Final Feelings: UGA Football Will Have to Wait to Start the Season; But We Are Ready Now

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ATHENS - Kirby Smart and UGA football are a week away from kicking off the season, but college football is back, and the Dawg Post crew is back with their Final Feelings for this weekend.

Matt’s Final Feelings:

Football is BACK.

Finally. This really is the best time of the year. High school football has started and you can smell college football in the air. 

The excitement grows by the day. The summer heat is brutal, but it’s fine. Because college football is almost back.

Now the Dawgs are a little banged up at the moment - especially at running back. Branson Robinson is out for the season, and both Kendall Milton and Daijun Edwards are still fighting through injuries. Luckily, Kirby Smart won’t need them back until week three.

Even with an injured backfield this team has a chance to make more history. Due to the easier schedule, another loaded defense, the leadership and the winning culture created inside the program, it’s easy to see Georgia winning their third-consecutive national championship this fall.

For the third consecutive season, the No. 1 Bulldogs will go undefeated through the regular season and walk to the SEC championship game. Will they take on Alabama or LSU? It has to be between them right? We’ll find that out a few months from now.

Either way, I see these Bulldogs back in the Playoffs.

Who could meet them there?

Another SEC team? That could absolutely happen.

Ohio State or Michigan? Maybe both again? That could happen too.

Is anyone believing in Texas/USC/FSU? One might meet expectations, but two of those three teams are going to disappoint. 

Can Clemson get back to the Playoff? Will Oregon take a step forward? Will Penn State finally make some real noise? 

So many questions, but I’m here for it. 

The ‘Dawgs are still No.1 on the recruiting trail. They’ve got two outstanding quarterbacks, they’re bringing in more size and depth on both sides of the line, adding talented backs and are loading up on more elite linebackers. 

It’s not a perfect class, but it’s still an elite class, and one that will keep Georgia pushing for national championships in the near future.

The Braves are in first place. The bats are hotter than the weather. It might be the best Braves lineup in my lifetime. The pitching is coming back around. They’re only getting healthier. 

But can they keep this up? They’ve been doing it all year, so we’re all expecting it to happen in October, too. I’m hopeful, but I’m nervous. The Dodgers are really good. We saw last year what a hot Phillies team can do. The Brewers aren’t great, but they won’t roll over.

It’s been one hell of a summer. Let’s hope it continues in the fall.

As for the Birds, I think they’ll improve, but even in an incredibly weak NFC South, I think they’ll manage a 8-9 season. They’ll look to run on everyone, and that’s going to be really tough. The defense is improving, but I’m still on the fence about quarterback Desmond Ridder. According to FanDuel, the Falcons have just -5500 odds to win the Super Bowl this season.

All in all, Summer 2023 was a good one. London and Paris are awesome. As much as I enjoyed both, the next time I travel across the pond I’d like to see Germany and Italy. Of course, playing golf in Ireland is on the bucket list as well. But I got my culture on. That was fun.

I’m still really bad at golf, but really good at drinking beers on the course. Why do beers go down a lot quicker on a golf course? I think I’m pacing myself, then boom, the 12-pack is empty, and I still have five holes to play. 

Anyway, there’s a Georgia Bulldog football game next week. Get ready. 

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Ryan’s Final Feelings: 

Let’s go baby! We get to watch college football this weekend.

The last time I wrote Final Feelings, I was not sure if I would be doing it again, but I am back for this season and this time as a graduate of the University of Georgia. 

It was a pretty chill summer for me. I needed that. I am trying to learn how to play golf, so I am in the early stages of that. 

I need to know how everyone feels about pickleball, because people my age are all over it right now, and it is a little weird. I haven’t played it yet. Is it because it’s easy? Is it really that fun? When I do pick up a paddle or racquet or whatever they are called, watch out. 

I haven’t decided how I am going to spend Saturday, but if I end up doing nothing but watching football on the couch, that will be a day well spent. 

We will have to wait another week to watch the Dawgs play, and I want to save most of what I have to say for next week’s edition of this. 

What I will say is, we are so close to this thing now that I am just ready to see them play. We are at the point where all of your questions and all of my questions are just going to have to be answered out on the field. 

Georgia is banged up right now. Everyone says that their first real test will be against South Carolina, but their first real test is getting to the season as healthy as possible. The Dawgs are most likely the most talented team in the country, but the equation changes with each missing piece. 

This was not the fun and celebratory offseason that it could have been or should have been. I’m glad it is finally over.

