Are Hartman Fund Contributors Sending the Signal That Mark Richt's Job is Not Yet in Real Jeopardy?
by T Kyle King on Jul 20, 2011 9:19 AM EDT
in Georgia Bulldogs Football
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PrintWhile I agree with Senator Blutarsky’s critique of Seth Emerson’s thoughts on Mark Richt’s job security, I’m starting to come around to the school of thought that Coach Richt’s seat may not be as hot as we think in 2011.
Assuming the Georgia Bulldogs are in store for a season that is neither stellar nor shameful---say, an 8-4 regular season, a second-place finish in the SEC East, and a win in the Chick-fil-A or Outback Bowl---the decision may come down to which of his former bosses, Vince Dooley or Jeremy Foley, Greg McGarity is most inclined to emulate, but, to the considerable extent that this decision will be dictated by the bottom line, recent developments are breaking in favor of maintaining the status quo, staff-wise:
Assignment of football season tickets, as well as a portion of single-game home and away tickets, for the 2011 season has taken place, The Georgia Bulldog Club announced today. . . .
Those patrons who ordered additional non-renewable season tickets will not have their order fulfilled and will be issued a refund. . . .
South Carolina: No single game tickets were available for this game as South Carolina receives the maximum allotment for a visiting team. . . .
Auburn: No single game tickets were available for this game as Auburn receives the maximum allotment for a visiting team.
Although all Hartman Fund contributors who ordered Mississippi State, Tennessee, and Kentucky tickets had their orders filled, future press releases will announce which donors were able to purchase tickets to the Ole Miss, Vanderbilt, Florida, and Georgia Tech games, which means there were more Georgia fans willing to pay to attend those games than there were seats in which to put them.
This decision won’t be entirely about the money, but it will be dollar-driven to a much greater extent than rank-and-file fans would like, or than they would like to think. I knew before the midpoint of the 1993 season that Ray Goff had to go, but "significant improvement" was not demanded of him until the Bulldogs’ failures on the field led to reduced contributions. For good or ill, the job security of a head football coach who has generated neither unmanageable scandal nor an atrocious record---and Mark Richt has done neither---is as tied to the financial health of the athletic association as it is to any other single factor. To the substantial degree that the largesse of Hartman Fund donors is a yardstick for measuring the health of the program, Coach Richt appears to be on significantly sounder ground than any of us expected last New Year’s Day.
Go ‘Dawgs!
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The check that I got in the mail last week...
… is proof that all season ticket holders who ordered Boise State tickets didn’t get them, either.
I'm pretty sure they did...
…otherwise, why would they be releasing tickets to the general public on Monday?
Perhaps you ordered club level tickets, were assigned upper level tickets, and were being refunded the difference? Or maybe you just pissed off Freddy Jones a decade ago and he showed back up out of nowhere to exact his revenge.
by FisheriesDawg on Jul 20, 2011 11:01 AM EDT up reply actions
Hmm... I'll have to investigate this.
I would not at all discount the Freddy Jones factor. He’s a sneaky one, that guy.
by vineyarddawg on Jul 20, 2011 12:05 PM EDT up reply actions
I think it also reminds us of where we are
as a program. People are dissatisfied sure, but they know that we’re super close. They may not think Richt has the ability to break through. But at the same time, we don’t feel as far away as we did at the end of Goff or Donnan. The feeling is that we’ve just kind of stagnated. But despite all our hair shirt wearing and hair tearing, we’ve stagnated at a pretty good spot relative to where a lot of schools would like to be.
I’m not for stagnation, and in all honesty I think that if another coach came in we could finally take the program to the top. I also think it’s just as likely that we could slip back into the days where the program highlight is an Outback victory over Wiscadue and not beating Florida, Tech, Auburn, or Tenn.
That’s why I’m patient. But even mine will where thin without a fla victory.
What is atrocious for a program like UGA?
8-5, 6-7, and a hypothetical 8-4 is pretty bad. At that point, it would be obvious that there is in fact a trend.
That trend was enough to fire Jim Donnan. Should a coach be retained for his early glories when it is clear those glory days will not be returning?
Those records are bad, not atrocious. Whether they are fireable offenses . . .
