Georgia football is fine in 2023, and if you don’t think so then kick rocks
Georgia football fans have been losing their minds on a weekly basis because the Bulldogs don’t look like the team that laid TCU out on a slab in the national championship game.
If you’re worried about the Georgia 2023 football team — or if you’re a rival who is relishing the fantasy of the Dawgs’ fall from grace — you need to relax…or…get over it. Kick rocks. Pound sand. The Bulldogs are just fine…probably.
The latest chapter in the UGA-sky-is-falling saga came in Week 4, in a close call against South Carolina, and in Week 5 on the road against the Dawgs’ No. 2 rival, the Auburn Tigers.
Georgia “escaped” an upset on the plains with a 27-20 win after trailing for much of the game. The calls for quarterback Carson Beck to be benched and for offensive coordinator Mike Bobo to be drawn-and-quartered reached a fever pitch as Georgia fumbled their way through the day.
Bulldog Nation (and Bulldog haters), just let it go. This is not the 2021 team, the 2022 team, or the 1980 team. Yet, the so-called struggles are quite similar.
Case in point. In Week 4 of 2022, Georgia got all they could handle at home from a supposedly overmatched Kent State team, coming away with a 39-22 win in what was projected to be a blowout. Then, just one week later, you’d think that locusts and giant frogs had descended upon Athens, Georgia.
The Bulldogs went on the road to play a relatively (by SEC standards) weak Missouri team. The Bulldogs vaunted defense looked completely out of sorts against the Tigers, and the offense moved up and down the field with ease, but had problems punching it in once in the red zone.
Georgia again “escaped” in Week 5 with a 26-22 win after trailing for much of the game and coughing the ball up twice to Mizzou.
Sound familiar?
That week, fans wanted Stetson Bennett to be gone. They wanted a new quarterback. They wanted an offensive coordinator not named Todd Monken who would use the team’s massive stockpile of weapons properly.
Sound even more familiar?
Mere weeks later, those same fans were singing praises to Bennett and were praying Monken didn’t leave Athens for “greener” pastures (which he ultimately did).
Georgia football fans are pushing the panic button too soon.
The Bulldogs gelled after that Week 5 game at Missouri and went on a tear that set them apart from the rest of the country. By the time December got here, no one even remembered the near misses of Weeks 4 and 5. All anyone saw was an unstoppable team.
Will we see something similar from Georgia this year? Nothing is for certain, but when you have a team as talented as the Bulldogs who make it through some real adversity, it usually ends up having the effect of making them even stronger and more determined.
The Dawgs return home this week to take on the upstart Kentucky Wildcats. My guess is that many will be predicting the upset, given the way Kentucky manhandled Florida last week. I’d also imagine you’ll see a more motivated and emotional Georgia team than has been seen all season.
You want to bet against these Dawgs?
Not me. Not a chance.
