IMO is an expression of my own opinion. I believe the mutts are on the downside of the mountain. I'm also of the opinion that after winning multiple NC's, like Saban, this whole new reality of NIL / transfer portal is weighing on Smart and he won't be able to stockpile talent 3 deep anymore.. (which i also believe that Saban didn't want to deal with this new reality ). I can see Smart making a career change in a few years. We won't know for another year or two, but I'm all in that the tide has turned and we are rising, they have slipped and won't get back.
DJ still has a long way to go to be considered a player that makrs us a favorite to beat the top reams in tge country. Our defense is what really turned the il miss and lsu games.
Its that way for every team in the country. Theres no way to stockpile talent to gain an unfair advantage except cash. We can all buy players now and its much more expensive. We have a budget but not a cap. The most money combined with coaching will win most of the time but its going to be much more competitive going forward. Coaching will be a bigger factor. Spurrier closed tge talent gap with coaching but he still only won one. The gap saban and kirby were allowed to creste was insurmountable.
IMHO, KS is not a "bad" HC - not by any means. Unfortunately for UGA, Kirby's apparent WGAF attitude toward a recruit's character/conduct off the field (or his own questionable conduct in "recruiting" them) may finally be raising its ugly head on the field. What a pity that would be.
The national media doesn't appear to care and the local media has been muzzled. Even deaths haven't slowed them down much and the only character that Kirby cares about is between the sidelines. I'd love to believe that the tolerance for misdeeds within that program will eventually do in that regime, but I don't think it will (it sure didn't for Aw Shucks Bowden). About the only things that might get Kirby outta there not by his own doing is losing or catching him in bed with a dead girl or a live boy.
Georgia is not the juggernaut they were in 2021 and 22’. It will be difficult, not impossible, for Kirby to regain that kind of team and coaching staff together. Those teams also were fortunate not to have inordinate amounts of injuries either. Perfect storm. But he has set the bar at UGA and the fans expect to win it all every year. That will cause grousing and sniping at his coaching and even though the Georgia faithful love him it will wear on KS just like it wears on the very best coaches, SOS for example. It won’t help when we start kicking their azzez again next year either.
At the beginning of the season, I said that Texas oil money will change the landscape in the SEC. I still think so.
Smart got outfoxed by Marcus Freeman in the Sugar Bowl. He kept whining that you can't swap 11 for 11. Freeman knew you could. The game officials knew you could. I saw one sideline ref look at Kirby as if to say, "Read the Rules dumbass." Kirby is a great recruiter but not as smart as his last name suggests.
I take it his no fun league evaluation was nothing to write home about. He so thought he was gonna be on the 3yr and to the league gravy train plan. How sad.. Georgia tailback Trevor Etienne expected to stay with Bulldogs for 2025 season
Before he was grabbing every 5 star in the country how well was he doing? Now that the portal is here they are always one of the most raided schools and where has that got him? Just like saban he HAS to out-talent you in order to beat you.
I don’t think Saban was scared of more teams being able to compete. I think he just didn’t care to deal with all the extraneous bs nil strain puts on the coaches. Having to re recruit your own players- assistant coaches making less than players etc..I think he was probably already close to hanging it up anyway, this just pushed him over the edge. As for Smart, the guy won back to back titles out of the sec, and then went 13-1 last season (‘23). I refuse to put that all on recruiting advantages. OSU, LSU among others, recruit top five every year and you don’t see them doing that, or even anything remotely close. Saban is a mad scientist, and Smart was his closest and trusted understudy for years. As long as smart is at uga, they will be a giant pain in our ass.
Still seem to be doing pretty well to me. You're free to use strange mental gymnastics to say he's a bad coach, I won't stop you as I don't really care.