AJC > Sports > Columnists > Archives > 2007 > September > 25
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Yellow Jackets can’t find balance
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
From No. 15 in the nation to No. 6 in the six-team ACC Coastal Division in the span of two games: That’s Georgia Tech for you. But this is also Georgia Tech: a truly dangerous team when it isn’t expected to win, which it won’t be Saturday against Clemson.
By now, we know that you count the Jackets out, or in, at your peril. Whatever seems the most likely outcome is least apt to happen. (If they played football in the Bizarro World, Georgia Tech would be the flagship team.) It’s a weird way for a serious program to conduct business, but the unrelentingly understated Chan Gailey is, judging not on demeanor but on results, the weirdest coach alive.
“You worry about your team’s confidence [when it’s losing],” Gailey said Tuesday. “And when you’re undefeated you can’t be too cocky. There’s a balance.”
Only there isn’t. Not at Tech. Here’s a school that’s demonstrably great as an underdog, having felled seven higher-ranked teams in five-plus seasons under Gailey, but awful as a peer, having won only one of six games when both sides were ranked. Here’s a school that lives to grab people’s attention but never seems to know what to do with it. That’s not a balance. That’s a pogo stick.
Said fullback Mike Cox: “We like it when you all [meaning the media] say we’re not supposed to win. We use that as motivation.”
And what, Cox was asked, do the Jackets do when they’re favored? Do they draw strength from such a show of faith? “I usually don’t get too upset with that,” said Cox, using an apt word.
Tech has become the classic upsetter — too gifted and resourceful to be dismissed, too unstable to spend an entire season in the Top 25. (The Jackets didn’t receive a single vote in the latest Associated Press poll.) They should have won the ACC last season but didn’t, and only two weeks ago they were consensus choice as the best team in a conference undergoing a tectonic shift. Today Tech is 2 1/2 games behind Virginia, which isn’t very good, in the Coastal.
“I definitely didn’t think we’d be 2-2,” center Kevin Tuminello said. “But sometimes things like this happen.”
Sometimes? At Tech they happen on schedule: First the buildup, then the letdown. The good news for Jackets fans is that their team never stays down for long. Just as nothing is ever quite as sweet as it seems, neither are matters half as rotten as they might appear.
Two weeks ago Taylor Bennett was considered a clear upgrade over Reggie Ball; today Bennett doesn’t even rank among the ACC’s top 10 in passing efficiency. Two weeks ago Tashard Choice was a Heisman hopeful; today Choice, who has a bad hamstring, stands only fourth in his conference in rushing. But the flip side to this — with Tech there’s always a flip side — is that Choice and Bennett and the other Jackets are fully capable of dealing themselves back into the league race after stumbling twice at the start.
“Hard times come,” said Darrell Robertson, the stellar defensive end. “Everything’s not always going to be green.”
The hard times Tech can handle. It’s the good times that stump this curious band. Only two weeks ago analysts were slotting the Jackets into the Orange Bowl. Today they seem in danger of not going to any postseason game. But that, too, will change. They’ll wind up winning eight games, give or take, and gracing some not-very-exotic bowl. This is Georgia Tech, and that, for reasons unknown and surely unknowable, is what it does.
Favored against Boston College and Virginia, the Jackets lost to both. This time they’re underdogs. That means they’ll win.
Permalink | Comments (69) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Tech / ACC
ESPN ploy is laughable
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
THE TUESDAY COUNTDOWN
10: ESPN is holding a “Town Hall” meeting tonight in Atlanta to debate racial elements of the Michael Vick dog-fighting case. Well. That’s timely. What was their second choice? The Scopes Monkey Trial?
9: If you were wondering, the “E” in ESPN still stands for “entertainment,” not excellence.
8: How lame is this? It accomplishes nothing. It only attempts to stir up an issue that was illogical to begin with, has been dead since Vick plead guilty to fighting and killing dogs (of all colors, by the way) and two months since he was indicted — after which any racial elements of this case quickly subsided. Is anybody talking about this other than ESPN?
7: For what it’s worth, the event is not open to the public. It will be held at the Georgia World Congress Center but is an invitation-only event, hosted by Bob Ley. I believe it’s followed by an episode of, “Desperate Soccer Moms And The Bowling Alley Romances That Heal Them,” on ESPN-3, hosted by Jerry Springer.
6: There’s another tell-all book out suggesting “Marcia” and “Jan” of the “Brady Bunch” were close off the air. I mean, like, really close. I mean, like, you know, they didn’t just swap the sandwiches that “Alice” made them. So this follows revelations that “Greg” dated his “mom,” Florence Henderson. And a bunch of the “brothers” and “sisters” actually made out in “Tiger’s” doghouse. And “dad,” Robert Reed, was gay (probably because his “wife” was dating his “son.”) OK, I know the show is over 30 years old. But THIS, I want to see a “Town Hall” meeting about.
5: Coming soon: “My Name Was ‘Tiger.’ And I like cats.”
4: Feeling nostalgic? The Falcons and Saints are 0-3.
3: This isn’t exact science - we’re talking about the Falcons. But if DeAngelo Hall was going to be suspended, don’t you think it would’ve been done by now? And how would it look to suspend a player you didn’t even pull out of the game? Bet on a fine.
2: Dave O’Brien, our Braves dude and stream-of-consciousness blogmaster, suggests bringing back Tom Glavine would help fix the team’s starting rotation. I’ll take it one step further: the Braves began to seal their ‘07 fate before this season when they had a chance to sign Glavine and didn’t.
1: The Braves are three games back in the wild-card race with six games left. On a related note, MegaMillions is tonight.
Permalink | Comments (169) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Quick Hit
Services »
