IF THE UNTHINKABLE HAPPENS

[JacketOff]

it can be both. lots of schools are committed. FSU is completely committed and they screw up. Texas as massively committed and they can't get anything right. etc etc.

bama got lucky that saban was available when they needed him. UGA got lucky that Kirby wasn't the usual saban disciple screw up. he was an unknown and it was a crap shoot. they won the lottery.

But there’s still a difference. As much as FSU, Texas. Florida, USC, Penn State, Auburn, Miami, and the like are “committed” to having a successful football program, they are not spending anywhere close to what Georgia and Bama are spending. Even places like Ohio State, Clemson, and Oklahoma aren’t. Georgia outspends everybody in recruiting, and Alabama is a close second, but nobody is as committed to battling it out as those 2 are. It looks like Texas A&M may be trying to get to that level, but they’ve still got a long way to go.

Just look at their rosters. Georgia has 19 five stars on their roster. That NINE more than Clemson, TWELVE more than Oklahoma FOURTEEN more than Texas, and EIGHTEEN more than Notre Dame. Those are 4 major names and contenders in college football, and 3 of them have played in the CFP in the last 3 years, and Clemson won it all just 4 years ago. When there’s that big of a disparity in the makeup of rosters there’s nothing anybody can do. Georgia has as many 5* players on their roster as Ole Miss has 4* players. And they have more 5* players than Wisconsin, Michigan State, Utah, Pitt, Baylor, Oklahoma State, Iowa and every other program in the country. Those are teams that played in NY6 bowls and for their conference championships, and they aren’t even remotely in the same league as Georgia and Alabama are. Talent disparity has never been greater at any level of major sport.

 

[ChicagobasedJacket]

But there’s still a difference. As much as FSU, Texas. Florida, USC, Penn State, Auburn, Miami, and the like are “committed” to having a successful football program, they are not spending anywhere close to what Georgia and Bama are spending. Even places like Ohio State, Clemson, and Oklahoma aren’t. Georgia outspends everybody in recruiting, and Alabama is a close second, but nobody is as committed to battling it out as those 2 are. It looks like Texas A&M may be trying to get to that level, but they’ve still got a long way to go.

Just look at their rosters. Georgia has 19 five stars on their roster. That NINE more than Clemson, TWELVE more than Oklahoma FOURTEEN more than Texas, and EIGHTEEN more than Notre Dame. Those are 4 major names and contenders in college football, and 3 of them have played in the CFP in the last 3 years, and Clemson won it all just 4 years ago. When there’s that big of a disparity in the makeup of rosters there’s nothing anybody can do. Georgia has as many 5* players on their roster as Ole Miss has 4* players. And they have more 5* players than Wisconsin, Michigan State, Utah, Pitt, Baylor, Oklahoma State, Iowa and every other program in the country. Those are teams that played in NY6 bowls and for their conference championships, and they aren’t even remotely in the same league as Georgia and Alabama are. Talent disparity has never been greater at any level of major sport.

Like it or not, some of the talent disparity/UGA talent advantage is on GT pretty much not competing for in-state talent in terms of being a realistic destination for an NFL future or an opportunity to play for national titles.

 

[4shotB]

it can be both. lots of schools are committed. FSU is completely committed and they screw up. Texas as massively committed and they can't get anything right. etc etc.

bama got lucky that saban was available when they needed him. UGA got lucky that Kirby wasn't the usual saban disciple screw up. he was an unknown and it was a crap shoot. they won the lottery.

Good points. Both the schools you have are committed (if by commitment you mean money) but they have other systemic and root cause issues. In this case, there is an incestuous relationship between the boosters and the AA resulting in a too many chiefs and not enough Indians situation (throw the other UT into this pile as well).

So here again, these schools will remain stuck until they address their root cause issues. This requires a type of connitment to do unpleasant tasks. So here again we go full circle - failure of performance lies at the hand of the AD along with the school President. If the president won't back the AD the boosters call the shots.

As I said earlier, Tech does not have the will to perform well and is content to go through the motions. how would you describe Pitt's attitude toward athletics?

 

[Northeast Stinger]

On Twitter last night I saw lots of ads for uga paraphernalia. One was a T-shirt with a dog paw sporting 3 national championship rings. THAT’S the uga mindset. Proud they have 3 championships and oblivious that Tech has 4. They are one of the least self-conscious fan bases I know of.

