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Defensive coordinator Teryl Austin was a Steve Addazio hire. The two worked together at Syracuse, and Austin said Addazio called him a few days before National Signing Day to gauge his interest in the job in case it came open. This means Meyer and Addazio knew George Edwards might be planning to skip town before signing day.

It's believed an agreement with Edwards has been in place for awhile. The announcement of his hiring came a day after the college signing day for high school recruits.

Georgia didn't end up impressing to the degree Bulldog fans wanted to. UGA lost out on some highly touted recruits, some to other SEC schools like Da'Rick Rogers to Tennessee. The final ranking was not as high as most wanted either, but there's a good reason for that. Georgia signed just 19 players, and a larger class with the same proportion of star ratings as those 19 would have resulted in a much higher ranking. On an average star basis, Mark Richt made out better than a lot of the teams ranked above him, so while it wasn't a blowout day, it wasn't a failure either.

One more point about Da’Rick. You hear a lot of whispers about what really went into his defection and off-field concerns about him, but in the wake of his putting on the orange cap, all that sounds like the same sort of sour grapes that emanated from the other side last year when Marlon Brown pulled a similar 180 and signed with the Dogs. Let’s not stoop to that level. The kid had a change of heart. Leave it at that.

Lonnie Outlaw makes Fred Gibson look like a girl. He’s the most demoralizing player I have ever coached against. We triple-covered him, and he still caught everything.

Georgia benefits most from averaging, going up three places because the Dawgs only have commitments from 19 players this year. Moving up one: Alabama, LSU, Mississippi State. Down one: Tennessee, Ole Miss, Arkansas.

Of course, that's all relative. There's not such a large gap between most of the upper-tier teams that it's going to take a heck of a lot of "coachin' 'em up" to make most of these teams very good. There are some league champions that would likely take the No. 3 or No. 4 class in the SEC. . . .

In the end, coaching still plays a pivotal role in all of this. Ron Zook proved that winning in February doesn't automatically translate into winning in November. It sure helps -- does anyone think the spread option would work as well with Vanderbilt's level of recruits as with Florida's? -- but it isn't fait accompli.

Of the top 25 classes, Georgia signed the third fewest number of players at just 19. If you take away Lonnie Outlaw, who will go to GMC, then Georgia is tied for the fewest with Ohio State and USC. Penn State (20 signees) was the only other team in the top 25 with fewer than 22.

Of the 11 other SEC schools, none had fewer than 24 commitments.

If you go simply by the average number of stars for a class, Georgia scored a 3.47 -- the second-highest total in the SEC and the ninth-best mark overall.

If there’s a bottom line here, it’s that I can’t say I’m particularly surprised that Georgia’s incoming class doesn’t match the level of some of its predecessors, at least on paper. A disappointing two-year run for the program, an unfair "hot seat" meme that no doubt made the rounds and a historic change to the defensive staff all contributed to that. But as Paul notes, it’s not like a bunch of stiffs are coming to Athens this year. Don’t let yourself get wrapped up in the departures so much that you lose sight of what kids like Jakar Hamilton will (hopefully) bring to the table.

As for this recruiting class, there's a lot of talent in it. It would be a shame to focus almost exclusively on the kids we didn't get.