. . . is a matter of some dispute. The answer to your concluding question depends upon your definition of clarity. Many in Bulldog Nation no doubt were asking the same thing of Wally Butts four losses into “The Drought”; many in Bulldog Nation certainly were asking the same thing of Vince Dooley after the 1974 season. Reasonable fans may differ over whether Coach Butts’s 1959 SEC championship and four-game winning streak over Georgia Tech constituted a return to some semblance of glory; Coach Dooley’s successes between 1975 and 1983 are not arguable.
Go 'Dawgs!
also
We did go to the sugar bowl three years ago. It’s not like he had only early successes.
by Mark Mandingo on Jul 20, 2011 2:14 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
2007 is a hard year to figure...
yet it had the absolutely amazing wins against UF and AU, capped off by a demolition of Hawai’i. But that season also included a loss to SC, an embarrasingly ugly L to Tennessee, and a near-defeat to Vandy. If that Vandy game gets a bounce for the worse, do we generate the momentum that carried us through the blackout? Do the wheels fall off the bus sooner and Willie/etc moves get forced earlier in the timeline?
http://sportsandgrits.blogspot.com/
Consecutive Rebuilding Years
The timeline of which you speak is something I found myself wondering about many times during last year’s games. The high powered offense that caught fire late in 2007 and carried over into 2008 masked a lot of deficiencies that now seem to have been around forever. Double digit win seasons, even “disappointing” ones like 2008, tend to argue against major changes the status quo. It is difficult to address a problem when you’re not quite convinced that it is a large scale, priority issue.
While hindsight validates many of the concerns raised about the team much earlier, I’ve always felt the real wake up call was the 2009 season, and even that season had to be played out before things could be effectively diagnosed.
by Cousin Pat from Georgia on Jul 20, 2011 3:17 PM EDT up reply actions
Yeah it definitely was weird
After Tennessee it felt a little like the wheels where coming off. Then they went back on. It’s also weird because if kentucky beats Tenn, we go to Atlanta. And in my homer mind, I’m convinced we would’ve stoned LSU. And then we would be in the big game in New Orleans instead of the little one.
But it’s hard to think this way. If I remember correctly, Vandy came close to beating Tenn and Manning in ’97. I remember watching it during the Tech game. That would have put Jim Donnan in Atlanta in a rematch with that Auburn team. Would a trip to the ATL have gotten Donnan on the right track.
by Mark Mandingo on Jul 20, 2011 3:33 PM EDT up reply actions
I'll agree we win that game...
LSU was not playing well at the time, having lost to Arky the week before. And if Tennessee had a QB that wasn’t gifting INTs that game, they probably win. Considering how LSU played that day, and the roll we were on at the time, it’s pretty easy convincing that we’d have won if we made it there.
http://sportsandgrits.blogspot.com/
Are you an Arsenal F.C. fan, GoonerDawg...
… or is a “gooner” a type of feral animal that is related to the echidna?
by vineyarddawg on Jul 20, 2011 2:52 PM EDT up reply actions
Big Arsenal fan. . .
I’m a glutton for teams that don’t live up to their potential.
Go Dawgs and Gunners!
I'll try not to hold it against you :-)
"If there's one thing worse than chlamydia, it's Florida." ~ Emma Stone
by RedCrake on Jul 20, 2011 10:41 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
perception
is a funny thing. Mark Richt’s 2001 record was 8-4. That was a ‘pretty bad season’, I guess.
Right now, 8-4 seems pretty good to me considering the disaster that July has become.
"If we score, we may win. If they never score, we'll never lose."
-Erk Russell
I'll never consider 8-4 "pretty good"
maybe understandable with extenuating circumstances, but an 8-4 football season from UGA will never be deemed “pretty good” barring a catastrophic run of injuries (which would fall under the understandable with extenuating circumstances category)..
http://sportsandgrits.blogspot.com/
I would agree with that categorization.
8-4 is never good; sometimes, it is understandable (this year might be such a year); sometimes, it is acceptable (2001 was such a year); sometimes, it is disastrous (2000 was such a year); but it is never good.
