Hi! Welcome to Dawg Sports. We here are fans of the Georgia Bulldogs, about whom you lately may have heard a few things, all of which were unflattering. If you came here hoping to find out who we are and what we’re all about, you’re in luck, because this is your primer on all things Bulldog.
Here’s what you need to know about Georgia:
- We’re thugs. You can tell this because our head coach, who adopts Ukrainian orphans through his church and sells vacation homes to raise money to give to the poor, consistently has handed down meaningful discipline within 48 hours of learning of a player arrest for more than a decade. Right after being hired, he ran off a three-year starter at quarterback, and, that fall, he booted from the team a three-year starter at running back just before the Bulldogs played an in-state rival against whom the Red and Black had a three-game losing streak, which was one of the main reasons Coach Richt’s predecessor was fired. We have the Southeastern Conference’s toughest anti-alcohol policy, and we have the Southeastern Conference’s toughest anti-drug policy. We’ve been known to hold academically eligible players out of games for missing meetings with tutors, and we’ve been known to hold otherwise eligible players out of games just to let them know we love them. When players get into trouble with the law, it’s almost always for minor administrative matters (like having a license suspended due to unpaid parking tickets), or for things you didn’t even know were against the law (like misspelling your middle name to a police officer or emerging from an alley), or for things that probably shouldn’t be against the law (like having a can of beer in your hand when you’re 20 years old, eating brownies you didn’t know had marijuana in them, or falling asleep inside a locked bathroom stall). When players get into more serious trouble with the law, they routinely are suspended for big games or kicked off the team altogether. There has been a dramatic decline in player arrests in the last year and a half. According to reputable major media outlets, all this is evidence that we’re out of control in comparison to rival schools that fail to enforce standards in places where police and prosecutors give preferential treatment to scholarship athletes. Do not try to make sense of this, because it is glaringly stupid and nonsensical. Just accept it as a fact, despite its obvious absurdity.
- We only won the East last year because our schedule was weak. The Bulldogs didn’t face a slate as tough as that navigated by the South Carolina Gamecocks. South Carolina, for instance, had to play such quality SEC teams as the Auburn Tigers, Florida Gators, Kentucky Wildcats, Mississippi St. Bulldogs, Tennessee Volunteers, and Vanderbilt Commodores, whereas Georgia was able to skate by with playing such mediocre SEC teams as the Auburn Tigers, Florida Gators, Kentucky Wildcats, Mississippi St. Bulldogs, Tennessee Volunteers, and Vanderbilt Commodores. The Gamecocks also had to play the Arkansas Razorbacks, who went 11-2 overall and 6-2 in SEC play, while the Bulldogs got away with playing the South Carolina Gamecocks, who went 11-2 overall and 6-2 in SEC play. This yawning chasm in schedule strength, rather than, say, the ability, vel non, to beat a mediocre Auburn team at home, accounts entirely for the way the Red and Black lucked into playing in Atlanta. The only break the Garnet and Black caught last year was in getting to play crummy Georgia.
- We only keep Mark Richt because we’re tolerant of mediocrity. We don’t insist upon excellence like, say, the Alabama Crimson Tide, which is why ‘Bama has Nick Saban and we’re stuck with Mark Richt. Between the two, there simply is no comparison. Coach Saban has a .729 career winning percentage as a college head coach, has gone 7-6 in bowl games, has led his teams to four SEC Championship Game appearances and won three Southeastern Conference championships, has guided his teams to five top ten final rankings in the coaches’ poll and five finishes of no worse than tied for first in the division in ten years as an SEC head coach, and has posted double-digit win totals in six of his 16 seasons as a college head coach, including a string of four in a row. This stands in stark contrast to the meager achievements of Coach Richt, who has a .736 career winning percentage as a college head coach, has gone 7-4 in bowl games, has led his teams to four SEC Championship Game appearances and won two Southeastern Conference championships, has guided his teams to six top ten final rankings in the coaches’ poll and five finishes of no worse than tied for first in the division in eleven years as an SEC head coach, and has posted double-digit win totals in seven of his eleven seasons as a college head coach, including a string of four in a row. Clearly, it is a sign of weakness that we put up with a guy so demonstrably inferior to the Armani Bear.
- If you lose to us in the Independence Bowl, you will be invited to join our conference. It’s a really good consolation prize, when you think about it.
- We suspend players in bunches, arranged by position group. Sure, it increases our risk of losing games due to a single weak link, but it’s much more orderly, and it helps knee-jerk reporters and rival partisans pigeonhole and overgeneralize without being bothered by minutiae. Did you know that the first two letters of the abbreviation for “The University of Georgia” and the last two letters of the word “thug” are the same? You can use that if you like; no need to give us credit.
- If you beat us in a bowl game, your relationship to the Big East will change for the better shortly. If you’re out, they’ll let you in, but, if you’re in, they’ll let you out, which is the way to go, really.
- Everyone’s a rival. We don’t like anyone, and no one likes us. Some people even dislike us for not disliking them enough.
- If you’re an up-and-coming team and you schedule a season opener against us in what you anticipate will be a breakout season, be patient. We’re going to beat you the first time, but, one year later, your program is going to take off like a rocket. Just take your whipping and know that better days are ahead. Oh, by the way, you’ll get us in the rematch, so it all ends well for you.
- We’re good at sports rich people play. Golf? Horseback riding? Lacrosse? Tennis? Yep, we’re good at all of it. Affluent metropolitan Atlanta suburbs FTW!
- If you lose to us, you suck, because everyone knows we never play anybody. I mean, that basically goes without saying, doesn’t it?
We hope this primer has acquainted you with what it means to be Georgia, but, naturally, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask them in the comments below!
Go ‘Dawgs!