Shaving facial hair in relation to basketball vs. in relation to Football

by loran smith on Apr 16, 2008 6:05 PM EDT

So, the F-bomb is paying up to the students Friday at Tate by shaving off his 'stache. http://onlineathens.com/stories/041608/mensbb_2008041600214.shtml

What is our official take here at DawgSports with the recent advocacy of as much facial hair as possible?

Is there a correlation between facial hair and basketball and facial hair and football?

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Dealing with two different sets of Sports Gods

While the Facial Hair Gods may not approve, im sure they will understand the need to appease the Gambling Gods. Going back on such a wager could result in very bad karma. I am all for the shaving and am very happy that I will be passing through Tate plaza at noon on Friday.

by SG Standard on Apr 16, 2008 11:08 PM EDT 0 recs

Agreed, SG Standard

You can't go back on your word on a thing like that and expect to get good karma working for you thereafter.

Vince Dooley promised to shave his head if the 1976 Bulldogs won the S.E.C. championship and beat Georgia Tech. They did, so he did. If he hadn't, would we have won the 1980 national championship? I doubt it.

Also, in the F-Bomb's case, he may take the view about his moustache that Orlando Cepeda took about his bats.

Cepeda believed that a bat only had so many hits in it, so, after he got a hit with a bat, he refused to use it again. His thinking was that you never knew whether that was the last hit. (Cepeda is in the Hall of Fame, by the way, so anyone who quarrels with his logic is welcome to show me his plaque in Cooperstown to confirm his credentials for criticizing.)

Maybe Dennis Felton figured that his moustache only had so many S.E.C. tournament titles in it and he didn't want to run the risk that this was the last one. The miracle well certainly seemed to run dry in the second half against Xavier, so maybe it was time to shake things up a bit.

Shaving facial hair. Growing facial hair. Getting mad at the players for celebrating on the field at Vanderbilt. Threatening to get mad at the players if they didn't celebrate on the field against Florida. Black jerseys. Soulja Boy. Whatever works, man.

by T Kyle King on Apr 16, 2008 11:24 PM EDT 0 recs

same with golf

Many golfers firmly believe there is only 1 birdie in any given ball. If you are a good golfer, this may be relevant. I suck at golf. But I firmly believe that there is 1 good slice in any given ball, therefore I use that logic to never complain when my tee shot goes awry. Good riddance, I say.

by DavetheDawg on Apr 17, 2008 10:42 AM EDT up 0 recs

Well, the stache is officially gone

I just left the tate plaza. It was pretty fun. There was a crowd of a few hundred gathered around, standing on ledges, just trying to get a good view. Lots of photographers and a couple camera crews were there as well. They were giving out posters and t-shirts. Most of the team, as well as the SEC Championship trophy was there. The barber made a big show of showing the razor right before the shaving. After, The F Bomb stood up on his chair and led the crowd in a few cheers. Billy Humphrey got on the mike, thanked everybody for coming and for their support of the team, and said he wants us to do this again next year.

It was great to see a bunch of people out supporting the basketball team. When I first got to school right after H*rr*ck-gate, I was afraid that a part of my college experience was lost. I was looking forward to the excitement that comes with a basketball team making a run deep into March. With all the sanctions, it looked like that chance was gone. This team changed all that, and its something that I will always remember.

While this post season may not lead to us being a national power instantly, it sure helped put this team back on track and will pay off eventually. Between the notoriety this run brought to the team and the incoming recruiting class, I don't see any reason that our basketball team can't continue to ride this wave of momentum into becoming a respectable and competitive basketball squad.

by SG Standard on Apr 18, 2008 12:22 PM EDT 0 recs

Put this in context for me, SG Standard:

How did it compare to the shaving of Burt Reynolds's moustache shortly after he went to prison in "The Longest Yard"?

Unlike MaconDawg and Paul Westerdawg (the whole -dawg family, really), I'm not a basketball guy. I have nothing against basketball and I completely understand what those who love it love about it, but it's just not my thing.

Accordingly, my position was simple; now that S.E.C. teams that were good at football were good at basketball, too, I wanted us to be good enough at basketball so that basketball wouldn't be an embarrassment. Basically, I wanted our basketball team to be good enough for me to ignore it completely rather than regard it with shame.

Then a funny thing happened on the way to the N.C.A.A. tournament. This team got fun to watch. While my views on the fundamental legitimacy problems of playoffs remain unchanged, one thing I have always admitted is that the N.C.A.A. tournament is exciting. (Also, my feelings on the legitimacy issue were softened somewhat this year by the fact that, for the first time ever, all four No. 1 seeds reached the final four, so the entertainment of the early rounds did not detract from the validity of the later rounds.)

The legend of the 2007-'08 basketball team will only grow over time. 20 years from now, we'll all be talking about how the F-Bomb underwent a public (yes, there's an "l" in that word) "40-Year-Old Virgin"-style body-waxing in the Tate Center plaza after a team that went winless in the regular season won six games in a single day in the middle of a hurricane while Gaines and Bliss played 240 uninterrupted minutes apiece with four fouls on them both the whole time . . . which, honestly, ain't a whole heck of a lot of exaggerating, all things considered.

The question isn't whether this will make for an enjoyable memory; it undoubtedly will. The question is whether this will energize the program. I know it has energized the fan base, because there may be no more difficult denizen of Bulldog Nation than me to get fired up about roundball and I'm looking forward to the 2008-'09 edition of Dennis's Dogs already. That's a start, at least.

by T Kyle King on Apr 18, 2008 3:01 PM EDT up 0 recs

Some perspective

I would compare it to the haircut that Eddie Murphy got in Coming To America. It was over quickly, not much happened, but there was laughter and good times aplenty.

Kyle, I'm with you. I've never been a basketball guy. I gave up on following the sport when the Hawks traded Dominique. That was the end for me. Sure, I have rooted for UGA basketball and followed them with passing interest, but nothing really managed to draw me back in until this. Not only did I find myself enjoying the game, but for the first time I was appreciating strategy and aspects of basketball that I had previously brushed off. Now, for the first time in more than a decade, I am back into the swing of things. I'm not the only one. Today during the F-Bomb's shaving, or even while watching the Xavier game at the Tate theater, I overheard plenty of people saying things to the extent of "I've never really watched basketball, but I guess I have to now." Nothing breeds fans like success. I don't doubt that Stegman will be packed for the home opener next season so we can all be there to see a banner put up, and a solid start to the season will do nothing but build excitement, expectations, and goodwill. The team is returning some talented, experienced players. The incoming recruiting class is probably a better one than you would expect from a team that struggled as much as ours did (March excepted). Best of all, we are unlikely to witness a season full of so many...distractions...anytime soon. We don't need to win an SEC championship next year, but regular season improvement and another post season trip would continue to build on the foundation that was layed this year. Doing that would lead to an even more energized fanbase, program stability (which was no doubt helped by the grace period the F-Bomb just bought himself),higher quality recruits, and even more improved results. Basically, the last week of the season gave this program potential for the future. It is up to the players and coaches to make something of it. If they can, we could look back on those two days at Alexander Memorial Coliseum as the moment that blew the lid off the basketball program. That tornado could have been Dennis Felton's hobnail boot.

by SG Standard on Apr 18, 2008 6:16 PM EDT up 0 recs