Hey BlackWatch,
Thank you for your kind sentiment. I also appreciate you keeping up the good fight on this board. I made my posts on the Hive because a Tech fan had asserted in one thread that it was significant to beat Georgia for a recruit. Basically, others corrected him that the big deal was beating Alabama and Notre Dame for a DT from Alabama. My whole point was that it doesn't mean much at all to beat Georgia for a recruit anywhere other than in certain parts of this state and in some of their fans' so-called minds.
I am hesitant to post my comments on this board because a few sketchy fonts will find some way to turn this into a discussion of how bad they believe Coach Gailey is or some other such nonsense. They will only serve to demonstrate their own mental weakness or clear subversive agenda; but it will still make it annoying to find reasonable and relevant posts that quickly get pushed down this board as the thread inevitably degenerates into personal sniping.
However, for you, BlackWatch, I will cut and paste some of my comments with a few alterations due to venue and context. However, I hope you will forgive me if I don't respond to all of the baseless, ludicrous, assinine things that these few people spew out - over and over and over - in this thread as if they deserve credible consideration on par with the logical and well founded points that refute their case. I may read a few of their responses for a laugh; but I refuse to get drawn into wasting my time sniping with the intellectual equivalent of a twelve year old - or with someone that hates Coach Gailey for whatever sad personal reasons - in a public forum that utterly fails to represent most Tech fans. I am only posting this here because I appreciate your dogged efforts to keep up the fight, BlackWatch. Do with it as you choose.
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Except for certain geographic areas within this state, beating Georgia for a recruit is not a big deal.
There are places in South Georgia and around the state where the pups are respected. Anywhere else you go, they might as well be Arkansas, Oklahoma State or Ole Miss for most recruits. Outside this state, they don't have a noteworthy city, attractive academics, memorable tradition, special facilities or programs, or anything else that stands out.
On the other hand, going into the state of Alabama and winning a battle against the Tide and Notre Dame is a big deal.
I also respectfully disagree with you about Ty Willingham [responding to font who suggested that he was not a good coach]. I think that given time he will probably right the ship at Notre Dame. I hate the Irish; but in college football, everyone has bad years. Ask Oklahoma, Alabama, Florida State, or Miami. Willingham generally gets a lot from his players. The big question is how long it will take and whether Willingham will get that much time.
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Georgia has some tradition. So do a lot of other schools. They have had two Heisman winners and a national championship. I could go on; but that is not my point. There are a bucket of schools that can trot out various facts about how they did this or that. Many schools have more national championships (I will take our four any day over their one).
I WILL take this occasion to point out that one player (Hershel Walker) is the difference between Georgia's tradition over their entire history being in the top 15-20 (which it probably is - comparable to Tech) vs. being arguably in the top 30.
What is their great tradition over the lifetime of most recruits? An SEC championship last year. So what? Northwestern won the Big 10. Georgia has also had handful of top ten rankings and a huge number of incredibly highly rated recruiting classes. I can't think of much else. That certainly doesn't separate them from a lot of other schools. They have won more consistently over the last twenty years than us and some others; but they also have had less accomplishment than us and many others over the same period.
I don't see their tradition being recognized by most recruits as any better than, say, Arkansas, Michigan State, or Oklahoma State by many people (if any) outside of this state.
When recruits go into Georgia's facilities and look at tradition, they see a lot of Hershel Walker's accomplishments, his team's championship, and a few other things. When they go in our locker room, they see a more recent championship that they may actually remember, names like Heisman, Ross and Joe Hamilton that they are familiar with, and more recent tradition to go with the ancient stuff.
As far as their facilities go, they still have (I think) what is listed as one of the ten largest stadiums. I think they say it seats 93,000. Who knows what the real number is? I know that when we were ready to re-build our stadium, we re-stated our seating capacity from 48k to 42k. I point this out because I had a conversation with a couple of U(sic)GA staff members at the time who admitted they had overstated their own numbers. Their stadium probably seats more than 80,000, which is a large number. For comparison, we are shy of 60,000. Good for them. It doesn't really matter. Their stadium is ugly, uninteresting and surrounded by nothing. It is not especially loud compared to dozens of other stadiums from Austin to College Station to Raleigh to Lincoln.
Recruits from anywhere outside this state generally wouldn't prefer Georgia's stadium (or even differentiate it) in any way from other stadiums I have attended in Clemson, Tallahassee, Auburn, Happy Valley, Columbia, Tuscaloosa, etc or many other places in the SEC, Big 10, Big 12 and elsewhere. It is inferior to the top tier of stadiums at Florida, Michigan, Ohio State, Tennessee, etc. At least our stadium, UNC's, N.C. State's, Notre Dame's, UCLA's and some others have some interesting and unique appeal. Many are newer and nicer.
Other than that, Georgia has a decent weight room, locker room, practice facilities, etc. They have an excellent museum. I could go on; but my point is that they are good but no different from any of a couple of dozen schools. Again, I don't see anything about facilities that anyone from outside this state would particularly remember. On the other hand, ours are perhaps the best in the country in many ways. If you don't believe me, tour our training room, locker room, study halls, etc. I am not sure why recruits will like Georgia's hedges; but I am willing to give you that one if you really want it. Every college has something.
