MACON — The annual Pigskin Preview was held at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame on Tuesday. That meant that coaches and players from every football-playing college in the state gathered to talk about the coming season.
Because we’re not halfway through June, the forecast was pretty much the same for all 15 programs (Albany State, Clark Atlanta, Fort Valley State, Georgia Military College, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Georgia Tech, LaGrange, Mercer, Morehouse, Savannah State, Shorter, UGA, Valdosta State and West Georgia).
So rather than regurgitate propaganda, we asked coaches from Georgia, Georgia Tech, Georgia State and Georgia Southern to share their feelings about some of the topics looming over college football at this time. The responses were as varied as the colors of their uniforms. Here’s a sampling:
On changes taking place in college football
Georgia State coach Bill Curry: As usual with Americans, we're doing too much, too big, too fast. I mean, all of us; I'm not talking about Georgia State. I think Georgia State had no choice but to make the move to FBS when we did and to the Sun Belt. I believe that was not only a good decision, but it will eventually prove to be a great decision. But I don't think that the overall tenor of what's going on in college football is good for the universities or the student-athletes, with all the shifting and all the emphasis on the money and the TV ratings and revenues. I think the interest in how the championship game is going to be structured is fun. That's interesting. But we don't have the emphasis on the student-athletes the way we should.
Georgia Tech coach Paul Johnson: I think change is inevitable, and it's going to happen. So, you know, I hope we don't get too far away from where we are now because the game's as popular as it's ever been. But I think sometimes change is good and tweaks are good.
Georgia coach Mark Richt: Sometimes it's kind of like that frog that gets put in the water that's getting heated up slowly and he doesn't realize he's getting hot and there's a lot of change going on before he realizes it's too late to get out. I guess what I'm saying is sometimes when you're in the middle of it you really don't have a perspective to stand back and look at it. I'm so busy trying to run our program the way it needs to be run and adapt to new rules changes and whatever it may be, I'm having a hard time seeing the big picture of it.
On possible FBS playoff
Johnson: I've been a proponent of a playoff for a long time. I think we're the only sport in the NCAA that doesn't have a playoff or a true championship, and I think it's good that we're getting one. I personally favor a 16-team playoff, but I'm probably in the minority. I think it gives everybody a legitimate shot. It gives all the conference champions a chance to get in. It doesn't rely so much on subjectivity. I mean, you can have a top 20 ranking right now, but how does anybody really know? Nobody has played a game. The polls get skewed, and things happen. This way, you get it done on the field. You have to win your way into the playoff. You don't just get put up there to start with.
Richt: I think that a playoff system is OK as long as there aren't too many teams. I've been saying for a long time, too many teams would be very difficult for the student-athletes involved as far as adding games. I also think it would de-value regular-season games. Regular season games, right now, mean everything. They can mean the difference in possibly playing for a national championship or not. You have a 16-team game playoff and all of the sudden there are too many games that, whether you win or lose, you're still in the playoffs. They don't mean as much. I think that's a little bit dangerous.
Georgia Southern assistant head coach Mitch Ware: It is interesting to me. We've played 29 games in two years. Obviously they'd have to tweak the conference championships games or whatever. But just as a college football fan, I'd like to see a playoff just like we do it. That's just my personal opinion. Our guys, we practice and practice. If we're fortunate enough to get a bye in the playoffs, we're off on Thanksgiving. Then we start the playoffs and you just keep going. Once you get to that point it's not much different than the season. You just put your head down, you game plan and you go.
On use of social media such as Twitter
Curry: I've got 476 tweets [on @coachbillcurry] the last time I looked at that little number up there. I've been doing it for four years. It's fascinating to me that not many people know that I'm doing it. I'm intentionally bland, I must say. I'm not going to put anything on there that could be misunderstood. I do my own and I try to report on the facts of what's going on. I try to have a moral lesson every now and then. But it is all about recruiting, so I've been tweeting for four years now.
Johnson: I don't have a Twitter account. We've got things that come out of Georgia Tech. Our SID runs the Twitter account. I just haven't found any real need to do it. If you asked me this morning 'am I thinking about it?" the answer would be I haven't thought much about it.
Richt: Why am I tweeting again? I don't know. I think it's certainly the way people communicate now. It's the way people get the word out, and I want to get the word out about Georgia and what a great program we have. So it's an opportunity to keep people up on the good things that are happening at the University of Georgia. That's probably my number one reason for tweeting. I physically do it most of the time, but there might be a time where I might be driving down the road and have a thought and I've got a guy on staff I might say, 'do you mind putting a tweet out about this or that. But there's not a tweet that goes out on my account with my name attached to it that I don't know about 100 percent.
On concussion research
Curry: My daughter is a an English teacher at a high school, and one of her students chose as a topic the safety issues with head injuries in the sport of football. Her last question to me was, 'Do you think that rule changes and new equipment and new technology is going to lessen the intensity of football.' I said 'yes, absolutely.' I also said, 'I believe it's going to save many, many lives.'
So I think we’re in a very healthy era where we question everything and we’re looking at the foolishness of smashing into people. Like, why in the world in the first place would you smash your face into Dick Butkus and Joe Greene for 10 years? I thought it was fun, so that tells you something about our brains.
Richt: I know I got my bell rung. I got knocked cold a few times. Maybe being second team wasn't too bad of a thing for me. I know it's a very serious thing and hopefully we're doing the right things. ... What I'm thankful for is Ron Courson, our director of sports medicine, because he's on the cutting edge of most everything in our sport when it comes to the health of our players. For years we've had a protocol that I think is outstanding and I think a lot of people are starting to mimic it now because of Ron's understanding of it. So I trust him to help us make the right decisions on these guys.
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