My point was that an 8-4 regular season, with the attributes I outlined above, would put us in a grey area. Everyone agrees that a 10-2 regular season and an Eastern Division championship would ensure that Mark Richt returned in 2012, and that a 6-6 regular season and another Liberty Bowl loss would guarantee that he didn’t, but that a middling year would leave us in doubt as to Greg McGarity’s decision. It wasn’t a prediction; it was a hypothetical to get us to the point of considering what factors might be determinative. Absent scandal, I believe such a season would cause McGarity to look primarily at the financial bottom line. Fan discontent is one thing; fan discontent expressed through the use, vel non, of the checkbook is something else again. Currently, we have the former, but not the latter. That’s all I meant.
For the record, I think the Bulldogs will either be a team clearly on the upswing or clearly on the downslide. Whichever way this one breaks, I don’t expect there to be much room for debate, even though some folks will be pleased, and some displeased, either way. I feel certain that, on the first Saturday in December, 90 per cent or more of the denizens of Bulldog Nation will say, “Yeah, this is the way it has to be,” regardless of whether they like the way it has to be.
Go 'Dawgs!
"Categorization" . . .
. . . probably should have been “characterization.” I don’t know what I was thinking.
Go 'Dawgs!
A middling year...
would leave us with another 12 months, minimum, of the same already worn out and tired, debates on going at the moment of will he won’t he, is he isn’t he, able to get this thing going back to an elite level. And I’d agree with your checkbook/bottom line evaluation method as an accurate one.
I also hope you’re right that this will be a clear make or break year. I’m tired of these hot seat discussions, and another year of mediocre maybe we’re improving, maybe we’re treading water before finally drowning type perfromances would cause tremendous aggravation.
http://sportsandgrits.blogspot.com/
I agree
If its not a clear “keep Mark Richt” season, even if I still want him, I couldn’t do another off season of feeling like I crapped on the table when I defend him at dinner parties.
/doesn’t actually go to dinner parties
by Mark Mandingo on Jul 20, 2011 3:49 PM EDT up reply actions
"team clearly on the upswing or clearly on the downslide"
Is it allowed to suggest instead to you T Kyle King sir that 10-4 or worse yet 10-3 – meaning we didn’t even play in The SEC Championship for the 6th consecutive season in this Down SEC East, is
more of the same…
We have squandered the assets given Mark Richt’s coaching staff, have a 3-9 record vs teams finishing in the AP Poll Top 10 in his 1st 10 years and have added for insult an additional 10 losses to teams who did not even finish in the AP Poll Top 25 in his 1st 10 years. Of the 3 wins, we lost 4 games 1 of those 3 years, we lost 3 games the second of those 3 and lost 4 games the 3rd of those 3 years we actually did beat a team who ended up in the AP Poll Top 10. Auburn won 7 games vs teams who finished in the AP Poll Top 25 and 2 of those wins were against teams finishing in The AP Poll Top 10.
This season surely we will put the ball on the carpet up for grabs with 24 fumbles.
Our secondary is non-existent.
Our OL is full of holes.
We have no fullback.
We have no tailback.
We cannot call plays.
We are insistent on a pass-happy offense.
We have no one who has sacked a quarterback on the roster.
We were # 72 in the nation at even making a 1st Down last season.
We have lost 10 players off this team since this time last year who figured all 10 they would start against Boise State who now will not play at all. And, that number is counting and continuing to grown every day.
Our Wide Receivers are not any of them great.
We play 10 cupcakes this season with the softest easiest schedule ever faced by any Georgia Bulldogs’ football coach and in The SEC East which has been and continues again this season to be Down SEC East.
SEC East may be the weakest Division of any football conference in America.
We don’t beat the truly great teams and the only 3 times we ever have in the entire Mark Richt Era, we had clearly poor records anyway all 3 years. 2001 you want to talk about as so great T Kyle King sir, we beat # 4 vols to knock lid off this # 11 all-time most wins Division 1-A football program and lost 4 games that season. David Greene never beat another team his entire career who ended up in the AP Poll Top 10. 2006 when DJ Shockley beat # 6 LSU for The SEC Championship we were told how great Joe Tereshinski III was and he stunk it up against Florida forcing us to put DJ back in full-time vs Auburn and lost and then I sat down at the Sugar Bowl in the Georgia Dome and started booing Michael F. Adam$ and his wife, and we were soon making friends with West Virginia fans – losing 28 to nothing before losing. That’s it for seasons in which we did beat truly great teams.
