Bobo or BooBoo?

Everybody has been all over Mark Richt the last few seasons, calling for his head as his fanny burns on the hotseat. Some members of Bulldog Nation have also been thirsting for offensive coordinator Mike Bobo’s head after watching the offense struggle since Knowshon Moreno left town. Fans don’t quite get why the offense, with AJ Green leading the charge the last few seasons, hasn’t been piling up numbers like Mark Richt’s Florida State teams.

Honestly, it is a good question. The common response from the Bobo/Richt defenders is that Bobo’s offensive (no pun intended) play-calls are a part of Mark Richt’s philosophy, but that logic is flawed. I cannot believe that Richt would have abandoned his entire offensive philosophy when he came to Athens. Tweaked, yes. Evolved, yes. Completely abandoned the high-flying, electricity-filled point-a-minute scheme? I just cannot see it.

Which makes me believe that perhaps the offense just isn’t being coordinated the way Mark Richt really wants it to be. Richt is fiercely loyal so he would never call out Bobo through the media, but we saw him crack during a few postgame pressers last year. He questioned running plays with certain personnel in the game. He thought that some play-calls would have been better suited, but he never blamed Mike Bobo for losses.

Interesting because Bobo hasn’t been afraid to play the blame game. Case in point: last year’s Arkansas game. After Georgia mounted a serious comeback by sticking with the running game (something I thought that would have been left in the halftime lockerroom, but he knows better than I do, I guess), the Georgia defense held and gave the offense a chance to win the game with redshirt freshman Aaron Murray under center. On third down, Bobo decided to call one of the most drawn-out, slow-developing plays probably in all of the SEC and Murray was sacked out of field goal range. After the game (a loss), Bobo threw Murray under the bus, saying he needed to recognize what was going on and get rid of the ball. How about you NOT hang your FRESHMAN QB out to dry and give him a quick-hitting play with a high chance of success, even if it meant settling for a field goal attempt by one of the nation’s best kickers? (Though settling for the field goal has also been a complaint by the Bulldog Nation as sometimes it seems a draw is called on third and long to preserve the field goal try.)

This was just a week after Bobo didn’t trust Aaron Murray enough in Columbia to take the handcuffs off in a loss to the Gamecocks. The South Carolina defense was beatable, but from the casual fan’s point of view Murray was limited by Bobo in a game Georgia could have won.

I wonder what the future holds for offensive coordinator Mike Bobo. Will he unleash Murray this year the way DJ Shockley was in 2005? (Note: Bobo didn’t take over play-calling duties until late 2006) Will Bobo play it too conservative in the first two games against what figure to be highly-ranked teams, afraid that his offense will turn the ball over in a crucial spot? Will Bobo let it all hang out this year, figuring he has nothing to lose? I would hope that Bobo turns it loose and lets Murray try to live up to his potential and hype. That might be difficult with a patch-work offensive line, but if Bobo is worth his salt, he’ll figure out a way to replace AJ Green and use the backfield trio of Aaron Murray, Isaiah Crowell and Caleb King to make a run to the Georgia Dome for the SEC Championship.