From the outside, the minor existential crisis at Georgia over last year's descent to 8-5 is a classic in the genre of spoiled overreaction: After six 10-win season, five top-10 finishes and two SEC championships, coach Mark Richt has obviously earned a mulligan. On paper, in terms of money, recruiting and wins over any significant portion of the last decade, the Bulldogs are still clearly among the league's elite.

But you can't really blame UGA fans for feeling like blowouts at the hands of East Division rivals Florida and Tennessee (in a down year for Tennessee, no less) in between losses to Oklahoma State and Kentucky was less of a mulligan than the beginning of the bottom falling out. Since Urban Meyer's Florida Death Star became fully operational in 2006, there seem to have been a lot of little mulligans. There was the disappointing 4-4 start that year with a rebuilding lineup led by a true freshman quarterback, followed by the lackluster start over the first half of 2007. And even after an emerging group of young stars tore through the second half of that season en route to a No. 2 finish in the final polls, they failed to capitalize on that potential with three ugly loses in their three biggest games – against Alabama, Florida and Georgia Tech – after opening the season atop the mainstream polls in 2008.

If you've been strapped in for the long run, then, last year was only worst in a series of disappointments . . .