I have lived near Athens. Many people that live there think it is special; but the same thing could be said of any other college town.
For most recruits outside of Georgia, there is nothing special about Athens that you can't find in Auburn, Fayetteville, Oxford, Stillwater or just about any other college town surrounded by pastures. I personally would certainly take Clemson or Gainesville over Athens in a second. I can't imagine why you think many recruits from outside of this state would consider Athens, Ga. to be a special place. The only thing it has going is that it is close to Atlanta; but if you have ever made the drive, you know it takes at least an hour and a half to get to Atlanta (usually two and a half hours with traffic). You might as well be in Clemson or Auburn.
I know Georgia very well. What I can't figure out is why you choose to overestimate them in this thread about David Brown.
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I will concede that in my opinion Athens is better than Starkville.
I know it is a matter of personal perspective; but my humble opinion is that Clemson, Oxford, Auburn and many other places are better college towns (better college bars, prettier girls, etc). I also would take Gainesville, Tallahassee, Chapel Hill or any number of other places to go to college over Athens. My real point, though, was that I believe (just my two cents' worth) that most recruits from other states will not think Athens is a great (or even particularly distinguishable) place compared to other schools they may visit. I do realize that may be different for recruits from in state.
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Georgia may be considered a top notch program in this state and by their fans; and they make a nice living off of players from around the state. However, if you go anywhere else, they don't have much to sell. To most recruits elsewhere, they are second tier, at best, as a football program behind Florida State, Miami, Notre Dame, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, USC, Florida, Michigan, Ohio State, Tennessee and, depending on where you live, a few others. Outside the south and particularly this state, and depending on where you live, Georgia looks about the same as Auburn, Clemson, Arkansas, Maryland, Oklahoma State, Michigan State, UCLA, Texas A&M, Colorado, Virginia Tech, Virginia, Wisconsin, and many others.
One of many things that have changed recently - Georgia can continue to sell instate recruits on the SEC where the most exciting road games are in Columbia, SC, Gainesville, FL and Auburn, AL - and they don't play many non-conference games away from home. We can sell travel to conference games in Miami, Boston, and Tallahassee and nonconference games in Provo, South Bend, Annapolis and other fun places. They used to be able to scare recruits with how bad the neighborhood was around Tech. Now, we are in an awesome location with shopping, restaurants, tourist attractions, hotels, cutting edge research facilities, etc. surrounding our campus. They also used to scare recruits with how hard our academics are (vs. their worthless piece of paper); but now we have put in place academic support infrastructure that will give any recruit an opportunity to get a degree that actually means something.
Outside of this state, Tech can sell academics and national reputation, the many advantages of Atlanta, national following and exposure, best in the nation facilities (in some areas) and programs (such as Total Person and Sports Nutrition), and the former head coach of the Dallas Cowboys that took John Elway to the SuperBowl three times, CREATED "Slash" for Kordell Stewart, won the NFC East with Emmitt Smith and Troy Aikman, won a college national championship, etc.
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Some people on this website always try to turn every thread into an opportunity to take a shot at Chan. They choose to overlook his four Superbowls, six division championships including winning the NFC East as head coach of the Dallas Cowboys, eleven out of fourteen NFL seasons in the playoffs (including his final eight years), a division II national championship, coordinating one of the most prolific college offenses ever (when he was at Air Force), etc.
It is funny that some people claim to be Tech fans; but they love to come on the internet and assert that Chan is not a capable coach. These marginal few say it over and over and over in as many places on the internet as they can - as if stating it frequently will invalidate the overwhelming preponderance of evidence to the contrary. I find it amusing these people seem to believe that mentioning scores from two or three games invalidates a coach with a lengthy, irreproachable history. I could mention embarrassing scores from three games of any coach that has been in place for a long time (including Bob Stoops, Steve Spurrier, Bobby Bowden and any other accomplished coach). Are all coaches terrible? Repeatedly bringing up a few scores by itself has no bearing on whether Chan (or Stoops or Spurrier or Bowden for that matter) is a great coach. Those people that enjoy brandishing those scores so much only serve to reveal their own weakness and ignorance.
I have read in a few places where people on the internet stated that Michael Jordan was not a great basketball player because he was overblown by Nike and he couldn't win when he came back without Pippin and Phil Jackson. That is an example of the same incomplete logic. Instead of convincing me that Jordan was not a great player, it simply exposes the ridiculous weakness of the person making that case.
I can substantiate that Michael Jordan was one of the greatest players ever. I can also prove that Chan is a great coach. I still have not seen the first bit of reasonable evidence to the contrary. Yes, I know that Jordan was in some ways not as good when he came back - because of the time away from the game and his aging physical skills. That doesn't apply to Chan, who is just now reaching the best years of his coaching life in his early fifties.
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Anway, have fun with this and GO JACKETS!!!
