This week didn’t disappoint in the message board universe with upsets, controversy and seasons crashing & burning. We’ll get to the Plains at the end of this week’s journey around college football. Let’s start out with the season crashing and burning in Tallahassee as Pitt ends any hope of a CFP berth for the Tribe.
The only defense really to limit Alabama and Ty Simpson now is leaking like a sieve as they give up 34 points and almost 500 yards to a Pitt team that has lost to the powerhouses of West Virginia and Louisville. Everyone who was hailing Mike Norvell as the turnaround genius in September is now back to calling for his head on a platter. Don’t look now, but the Seminoles have a surging Wake Forest team coming to Tallahassee and a trip for what may be a resurgent Clemson’s Super Bowl as Dabo fights for his job security in the Upstate.
Let’s jump out west to check in on the Handbags of the Northwest … Oregon.
“Humility is a week away” should be a motto plastered on every locker room and weight room in America. After being the latest team to rain on the annual Penn State white-out parade, Oregon gets slapped around at home by Indiana. I love Dan Lanning, but he seems to find a way to lose games his talent and NIL budget shouldn’t lose.
Their fans have a degree of entitlement and expectation not seen since Spurrier and Meyer were on the Hogtown sideline. I don’t care for that fanbase at all. 49-3, you jerks.
Let’s head down the left coast to the Coliseum to check on the state of the Michigan cheating Wolverines.
While not an upset (the Men of Troy were a home field advantage favorite), USC skull drags Michigan to the tune of almost 500 yards and a 2nd half 17-6 surge en route to an 18 point win. The Wolverines’ season is officially on the brink where they will have no marquee wins assuming they lose to anOSU in Ann Arbor. ESPN and the committee want Michigan in their invitational, so Saturday’s loss makes winning out mandatory.
On the other side, the Boy Wonder has Saturday’s trip to Notre Dame and a late season trip to Eugene to bolster their playoff resume or to put Riley officially on a hot seat entering 2026.
Let’s head to the Cotton Bowl and the Texas State Fair to check in on the Crimson and Cream at the Red River Shootout.
Texas methodically puts Oklahoma away with defense and special teams. Josh Pate has slobbered over John Mateer all season, and he doesn’t meet the moment against a Texas team that was reeling after last week’s loss to Florida. The Texas offense continues to sputter under the Archduke. I’m sure F-bum will start the Arch publicity machine back up again.
At least, Texas now has a Power 4 win unlike the Not so Happy Valley faithful after another loss to an overmatched opponent.
James Franklin seems to have completely lost the fan base. (Editor’s note: Franklin is now out as reported on Sunday) Everyone knows Penn State’s 2 wins in the CFP last year were of questionable value at best. Drew Allar is lost for the season with a leg injury. Penn State may be fighting for bowl eligibility this season after starting as the #2 team in the country to prove the value (or lack thereof) of the preseason polls.
I’m sure Franklin consulted today with the Voldemort of agents, Jimmy Sexton, on his buyout provisions to the tune of the 2nd largest buyout in CFB history (behind Dumbo).
Let’s end today’s trip on the Plains for a game that was truly the opening line of a Charles Dickens novel.
Geniuses calling for Kirby’s firing just need to get off the bandwagon and go find another team to cheer for. To the other geniuses who are saying it’s back to the “Donnon” days likely have no idea what they are talking about.
On the game itself, I have no idea what we were doing on either side of the ball in the 1st half. We had no answer on defense for what was one of the SEC’s worst offenses. In particular, Auburn had success running the ball where they could protect Jackson Arnold from making mistakes. On offense, we looked like we were up against the ‘86 Bears with the number of breakdowns we had in the offensive line.
Then, the fumble happened.
After that, the Dawgs took control of the game in a way I wasn’t sure we could do. We couldn’t get a consistent run game push, so Gunner was throwing it around. Our front 6 then absolutely took over the game as Auburn had less than 30 yards of total offense in the 2nd half. Why did that defensive effort not show up from the first snap? That’s what frustrating about this team. They are immensely talented while also being inconsistently motivated.
