Climbing the mountain is easy; staying at the top is hard. That’s exactly where Kirby Smart’s Georgia Bulldogs find themselves.
Coming off back-to-back national championships, the Dawgs are primed to return to the College Football Playoff due to their relatively easy schedule. Still, they have to play Auburn, Ole Miss, and the entire SEC East. Smart’s program doesn’t have the luxury of coasting because everyone wants a shot at the champ.
It’s called rat poison. Nick Saban has done a masterful job of not letting his team eat the cheese. Social media, national pundits, and everyone else kissing a team’s ass can be catastrophic. Once a team starts believing what outsiders are telling them is the exact moment they’ve lost.
It’s one factor in how Alabama has stayed dominant all these years. Saban refuses to let his teams believe they’re better than they are — there’s always something to improve upon. And his protegee, Kirby Smart, has taken that to Athens.
“We have an extremely long way to go as a football team,” Smart said following the Dawgs’ first scrimmage. “So many people make an assumption off of last year’s team and their accomplishments. I asked this team, after the scrimmage and after we ran, ‘What have you done to deserve anything you have gotten?’ They have done nothing. We have got to get the right guys in the right spot, find the guys that can really compete.”
Well, if we are getting technical, a lot of the players on the 2023 team have at least one title and some of them have two. So yes, they have done something to deserve the praise. However, Smart can’t let them think that. He’s got these boys believing the 7-5 crap that Nolan Smith spewed last year.
Carson Beck is taking over for Stetson Bennett, and though he’s got a cannon for an arm, it takes more than that to run Mike Bobo’s system. However, he’s got the supporting cast to carry him until he figures out the nuances of the offense, especially in September.
Georgia opens against FCS program UT Martin and Ball State before its SEC opener at home against South Carolina. Then, after another home contest against UAB, the Bulldogs play their first SEC road game at Auburn. The first threat to another undefeated regular season is Tennessee, which is the second to last game of the season, giving Beck and Georiga plenty of time to figure things out.
Kirby Smart has built a monster in Athens, and he’s doing all of the right things to stay on top of the mountain.
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Photographer: David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire
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