An early Christmas present: TheFletch!

Don't forget to stop by and pick up a copy of ScoreAtlanta when it hits newsstands tomorrow! and by newsstands, I mean Kroger and QuikTrip!

Funny how a win over Georgia Tech can turn the tide for the Bulldog Nation. Earlier this college football season when Georgia was playing sans AJ Green and losing four straight games, including the embarrassing loss to Colorado, Dawg fans were calling for head coach Mark Richt’s head, offensive coordinator Mike Bobo’s head and even fill-in Uga Russ’s head. Now though, after Georgia rebounded to gain bowl eligibility and knock off Georgia Tech in the process, most of the Bulldog faithful seem to want Richt to stick around. Callers in to 680 The Fan and Sports Radio 790 The Zone also seem to have cooled off on the Richt-on-the-hotseat talk and those listening to the Mark Richt call-in show were nearly begging Richt to stay in Athens and turn down potential offers from Colorado as well as his alma mater Miami. In a recent blog from the AJC, Georgia beat writer Tim Tucker touched on the highlights from the call-in show, noting that one caller “implored Richt to ‘hang in with us.’”

In a recent piece in the AJC Jeff Schultz argued that Richt will stay in 2011 and he deserves to stay on. “Mark Richt has built up a lot of credits. He deserves a chance to fix this,” opined Schultz. “The bottom line numbers are too overwhelming to ignore so quickly.” Schultz did leave a bit of an opening in that if the immediate future doesn’t show results, the new AD and the Dawg fans might pull the chord, but that is a problem for 2011.

On the other hand, Mark Bradley of the AJC was back at Richt’s throat with his solution to fixing Georgia’s problems. Unlike his (exact same) piece about Georgia Tech, which said the Jackets simply needed a talent infusion and a more humble coach, Bradley hammered Georgia, saying that the team needed to get stronger (READ: fire the strength coach), get edgier and “get an idea.” The last point questioned Richt’s offensive philosophy, and honestly, it might be time to start thinking of new column ideas. Bradley goes after Hewitt and Richt to the point that I am starting to think that Terence Moore has taken over his column.

While driving back in town from a Thanksgiving with the family I had the chance to catch the last few minutes of the Atlanta/Green Bay game on Dave FM (and again, what a treat Atlanta gets every week, being able to hear Wes Durham call a football game), and then I heard a bit of postgame on various radio stations. Apparently at one point some of the coverage, the personalities on 790 The Zone compared the 2010 Falcons to the 1998 Falcons. Looking back now, we know that the 1998 team didn’t have the staying power that the current Falcons squad has, and the current team has one of the top seven quarterbacks in the league, unlike the 1998 squad. I also think that this team will actually be feared in the playoffs, unlike the 1998 team that was an afterthought to the Vikings with Randy Moss and Cris Carter roaming around. But that was without question the most successful Falcons team ever, so I can see why you’d want to use that team as a measuring stick with this unit. That team went farther than any other team in franchise history, including any team that ever featured one Michael Vick.

While I don’t necessarily agree with the comparison, I think it is quite comical that several shows on 680 The Fan have taken 790 to the woodshed over the comparison. One show in particular, The Rude Awakening, Perry, Leo and Rude were barbing the discussion, saying “Oh that was ANOTHER radio station making that comparison,” when a caller asked about that. On that morning I guess it was a little too sports-related of an inquiry as the three had just spent a segment discussing turkey, online shopping and listening to Leo discuss fashion. I swear I was listening to Q100. A caller tried to steer the topic back to sports but was told that they were entertainers. Could have fooled me.

Finally, I must commend Score Atlanta, the AJC, the Marietta Daily Journal, the Gwinnett Daily Post, the Valdosta Daily Times, Gainesville Times and nearly every other newspaper in the state of Georgia for the coverage they all give on high school sports in Georgia. I was in Texas over the Thanksgiving weekend, where Johnny Moxon once proclaimed that “High School football is a way of life.” I must say that as a high school football commentator/writer/fan, I was looking forward to indulging in the wall-to-wall coverage I expected to be immersed in during my stay. BOY was I surprised when I could not find a single game on the radio while drive around during prime “Friday Night Lights” time. I was surprised when the Friday morning paper didn’t have the previews that Score Atlanta, Georgia Public Broadcasting or the Gwinnett Daily Post put forth every Friday morning. I was amazed that Saturday morning’s “recaps” were maybe four paragraphs long per game, if that. I thought towns shut down in Texas so folks could go watch the local high school team play. I thought Peter Berg made a movie and subsequent television show about life in Texas revolving around high school football? Was I mistaken? Perhaps I was in the wrong city/town/region of Texas, but I was disappointed with the coverage of high school football in the Lone Star State and must thump my chest at the Peach State’s coverage. All of the papers discuss the sport; every single website seemingly has a webcast discussing the local teams. Georgia Public Broadcasting runs Sports Central and gpb.org/sports runs an hour-long interactive webcast following the show called Sports Central XL, where coaches, writers and guests are interviewed by myself and Mark Harmon. You can find two games broadcast on television every week with GPB’s webcast, and the state championships will be broadcast yet again on GPB-TV as it has been for years. Georgia has high school football covered and Texas may want to take notes.

Can You Believe He Said That
“He deserves most of the praise he gets from the national media, but why are we so hesitant to call him out on his futile record in the games that matter the most?”
That was Jeff Woolverton on 790thezone.com as he called out Peyton Manning in a debate over who was better: Manning or Tom Brady. I agree with Woolvey here. I am not sure why, simply because of MVP trophies we award Manning the title of best around. Brady has three Super Bowl titles with another appearance while Manning, despite regular season success has choked in the playoffs. The year he won was clearly a down year for New England and he lost last season’s Super Bowl. I’d take Brady too Woolvey.
HHe most of the praise he gets from the national media, but why are we so hesitant to call him out on his futile record in the games that matter most?