As to the last scoring drive, the Georgia offense did its best impression of a dementor by sucking the soul out of not just the Auburn defense but the entire program as shown by the reaction of the Auburn family.
It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch that cheered for Nick Fairley and retired Cam Newton’s jersey after being at the Alabama Cow College for all of 1 year.
What did you see this weekend? Let us know in the comments.
I’m beginning to get the impression that college football fans aren’t patient.
Or forgiving.
We’ve never been patient. I think we can all look in the mirror and know that.
The forgiving left the building when the coaches’ contracts went through the roof and ticket prices and contribution minimums skyrocketed.
Fans want it all and want it now.
You are so accurate with this statement. I’ve been a dawg fan since I started school in 1974 and I love our team and school and have given $$$ til I’ve bled. The coaches(and Kirby is my guy so don’t start that banter) and these salaries are ridiculous and REQUIRE high demands and expectations. We are dodging first half grenades with super human second half efforts. I’m not asking for heads(well maybe Searels from past experience) but I’m asking for some soul searching.
And no way Kirby wasn’t calling a TO. We weren’t getting that snap off even if he was complaining about clapping.
I blame Saban and the CFP for this. Seriously. Before Saban went on his decade-plus run of dominance, we rarely saw one team so often in the mix. Sure, there were some. Miami in the late 80s, Nebraska in the late 90s, USC here and there throughout history, but at least we had more variety in the champs for decades. Saban made every fan base think that they could be the next Bama if they just hired the right coach. Just look at how many coaches cycled through the SEC during his tenure. Kirby has brought us the closest to that, and now there’s a segment of our fan base who is unsatisfied unless we win it all every year.
The CFP has made it even worse. The BCS ended the era of voters picking the champs, but most fans realized that it would be near impossible for their team to be one of the top 2 at the end of the season. As long as a coach was going in the right direction, most fans were patient (outside the SEC). Then we had the 4-team playoff, but it was mostly conference champs competing. The title was more achievable, but barely. The 12-team playoff made it so more teams technically have a shot at the title, but that also means that coaches are now evaluated on making the playoffs. I think that’s going to lead to less patience and more firings if a coach can’t get an at-large bid.
Now, I’m not justifying Franklin’s firing. No coach has ever face-planted more often against ranked competition than him, and this year he doubled down and derped against two bad teams. He deserved to be shown the door.
Was moving on from Franklin worth $50,000,000+? I have no idea, but it seems that’s really the question. I can’t imagine Sexton was willing to negotiate the buyout down for a mid-season action by PSU.
I guess the only leverage is to lockout the HC from the facility and anything to do with the program, thus he has to sit home unable to take another job while making the regular salary for years vs a pot of money and a new gig/grift elsewhere immediately especially on TV.
I think that if the answer was that you were going to fire him at the end of the season if PSU didn’t make the CFP, then the answer was not only “yes” to the question of whether it was worth it but also the answer to the question of doing it in October. At 3-3 it would take a miracle for them to make the playoff. Their starting QB is done for the season. They are at Iowa, at Ohio State and have Indiana at home in their next three games. With or without Franklin, 4-5 is the best case scenario and 3-6 is likely. Looking for *bowl eligibility* in a season where you started #2 and 3-0 is a coaching failure like never before in history (literally, as like being the only head coach in history to lose back to back games to teams that you were favored by more than 20 points in).
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong. I know the record. I also know the bias including myself has against him from his days in Nashville.
It’s the same argument we all had in 2015. You better get the hire right, or you’re looking like complete fools for taking out a guy who has had a lot more success than failure over the last 12 years.
The $50m buyout in a time of revenue sharing and NIL is a financial drag on the entire athletic program even if you do raise the money to buyout the deal including the assistants. The assurances you’re going to have to give a coach and staff to come in after this are likely going to be high.
