Friday, December 21, 2012

About Garner

First of all I'm happy for Coach Garner. Even if I don't understand making a lateral move to a program that at best is a smoldering dumpster fire, he had the opportunity to coach at one place for 15 years. That's practically unheard of these days. I'm thankful that he helped bridge the program between the Donnan era and Richt's. And now he gets to go home to his alma mater. I wish him and his family well.

Moving forward, this is a good thing for Georgia. Some will worry about the timing of it given the full time job that recruiting is these days. But we have some of the best college recruiters in the nation on staff plus we finally hired Daryl Jones to really organize that for us. If a recruit/"commitment" feels a need to leave Georgia behind because Rodney Garner is going to Auburn, then did we really need that kid anyway?

Soon Richt will name John Lilly to succeed Garner as the staff's recruiting coordinator and Grantham will be able to hire his own guy to coach the defensive line. Lilly is one of the best recruiters in the nation and headed up things in Tallahassee for years. With him, Bobo, McClendon and Grantham I like our chances with any recruit we aim to get.

Coaching wise, it will be interesting to see who Grantham goes after. He has contacts everywhere. I always wondered how good of a fit Garner was in Grantham's system, especially given that he's had some run ins with previous coaches on staff. And with my eye outside the arena I didn't see a ton of progress being made along the defensive line. Not saying that's all Garner's fault. I've just wondered how well all of our defensive coaches were reading off the same page.

Lastly, please understand that this is all Grantham's hire. So some of you that are daydreaming (and possibly smoking something funny) about Richt bringing in Hines Ward to recruit and David Pollack to coach defensive line...really? I mean have you listened to David Pollack lately? If he can't say something nice about Georgia football in Bristol do we really want him in recruits' living rooms?

Let Lilly coordinate and let Grantham bring in his guy. Like Michael Stipe, it's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine.

1 comment:

AthensHomerDawg said...

I'll take a pass on Pollack. Never thought I say that. You are right though and he better not kiss his Momma until he cleans up that negative Georgia mouth. We can daydream about Mr. Every Position though... can't we?