Speaking of star ratings... remember former greats?

Star ratings are a funny thing. I decided to look back at some former players from Georgia and elsewhere to see what their star ratings were when they were just high school seniors being recruited. Some of them may be surprising.

First, the not surprising ones:

-Matthew Stafford was a 5 star, and the #2 QB in his class.

-AJ Green was a 5 star, and the #2 WR in his class.

-Tim Tebow was a 5 star, and the #3 QB in his class.

-Percy Harvin was a 5 star, and the #2 WR in his class.

-Eric Berry was a 5 star, and the #1 CB in his class.

So clearly, sometimes the star ratings and Scout/Rivals/ESPN player rankings get it right. But they also often miss the mark on some players, and sometimes players grow into stars with coaching and maturity.

-Knowshon Moreno was a 4 star, and the #9 RB in his class.

-Rennie Curran was a 4 star.

-Mohamed Massaquoi was a 4 star.

-Jeff Owens and Geno Atkins were both 4 stars.

From other schools:

-Mark Ingram from Alabama (Heisman winner) was only a 3 star, and the #58 RB in his class.

-Dexter McCluster from Ole Miss was only a 3 star, and get this: the #100 RB in his class.

-Ndamukong Suh from Nebraska was a 4 star.

-Sam Bradford from Oklahoma was a 4 star, and the #17 QB in his class.

-Colt McCoy from Texas was also a 4 star, and the #14 QB in his class.

-Jordan Shipley from Texas was a 4 star and the #18 WR in his class. Nice picture by the way.

Just think, some of these guys when being recruited weren't exciting to their team's fans.

(Of course, it can go the other way too, and there are plenty of former 5 star recruits that never show up strong on the field. I'm not going to list them. But still, it's much more likely that a 3 or 4 star out there is going to make a huge impact than a 5 star that makes none.)

Grading Georgia's 2010 Recruiting Class

Many will point to Georgia's last-minute losses in their 2010 recruiting class and see this signing day as a failure. Others will look at the overall star ranking average of this class and compare it to others (which is actually good). But maybe it would be best to look at Georgia's personnel needs of the present and near-future to determine whether our coaches filled the spots that were really important. So here is a look at each position and the grade assigned to it, depending on depth and talent (based on recruiting star ratings from Scout.com). (note: If a position has top-rated players on the roster, plus multiple backups that are also of high-rating, then it will likely be rated as an A, whether recruited this class or not).

(Another note: I know that star ratings don't always mean much. But the point of listing them here is to show that there are plenty of players already on Georgia's roster who were highly rated when they were recruited. So for the sake of analysis and comparison, star-ratings will be measured as "talent.")

Grading scale:

A: Plenty of talent and/or depth

B: Good talent and/or depth, but could use improvement

C: Lacking talent and/or depth adequate for Georgia

F: Terrible and catastrophic failure of a position for a Div. 1 football team

Offense

Quarterback (A+)

UGA was looking pretty good with 2 redshirt freshmen (Murray and Mettenberger), a 5 star and 4 star according to Scout.com. Then of course there's Logan Gray (Jr.), another 4 star recruit. Three high-rated QBs on scholarship is pretty good, but it certainly didn't hurt to get Hutson Mason, a 3 star out of Lassiter High School.

Running Back (A+)

Once again, the running back position is loaded at Georgia. Caleb King (5 star) and Washaun Ealey (4 star) are now the relied-upon duo for UGA, and they're backed up by Carlton Thomas (4 star) and Dontavious Jackson (4 star), as well as Kalvin Daniels (1 star). But UGA went ahead and grabbed another, Ken Malcome, a 4 star and the #9 RB on ESPN. At fullback, Georgia has 3 experienced returners, Shaun Chapas (3 star), Fred Munzenmaier (3 star), and Justin Fields (1 star).

Wide Receiver (A)

AJ Green (5 star), Tavarres King (4 star), Rantavious Wooten (4 star), Israel Troupe (4 star), Marlon Brown (4 star), and Kris Durham (3 star). Despite losing 5 star Da'Rick Rogers at WR this time around, Georgia did get Michael Bennet (3 star) and Derek Owens (3 star), who could play at CB or WR. The receiver position was already pretty stacked at UGA, and a couple more were added for good measure. With the likely departure of AJ Green after 2010, Georgia should work hard to get a couple more top WR recruits in the 2011 class, but for now, this group looks perfectly fine. Signing another 5 star would have been tremendous, but losing one in recruiting isn't going to bring down this already outstanding group of receivers.