As I say, I don’t give a rat’s ass about James Franklin. He’s got money and will get enough where he doesn’t need to work again.
I hope Penn State flops, so I hope this coaching search blows up in their face.
It’s the absurd buyout clauses. Getting a huge gift for underperforming is obscene. Why are ADs afraid James Franklin, Hugh Sleeze, Norvell, etc. won’t take the job without one? But we all know it’s the big booster money backing these decisions so if billionaires want to throw away money it’s their right. Jimmy Sexton has been happy to oblige. You can’t or at least shouldn’t legislate against this but I submit it’s the most corrupting influence created by the feeling that dear old uni needs to chase after the Saban legacy as Carolinadawg has pointed out. On the other hand, if they hit the kids with a salary cap then so should they do the same for the coaches.
“I guess the only leverage is to lockout the HC from the facility and anything to do with the program.”
Vandy did that to Franklin and his assistants as they tried to “snap a picture of the whiteboard” on their way out to some hilarious results according to a friend that worked in their athletic department.
Ahh, the good old days. We thought Vince was making bank at 100k a year. And he turned down a cool million to go back to Auburn.
According to Brooks Austin, Auburn completely new plays for about the first 25 plays of the game that we had not seen or prepped for, but they used them all in the first two drives. He claims after that they went back to their same vanilla offense which is about 7 plays. Who knows?
That may be the case, but I saw better tackling for one thing and we shut down the run game. Then Jackson Arnold started coming back down to earth as we started getting pressure.
For our part Rusty Mansell said having Ellis Robinson and Damello Jones out there at the same time made a big difference. He pointed out Robinson cover Came Coleman who got a lot of pre game hype translated to Coleman being targeted three times for like six yards.
Robinson and Everette did a pretty good job of Coleman. Other than 1 jet sweep, Stallworth was a non-factor IIRC (too lazy to look at stats this morning).
One thing that scares me is the safety play of whoever is opposite Bolden. As a result, I hold my breath any time the ball goes deep. Thanks goodness we got pressure on the late deep ball to Stallworth because that had explosive play and likely TD written all over it.
We miss Malaki Starks as an eraser on the back end.
Oh that was a touchdown if Arnold didn’t have to hurry/throw off his back foot. Our guy was beat and Arnold had to hurry just enough that it went just beyond their guy’s finger tips. That was close.
It was also a great example of why we need to get pressure (even if it’s not a sack).
Oops. Didn’t see this before I posted below. 🙂
“Auburn completely new plays for about the first 25 plays of the game that we had not seen or prepped for, but they used them all in the first two drives”
Kirbs actually said the exact same thing that Brooks mentioned in his post-game comments.
If Freeze showed some razzle-dazzle in the first half…getting 10-17 pts at most…then he proved how worthless he is as a HC in the second half as they did show very little. Our biggest adjustment at halftime was designing how to get more pressure on Arnold and spying him better. Unable to run he’s just not that good of a passer. Can we please remember this over the next few weeks?
If Brooks said it you can take it to the bank. He unlike, we fans, knows more from his film reviews than anybody on the net. I guess this explains why our D coaches were looking like epileptic sign langue interpreters at first. They had zero clues.
Love the message boards posts every Monday keep ‘em coming. Hope Donnon who ever that is didn’t get his or her feelings hurt.
No wonder when SOS quit Florida he cited unappreciative fans as a major reason. Said he was sick and tired of hearing just winning the SEC championship was not enough.
I haven’t been able to find it yet but apparently Brooks Austin asked one of the Georgia defensive coaches on the way off the field at halftime what was up and Coach said something to the effect of “They’re out of plays. They had a week to get ready. We’ve seen everything they have.”
Which makes sense, ’cause the Dawgs ATE in the second half. GO DAWGS!
