By Rock Westfall
Trevor Etienne’s DUI booking on Sunday is the latest in a litany of Georgia football traffic violations. Head coach Kirby Smart’s program continues to take on more of a renegade image. And where is SEC commissioner Greg Sankey during this lack of institutional control?
Georgia Football Culture Is Not a Pattern – It’s a Way of Life
Trevor Etienne’s arrest for a DUI is nothing new for the Georgia Bulldogs. Alarmingly, during Kirby Smart’s tenure as Georgia’s head coach, his program has had roughly 300 traffic violations.
Even worse, there were the tragic deaths of offensive lineman Devin Willock and football staff member Chandler LeCroy in a car crash on January 15, 2023. Reckless driving and speeding were a contributing factor to their deaths. During Smart’s tenure, there have been numerous speeding and street-drag racing incidents that occurred AFTER the deaths of Willock and LeCroy.
Smart has acknowledged the problem and has previously claimed to take ownership of it. In response to this epidemic, Smart has worked with local Athens police officers, university police, and the Georgia State Patrol in “educating” UGA players about the dangers of reckless driving.
Last summer, in an interview with Pat Forde of Sports Illustrated, Smart’s answer to a question about his program’s off-field problems came off as inadequate, defensive, political, and deflective. Worse still, Smart’s comments would hardly seem to stoke fear in his players.
Smart’s comments to Forde were as follows:
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“I’m disappointed anytime we have traffic incidents. It’s very evident when you look at it we’ve had traffic citations and incidents throughout the history of being at the University of Georgia. We actually don’t have more now than we’ve had in the past. What concerns me most is the safety of our players, and when you drive at high speeds, it’s unsafe. We don’t want that to happen. We’re going to do all we can to take that out and make sure that’s eradicated.
“But I’m also smart enough to understand and know that 18- to 20-year-olds is when this happens. It’s when it happened to me as a student-athlete. That’s when speeding happens. What we want to do is take that out and make it safe and not have high speeds. As long as they don’t get a speeding ticket, it should not be a super speeder.”
Yeah, that likely had Georgia football players quaking and quivering in terror to knock it off.
https://twitter.com/KurtPinkerton2/status/1669705607807418369
Kirby’s Soft Tone is Proven Not Smart Nor Effective
Nobody is more results-oriented than Kirby Smart. He is the best recruiter in college football, and now, with the retirement of his mentor, Nick Saban, he presides over the top program in the SEC. Smart has two national championships and two SEC titles, with additional near misses. In the past three seasons, Smart’s Bulldogs lost only three games. Thus, on the gridiron, Smart is proven to get maximum results.
But off the field, Smart is not getting it done. Counseling and education are nice. Certainly, Smart doesn’t want bad things to happen to his players or others. Nobody believes he enjoys such incidents or the damaged image of his program and himself. And significant time has been spent addressing the issue. But at the end of the day, Smart is not delivering results off the field. He has utterly failed. Thus, it is fair to say that fixing his off-field culture is not a serious priority.
Perhaps a Smart idea for Kirby would be to take a page from Saban’s playbook. The Alabama GOAT was never shy about pounding the iron fist and creating a fear culture when needed. There is no way Saban, who was hardly perfect, would tolerate the excessive off-field incidents of Smart’s program.
https://twitter.com/YahooSports/status/1675683449896665089
A Privileged Lamborghini Culture of Unaccountability
Georgia QB Carson Beck was seen this spring in an ultimate look-at-me car. Beck is driving a Lamborghini Urus Performante, which ranges in price from $260,000 to over $313,000.
Beck’s ride is indicative of a tone-deaf program that is also known for bar room brawls, sexual assaults, weapons on campus, and domestic violence. Beck’s Lambo hardly shows the humility and contrition of a program that is out of control. In fact, it is the crown jewel example of Georgia’s unaccountability.
What kind of message does Beck’s car send to the rest of the football program that is known for traffic incidents? For that matter, what does it show in regards to football preparation?
Last year, aiming for its third straight national championship, Georgia was off a notch. Yes, they made the SEC championship game with an undefeated record. But they lost to a tougher, more focused, and better-disciplined Alabama team that lacked UGA’s depth of talent. Georgia lacked the polish of its previous national championship editions. And the off-field incidents no doubt had a role in that decline.
https://twitter.com/rizzo_forsyth/status/1754998350682759286
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey Missing Where It Matters Most
And then there is God’s Gift to college football leadership, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey. At least, that’s how Sankey no doubt sees it. When Sankey is not bullying the other conferences to hog most of the CFP TV revenue pie and automatic bids, he is bloviating about altering the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament so that more of his mediocre SEC teams can bump mid-major programs out of March Madness.
Yet Sankey has done nothing of substance to curtail the increased threats to innocent people by the Georgia football program. Sankey believes he is the smartest man in any room he enters. Perhaps he should get tough and spare the potential future tragedies that are likely to happen if Smart’s hooligan program isn’t reigned in.
https://twitter.com/wpmcgee/status/1771315100202234190
Win at All Costs? Fine, Until Innocent Bystanders are Harmed
Georgia football has been the topic of several exposes, the deepest and most disturbing by the Atlanta Journal and Constitution. When observers are reading such material, the common refrain is that Georgia runs a win-at-all-cost football program. And in this lawless era of college football that is ok in and of itself.
But when winning at all costs trespasses into the harming, maiming, or deaths of innocent citizens, that is where the chalk line on the field must be drawn.
Kirby Smart and Greg Sankey have not done enough to protect outsiders from Georgia’s outlaw culture. Now is the time to slam the brakes on UGA’s Lamborghini fast lane way of life before a horrific catastrophe happens.
Is another Georgia national championship worth the loss of your life or the life of your loved one(s)? Would Smart’s soft attitude and remarks that Boys Will Be Boys suffice?
I didn’t think so.
