Did UGA and Florida flop? Or did they just get hurt?

The master pragmatist Bill Russell used to say, “Injuries are as much a part of basketball as free throws.” Injuries are an even bigger part of football. If you play this violent sport, there’s a chance you’re going to get hurt. If enough of your guys get hurt, you’ll be …

Georgia. Or Florida. Neither has been as good as it figured to be, which is why neither is ranked as they approach what The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Chip Towers has termed “The World’s Largest Outdoor Pity Party” in Jacksonville on Saturday.

Sometimes we on the periphery — and I’m speaking of us writers as well as you fans — don’t grasp how debilitating injuries can be. We think a big tough guy should rub some dirt on a torn ACL and get back out there. But then, if we’re honest, we take a moment to reflect: Without its two best tailbacks and three of its four best receivers, what should Georgia have been expected to do in the deflating month of October?

Toward that end, I asked a man who knows a bit about college football: Had we known going into this season that the Bulldogs would be so beset, would we have seen them as the No. 5 team in the land?

Said Vince Dooley, who coached Georgia for 25 years and who as athletic director hired Mark Richt: “If that was the case, there’s no way this could be a top five team. With everything (else) going right, you’d think it could have won eight ballgames.”

As it is, Georgia cannot win more than nine regular-season games. And now you’re saying, “Wait a second. Other teams have had injuries, too. Didn’t Georgia lose to Missouri and Vanderbilt on days both lost their starting quarterback? Why should the Bulldogs be cut such slack?”

Because, I submit, of the sheer tonnage of manpower in absentia. The same applies to Florida, which has lost five starters — including quarterback Jeff Driskel and tailback Matt Jones and defensive tackle Dominique Easley — to season-ending injuries and saw three more defenders miss the Missouri game Oct. 19.

Said Dooley: “In the case of both teams, they were decimated in their strength. With Georgia, the strength has certainly been offense; with Florida, the strength has been defense. Having so many injuries turned them into good teams but not very good teams anymore. Georgia is getting some of its players back (namely tailback Todd Gurley) and that will be of some help … but if you’re just adequate in defense and in the kicking game, and you lose tailbacks and wide receivers, then you’re just adequate.”

It’s not unreasonable to suggest that Georgia’s defense, which has been a comparative picture of health, could have done more with the offense ailing. As Gary Pinkel noted after his Missouri Tigers won in Sanford Stadium, “They didn’t have many injuries on defense.” But that’s not how these Bulldogs were built. They had to win shootouts. They won two major ones against South Carolina and LSU. Come October, they weren’t the same offense.

Said Dooley: “A lot of times one guy will step up, but it’s different when you lose that many. … Going to a second-teamer is one thing. Going to a third-teamer is a pretty good drop-off. Losing tailbacks and wide receivers had an effect on the quarterback’s (Aaron Murray) confidence.”

Emotion can carry a stricken team for time, but only for a time. We may have seen that with Missouri. The Tigers closed their victory in Athens and thrashed Florida behind backup Maty Mauk, but the Mauk magic began to wane in the second half against South Carolina. That stunning loss lent renewed hope to those SEC East teams chasing the Tigers, Georgia and Florida among them.

Dooley also sounded this cautionary note to mighty Alabama, which appears impervious to ordinary aches and pains. “They’ve just lost their safety man (Vinnie Sunseri),” he said. “I think that’s going to really affect them.”

Any injury to any starter can make a difference. Enough injuries to enough starters can spoil a season. There will be a time, Dooley suggested, when Georgia fans will cast a colder eye on what has become of this promising team. That time, however, is not yet at hand.

“When it’s all over and people start thinking about it,” Dooley said, “they might say, ‘Well, we understand.’ But not now.”