Do I REALLY Need To Say Anything.....

I must say....I wish I was cool enough to pull that look off for Halloween. I would have to buy this album if it ever dropped.


Thanks Dennis! 


Happy Fall!

Why Cam Newton won't win the Heisman Trpohy.

To begin this article, I would like to point one thing out. I am NOT an Auburn hater. As stated in my profile, I am quite the opposite. I am an Auburn fan (when they are not playing Georgia) and my school's most beloved Head Coach and Athletic Director played at Auburn. My all time favorite athlete played at Auburn and one of my dearest friends is an Auburn grad (wud up Phil!). I felt this was a needed intro statement since early today I got hammered for a comment made in haste regarding a Tebow-esque article. So, now that we've established that we can move on.

I would like to start this blog by wishing everyone a happy first BS week! Oh wait! (My apologies I left out the "C" on accident.) Let's try this again...happy first BCS week! Now that we are getting a clearer picture of college football's National Championship race, we are also getting a clear picture of who the real Heisman Trophy candidates are. Jake Locker, Denard Robinson, Terrelle Pryor have all stayed on the short list with losses. While Kellen Moore, LaMichael James and Cameron Newton have become the Big Three in the conversation. With their teams being undefeated and with James and Newton playing big time schedules I am going to go ahead and rule out Kellen Moore. Even though the rankings don't prove Boise State a fraud the people who vote Heisman should see right through them and that is why Moore won't take the trophy.

So now we've narrowed the Heisman down to two.

James is blowing up Pac-10 defenses, with 848 yards rushing, 87 yards receiving and 10 touchdowns. Newton is exploding onto the SEC scene with 1,278 yards passing, 13 passing touchdowns, five interceptions, 860 yards rushing with 12 touchdowns. To summarize, Newton has 2,138 total yards and is responsible for 25 touchdowns! Moore is the only one kind of close to this number with 1,555 total yards and 16 touchdowns.

Currently, you would say Newton is the only dog in the fight. He is a beast! The next best player has nine touchdowns less and 583 less total yards! He alone has more yards running than the only Running Back on the list! This being the only season you will see Cam Newton playing college football, you could easily say this is a done deal...but in the words of the famous Lee Corso "Not so fast my friend!" What would keep Newton from college football's most coveted individual award?

Let's flash back to the end of the summer (September 14th, 2010). The temperature here in Atlanta was still hovering around 90 degrees and Georgia fans were talking about Marcus Lattimore's ridiculous beat down of the Georgia defense. When the news came down that Reggie Bush would forfeit his Heisman Trophy for allegedly taking money and gifts from agents valued at over $200,000 while still playing at the University of Southern California, Reggie respectfully gave the trophy back after being ruled ineligible as well as not honoring the "integrity" qualification of the Heisman. Why is this important to the 2010 race?

Because there is the possibility that Newton's past mistakes may come back to haunt him now. You see, the 6-6, 245lb. Quarterback did not start his football career at Auburn and work his way to starter. He actually started out his college career at Florida as a redshirt backup Quarterback to Tim Tebow. During his time at Florida Newton went six of 12 for 54 yards and no touchdowns in his two seasons with the Gators. He also was arrested for allegedly stealing a laptop and then throwing it out the dorm room window while being questioned by police. The charges were eventually dropped since Newton was a first-time offender and his punishment was a pre-trial intervention program. Now the story goes that Newton did not steal the laptop but was simply a victim in the deal. He states that he bought the laptop from another student, at a “Tom Stimus” super cheap price, and that he should have known better. Newton has been open and honest about the incident calling it a mistake, and his responsibility to know better. So, why should this keep him from winning the trophy?

There are two reasons why the best player in college football won't win the Heisman trophy this year. The first is because even though Newton has said the right things and served his punishment, there is still the fact that he threw the laptop out the window. Why would a guy who didn't know the machine was stolen -- throw it out the window after being questioned by police? I think this question leads to the second reason, which is the Heisman Trust is already feeling like they have a tarnished image from the Bush scandal. So, do they want to take a chance on a questionable situation? I really don't think they do. My opinion is that they would rather give the award to a squeaky clean character guy than to someone who has a "past" because they don't want the controversy in 2010. Since Newton won't be coming back to Auburn in 2011, he won't take the stiff-arm trophy.

