Welcome to Dawg Sports!
If you found your way here from my historic home at Kyle on Football, I thank you for making the jump over to SportsBlog Nation with me. I would be most grateful if you could go ahead and bookmark my new website and link to it while it's on your mind.
If your arrival here was via some route other than through my aforementioned former weblog, I offer a warm welcome and an introduction.
My name is T. Kyle King. I am a two-time graduate of The University of Georgia, having received my undergraduate degree there in 1990, followed by a law degree in 1997.
When not engaged in the practice of law or spending time with my family, I (like many citizens of Bulldog Nation) devote absurd amounts of time to University of Georgia athletics.
For six seasons, from 1999 to 2004, I was the co-host of "The Dawg Show" on local cable television in Henry County, Georgia, alongside my brother-in-law, Travis Rice.
During the years the program was on the air, I devoted a fair amount of time to researching and writing bits for the show and the results of these efforts ultimately became postings to my weblog.
Three people deserve thanks (or blame, depending upon how you choose to look at it) for my arrival at this juncture.
First of all, Paul Westerdawg provided the original encouragement for me to set up my previous site rather than continue to send out mass Bulldog-related e-mails to a growing list of readers.
Secondly, MGoBlog's Brian---to whom I refer as "The Lawgiver"---brought me into the larger college football weblogging community through the BlogPoll. If Paul made me aware that my fixation on Georgia football was shared by a larger group of Bulldog webloggers, Brian made me aware that this obsession with college football was not unique to webloggers in my environs.
To that list must now be added Burnt Orange Nation's Peter Bean, who encouraged and facilitated my move to SportsBlog Nation. For the most part, Peter provided this assistance directly, in correspondence between the two of us, but the transition really began last December, when Peter handed out the real weblog awards.
At that time, Burnt Orange Nation declared Kyle on Football to be the "Best 'Almost There' Blog." Peter explained that characterization thusly: "Simply put, Kyle covers Georgia and general college football so damn well that it's required reading. The site itself is a little crude, and you wish he'd take it up to the next level, but in the end, we're splitting hairs. It's the content that counts, and Kyle's got it. A genuinely thoughtful and kind writer that we can all learn a little bit from."
Naturally, I appreciated Peter's comments and his assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of my earlier site pretty closely mirrored my own sense of what I was doing well and where I needed to improve.
This brings me---and, by extension, you---to Dawg Sports. It should be apparent at first glance that my new site, like Burnt Orange Nation and such fellow college sports sites as Around the Oval, Bruins Nation, Schembechler Hall, and Swamp Ball, provides a distinct upgrade in appearance from my old one.
In addition, the Dawg Sports site provides the opportunity for us to interact, not just through the comments section, but also through the poll questions I am able to post and the diaries into which you are able to make entries. Clearly, this new location offers greater versatility, not just for me as author, but for you as reader and for both of us as fans.
Finally, my new home on the internet allows me to expand my range just a bit. Kyle on Football began last July, as the buildup to football season was becoming unbearable, and continued through the season, the postseason, and recruiting season into the winter, when other sports come to the fore.
When Sports Illustrated's "On Campus" page linked up with my old weblog, I was listed erroneously as "Kyle on Sports," not as Kyle on Football. Perhaps that Freudian slip on Sports Illustrated's part was a harbinger of things to come.
Although my primary focus will continue to be between the hedges, this new site will enable me to cover events in Stegeman Coliseum, Foley Field, and other Classic City venues, as well.
As my subject matter no longer will be limited to my ruminations on a single sport, but rather will include coverage of a greater array of Bulldog athletics, the move seemed appropriate and the name reflects the change. Hence, Kyle on Football has given way to . . . Dawg Sports.
Irrespective of the particular winding path by which you arrived here, I welcome you on board. I will look forward to hearing from you as we who bleed red and black turn our attention to all things Bulldog.
Go 'Dawgs!