 

[sgreer]

These are great questions and are what (imo) separate great leaders from the great managers. Great managers do well within the given constraints and keep things moving in the same direction more or less. Great leaders can remove or minimize constraints. Frankly we have mostly been overseen by the management types from what I have seen in all of our years as GT fans. Dr. Rice perhaps being the execption.

I think about this alot. In my younger days, there was very little (outside of groceries and gas) that my family didn't purchase at Sears & Roebuck, JC Penneys, Western Auto or Woolworth's. The thought of a world without these companies at the time was probably unimaginable fo people in that area at the time. What killed them? They had plenty of management but failed because they lacked leadership. I think this is the story of GT athletics at the end of the day.

College football is a business but unfortunately it’s not how Tech has looked at it the past 20 years as they have been outspent by schools with even smaller fan bases as ours. Saban has been one step ahead of the competition for years in spending and innovation and now uga has upped the ante with Texas A&M jumping in and raising stakes more. GT has been left behind and it would take a miraculous donor situation to change it. That being said good coaching and recruiting could get us back to our 7 win seasons and low tier bowl games with an occasional fun season like Wake Forest just enjoyed

 

[sgreer]

college football has basically lost any semblance of parity and for me the magic has been gone for several years. even ignoring last night the fact that teams like 2019 LSU and this years UGA team are the scrappy underdogs everyone is rooting for is hilarious.

riley in a year or two if he can turn usc around might be the only “fun” new team in the playoffs for a while. otherwise i don’t see any variation between the tournament each year as it will always contain one of bama, uga, ohio state, clemson, notre dame or oklahoma.

I think the parity was great outside the top 2 teams. Unfortunately the top 2 teams have players 3 deep on depth chart better than anyone we had other than Gibbs this year.

 

[sgreer]

it can be both. lots of schools are committed. FSU is completely committed and they screw up. Texas as massively committed and they can't get anything right. etc etc.

bama got lucky that saban was available when they needed him. UGA got lucky that Kirby wasn't the usual saban disciple screw up. he was an unknown and it was a crap shoot. they won the lottery.

uga spends way more on recruiting than Alabama. kirby took the Bama model and increased the $ and uga happily signed the check

 

[sgreer]

Like it or not, some of the talent disparity/UGA talent advantage is on GT pretty much not competing for in-state talent in terms of being a realistic destination for an NFL future or an opportunity to play for national titles.

I can’t remember being in the hunt or even competing for a player uga wanted since Calvin. Players would rather be a back up there than come to Tech. Maybe we need to find some NIL funds

 

[JacketFan137]

I think the parity was great outside the top 2 teams. Unfortunately the top 2 teams have players 3 deep on depth chart better than anyone we had other than Gibbs this year.

i have a feeling that parity is fleeting and largely due to a lot of 5th/6th year seniors from the covid rules

either way i just feel like since 2016 it’s been a pretty disheartening trend as a fan of a team that’s not one of the teams i mentioned.

 

[4shotB]

On Twitter last night I saw lots of ads for uga paraphernalia. One was a T-shirt with a dog paw sporting 3 national championship rings. THAT’S the uga mindset. Proud they have 3 championships and oblivious that Tech has 4. They are one of the least self-conscious fan bases I know of.

To push back on this for the sake of discussion, we are proud of our 4. But there are schools with more than us so we need to be careful about casting stones or pointing out the splinter in others' eyes.

 

[JacketFan137]

I can’t remember being in the hunt or even competing for a player uga wanted since Calvin. Players would rather be a back up there than come to Tech. Maybe we need to find some NIL funds

there’s been a few. myles autry (wild story and never made it to tech ultimately), gibbs, derrick morgan, sims had an offer, so there’s been players we’ve grabbed. just not many

 

[4shotB]

. That being said good coaching and recruiting could get us back to our 7 win seasons and low tier bowl games with an occasional fun season like Wake Forest just enjoyed

I wonder if that model is sustainable in the long run. Sure after our last 5 or 6 years the Hunts Frozen Pizza Bowl in Waycross will be great. But what if we get beat by Uga and Clemson by 45 points along the way? Will we be happy knowing that we are, if not officially, playing on a lower level than the top 6-8 teams?

Years ago, a 7 win, bowl type team could compete with the top 5 - 10 teams on any given day. How many times have we seen GT play the spoiler role as a big underdog? Remember a 1 win GT team beating Bama in B'ham? Or a winless GT team playing the number 1 ND team to a 3-3 tie. I am not sure that this is the case anymore. Outside of Bama, did anyone really test Uga this year?