However, I could be completely wrong. Now, that ESPN basically owns the rights to the award, the Ego Sports Programming Network doesn't like to be wrong. The entire Heisman talk has revolved around Newton and I honestly think they could flex their muscles and get their way. Both situations would be completely unfortunate. Television companies should not be able to lobby for candidates just as the Trust shouldn't be able to lobby against them. Are they? That is my latest conspiracy theory. I have to say, I would be a liar if I told you I was sold on Newton's on-field character; the fact is Newton is by far the best player in the country and  deserves the trophy --should he be a finalist.

Not sure I am doing this right because it's been a LONG time since I have cited articles. But here are my sources.


Heisman Trophy
ESPN: Heisman Race
Heisman Mission Statement
ESPN: Newton's Stats
Newton's Arrest
Newton Addressing His Arrest
Reggie Bush "Cash & Carry"

Tom Stimus

Teaching The Hard Lesson

Well as usual the loyal haters, nay-sayers and pessimists made it a point to reach out to their Georgia friend today to let me know about the recent arrest of Caleb King (which I already knew). Of course one of them being a Georgia State Football blogger who truly eats up anything that comes out of Athens that is negative. The only thing more noticeable than his hatred for UGA sports is his love for GSU and FSU sports. This morning, I come back from a meeting to an IM that says "Caleb King got arrested" and the text message from my Auburn friend "I am out for Vandy. I saw Caleb King got arrested." Both of these were obviously before they knew what the situation was. But the point still the same....WE WANT TO SEE GEORGIA CONTINUE TO EMBARRASS THEMSELVES.

I don't really understand the point in it other than kicking a man when he's already down. That is the only angle I see in that behavior. Fine...GSU will ALWAYS have a squeaky clean program under Bill Curry it will never be explosive, dynamic, or even fun to watch (see Kentucky in 90-96). Auburn on the other hand is still mad at losing four straight. So that one is what it is.

On to my point.

Recently coach Richt (to my knowledge) has put a zero tolerance policy in place regarding players and the law. Because let's face it, our players have seen the inside of a jail cell more than T.I., Gucci Mane, Lil Wayne and Lindsay Lohan combined in the last twelve months. This policy is meant to keep players from getting into stupid situations, and because..well...everyone else in society has to follow the law. He has already acted on this once, when he kicked Demetre Baker off the team and we thought this was supposed to begin the revival  with our players. It was supposed to set the example that coach Richt was serious about this and that Georgia Football needed to be held to a higher standard.

Now insert Caleb King.

Caleb is a starting running back, and in this blogger's opinion the best one on the team. So does zero tolerance apply? Or do we go to the three strikes your out method? Personally, you have to send him packing. To steal a line from Al Pacino in Any Given Sunday "You make a ritual out of it; people are gonna respect you for it." If players know that you are not going to tolerate their immature "I a football player" attitude then they won't have one. They have be taught that they are not God's greatest gift to the world because they play football at Georgia. News flash: NO ONE CARES! The law is going to treat you no different than the rest of us.

How do you do that? You stick with being consistent. If you warned them that being kicked off the team and losing their scholarship was the punishment for breaking the law then you have to show them. Again, I love Caleb King. He's one of my favorite players on this roster, but unfortunately he didn't hold up his end of the bargain. Players today are not being required to act as higher citizens' like they once were, you're not being asked to wear your dress pants with your jersey to class on Fridays or to address everyone all the time with "Yes M'am" and "No Sir" heck...I bet they don't even have to look adults in the eyes when they are talking. They are only being asked to do the exact same thing the rest of us in society are not asked to do but EXPECTED to do. Why is that so hard?

Again, I love Caleb but you have to stick to your guns or lose the respect and control of your players, coaches, fans and anyone else that hears the story. If you said zero tolerance then stick to zero tolerance regardless of the crime. I know the ticket was paid, and I know it was only $300, but the point here is you knew you broke the law. You knew you had a ticket, and unless you handled it when the policy came down the treatment should be the same for everyone. As much as it hurts our chances of winning this year, it's better to be a disciplined team, than to be a winning to me. The goal is to help boys become men. NOT win football games, that should be secondary.

