Long Coley Winter

Long Coley Winter

00:16

Welcome into the blog, the dogs Podcast. I am Herschel Gurley. I'm here with my co host as always boss, dog boss holler at the people.

00:26

Welcome back, everyone. hope you all enjoyed last week's podcast and enjoy the ride.

00:31

Yeah, so let's jump right into it. Obviously big news since Jake announcing and Jamie Newman coming on board as the fifth year quarterback is the offensive coordinator hire of Todd monken, which so many layers to the monken hire. But just to start off, why don't you just give your impressions on the hire and we'll go from there?

00:52

Well, as I stated last week, as the kind of with everything was kind of the genesis of the offense and the changes forthcoming. I think the Macan hire really kind of kicks that into high gear in the college game mungkin was known more as an air raid, OC, I don't foresee ga going to that type of offense, but I think we're definitely going to see more of your downfield passing attack, he's definitely going to utilize the Titans more, he's definitely going to stretch the field, there's definitely no question about that. We're going to see downfield passing it I don't mean just bombs, there's going to be you know, deep ends, there's going to be deep outs constantly being run deep posts, you know, we're gonna see, you know, more also more screens, there's just gonna be more, it's gonna be more of a pass offense. And it's like, I think I read a stat that like our offenses, the past three years have been about last two years, not including 17 had been 6337, run pass, I think we'll be closer to the 5248, we're still going to be run first. But I think it'll be closer to a balanced offense, which is definitely something that Georgia needs at this point in time. I love the hire. It shows that Kirby is really step taken a step back, I don't think monken comes here unless he has full control of the offense.

02:18

Yeah, I agree with that. I think that it's a number of factors that probably played into all this, I would be really curious to see if the changes would have been this aggressive if Jake had decided to stay. And maybe they would have been, you know, I think Kirby said a lot of stuff without saying it throughout the year about his satisfaction with the offense or where he wanted it to be. I will say he had to have some idea that he was going to look because mungkin came free. And and he was hired fairly quickly. So I think there's something interesting to that. I also think to your point, what I love about it is regardless of what ends up happening with the offense, because obviously that remains to be seen. And we'll see as the season comes on what what happens with that. But it's positive from my end, because it shows that there's some urgency there with Kirby. And I think there always has been, but it's very indicative of where he's at with the program that he wants to win now that he knows with this defense and with the returning edge talent they have that they can win now their time is now and so I love that he wasn't scared to just make a change. Because to your point from last episode, there could have been some hesitancy there based off their success. I mean, as much as we bemoan things they've they've won 11 games three years in a row three straight sec. East titles. One sec title. I think that's the big part about this, too, is is how much the the standard has changed in such a short amount of time. People are irritated that they've appeared in the SEC championship game the last three years. And that's pretty much all they did into it the three years. That's awesome, right? I'm so happy about that. I think you can attest to the fact that in years past in the mark Ric era, that's what used to bother me is that it was just okay to win 10 games or just okay, to go to the Outback Bowl or whatever. That's not the case anymore. It's if Georgia doesn't go to the playoffs fan base is upset. And I love that because I think that's part of being excellent. I think the culture has to be there not only on the team, but also within the fan base. I do want to speak briefly about Todd monken his origin story because there's just a lot of interesting pieces to it. Played quarterback in college, which always loved that because I just feel like it gives him more of a kinship with the quarterback which is obviously the engine of the offense. But he had his first coaching staff at Grand Valley State University. Can you answer for me who had a had a career start at Grand Valley State as a head coach, as a head coach as a head coach?

04:59

No No, I can't actually,

05:02

current Notre Dame coach, Brian Kelly had his head coaching start at Grand Valley State. I bring this up to tell you that they coached together. So Brian Kelly was, I believe, remember which coordinator role he had there. I think he was the defensive assistant on that staff while monken was there, so they coached together, but I bring that up, because on the heels of the NFC Championship game, were good friends, Robert Salah, and Matt lafleur, which we heard about all week. You know, the reason that they're good friends is because they coached together as graduate assistants for Brian Kelly, when he was the head coach at Central Michigan.

05:41

Very interesting stuff.