Tight End (A)

Orson Charles (5 star), Aron White (4 star), Bruce Figgins (3 star), Arthur Lynch (4 star). Yet another loaded position. Georgia didn't sign anyone for this position, and they didn't have to.

Offensive Line (A-)

Returning starters are Clint Boling (3 star), Cordy Glenn (4 star), Ben Jones (3 star), Chris Davis (3 star), and Josh Davis (3 star). They're backed up by Justin Anderson (4 star), AJ Harmon (4 star), Dallas Lee (3 star), plus the return of Trinton Sturdivant (4 star). The line looked pretty good before, but can definitely use more depth. Georgia helped to fix that problem by recruiting OG Kolton Houston (4 star and #5 OG on ESPN), OT Brent Benedict (4 star and #11 OT on ESPN), and OT Kenarious Gates (2 star). The line looks solid now. I considered giving this position a B, considering we lack any 5 stars along the O-line, but after looking at Scout's top recruits this year, I noticed that there were only 5 offensive linemen proclaimed "5 stars" in the country. I think UGA loading up on 4 stars and 3 stars should be sufficient.

Defense

Defensive Line (A)

At defensive tackle, we have returning Deangelo Tyson (5 star), Abry Jones (4 star), Derrick Lott (3 star), Ricardo Crawford (3 star), Kwame Geathers (4 star), and Brandon Wood (5 star). Considering the move to a 3-4 defense and now having one DT (NT), we have a few guys for this role, but the trick will be finding the optimum guy for the position. Georgia went ahead and signed 2 DT's from high schools, Garrison Smith (4 star) and Michael Thornton (4 star). That's a good group to choose from for the nosetackle spot.

At defensive end, UGA returns Demarcus Dobbs (4 star), Kiante Tripp (4 star), Justin Houston (3 star), Montez Robinson (4 star), Jeremy Longo (3 star), as well as a few others. But UGA went ahead and got 3 more DE's, because you can never have too many big guys to move around on the D-line. Brandon Burrows (4 star), Jalen Fields (3 star) and Dexter Morant (3 star) were all signed with Georgia. The defensive line is stacked with plenty of depth and a lot of highly rated players.

Linebacker (B)

Georgia returns 10 linebackers, including Akeem Dent (4 star), Darryl Gamble (4 star), Marcus Dowtin (4 star), and Chase Vasser (4 star). UGA got 3 LB's to sign with this class, T.J Stripling (4 star who can play DE or LB), Demetre Baker (4 star), and Alexander Ogletree (2 star). They lost 3 star OLB Deon Rogers to Louisville, but the position is ripe with 4 and 3 stars and a total of 13 LB's. Still, it would have been good to sign a couple more highly rated LB's to fill in the depth at this position to help replace the huge loss of Rennie Curran.

Cornerback (A-)

At CB, UGA has Brandon Boykin (4 star), Vance Cuff (4 star), Branden Smith (5 star), Jordan Love (4 star), Sanders Commings (3 star). This position has pretty good depth and good talent, but could use a little more work. Georgia signed Derek Owens (3 star), and athlete that can play CB or WR, but losing the 4 star CB recruit Nickell Robey to USC weakened this spot in recruiting.

Safety (A)

Georgia has Bacarri Rambo (3 star), Makiri Pugh (3 star), and Quintin Banks (3 star). This position was very thin with the departure of Reshad Jones and Bryan Evans, but UGA fixed that by recruiting 3 safeties, Alec Ogletree (5 star and #4 S on ESPN), Marc Deas (3 star), and Jakar Hamilton (4 star). Although still not quite as loaded as it could be, UGA managed to get two big-time safeties in this class (Ogletree and Hamilton) to solidify the position.

So clearly, these ratings and grades are very subjective. I really couldn't make a great case for any position lacking sufficient talent or depth, despite our big recruiting losses recently. Georgia's big losses from last season were Jeff Owens and Geno Atkins at defensive tackle, