Whatever Drew does today, Richt is a MONSTER

As Teddy KGB once said in Rounders, "Lays down a monster." Over the last few weeks, Georgia head coach Mark Richt has been compiling a "Monster" recruiting class, snatching up big-time prospects left and right. So who would have ever thought that all Richt would need to do to ascend to the Urban Meyer/Pete Carroll/Nick Saban/Mack Brown-level of the college recruiting scene is have a losing record at Georgia (and wait for Meyer and Carroll to leave)? Shoot, if he needed to just lose in order to rake in a top flight recruiting class, shouldn’t he have done this a lot earlier in his career, perhaps during his honeymoon grace period, so he could save himself all of this “hotseat” talk that he is currently soldiering through?

The Georgia head coach is not-so-quietly-of-late putting together a recruiting class that is quickly rising and could get even hotter over the next few days as several Georgia targets declare their intentions and four have Georgia as finalists. Running back Isaiah Crowell recently dismissed Auburn and said it is between Georgia and Alabama, though the Tide have already received one pledge from a big-time back in Dee Hart. Defensive Ray Drew narrowed his list down from five to three and Georgia made the cut. Even if Drew doesn’t commit Friday morning, (in a recent interview he seemed high on Auburn and noted that Georgia was recruiting him as an OLB to play in the 3-4, something he said he was “not fond of,”) Georgia now seems ready to pounce on the recent Clemson de-commit Jeoffrey Pagan who told an Atlanta newspaper that he is “excited about Georgia.” Oh, and don’t forget that mountain of a man John Jenkins whom Georgia is calling “the missing link” for its defensive tackle position, a title Jenkins is liking according to reports.

If Georgia can wrangle two of these four, Richt would be looking at a top five recruiting class. If the Dawgs land three, perhaps top three. And in Mark Richt’s wildest dreams, if all four were to decide to come to Athens, suddenly the Bulldogs could be looking back at Alabama and/or Texas with a No.1 or 2 class. Richt does have the advantage of telling these young men they will have EVERY chance to come in and compete for a spot on the field when the Dawgs face Boise State in the Georgia Dome. Should Richt land these players, all of a sudden that hotseat cools down and he could ride this “Dream Team” to the SEC championship game.

That’s getting ahead of ourselves a bit, but who would have thought that after a losing season, Richt would still be able to assemble the class he has to date. Maybe Richt should have scheduled this 6-7 year back in 2001. If he had, would he already have a crystal football on display at Butts-Mehre? Hmmmm. And if he does wrangle in these final pieces, those Richt-haters might be muttering another Teddy KGB line, "Hanging around, hanging around. Kid's got alligator blood. Can't get rid of him." But why would you want to with this talent?