Roddy White Is The Best Defense The 49ers Have Ever Seen!

By now we've all heard about Roddy's game saving strip of Nate Clements that lead to the Matt Bryant game winning field goal. But to me the funniest thing is that this is not Roddy's first rodeo with stripping San Francisco defensive backs. Some may not remember but this was reminiscent of last year's game in San Francisco, the Falcons are driving down the field and winning the game 35-10 on a second and nine from the Niners'  13 yard line. Roddy run a slant route to the inside of the field. Dre Bly jumps the route and starts the other way. But at his own 20 yard line Bly starts doing the Deion celebration! Roddy continues chasing him down and by the time he gets to the 40 Roddy has stripped the ball from Bly and Todd McClure recovers the fumble.

Dre Bly Stripped By Roddy White (NFL doesn't let you embed videos)



The announcers start giving Bly crap and point out he had nothing to celebrate. For a few reasons White had torched Bly for 8 catches 210 yards and two touchdowns including a 90 yard touchdown catch where he just burned Bly on a stop and go route.

Enter 2010 the 49ers leading and the Falcons starting to drive down the field, Nate Clements takes a Matt Ryan pass down the sideline and who other than Roddy White comes down and strips the football, and it's recovered by Harvey Dahl! If I am the San Francisco 49ers I do not EVER want to see Roddy White again! From an offensive perspective...he has burned them for 15 catches, 314 yards and two touchdowns. From a defensive perspective he has two tackles and two forced fumbles. With a total of 10 points as a result of the turnovers! I know I am a week late here, but I felt the need to bring it up.

Roddy White Strips Nate Clements (NFL doesn't allow you to embed video)


RODDY WHITE 24
SF 49ers                 0

Welcome To Athens Georgia Where The Pansies Play!

Honestly this is not what I personally think. But welcome to what the rest of America now sees.....

As many of you may now know (since this happen last week) Georgia's new Athletic Director made a HORRIBLE decision and he's not even been AD six months! Last week we were informed that Greg McGarity decided to back out (throat clear..) excuse me..."mutually agreed" to cancel Georgia's home and home with Oregon. With the excuses like "it's too far" and "we don't believe this model is ideal to win National Championships". Can someone explain to me how playing 7 home games and 2  of them being against Sissy Mary State (just for you Robert Lammers) will help us in winning National Championships? I don't want 7 home games unless the we are playing at least 6 decent games! Currently in 2010 we have 3...Tech, Vanderbilt and Arkansas! Boy those are QUALITY games, that will help us win a BCS Title! Here is the problem...we're NOT FLORIDA, ALABAMA, USC (Southern Cal) or OHIO STATE! We can't play crap teams and get into the title game because we're not one of the big boys!

See in the greatest conference in college football you have 3 tiers. You have the "arrived" currently that group is Alabama, Florida and LSU (though they shouldn't be). Why are they the first tier? Because they have won 5 out of the last 7 BCS titles! The second tier as of 10/4/10 is Auburn, South Carolina, Arkansas. Then...there is everyone else. Most years the Dawgs sit in the second tier like a Nook to a Amazon Kindle! Completely happy to be there and glad to be acknowledged. But here is my issue....the University of Georiga is ALWAYS in the top 10 of most profitable programs in the country, but yet our major sports dwell in the land of mediocrity at best. How do we change that? Two ways...1) Pay coaches 2) PLAY BIG TIME TEAMS!

Let us look at the second of these two. I seem to remember a year when Auburn was the best team in the coutry and they were overlooked for the 2004 BCS game for Oklahoma and Southern Cal. Why? Because they played Citadel (and because the previous year they embarassed the media by losing the first two games when being a pre-season favorite). Not because they weren't as good as OU or USC, but because they replaced USC ('02 & '03) with The Citadel they were rejected by the BCS Championship game! Now, looking at the tier system, why would that happen? Because they weren't the media darlings/top teir of the SEC. When you are the second tier in the SEC you MUST play USC, Oregon, Nebraska and whoever else will step it up and play you.
Your mentality should be that of Southern Miss...Anyone...Anywhere...Anytime. That is the ONLY way you can get in the first tier. I don't care that we're the SEC, I don't care we play in the toughest conference in college football. Yes, it's great as a fan to travel, but...as my man Ric Flair used to say "To be the man, you gotta beat the man" and playing Idaho State and UL-Lafayette doesn't do it!


