Gig 'em

You know, in those roles with Saban's framework, I bet Saban could make it work.

Considering Riley's new employer, I guess we'll be able to combine those terms going forward.

Imagine a TCU fan seeing Stetson knockin’ on their door at 6am. Ha! Hasn’t he terrorized them enough???? UGA- Surprised to hear that UGA’s WR talent will be better next year, after AD Mitchell left and Rara found his legal trouble. Could be what he meant was the WR room is better than UGA had during the regular season when AD Mitchell was injured. Then, there’s always the portal. I’m sure UGA can still find a good receiver there. LSU – Kelly already publicly announced that Daniels would be the starter, right? He could always change his mind, but he was pretty definitive in his statement earlier. QBs I’m excited to watch reshape their teams: 1. Conner Weigman 2. Spencer Rattler 3. Carson Beck

"AU is perfect at home this season. TAM is garbage." Scoreboard, dude. Scoreboard.

What's more natural than that?

Best to ignore the guy. He'll go away once he grows up and realizes that he's no better than anyone else and that having a chip on his shoulder doesn't make him a deep thinker - it just makes him bitter.

1. Ainias Smith has not declared for the draft. He seems to be waiting until closer to the March 1 deadline to see how his rehab goes. My guess is that if he gets his 40 time to where he wants it for the combine, he'll probably go, but that's far from a given. I also think he's compelled by the idea of rehabbing more and improving his draft stock by finally having a QB who can throw the ball to him downfield backed by an OC who can scheme him open on just about every play. NIL money won't hurt his chances of coming back, either. 2. Max Johnson will be the backup unless Marcel Reed turns out to be a freshman phenom. While Max isn't a Heisman candidate, he's a dependable backup. 3. I don't really care whether they're ranked to start the season. I do think Fisher and Petrino both have way too much riding on this working for their redemption to screw it up. They can make it work for a couple of years, and that's all we need at this point.

I heard a question asked on a podcast recently and I didn't have a good answer. How does it benefit a player to sign a NLI? IT's not a requirement for a player to sign one to attend a school or get a scholarship, it's just something that's helpful for the schools to plan. It's great for lower-level players for them to secure a scholarship spot. For someone like Rashada or other top 50 players who'd get a spot no matter where they decided to go, though, why even both signing a NLI. The NCAA better get in gear and place some rules on this process. I know I'm stating the obvious.

Agree. There's a part of this game that has the feel of last year's revenge game against Bama. I love watching the psychology of these games play out. The outcome is often hard to predict with 18-22 year-old kids, though. All it takes for this game to go down to the wire is for one or two key UGA players to have the thought deep down that "it's just TCU....". Loose contain on a couple of plays early on and the 2-score margin goes up in smoke. That's really all it takes. I fully expect UGA to take care of business, but it's an intriguing matchup nonetheless.

TCU's been a second half team, but their only hope in this game is to get a fast start like they did to Michigan and hope to either derail UGA's run game (somehow???) or benefit from UGA deliberately not running early on. I don't see Monken and Smart making the same mistake Michigan did by getting cute with the ball. I think a 2-score game is the right margin because UGA will likely eat a lot of clock running the ball, and that will keep the score from getting out of hand for either team. I doubt this will be a shootout. In the off chance this turns into a shootout, then TCU's WR speed will be hard to handle, even for UGA. The talent gap in this game should make it uncompetitive, but anything can happen. That's why we watch, right?

Buckle up, cupcakes.

I really don't understand the negativity. We hired an OC, not a minister. If he acts up, let him go. My guess, though, is that he's wandered in the desert long enough that he's willing to behave to get back into big-boy football and prove his doubters wrong.

@Ron - Petrino's offenses are based more on creating opportunities to get the ball into the hands of specific playmakers at specific times in the game more than being married to a particular style of play. That offensive approach will never go out of style, and if executed by talented players, will never really be "figured out" by defenses.

My take on the big guaranteed contract is that it sort of protects us from ourselves. Nobody with any influence will ever decide to pay an $85M buyout when 25% is due immediately. In reality, we made a purchase and we're stuck with it for a minimum of the next 5 years or so. We've had a couple of bad seasons - this last one was horrid. Jimbo's finally come to realize that he can't be a HC and play-caller at the same time and he has to choose. I think the Petrino hire will fix a lot of issues and put us in a very competitive position next year. Jimbo will have a chance to fix the problem precisely because of the guaranteed contract. As for escalating coaching salaries leading to NIL, there was certainly a progression, and if A&M weren't the first to pay someone like that, it would have been another school. It's a natural progression in a multi-Billion dollar industry. NIL is actually a really good thing. The problem is that the NCAA has mismanaged the program. I think most of us would agree that immediate transfer eligibility added on top of the mismanaged NIL is more of a problem than NIL itself.