 

[Northeast Stinger]

To push back on this for the sake of discussion, we are proud of our 4. But there are schools with more than us so we need to be careful about casting stones or pointing out the splinter in others' eyes.

My point is that Tech does not OVERPLAY the 4 while uga acts like this makes them a national historical monument of football excellence.

 

[bobongo]

I wonder if that model is sustainable in the long run. Sure after our last 5 or 6 years the Hunts Frozen Pizza Bowl in Waycross will be great. But what if we get beat by Uga and Clemson by 45 points along the way? Will we be happy knowing that we are, if not officially, playing on a lower level than the top 6-8 teams?

Years ago, a 7 win, bowl type team could compete with the top 5 - 10 teams on any given day. How many times have we seen GT play the spoiler role as a big underdog? Remember a 1 win GT team beating Bama in B'ham? Or a winless GT team playing the number 1 ND team to a 3-3 tie. I am not sure that this is the case anymore. Outside of Bama, did anyone really test Uga this year?

With the exception of the six or eight exceptional programs at the top, everybody else is in the same boat. Things have a way of changing, and often faster than we imagine they might. I can't accept that this situation will drone on ad infinitum. We can strive to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and win a conference championship down the road. That would get us into an 8-team playoff. And we will pull upsets over Clemson and Georgia again, some sunny day. We just have to take it one step at a time.

 

[sgreer]

I wonder if that model is sustainable in the long run. Sure after our last 5 or 6 years the Hunts Frozen Pizza Bowl in Waycross will be great. But what if we get beat by Uga and Clemson by 45 points along the way? Will we be happy knowing that we are, if not officially, playing on a lower level than the top 6-8 teams?

Years ago, a 7 win, bowl type team could compete with the top 5 - 10 teams on any given day. How many times have we seen GT play the spoiler role as a big underdog? Remember a 1 win GT team beating Bama in B'ham? Or a winless GT team playing the number 1 ND team to a 3-3 tie. I am not sure that this is the case anymore. Outside of Bama, did anyone really test Uga this year?

Outside of Alabama and Ga- Tech had great opportunity to beat Clemson this past year- Pitt won ACC- Purdue Spoilermakers had some nice wins as did Michigan State- Ole Miss is now good (SEC $ of course). ND had many wins that were almost losses to lesser programs and lost to Cincy (not a traditional factory). dogs and Bama are on another level. Michigan did not come close to challenging and they were Big 10 Champs. Unfortunately SEC has built an unsinkable ship for now.

 

[GT05]

Uga does not care Tech has 4 nor should they I don’t care they have 3. Just need to Compete for another that’s all.

 

[ChicagobasedJacket]

I wonder if that model is sustainable in the long run. Sure after our last 5 or 6 years the Hunts Frozen Pizza Bowl in Waycross will be great. But what if we get beat by Uga and Clemson by 45 points along the way? Will we be happy knowing that we are, if not officially, playing on a lower level than the top 6-8 teams?

Years ago, a 7 win, bowl type team could compete with the top 5 - 10 teams on any given day. How many times have we seen GT play the spoiler role as a big underdog? Remember a 1 win GT team beating Bama in B'ham? Or a winless GT team playing the number 1 ND team to a 3-3 tie. I am not sure that this is the case anymore. Outside of Bama, did anyone really test Uga this year?

Recruiting has become more of an exact science in the last 10-15 years. Stars actually matter and now Vegas can easily predict winners. There are upsets but not usually with the top 3-5 most talented teams.

 

[sgreer]

Uga does not care Tech has 4 nor should they I don’t care they have 3. Just need to Compete for another that’s all.

In my lifetime uga has 2 and Tech has 1 co Natty which I still count as one LOL

 

[Jim Prather]

I can’t remember being in the hunt or even competing for a player uga wanted since Calvin. Players would rather be a back up there than come to Tech. Maybe we need to find some NIL funds

U(sic)GA really wanted Shamire Devine. They were pushing hard at the end.

 

[g0lftime]

99% of our football team does business if I had to guess.

New name for Parks and Recs. Basically the same but sounds more academic. One of my son's majored in that at NCSU. Worthless unless you are a jock to stay eligible. Lots of jocks were in his classes.