05:43

I mean, is that not the daisy chain? About daisy chains?

05:45

Yeah, no? Well,

05:47

it's just, it's just incredible that the staff that Brian Kelly had at Central Michigan, you know, who was the offensive coordinator on that staff, Butch Jones. So you have all these like big time, names, that all came from the staff that Brian Kelly had, which I just always find that interesting. So there's your there's the wormhole that you didn't need to go down on Todd monken. But I just figured I'd throw that out there as a point of interest. The other thing I wanted to throw by on this is I think there's been this assumption that because it's monken. And because he's been the certain places with this history, that it's this this air raid, and I think you speak to the point that it's not going to be a traditional air raid where it's throw the ball over all over the field. I mean, he's got some in his coaching past, he's had some successful rushers in his past. We will talk about that a little bit.

06:33

I don't know if this is the only one in history, but I do know when he was at Oklahoma State, he has the one of the only teams that have a 4000 yard passer and to 1000 yard rushers, it's an elite company if he's not the only one. Also, when you look at his success in the NFL, the teams that he had, I mean, let's be realistic, the Buccaneers teams that he was the offensive coordinator on the Buccaneers have been put up lightly garbage forever, you have to go back to the Mike hallstatt days from when they were really, really good. But he was putting up extreme passing yards. And this is where I caution dog fans with this is those teams put up great passing numbers because they were down a lot. And they're rushing stats were pretty awesome. Considering how how far down they were so early in games, doesn't mean they had to throw the ball to try to get back in these games because their defense was so bad. Their defense in monkeys. Two years ago, he was there were in the bottom third. And in one year, they were 28. So I mean, they were bad early most of the time. So and they still they didn't have 1000 yard rushers, but they still had, you know, good rushing numbers as a team. They weren't led by Ryan Fitzpatrick, like Miami was this year.

07:51

Yeah, I think the there's some other interesting pieces, whether you think about it philosophically, or whether you think about it from what the genesis of this was, but it seems that Kirby was really influenced or has been really influenced by his initial coaching stop with Valdosta State. And I bring that up because he was there what in the 2000 2001 season, when Chris Hatcher was the head coach, and Valdosta State was the class of Division Two football, Chris Hatcher was the quarterback at Valdosta. State for how Mummy, how Mommy, the inventor of the air raid offense is an offensive coordinator folks may remember was Mike Leach, the new head coach at Mississippi State. So Kirby has seen what that type of offense can look like, and what it can do for a defense, I think. So I do think there's something interesting about that. And to kind of piggyback off of that there was another hire on the offensive staff Buster Faulkner, who also has called us to state ties. I know you have told me what your thoughts are on his hire and what it means for the rest of the staff. But what were your thoughts when you saw shortly on the heels of the mocking hire that Faulkner was hired?

09:07

Well, we'll get into how this affects the staff overall, but just how this affects the team. I love the Faulkner hire because I really felt that one thing that was missing from this team this year are that we felt the loss of Jay Johnson more than I think anyone was willing to admit. I believe it was Shawn Walton. Is that correct? Was the set the correct name? I think that's right, was the quality control analyst. And I'm not saying that he did a bad job. But

09:35

it was clear that maybe Watson

09:38

Watson Shawn Watson, I'm sorry, was it was clear that he wasn't Jay Johnson and losing Jay Johnson. I mean, those were big shoes to fill in that role. Now, congratulations to Jay. He did a great job at Colorado this year. But just not having him analyzing that tape each week. I really think that that I heard Jake more than anyone was really willing to admit, especially once pager went down once the security blanket was gone. And, you know, then he also doesn't have Jay Johnson. I know Jay Johnson is not an on field coach. But those analysts, Kirby's great at replacing those usually with former coordinators or head coaches, and they do a great job, you know, at what they do. And I just feel that if Falconer is going to stay in that role, being a former offensive coordinator in this type of system that monken is going to run is going to be invaluable for all of the the offense, and I think it's going to help, whatever transition there's going to be.