I've followed the Aggies long enough to know that they've too often listened to uneducated Jerry Springer-type hacks like Paul Finebaum. Jimbo seems to have finally been able to get the Board of Regents to a point at which they're wiling to tune out the noise and focus on what's important. Petrino's done a lot of things I don't approve of, but we all deserve another chance. Whether it will work or not, I'm willing to wait and see. One thing I know is that Jimbo's job is on the line and he's willing to make this hire. I commend him for that and I'll support him to see how it works. As for Finebaum, he can suck an egg. The protein would help him.

Poor cachectic Finebaum. "Somebody please get that man a sandwich!"

Who wouldn't pay money to see Finebaum and Jimbo in a cage match? Or Finebaum and Petrino????

In for a penny, in for a pound, right? Funny that the wholesome Aggies are now the bad boys of college football.

You guys love to talk about how incompetent Jimbo is with his 8 sheets of oversized paper calling plays. Aggies were 5-7 this year. If they'd had a single TD more each game this year, they'd have been a 10-win team in the regular season and would have won the SECW. That's how close this league is. Bobby Petrino doing nothing but focusing on offense is worth a heck of a lot more than one TD/game over stretched-thin Jimbo. Jimbo knows his legacy is on the line with this hire, but he passed up a lot of guys who wanted the job to pick Petrino. I can't imagine he'd do that if he didn't know he can work with this guy. I'm excited to see what the next season holds.

I've heard the Aggies talked to him early on when they were taking an initial look at options, but he made it clear he wanted to stay in the booth for at least another year - not ready to get back to coaching yet. I agree Mullen would be a really good OC without having the burden of recruiting and re-recruiting the roster every year.

That's a great take on the game. It's going to be competitive. Michigan got cute early in the game and made the decision to air it out, counter to their identity as a team that pounds the ball down their opponents' throats. If UGA plays bully football in the run game, they should pull away in the second half. It's going to take a lot of discipline to do that, though, because TCU's play against Michigan shows that when they're well-rested, TCU's tougher against the run than most people thought, and their offense is tougher to stop than most people thought. I can't wait to watch this game.

Before the semifinal games, I would have bet lunch that UGA and Michigan would both run away with their games and be able to virtually sleepwalk their way to the title game. That didn't age well. You never know for sure what you're going to get from week to week with these teams, and that makes it hard to predict the outcome of a specific game. One thing we've seen recently, though, is that TCU's been able to play a lot tougher than I'd given them credit for, and UGA's pass defense hasn't performed nearly as well as I'd been giving them credit for. I still think UGA has the better team and will pull out a win, but the Dawgs need to tighten things up to make that happen. TCU didn't get to the title game on a fluke. UGA's in for a fight.

I see this as a really good move for the Aggies. Jimbo and Petrino are both highly qualified and competitive, and they both have a chip on their shoulder with something to prove. There's a high risk/reward look to this that could take the Aggies to a natty or implode. Personally, I like the gamble, and I think it's going to work pretty well. Nothing about it speaks of complacency.

You're proving her point, Ma'am. Losing to that Auburn team is proof positive that we fielded the worst team ever - and still mauled LSU.

I've always thought Michigan's helmets make them look like cyclists on the field. The short pants they wore against UGA last year went along with the cyclist theme really well and I can't get it out of my head. Their uniforms look out of place on a football field for some reason.

It's not a popular position among the talking heads, but I think this is a great hire, and guys like Chris Wright will be pretending they had a 180 different take by this time next year. I think Jimbo hired him over some others because he trusts him enough to hand over the offense. I think they both have a chip on their shoulder now, and being as competitive as they both are, I see this working well for both of them, and for Aggies as well.

Both TCU and UGA pulled out gutsy wins, no doubt. I have to go back to the refs in the TCU game. I'm glad TCU beat Michigan because - well, I'm from Texas and their uniforms are better than Michigan's. Anyone watching the replay knows that Michigan had a TD taken off the board by incompetent SEC refs that day. Would that have given Michigan the game? No, but it would have certainly changed the game dynamics in their favor. We're always going to have missed calls - that's part of the game you just have to accept. But when the correct call is made on the field in a split second and then the replay official takes all the time in the world to look over the play in slow motion and then still manages to screw it up and overturn the call in the field in the process - when that happens - officiating really needs to be fixed.

That's a shame. Lucas is a beast physically. I'd really hoped he'd work out with the Aggies. If he gets his head straight, he's going to wreck some O Lines wherever he goes.

This is a great pickup for the CB position. Gig 'em!

Great to hear that. Richardson may be the only player in CFB who's intercepted both Tua and Bryce. He has a great habit of being in the right place at the right time. Can't wait to see him play next year.