to the upcoming game. And yes, I do suffer through the ups and downs and want the team to do well. I was attracted to the message boards in the early days because, in their infancy, it was a place to get details and insight into the program. To discuss specifics about strategy. Recruiting. Breakdowns of previous games. Camraderie amongst fellow Tech fans.

Over time, it has devolved into discussions of uniforms and press conferences and Myers-Briggs personality types. I just want to watch the actual games and discuss them without rancor or angst but it it is getting harder and harder to do so.

Fan is short for fanatic. While I strive to view everything with a dispassionate lens, I confess GT football sometimes pulls me beyond reason. I struggle with posters who rely on anecdotal evidence to drive agendas, and sometimes feel the need to respond with actual facts. Lately I've often just shaken my head and not bothered at all. It's hard to convince people to look at all sides and come to a reasonable conclusion. Confirmation bias runs rampant here. So I get where you and @forensicbuzz are coming from. I also understand that people are going to vent, and as long as that venting stays within the proscribed bounds, then they should be allowed to vent. It may not be what I would choose to do, and I might find it silly, but not everyone sees the world through the same lens I do. Complaining about their venting and name calling to attempt to shame them is about as pointless in changing their actions as their complaining is in changing the trajectory of this coaching staff.

My $0.02
 

Northeast Stinger

Helluva Engineer
Messages
9,566
At this point we are at 4 years since our last major successful season (i'd argue 2018 was "successfulish" Might be hard to imagine but fanbase was pretty much the same going into 2014. We just had more wins over the previous 4 years than now. And there were just as many calls for johnson's head in 2012 on other sites after the collapse. In september and october. And the OT loss to VT in a game we should have won. 2013 saw bringin in roof to appease the money guys who were friends with him. Also that happens to be the year Johnson literally changed his offense to a more power running passing offense around vad, even if we weren't that successful. Remember godigh had like 600 yards rushing and 400 receiving or something like that. We did the diamond thing, lots of pistol. But we still had inexplicable losses. 2014 we had the same things said in the first couple games. We just won them. The irony is a lot of people complaining about people calling out the coach now were the same folks on different boards calling for johnsons head constantly. If collins wants to win over fans he has to prove it. Johnson did too. The differences was Collins way of talking rubs people the wrong way.
I watched dabo's presser about us today. He was in spin mode to truly make the game out to be liek they were playing world beaters in us. So that when he wins it can viewed as bigger than it is. However its dabo and i did have to laugh because you know what a "elite player" is to dabo? "A good player." That's how he described yates. That's how johnson described good players. Collins uses elite to mean good. Its hyperbole. Hyperbole works when you winning. It bites you triple hard when you are losing.
I have watched Tech fans complain and try to run off coaches for as long as I can remember. More than one site has changed from analysis to complaining. None of this is new.

Perhaps conversations about recruiting, uniforms, coaching schemes and personality tests happen because there is a hunger to have a conversation about Tech sports but there is often little of substance in the media or from coach’s press conferences. Uga, rightly or wrongly, gets the lion’s share of substantive football coverage and analysis in this state. That was not always the case but things slowly started changing after Dodd left coaching and Vince Dooley started building a PR machine out of the SEC.

Winning will often fill the emptiness of scant Tech news but for a few wretched souls even that is not enough. I usually find myself feeling sorry for every Tech coach at some point. The exception would be Lewis who seemed really destructive to the program. In Gailey’s last years I was also ready for him to go. For him it was the combination of watching an offense that was like watching paint dry juxtaposed with the hype that he was a pro style coach recruiting future pro players for a pro style offense who will end up in the NFL. If he had beaten uga just once, or even Wake Forest when it counted I might have tolerated better the idea that he was beloved by high school coaches all over the state and would make Tech relevant again.

Does CGC deserve the current criticism? It doesn’t matter. That is the nature of coaching at Tech. Whining about criticism of Tech coaches is a waste of time. Only winning will tone this down.
 

Root4GT

Helluva Engineer
Messages
2,356
I think you are underestimating some of the people offering criticisms. It’s not all just an irrational emotional reaction to something said. For better or worse, CGC has said that he understands elite players and elite levels of play and elite programs. After dismal showings on the field he is asking us not to trust what our eyes are telling us but to trust him. After two years of being asked to ignore on field results some people are concerned that CGC is not addressing serious problems with his approach. His continuous happy talk is confirmation bias that he is not getting it done.

For my part I think beating Clemson is a chance to flip the script and look at this program in a whole new way. When we beat Clemson some of us will be tempted to say “I told you so,” but for my part I will just rejoice that there is renewed hope and the CGC approach might just be working.
We aren’t beating Clemson. Wish we would but this will be a blowout.
 

jojatk

Helluva Engineer
Messages
1,349
.Only winning will tone this down.
I wish you were right about that. But I fear you are not. People are always looking for reasons to complain and vent and be offended about things. If we win they’ll doubtless find something else to be upset, offended, or angry about with respect to our program. As far back as I can remember in my GT fanhood (1984, not as long ago as many others but still a fair amount of time) people have always, always, always found some axe to grind… if it’s not the play on the field it’s the uniforms. If it’s not the uniforms it’s what the band plays. If it’s not what the band is playing it’s the fans on the other side of the stadium. If it’s not that then it’s what is being served at the concession stands in the stadium or the lack of some key piece of clothing that fan X wants to buy but isn’t offered. There will always be something. People love their rightness too much to give it up.

Of course that’s not true about everyone. And it isn’t even about the folks who are complaining now. They aren’t any worse or better than those who complained from day 1 of CPJ or CCG or Big Bee or any other coach. There just will always be a vocal group who have nothing but vitriol to spew. Hopefully those of us who try to be positive can drown them out and will have ample reason to do so.
 
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