Kirby: Quality Didn't Match Expectations

ATHENS - Kirby Smart reached back and swung his hammer to hit the nail as squarely as he possibly could on the head with one sentence on Monday. Smart, perhaps 

 

HOOVER - Kirby Smart during 2017 SEC Media Days at Riverchase Galleria on July 11, 2017.  (Photo: Dean Legge/Dawg Post, Scout.com)

ATHENS - Kirby Smart reached back and swung his hammer to hit the nail as squarely as he possibly could on the head with one sentence on Monday.
Smart, perhaps mistakingly; perhaps not, pointed out that he knew coming in that Georgia didn't have what it needed last year to meet the lofty expectations of its fanbase. The truth is it hasn’t had that in some time.
“When we got here I knew,” Smart said. “I coached against the University of Georgia. I recruited against the University of Georgia. I pretty much knew what was here.”
And then this critical sentence Kirby said that no one else would dare say in front of a podium over the last few years - and very few people would write or say out loud.
“I knew the level of expectation didn’t necessarily meet the quality of players that were here.”
Bingo times a thousand.
“And that’s indicative of what the NFL thought of our roster last year,” he added - further underscoring the point.
For the first time since 1992, UGA had only one player selected in an NFL Draft (Isaiah McKenzie). That’s 25 years. I can assure you UGA will have several players drafted next spring.
It must be pointed out that since Mark Richt’s final recruiting class, the 2015 class, things started to pick up. In that class a slew of very gifted players were signed and have been solid players ever since… Terry Godwin, Roquan Smith, Trent Thompson, Natrez Patrick, Jonathon Ledbetter.
But the base of the program hasn’t been “great” over the last decade. Too often, particularly the last two years, transfer players were leaned on this immediately fill in at starting spots. God bless Greyson Lambert and Tyler Catalina, but if they weren’t going to be difference makers at Virginia and Rhode Island, they most certainly weren’t going to be at UGA. Too often that sort of thing was happening in the top 22 of the depth chart at Georgia. Walk-on players filling in the bottom three positions on the scholarship table is one thing, two transfers starting on offense? That’s very much another thing. And it is indicative of not getting the job done on the recruiting trail.
That’s not a problem any more. In fact, and I am certain Kirby doesn't want this out there heading into a season, but this is the most talented roster the Bulldogs have had in modern recruiting history.
Many of the teams before this one - the 2012 and 2007 ones in particular, and even the 2014 team - were quite good… national championship good. But they didn’t have the base of talent this team does (don’t expect a national title - that’s not what I am saying). The 2017 roster has more Top 100 players and Top 300 players of any class since those metrics have been kept starting in 2001.
The 2017 team’s biggest liability, much like the 2007 team, is that much of its high-level talent is very young. Top 100 players like Jacob Eason, Mecole Hardman, Julian Rochester, Charlie Warner, Ben Cleveland, Isaiah Wilson, Richard LeCounte, D’Andre Swift, Andrew Thomas, Jake Fromm and DeAngelo Gibbs will all be sophomores or freshmen. Many have never played a snap of college football.
So while we wait for the foundation to set as a result of Kirby’s recruiting know this: expectations never change at Georgia. Results most certainly vary, but expectations don’t.