10:50

Yeah, I agree with that. I, I think it's always better to have as many guys on staff as possible that have coordinator experience, just because you're essentially functioning as the boss of that side of the football. So I think there's a ton of benefit to that. I think it was interesting, I saw that in addition to the the mungkin salary base, they've showed that the Buster Faulconer salary was released as well. And he made 250 grand in Hattiesburg last year is the OC for Southern Miss, and he's gonna make 150 grand at UGA, which I find interesting. And maybe it's just one of these things where he's non power five wants to get into power five door and try to climb his way up the ladder. So this is this is how you start as you do that. But that's a pretty substantial pay cut, and you're taking a cut in your title to come be an off the field guy at UGA. So I think there's a lot of interesting pieces to that. Again, Buster Faulkner played quarterback at Valdosta State. So again, those of us to stay connections come up, but I think he's a great supplement for for Todd monken. And I think, you know, I would obviously think that Todd that he wasn't hired without consulting, Todd monken. So hopefully, there's some some good synergy there. And they get on the ground running and start rolling once spring practice starts.

12:15

No, I think that with Faulconer, also, one thing that we didn't have on staff last year was we didn't have people on staff who had played the quarterback position before. So they didn't know the ins and outs, the mechanics of the position, as well as not necessarily that they should be but what from someone that who played the position before that has been rectified this offseason. And I think that that is something that will benefit the entire quarterback room. And I don't think we can really downplay that enough of how much just those little things that go into play in the quarterback position. I mean, you can speak to this much more than I can having played it. That how much the little things go into playing it that those that monken and Faulkner will be able to help with that. We didn't have someone on staff necessarily that could do that last year. Yeah, I

13:09

agree with that. I think that was one of the undersold stories from the 2019 season was Jake's development from a coaching perspective, he obviously looked different mechanically, than he had in years past. And, you know, iron sharpens iron. So if he didn't have anybody there counseling him, you know, pushing him somebody with that experience, you know, hey, I saw this Did you see this and that takes a different eye than maybe somebody that didn't play the position so I certainly agree with that and it'll it'll help to have a guy on staff who's run who's played an offense somewhat similar to that. Yeah, interesting Buster Faulkner note if we're going to go down another wormhole played it I believe Parkview High School in Georgia High School teammate of Do you know this? No. Josh Stinchcomb

14:00

What do you find this stuff?

14:02

Oh, man, I got you know, this is the kind of stuff I live for. If there was a way I could make money spending useless information. I could retire early. So yeah, state state championship with john Stinchcomb at my belief. It's called Parkview High School. So there's your Georgia connection there is image Josh Stinchcomb go way back. Apparently, he also grew up a Georgia fan because of the proximity to the university. Think he's like 40 minutes away or something town he grew up in. So you gotta love stuff like that. Right. Like maybe that plays into it the heartstrings play into it, where he wants to come be a part of something that he loved as a kid and this is the end. Maybe he wants to come home? Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of truth to that. Plus, man, I ain't been to Hattiesburg. But Athens gotta be nicer in Hattiesburg.

14:47

I can't imagine if it isn't, I'm just, I don't mean

14:52

a look. I'd love to go to Hattiesburg. I'm sure Harrisburg a beautiful place. I'm just saying Athens pretty nice. So this kind of leads into though obviously What does all of this mean for James Coley? You know, I know that the release said his title is going to change to assistant head coach and that's all fine. But what does this functionally mean? If he's not going to be calling the plays if he's not going to have his hands directly in the offense? Where does he go from here? If you had to put your mortgage payment on it, do you think James Coley is wearing red and black next season?

15:26

No, I would be shocked if he's wearing red and black next season. I will be shocked if he's wearing red and black February 7 this year I think it'll be announced after signing day that he is leaving the program if I had to take a guess I would say is probably to a&m to go coach with Jimbo Fisher. I don't know what position they have available but I do know they have a position coach available on the offensive side of the ball. My expectation is