McGarity's response to this is something like "we're adding Clemson for a home and home" that's great! If you plan to add them back in for every season. Until then we've
 just made ourselves the laughing stock of college football. We loss to the lowest of low Big XII teams and in the same week we back out of a series with the Pac-10 juggernaut Oregon. Because we want to go back to the "good ole boy" style of scheduling. Hello Greg McGarity! This ain't Florida! You ain't an Assistant to Foley anymore (or are you)! You have to EARN top status and we ain't got it! I know you're not a young man, but catch up PLEASE! Before you hurt our ability to recruit!

 What's on Justin's iPod this week? Also Kindles are where it's at!



Coaching Changes Won’t Fix Georgia’s Woes

Being a lifelong Georgia fan and eight-year season ticket holder, I have come to realize that we have a fanbase that expects of SEC titles (not sure why). This season started no different, a win against University of Louisiana-Lafayette had the Georgia faithful solidifying this mentality. Then there was the downturn. Why? Is it Georgia’s lack of tackling? Is it A.J. Green’s four-game suspension? Yes. But is that it? No.

See, Georgia is lacking something that every team we’ve played since Week 2 has. It’s called leadership. It’s not coaching leadership, but on-field player leadership. This is evident in each of their four losses.

Example 1

Ealey fumbles in the red zone late against South Carolina, and they cave.

Example 2

Arkansas holds Georgia to a three-and-out late, desperately in need of a defensive stand and they cave.

Example 3

In Starkville the entire game showed a lack of leadership! There were at least three times in the fourth quarter a leader was needed, and Mississippi State found theirs as we continued to look for our way out of the proverbial Egypt with no Moses.

Example 4

Against Colorado the minute that AJ left the game, the demeanor changed. They then caved again in the third quarter giving up a touchdown the next drive! Then a field goal capped off a nine-minute drive! Still with a chance King fumbles, because no one steps up and gets these players together as a unit. No one makes the big play that changes everything.

You can put it on coaching as a lot of folks are trying to do, but if you ever played football you realize that both players and coaches win and lose games. The coaching has not changed in 10 years, and it doesn’t need to. The system works. But as a former football player, not only do coaches need to be leaders but so do players.

There is always a group of players that are the vocal leaders and the example leaders and right now we’re lacking both. I do think they are there, but I think they are all young. To freshman and sophomores who think “it’s not my turn," well, it is your turn, because we know the upperclassmen aren’t going to do it!

Coaches can’t make this happen, and they can’t recruit it. There are only a few Tim Tebows in a lifetime. Most leaders just “show up.” In my years as a player and former high school football coach, I can tell you leadership shows up in the most unexpected people at the most unexpected time.

My hopes as a Georgia football fan are that it shows up FAST before the redneck faithful actually get their way and Richt gets canned! True Georgia fans look at the body of work and realize this man has built a respectable program and one bad year isn’t enough to fire a two-time SEC champion!

By the way, there are only five schools with multiple SEC titles since 1990: Alabama, LSU, Tennessee, Florida, and Georgia. Yes, we’re the only one without a national title, but that is not enough to fire an incredible coach. How long was Vince Dooley at Georgia before he got a National Title? Sixteen years.

I can also tell you I know this view point won’t be well received. No one ever wants to come out and question kids. Coaches don’t do their call-in show calling out players and they don’t go to the media and say, “we ain’t got no leadership.” Great coaches (Richt) take the responsibility on themselves and they deflect any of that from their kids.

Lastly on the “firing” idea, other than it being just plain stupid, what basis do people have for this ridiculousness? Because they give money? Because they watch a game on TV? Because they are a 30-season ticket holder? That’s not enough reason for you to think your opinion on firing a coach should happen! Fire this crappy Athletic Director first! That’s another blog.