Monday, November 2, 2009

Black Helmets?

This weekend Georgia broke with tradition in order to change the recent outcome of their annual battle against the Florida Gators. They came out of the tunnel with black helmets and black pants. This is the first time in their storied history that black helmets were worn. The black pants have been done several times before, but not since Coach Richt has been in Athens. For me, I like the look of the helmet and I think they had to go with the black pants to balance the look. But I just don’t think the timing was right to bust this look out. I can understand the desire to mix things up and try to fire up the fans and the team and change the recent domination by the Gators. If ever there was a time to go back to traditional Georgia football, this was the weekend. We should have come out in our traditional red helmets, silver britches and run the ball right at them. To me, it seemed like a gimmick and that we are desperate. I feel that if we were having a great season and we went into this game undefeated or with only 1 loss to a non-SEC team, then maybe it might have worked. But this was definitely not the case and it didn’t change the results from the pervious year. Florida won the game 41-17.




Apparently, the players had no idea this fashion statement was going to be made until after pregame warm-ups. “No, we didn’t know,’’ quarterback Joe Cox said. “It provided a spark. Maybe every now and then you need some change to bring excitement and we needed excitement.’’ Unfortunately, the spark didn’t transfer to the play on the field. I am not blaming the loss on the helmets, the falls squarely on the guys wearing the helmets not being able to execute on the field and the coaches not haveing the team ready. Unless UGA plans on becoming the Oregon Ducks of the SEC, I don’t imagine we will see the black helmets again anytime soon!

Go Dawgs!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Gotta agree with you, Alan. The gimmickry is getting old. How much did the black helmets cost?....my guess is over $10,000 to outfit the entire team. What a waste, especially during a recession. That amount could have fed a lot of hungry children. It's hard to picture Richt spending his time looking at fashion catalogs, but that must be what is happening.