ATLANTA -- I wanted Willie Martinez to stand up, drop his drawers, and say for the cameras, "You Dawgs can kiss my big behind."
He wouldn't do it. I tried to prod him, threw some bait out there. He shook his head from side to side and said something about the abuse being part of it.
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| Some Georgia fans want Mark Richt to fire defensive coordinator Willie Martinez. (AP) |
... of course he pays attention to it.
So, I'll do it for him. Georgia fans, kiss Willie's butt.
Do you have any idea how much perspective you lost this season? Your beer cups and shot glasses have been filled with 10- and 11-win seasons and you are slitting your wrists and demanding the Georgia head coach, Mark Richt, fire Martinez, his defensive coordinator, because of a season that went bad because of turnovers ... by the offense.
I want you Dawgs, with your lips puckered, to look at one thing to see the clear picture.
The two teams playing for the ACC championship were sacked and left at the curb Saturday by two average-finishing teams from the Southeastern Conference. South Carolina handled Clemson, and Georgia (7-5) beat No. 7 Georgia Tech, 30-24, here Saturday night.
It is big boy football in the SEC. There is not much separating the teams in the pack behind No. 1 Florida and No. 2 Alabama. Nobody stays on a peak in this conference. Alabama took a dive with its coaching changes before Nick Saban and Florida took a dive in the transition from Steve Spurrier to Urban Meyer.
Life in the SEC is tough. You think you know?
"Uh, no, I don't think they know," said split end Michael Moore when asked if fans can appreciate the SEC gauntlet.
Reshad Jones, the Georgia safety, just smiled and shook his head from side to side. No, fans don't get it.
Other Georgia players defended the frothing fans and said their griping showed they cared.
The fans cared, some even came all the way down to the stands where the Georgia players were parading off and yelled, "Way to go Willie."
Yeah, way to go Willie. Kiss my ...
Georgia's defense, Martinez' defense, handled Tech's spread option offense as well as a lot of teams this season. Paul Johnson, the Tech coach, kept making the point that his team didn't have the ball enough because Georgia had it and that the Yellow Jackets could have really scored a pile of points if they just had the ball.
• Recap: Georgia 30, Georgia Tech 24
Johnson seemed to insinuate that the Jackets were done in by their defense.
Not exactly true. Tech had the ball just six seconds less than the Bulldogs.
The fact is Martinez had a nice plan. He kept changing up the assignments on the line of scrimmage against Tech's option, giving the dive to one player, the pitch to another, the quarterback to another on different plays. Linebacker Rennie Curran said the Bulldogs were as deceptive with their defensive play calls as Tech was with its play calls.
The Yellow Jackets rolled up 205 yards rushing, but the Bulldogs weren't gashed like they were in 45-42 loss in 2008. Jonathan Dwyer, Tech's big back, got just 33 yards net rushing. None of Tech's seven primary runners gained over 41 yards, an indication the Jackets kept looking for a soft spot and couldn't find it.
Martinez, of course, credited the speed and skill of his players.
Meanwhile, Johnson, the Georgia Tech coach, the guy who has taken the Jackets into the top 10 in just two seasons, got his abuse in the stadium concourse after the game.
"What was he thinking?" groused one man.
Tech fans were grumbling about the three deep passes by their quarterback on Tech's last possession. They said Johnson should have worked the ball down the field, not taken shots for the winning score with long balls.
Well, I'm with Johnson because he had a trump card, Demaryius Thomas, his sensational wide receiver. When he needed 10 yards and a first down, Johnson could get Thomas matched up one-on-one by formation on the sideline for a quick comebacker for the 10 yards.
It was going to be there when he needed it and Johnson needed it on fourth-and-10 at the Georgia 46-yard line with 1:22 to play and the Jackets down, 30-24. The first down was there except Thomas did something he rarely does. He dropped a pass right in his hands. Game over.
For his part, Richt set himself up for serious second-guessing when he had Blair Walsh come on for a 55-yard field goal with 3:33 to play and Georgia up 30-24. Make it and it's a nine-point lead, game probably over. Miss it and Tech has field position with an offense that is in four-down territory once it crosses the 50.
Walsh hammered the kick, and missed it, wide left. I would have tried that field goal with this guy. Easy.
Richt has a harder decision to make and I hope he doesn't open the trap door under Martinez. If he does, it will haunt him. It's the first step to Richt getting shoved out the door himself.
I know one thing that won't happen. Michael Adams, the president of the school, won't get involved in any job messiness. He has to stay above this one because Adams just might want to be president of the NCAA. The last time he got heavily involved in a coaching decision at Georgia, the Bulldogs were put on probation because Adams hired basketball coach Jim Harrick.
If Adams tries to do what the Ole Miss administration did to David Cutcliffe and make demands on Richt, the rest of the NCAA presidents are going to question his meddling.
I can be pretty crappy to coaches, too. I can second-guess and belittle and poke. But I'm not hammering away all season; I'm not raking in the glory from 10-win seasons and then turning on guys.
I'm pretty down on Georgia fans. They treat their campus like a land-fill on Game Day and leave garbage strewn about for students to step around on the way to the library Sunday morning. Only when the authorities stepped in did they pick up their trash.
I'm down on them because coming into this season, Georgia had 40 wins in four years. One seven-win season and all is lost.
I wouldn't cave to the pressure, but to be safe Richt should just split the duties. Florida does it. Mollify the gang of fans by having co-coordinators on defense.
That, or tell them you are the head coach, and you can kiss ...