15:52

Yeah, I think it's great i think it's tight ends coach

15:55

tight ends coach Jimbo wanted him last year to come and be the OC no play calling duties I think it may be that would have been two years ago and he turned it down because he was next in line to be often the coordinator and I feel like that that is probably what's gonna happen next then he'll go coach for Jimbo again try to build up his reputation again to try to get another OC job down the road. Unfortunately, he just he there's not gonna be an offensive coordinator job waiting for him right now where he's gonna call plays after this past season. Not saying it was all on him. I'm not a James Coley hater. By any means. I think that the offense as a whole just struggled. I think it was from the top down. I think it was on him. It was on Jake, it was on the offensive line was on the wide receivers. It was on everybody. Everybody just struggled this year, the second half of the season. Everybody had a tough time. Was the play calling. Not that graded time. Yes. Was the play calling graded times. Yeah, he had some really good games where he called plays. And there was just, you know, clear misses, that you could see just from the casual fan, you could see, I feel that we're not going to really miss a beat not having Kohli on the field because at the end of the day, the best recruiter on this team is Kirby smart. And everybody talks about well who's going to replace him at you know, recruiting South Florida well, that might be his territory but you know what we got South Florida kids before Kohli we're gonna get South Florida kids after Kohli. And we built a pretty good pipeline there. Now, I don't feel like that's gonna go away just because James Coley leaves and then all of a sudden they're gonna start going to text saying them instead of Georgia, Georgia is a national brand now. And really since 17 has been, I don't see that changing just because James Coley leaves. Yeah,

17:39

I never get too hot and bothered about the recruiting implications of this stuff. You know, let's let's just look at the SAM Pittman thing, right? Everybody act like the sky was falling, Sam Pittman is leaving, we're never gonna get another offensive lineman. And they bring in Matt Luke. I mean, I think to your point, the personality of the coach or the the intangibles of the coach are fine. And they're one thing but a lot of people can recruit. There's been coaches at Georgia before there'll be coaches after and they've all recruited to Georgia, Georgia is the product. And at the end of the day, they're their salesmen, right salesmen sell a product so they got a pretty good product to sell. The donations that keep coming in make that an even better product as all these improvements keep coming to facilities and whatnot. So that that part of it doesn't really get me all bothered, you know, how it's gonna affect recruiting to your point, they still got Kirby smart and I will put him up in a recruiting battle against anybody in the country and feel real good about the chances of a kid picking him so that that doesn't really move me that much. To your point, though, about the play call and I'm the same way I this isn't one of these things where I put all the blame on James Coley or anything like that. I especially thought at the end of the season Sugar Bowl sec title Georgia Tech game. I thought the game plans were pretty good. I mean, sec title game, I thought they came out first quarter and had a great game plan. Let's go deep. Let's let's take the top off a little bit. They just missed, you know, the talent just wasn't there. I mean, I don't really know any other way to say it. I don't I don't know who gets credit for saying it. But well, what does the saying go? It's not about the x's in the O's. It's about the jimmies and the Joe's. Fortunately, the jimmies and the Joe's on offense, especially on the perimeter just weren't what they have been in the past. We've talked about this a bunch but I think a storyline that really wasn't talked about and maybe it was because of why he left but JJ Holloman not being there. Think proved pretty detrimental. Big time receiver coming back somebody Jake is super comfortable with I'm sure it's somebody they were relying on as they were preparing and planning for 2019 and he's not there. So you have to replace that and there's not just a replacement for him on the roster. So I thought that was a little bit of an undersold piece but but I agree with you i don't think James Coley should necessarily get thrown under the bus about play calling or whatever it may be. I thought the game plans at the end of the season, I was happy with them. I thought they took shots. I thought they did some things. You know, no, DeAndre swift and the SEC title. Though DeAndre swift really in the in the Sugar Bowl against Baylor. So I thought they did the best they could at the end of the day. But 12 and two, pretty pretty darn good season.

20:29

Exactly. I mean, and there's a lot of holy hate going around. But he had other opportunities and chose to stay and thank him for what he did. I mean, Georgia, under Kirby isn't Georgia what it is without cola. He was the third longest tenured person on the original staff. I mean, it's only Kirby and Dell left now from the original staff. Schumann was a controlling analyst To start off with, he wasn't on the field coach from the original on the field staff. It was Kirby Dell and Coleen. That's it now it's just currently in Dell. So I thank him for what he did. I mean, he helped me build that pipeline to South Florida for all those players. So I thank him for that. And I wish him the best at Texas a&m. And, you know, I hope he doesn't, you know, figure out the offensive coordinator stuff and we don't have to see him in another sec school.

