Agree on some of the causes, and agree it's not a death knell because there are already some really good young guys on campus, but it's definitely bad optics for Kirby.
Some of the complaints thrown at Richt that saw him pushed out was he didn't recruit well enough in state. I don't follow Georgia FB closely, that info is from your posts on this board, so I apologize if I'm remembering wrong and putting words in your mouth. Smart wasn't impressive last year without Saban level talent. It was his first year and obviously would expect him to get better no matter for what, but a change being caused by lack of recruiting, particularly in state, hiring an ace recruiter with no HC experience who was alumni and out a renewed focus in state of Georgia... Like I say, nothing to abandon ship over, but not a good look either.
I can't disagree with alot of that. Kirby's first class cleaned up instate, only missed on a couple kids and they were to the Big10. Meyer, Harbaugh and Franklin are hitting Georgia hard.and actually hurting us more than the SEC schools have the last couple of years. After last year, tOSU can almost assure a kid he is going to get in the playoffs, they have hurt our recruiting as much as anyone including the border schools. It wasn't Richt didn't recruit Georgia hard, he ignored it while throwing early offers to out of state kids we had little chance to sign and getting in late on instate kids. Funny how now kids think getting an offer prior to their soph season is late.
As far as our results, I thought we would get to 8 wins and we did, without some bad luck/play could easily have been 10. But we were one of the youngest teams in the country last year, we lost 6 guys off the top 44 and 3 of them come from the weakest unit, which doesn't say alot about that unit this fall and why there will likely be a couple of frosh playing, we return all 8 DL who played, 7 of 8 LB, 5 who have been starters, one was passed by a younger guy, signed 2 outstanding LB classes in a row and none have played yet, return all DB except starting nickle back. defense has potential to be very good and capable of keeping us in games until the young OL comes together. But Appy St. is no joke, should have beaten UT last year, beat Michigan a few years back, return a lot of offense with a sr qb who has won alot of games for them, its not a giveme win. But I expect 10 wins, AU is due to beat us and another alone the way, might not win the east depending on who else we lose. But anything less than 10, the honeymoon for Kirby is over.
On winning the East, I think 4 teams have a shot, until someone dethrones UF they have to be considered as one of the favorites. This fall the East is returning 5 starting qbs, all of them had some success last season, that's the opposite from last year when only UT returned a starter at qb. UT lost more offense and defensive production than anyone else, Vnady returns their career leading rusher and starting qb, USC returns who may be the best LB in the SEC after missing the 16 season plus a bigtime WR and a qb who had his redshirt pulled to get them bowl eligible last season, UF returns their leading rusher and receiver and 4 OL starters, I think we return the most offensive and defensive production in the East. I am probably prejudice but I think we have the top backfield,, TE group, DL and LB units in the east and maybe the conference. But on the other hand our WR corp and OL would be near the other end. Our DB unit is probably top 5 in conference. If our OL play is up to par, we could run the table, I don't see anyone that jumps out at me as being alot better than us but that's asking alot when there is very likely to be 2 frosh starters,.
![[winking]](http://l.yimg.com/j/assets/img/emoticons/classic/wink.r191677.gif "Winking [winking]")
