Oof. A couple days late, but this is still resonating with me.
Let downs. They happen from time to time. Maybe a game, maybe a playoff. Sometimes, whole seasons.
As fans, we ultimately encounter high expectations that result in massive let downs.
Case in point:
Ugh. The 1993 Dawgs rank up there as well. But those are my own youthful biases.
For today’s thought Provoker, what’s your biggest sports disappointment? Why was it so disappointing? What made you have high hopes in the first place, dear mortal?
Discuss.
Don’t leave out the 2004 UGA team either. Huge letdown that season
They played one terrible game … Tennessee … and then got beat soundly on the Plains by an undefeated Auburn team that was really good. Even if we beat Tennessee, I don’t think we beat Auburn the 2nd time around in Atlanta.
I think you nailed it with your 2007 reference. Losing toTennessee was rough, but still relatively normal at that point, but why South Carolina was such a thorn in Mark Richt’s side I’ll never understand.
If you’re talking about the SI cover, that was the 2008 preview when we were #1.
Ah yep. There were so many years that were so eerily similar, that they all sort of run together at this point I reckon.
As a New Orleans Saints fan from day 1 in 1967, I have too many to count.
Excited with new coaches running it now, but man do we have a long ways to go on the field. Anyways…who dat!
At least you won a Super Bowl, something Falcons fans will never see.
2000 … Jim Donnan: “I’ve waited 30(?) years to coach a team like this.”
Fired and in the Oahu Bowl by season’s end. Life comes at you fast.
Donnan….I’ve got one word for you. Charles Grant.
The prior 2 years (especially after the big bowl comeback) after the departure of Bobo, Hines Ward, and Robert Edwards were the run-up to what was supposed to be a run to an SEC championship. Then, that team falls flat on their face in Columbia, and Quincy Carter looked terrible. The team never came together.
2008 had a similar feel except that team thought their farts didn’t stink. The absolute destruction in the first half against Saban and then the total collapse in Jacksonville probably was the beginning of the end for Coach Richt.
There are more heartbreaks in sports and life than victories I believe making the big wins all the sweeter. A few that come to mind:
2nd & 26.
All of the Braves losses in the NLCS and WS.
The Jerry Jones Cowboys (especially Romo’s fumble and Dez caught that ball!)
Any loss to the gnats especially in Sanford.
The Ruskies stealing the win over team USA basketball in the 72 Olympics.
F’ing Montana’s pass in the NLC game.
Marge Scott’s purchase and subsequent destruction of The Big Red Machine.
Bengals loss in the Super Bowl.
Driving the green on 15 and draining the putt for eagle yesterday only to have that skin covered by another guy”s chip in from the fairway.
Never getting that blonde blue-eyed girl in all of my years in HS to fall for me.
The 2008 Sports Illustrated for me.
2nd and 26 was crushing.
Agree, but that was a moment. No one turned off the TV or left the stadium thinking that team didn’t lay it all on the line (very similar to the 2012 SEC championship game) for 60 minutes.
Compare that to a year later when the team acted like they wanted to be anywhere but New Orleans and Texas physically whipped our asses.
Personally that was the most crushing play I’ve ever witnessed.
I imagine 30-15 in Austin was crushing to a lot of Horns fans.
Anytime Kirby calls off the Dawgs hurts me deep down inside where I’m soft like a US Identifies as Mens Soccer player. So many chances to put 80 on teams. It’s not like we develop our backups in those games. Other than that, windshild’s bigger than the rearview. Learn and move on. Maybe Kirby’s first loss to Tech – my lady friend did not approve of my scowl walking back to Appleby Mews.
UGA loss to Virginia in the Peach Bowl
UGA loss to West Virginia in the Katrina-moved Sugar Bowl
Braves loss to the Twins
Braves traded Dale Murphy to phillies
I guess I had blocked that from my mind. How in the hell do the umps allow the fat body first baseman to physically push Ron Gant off of the base to tag him out at first, I will never comprehend.
Hrbek is still a dirty word around me
Doesn’t qualify as “biggest” but if you want to acknowledge the consistency of apathy-nurturing disappointment look no further than Georgia basketball.
Reaching into the vaults, I’d say losing the Natty to Penn St. in 1983 was the biggest for me. It was near the high water mark of the Dooley regime and it took a long time for us to get relevant again (plus it was Herschel’s last game!)
When we arrived in New Orleans a few days before and our hotel was still under construction I knew it wasn’t gonna be a good week. Then we couldn’t stop Curt Warner and Blackledge was capable of throwing the foward pass, a concept Dooley’s offenses never attempted to seriously grasp. Agree, huge disappointment.
Yeah, that one still hurts me. I was convinced we were a machine that year that would grind Pedo State into the turf.
Blackout game against Alabama in Athens. We just didn’t show up ready in first half. Kind of like a bowl game against West Virginia during the Richt era.
And our highly rated DB Bryan Evans attempting to cover Julio Jones wasn’t just disappointing it was plum embarrassing.
The night Terrance Edwards’ hands turned to stone in Jax
I’ll put out there the last seasons of “Lost” and “Game of Thrones.”
But so that we’re not all wallowing in our misery, I’ll offer a few times we mercilessly crushed our rivals greatest dreams:
UGA vs. Hawaii 2008 Sugar Bowl – After a while I felt bad for Colt Brennan (RIP).
UGA vs. Tennessee 2023 – After 6 straight losses to the Dawgs, the toothless nation was feeling themselves after the opening play TD run. It did not go well…
The Sugar Bowl last year. New Ole Miss coach comes in, makes better halftime adjustments (vs us coming out to run up the middle for the 3rd quarter) and walks out a winner. This Georgia team was supposedly on a roll, but they just rolled their helmets out after halftime. About the worst I’ve seen from a “Smart” team.
Much too recent, but yeah tough to argue that this will be looked back on as a huge missed opportunity for Kirby (I’d throw 2023 in there as well).
28-3 references are still to soon for me.