2002 The SEC had a grand total of just only # 14 Auburn besides us in the Final Coaches’ Poll Top 25. The SEC was down. Is that Mark Richt’s fault ? Absolutely not, but going 0-11 on 3rd Down Conversions against Florida who did not even end up in the Coaches’ Poll Top 25 certainly is the fault of Mark Richt and his coaching staff. We were better than Florida.
2007 LSU beat 2 teams who finished in The AP Poll Top 10. Mark Richt and his coaching staff not only beat 0 teams who finished in the AP Poll Top 10 in 2007 but in addition lost in a blow-out to the vols and lost to a South Carolina team who finished the 2007 season 6-6 and not even in a bowl game.
I am sorry T Kyle King, but I don’t see 2011 as
any
different
whatsoever.
What I see is that we have lost 21 games over the last entire 5 years and that season, you, T Kyle King are predicting yet again exactly
MORE
OF
THE
SAME.
Could we please before the season starts, not suggest to Mark Richt and his coaching staff and remaining scholarship players that another 4-loss season is just fine and dandy and acceptable ?
We have been clearly on the downslide with 21 Losses these last entire 5 years, right T Kyle King ? An average in Excess of 4 Losses a season over the last entire 5 seasons. This season we play 10 cupcakes and all of a sudden THAT is acceptable in your view that we are 10-4. I would recommend that we all should tell Mark Richt and his coaching staff and all the players that they must instead GATA.
by Thomas Brown UGA on Jul 21, 2011 1:53 AM EDT up reply actions
OMG - you are back with your lack of paragraphs.
"One thing I will never do as long as I’m at Georgia is lose to Florida." - Herschel Walker
Yeah, and we all knew it was Thomas Brown UGA before we even cleared . . .
. . . the first non-paragraph, didn’t we?
All right, we got it, Thomas Brown UGA. Mark Richt sucks. Everything sucks. Even the parts we thought didn’t suck secretly sucked.
I really wish the internet had been around in 1974 so Thomas Brown UGA could have lectured us all on how bad Vince Dooley had been the previous six seasons and how nothing would ever be good again until we ran him off.
I understand and respect that reasonable Georgia fans can disagree over Mark Richt’s stewardship of the program and what the future is apt to hold. However, inasmuch as Coach Richt almost certainly will not be fired between now and September 3, I would respectful request that folks like Thomas Brown UGA try actually rooting for the team.
That’s what bugs me more than anything. It’s one thing to be a critic who’s there, day in and day out, but I’m getting sick and tired of Georgia fans like Thomas Brown UGA who never show up to cheer when things are going well but always show up to bitch when they aren’t.
Go 'Dawgs!
Some English soccer fans do that, too...
… and are apparently not shrewd enough to catch when a joke is being made at their expense.
by vineyarddawg on Jul 21, 2011 10:08 AM EDT up reply actions
Are we better fans of the team, hyping them before they do a thing ?
I remained resolved that fans who cannot see anything wrong, are the source of problems within this football program; and that they the ones who put the efforts of others down to their own aggrandizement only, while the friends are those who dare to suggest that the other group settling for what they see, should instead be suggesting to the players and to the coaching staff that they instead must GATA. Thank you for letting me have my opinion, T Kyle King.
by Thomas Brown UGA on Jul 22, 2011 12:01 AM EDT up reply actions
If we go 10-3...
meaning that we don’t make it to the SECCG, then perhaps the SEC East isn’t as down as you believe. It could mean that we went 5-3 in the league with wins over Boise, Georgia Tech, and decent to good Big Ten team. In that case, it means someone probably went 6-2 in the league out of the East (didn’t happen last year).
If you think one of our losses comes to Boise (most likely) or Tech, then it means that somebody in the division went 7-1 (or 6-2 with a win over a 10-win UGA team). If that team is Florida, I’d guess they’re pretty doggone good with at least three wins from among Alabama, LSU, Auburn, Georgia and South Carolina.
by FisheriesDawg on Jul 21, 2011 12:15 PM EDT up reply actions
Which is, again, why I say there is no magic number at this time.