21:17

Yeah, I mean, that's that's the part you always are, I guess leery about is going somewhere else. And that ends up biting you. But again, I think some of that's overwrought. I mean, I think Georgia is gonna be okay, Georgia is gonna get talent, or we're just going to have coaches that develop people and as long as the the head man still in charge, as long as Kirby's there. You got to feel good about their chances, not only on the recruiting trail, but but on the field. And like I said, I think it shows that he's willing to evolve with these hires, willing to change things willing to do what needs to be done to keep the program. Excellent. I think that's what I have loved about his tenure as head coach is that excellence is the standard. Vince Lombardi has a great saying that you can't catch perfection but if you chase perfection, you can catch excellence. And I think that's a great kind of embodiment of what Kirby smarts tenure has been. They are just catching excellence, and it's awesome to watch and I'm excited to see what they end up doing this year. Just as a quick pivot to the pro game. Another another dog in the Super Bowl this year. How do you feel about the chiefs and mccole Hardman against the niners?

22:30

I'm not a betting man anymore, but if I was I'd be I'd be taking the Chiefs I know the 40 Niners have a great defense but speed kills man and the Chiefs hasn't for days all across the field. And it's just it's amazing watching watching them play like I mean, I'm not a chiefs fan. I'm not a Niners fan, but it's just fun watching them just the way they play cuz I mean literally anytime any one of those wideouts touches the ball they could go the whole way.

22:59

Yeah, it's it's super exciting from a fan's perspective if you're an unbiased observer because I think it pits strength against strength you get that awesome Niners defense tons of edge pressure they want to get after the quarterback make you uncomfortable make those feet move and then you got Patrick mahomes probably the most exciting player in pro football right now can move the pocket can throw big arm talent, great athlete I mean it's going to be awesome and like you said their edge talented receiver could get down the field and burn you which is awesome. Yeah, I'm back to our favorite Chief mccole Hardman you don't want to know what his his given birth name is. First Name.

23:36

Yes.

23:37

What is not not

23:38

what is given a first name? Carrie. Carrie.

23:42

Carrie

23:42

cry? Yep.

23:43

Carrie mccole Hardman try. care why. Yeah. may start counting Perry. Now you. You Mama. Dairy. I'm gonna call you care.

23:54

So what's your prediction for prediction for the game? No, no, no prediction for the game. What's your prediction for me Kohl's

23:59

outfits.

24:00

Oh, man, I can't wait. I mean, he has been on fire at boombox. divisional round was incredible. And then he comes in dressed as The Fresh Prince. I mean, I'm I'm real happy with his outfit choices. So he's got to amp it up for for the Super Bowl. I don't know it's gonna be electric though. He is his outfit choices are like his play on the field electric.

24:20

Now I'm hoping for some MC Hammer. That's my hope. That's my hope. I want some MC Hammer.

24:25

He could. I mean, fresh prints ain't Far from it. So he was right. He's right. There are

24:30

definitely pull it off. He could definitely pull it off. There's no question. So that's my hope is an MC Hammer. But I mean, I'll be rooting for the Chiefs just because of Nicole. But either way, I just want to see a good game, you know, but I mean, I will root for our reputation because for me.

24:46

Yeah, same. I'll rock the red

24:48

19 straight year with a dog in the Super Bowl.

24:51

Yeah, I love that. That's always great for the brand. So it's just good to see these guys leave and do good stuff. I know you and I've talked a lot about how we have really shifted Did from a professional football perspective from following a specific team to just follow in the guys that have come out of Athens which is fun. So I'm happy to see him goes loved watching Sony and it last year. So you know, as long as the dogs are not feel good about it. Well, I think that about covers it for the day boss. So, you know, guys, thanks for listening, like we said last week, please follow us on social media, Twitter, Instagram, it's blog that dogs it's a wg on blog and dogs. Go to the podcast, like it, share it, subscribe to it, give us those good ratings, anything you can do. We certainly appreciate you listening. Go dog cecum

25:41

go dogs