Enjoy your weekend of football. 

Dean’s Final Feelings: 

I’m not quite ready for the season to start, but I am probably as close to being ready as I have been for some time. Getting ready for the 2021 season - that was tough. I had not shot photos in nearly 18 months. I get out of practice when the summer comes along no matter what, but not shooting any of the 2020 season was hard to get used to. 

I spent all of 2020 in the press box, and I don’t belong in the press box. That’s where fancy people alot smarter than me work during games. 

The runup to the 2022 season was spent navigating an offseason writing and promoting the successful Dawgstruction, which was a learning process to be sure. The other problem I had coming into 2022 was that I had a new camera for the first time since the 2012 season - a so-called mirrorless camera. That type of camera (we used Nikon cameras - long story - and in this case I use the Nikon Z9) produces huge files, and lots of huge files. 

I’m still not used to the volume of data we get each game. For instance, the 2021 national title game against Alabama netted about 150 gigabytes of photographic data. The 2022 national title game against TCU was around 500 gigabytes, or about half a terabyte. 

Now we use two Z9s for each game. During the TCU game I rented two additional Z9 cameras… because those images are not coming back, so we try to get the best ones we can while we can. 

This season I don’t have to worry about anything new. It took me probably less than a quarter of the Buford-Jones County game to know for sure I didn’t have any issues. Little things popup along the way - is your computer (if you don’t have a Mac don’t talk to me about working with Dawg Post. Although I have and use a PC, I don’t speak and will not acknowledge a PC; they are not able to handle what we do; additionally they are unreliable; this is like Coke-Pepsi for me) cleaned off to deal with the data we inevitably get week one - even Kirby and company playing Tennessee-Martin, which sounds like a driver from Talladega Nights who finishes a lap or two down. 

I’m very excited about this weekend - we’ve got an SEC team, USC and Notre Dame playing. I will be watching all of those games hard. I am disappointed the Pac 12 is in the midst of dying because I really do like watching those late games. I realize that those games are not going away, but my subscription to the Pac 12 Network(s) is, and you can see some really odd games on that network in the spring. If you like watching baseball on astroturf that’s as good a network as any to have on. 

That said, at Dawg Post we prioritize watching teams play - all teams. We don’t care. Our current issue is as follows: we have a three-TV setup downstairs. I prefer not to stream on game days. I want to use the antenna, as God intended, for as many games as possible. The issue is that my antenna is acting up a little - Stone Mountain is really pissing me off as it is in the way of our secret location in east Athens and the TV towers near Emory. 

Side note - tell me if you are from Atlanta or not: 

A. Say the word “Atlanta”.

B. Pronounce “DeKalb”.

If you are pronouncing the wrong T or the incorrect L show yourself to the door. 

So we have to get the antenna setup right or move Stone Mountain. If not we are going to have some issues next weekend. But I will figure the antenna out here soon. One problem we are going to have next weekend is that Georgia plays so late that we are going to have to record a game to watch while we work late - and so the rest of the night becomes a game of specifically not watching the score of the live game in the middle of the three TVs in order not to spoil what is happening in the Coastal Carolina (+14.5) at UCLA game, which will be on a delay for all of us. 

See, Coastal is worth something… 

How good is USC going to look? They are the only team this weekend that really seems to have a shot at getting to the playoff. What’s that defense look like? If they are giving up 20 points or more that means not much has changed. We know the Trojans can score. 

I will be interested to watch Notre Dame as well. Imagine flying to Ireland to start the football season - they must have Matt DeBary money.

The No. 13 Irish do all this rigamarole to help the brand. I get it. It is good marketing. You know what’s better marketing? Winning games that matter against teams that matter. What’s Notre Dame’s best win in the last five years? Beating Clemson at home? Twice? I mean, ok. NC State has done that. Once. And that’s NC State; I feel like they should be given double the credit for that. 

I don’t hate Notre Dame. They don’t matter enough to elicit feeling if we are being honest. Georgia, Michigan, Ohio State, Alabama, good USC… Notre Dame certainly plays games that matter, but they don’t win them.

Have fun in Europe, men. 

We will have our picks a little later, but the best games of the weekend are Ohio (+2.5) at San Diego State and Florida International (+10.5) at Louisiana Tech, and, yes, I will be watching them - no matter how insignifigant they are.

Additional sidenote, and I don’t care if I am the bad guy here, I’ve had enough of the Little League World Series. Keep it moving boys. You are not entertaining enough for this old man - oh, and get off my lawn. 

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