"One thing I will never do as long as I’m at Georgia is lose to Florida." - Herschel Walker
"6-2 in the league out of the East (didn't happen last year.)"
The best The SEC East could produce last season was 1-game over .500 and that was South Carolina who ended the season with 5 SEC wins and 4 SEC losses. If that is not the very definition of a Down Division – The SEC East – pray tell, what might be in your considered opinion ?
10-3, which is worse than 10-4, meaning that we have not even played in The SEC Championship Game for then after this season, 6 Consecutive years and counting, is what you are arguing as a great season. I guess that about says it all about your position. Mine is that we play 10 cupcakes, all 10 of whom we should beat. That to be truly great, we must beat truly great teams – a definition of which is they finish in the AP Poll Top 10; and, that we must not lose to the truly bad teams – a definition of which is they do not finish in the AP Poll Top 25, even.
10-3 then I see as lackluster. The 1 advantage we have 2011-2012 is that we play none of the truly great SEC West teams, no game against Arkansas, LSU or Alabama. Were we able to play them, we lose by several touchdowns to all 3. The SEC East is a down division, yet our paltry 13-12 record vs this Eastern Division of The SEC over these last 5 years is testament to the fact that despite there only has been 1 team in The SEC East over these last 5 years – and, now they are down too – here we sit 13-12 and calling it great in your opinion that we get CLOCKED by any of 3 SEC West teams to be 10-4. Or, better yet that The SEC East is great you surmise and yet, poor us we STILL did not even play in The SEC Championship Game for the 6th consecutive season.
Pardon me for offending your delicate nature to even contemplate on my part that the # 11 college football program all-time in 1-A wins is somehow justified with our 21 Losses these last 5 years (2 more losses than Jim Donnan suffered his entire 5 years here for which we summarily fired him.) averaging these last 5 years after 2005 more than 4 losses a season and that then 10-3 is therefore great with our soft easy cupcake-filled schedule being the 1 advantage we have this season. Never mind, the coaching staffs assembled by Mark Richt have lost to 10 teams already in his 1st 10 years who do did even end up in the AP Poll Top 25 – and this for the # 11 college football program all-time in 1-A wins.
If you cannot see The SEC East is down, you remain the only person on this planet with such a vision. Thank you for allowing me my opinion.
by Thomas Brown UGA on Jul 22, 2011 12:18 AM EDT up reply actions
You're getting better.
If you drop the personal call outs and sarcasm, you will be at a point of putting on a great argument.
And Thomas Brown, please head my advice, do those two things, and TKK will promote your counter arguments. I say this, because, with a few little twists and turns here and there, I am not that far from disagreeing with you, and you are on the verge a sound argument. Furthermore, I know TKK likes and promotes a differing opinion when done without the slashing nature.
"One thing I will never do as long as I’m at Georgia is lose to Florida." - Herschel Walker
OMG
they quit making prozac.
"If we score, we may win. If they never score, we'll never lose."
-Erk Russell
I was being
somewhat facetious. And somewhat realistic. 8-4 sucks. 6-7 sucks worse. And Kyle is absolutely correct: We’re either riding the elevator up or riding it down this season.
Having said this, I was feeling pretty good about things…back in June. Now, I just don’t know anymore. Going into a season with virtually no experience at tailback and a thin offensive line is what prompted me to declare what I said.
"If we score, we may win. If they never score, we'll never lose."
-Erk Russell
Started ordering season tickets in 1993
No contribution required. Continued to order with no contribution required through 2004. In 1996 when I was pregnant and coming to the games with my 4 year old I requested tickets at the top of the lower level so it would be easier to get to my seats. This continued through the toddler years of my second child.
Until we go back to that, Mark Richt’s seat should be pretty cool.
by hbtd on Jul 20, 2011 6:01 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
Junkyard Blawg at AJC has a thing going about hot seat talk.
I am not going to link it, because really I dont want you to read AJC’s crappy AJC UGA journalism and even worse comments.
Everyone wants to assign a number. There is no magic number. THERE IS NO MAGIC NUMBER.