“They’re out of plays.” As much as I like that, I find it frustrating to watch this team not get guys on the ground in the first quarter. It looks like to me we really play in our “Base” defense the first couple drives before employing more advanced schemes, but not tackling in space and misses behind the line of scrimmage are killing us. If we tackle on 50% of our first half penetrations (don’t be lewd), would our number of sacks be tripled? As I complain like a rectal deposit because we just went on a 9-0 run against Auburn and probably pitched one of the best 2nd Half shutouts in the history of beating those fools.
I have to admit that reading through the Oregon message board examples that were provided looks exactly like reading through any major school messages boards, including our own. I hate those cocky, arrogant fans who think that we’re going to “smoke” every team we play (as we’ve seen, we rarely cover the spread when we win and no one seems to be “smoking” anyone very often these days).
I also don’t think that firing the head coach should be the first response when things go south (except for James Franklin – his issues were a pattern – can’t win the “big games” and now not even the “gimme” games – he lost his team). I prefer looking at the position coaches and/or the coordinators if the team looks like they haven’t practiced all week or are not ready to play (like we looked in the first half until “the fumble”). Yes, sometimes the play is good and it’s the execution, or the lack of (like missing a wide open Oscar Delp across the middle of the field or the reverse pass that Dillon Bell overthrew). But sometimes we’re either not playing up to standard or the playcalling is vanilla or just so predictable that my grandmother could guess what’s coming that Bobo or Shumann are easy targets as that’s their job that they’re getting paid more than we’ll ever make to execute. I have no problem with calling for their heads.
“Geniuses calling for Kirby’s firing just need to get off the bandwagon and go find another team to cheer for.”
I’m curious ee, why do you feel compelled to write that? I read a good deal of the comments, and you’d have to search pretty long and hard to find someone who’s advocating we ditch Kirby. Are you fabricating a ‘bad guy’ so you can deliver a shot? Just seems unbecoming for a guy like you that usually writes so well and knows his subject so well. Other than that I enjoyed the post.
Did you read the top left message board post from the MBG X account from the guy whose headline is “Fire Kirby”?
I’m guilty. Guilty as sin. At the end of the first half I told my brother I was ready to fire both Schuman and Bobo. I was so mad I couldn’t see straight. I went on to tell him that if we somehow managed to come back and win this game that I would give kiss his ass on the steps of the Rome city hall on prime-time CBS and give him three days to draw a crowd; after the game he told me to go buy some lip balm.
I reckon it just goes to prove that you shouldn’t taste the chili before it’s finished cooking.
Especially on defense, we see a WTF first half. Given Kirby’s pedigree, that is baffling. Adjustments are made at halftime, and we look like a different team. I’ve wondered why adjustments can’t be made before half. There is certainly a nice break between the 1st and 2nd quarters. Schuman is on the sidelines looking lost. This made me start thinking. Boom is not there any longer. Kirby has taken more of a CEO role and can’t be micromanaging the defense during the game. At halftime when he doesn’t have to be watching all phases is HE the one making the adjustments and Schuman is just carrying out the plan. I know it sounds like a conspiracy theory, but something drastic happens.
I think all of that is totally fair. The flip side is I’m sure Kirby is in on a portion of the defensive game plan meetings during the week.
So any team that is gonna face us just needs to make some new plays and we are screwed?
And then why not keep running the new plays if they are working? Seems like a weird excuse to me. But maybe its true.
Somebody above said we started in base defense. What else are you goin to do if you have no clue what the opponent is doing. They scored 10 points, 10, even if they had scored on the failed TD we would have still beat then 20-17. I don’t gamble but gambling is making a close win, a loss for some of our alumni. Just be thankful we won, hell by 1 or 50 it’ still a W.
Lost in all of this banter is that despite our terrible defensive performance in the first half, they only gave up 10 points, so the REAL problem IMO is that our offensive playcalling is boring and uninspired. This is more of the same since the 2023 season. Bobo has never proved himself as an elite playcaller at any job he’s ever had. Georgia will never win a championship with Mike Bobo as the OC.