And there is absolutely nothing on paper saying CMR will be fired if certain things dont happen. What will happen is we will have a football season, and the AD will evaluate the season, and go from there.
Freaking tired of this cart ahead of the horse non sense.
"One thing I will never do as long as I’m at Georgia is lose to Florida." - Herschel Walker
I think all of the cheating revelations and upcoming changes in the rules changes the calculus here.
I mean, Mark Richt has won 2 SEC titles, has been to another SEC Championship Game, and had whatever you’d call the 2007 season, all without one whiff of the kind of cheating now being revealed as happening at every other SEC champion not named “Florida” during that time.
The fact that Richt has achieved all of his accomplishments “cleanly” is going to count as a significant mark in his favor, in my opinion.
I don’t think that’ll necessarily save his job if he has another below-.500 season, but that’s the reason I don’t think he’ll be fired for a 7-win or 8-win season.
by vineyarddawg on Jul 20, 2011 7:47 PM EDT reply actions 2 recs
Coach Mark Rhetor-Richt
The Dawg Nation does not want a coach with 8 or 9 wins……..they want and deserve and coach that wins Championships plural!
You're half right...
The other half: they want an honorable, respectable coach. Being a parent of teens, I can tell you my opinion of the coach would weigh heavily on my kids’ decision, hence why I think CMR is still pulling some great recruits.
Success is never final. --Winston Churchill
Mark Richt & his coaching staff are not & will not be judged by season tickets
Mark Richt and his coaching staff will be judged on everything but how many season tickets are purchased T Kyle King, sir, as this will not have any bearing whatsoever.
How many of us boo, however, might.
by Thomas Brown UGA on Jul 21, 2011 1:19 AM EDT reply actions
I do not know which is more astounding, sir, . . .
. . . your utter lack of comprehension of basic business principles, or your complete ignorance of the reality of history.
Go 'Dawgs!
By the way, . . .
. . . given the evident correlation between the tenor and the time-stamp of your comments, Thomas Brown UGA, I believe you are neither a troll nor an echidna, but the internet equivalent of a gremlin. My suggestion to you, sir, is that you not get wet, that you keep out of bright light, and that you never post your thoughts on the internet after midnight.
Go 'Dawgs!
by T Kyle King on Jul 21, 2011 9:23 AM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
9:23 am EDT Mr. T Kyle King, sir ?
Do you not have any employment, or are you allowed in your employment sir, to go to any site on the Internet and goof off with whatever you want to pass off as an indictment of 1 who dares to disagree with you, sir ? It is either 1 or the other of those 2 choices, or this is your job, an even sadder predicament for 1 who proposes as the topic of his blog this day with 42 comments so-far, that our esteemed and fine individual who has for 11 years now assembled this garbage coaching staff of his to mismanage our recruits, allow willy-nilly play calling and generally for 10 years to have a 3-9 record vs teams finishing in the AP Poll Top 10 with 10 additional losses these same previous 10 years to teams who did not even finish in the AP Poll Top 25. I thank you for allowing my opinion, so over-matched as I am against those who can be paid all day long to find fault not with what is said, but others as if your own doesn’t stink to high heaven.
by Thomas Brown UGA on Jul 22, 2011 12:35 AM EDT up reply actions
Shit Dawg
I just posted some kind hearted advice above and two seconds later you poop in your kennel.
So, now, screw it. Wannna call me out for why I have been blogging all day? I got an answer for me, Kyle or you, NUNYA.
"One thing I will never do as long as I’m at Georgia is lose to Florida." - Herschel Walker
I think you’re onto something – the new tl;dr – tsmw (time stamp makes worthless). Just for clarification going forward, during what times are respectable, well-bred folks supposed to post? 3-4pm is out (obviously) for tea time, but I’m pretty open other than that.
And for what it’s worth, I’m sure Kyle was only available to post at 9:23am because his polo lessons were delayed by the weather.
"It'll only be reviewed because the guys up in the booth want to watch it a few times too." AJ's one-handed catch at Colorado
Polo lessons start promptly at 1:25 PM.
I believe the time segment from 9:00-9:30 AM is set aside for a morning opium break.
/British’ed
by vineyarddawg on Jul 22, 2011 9:58 AM EDT up reply actions
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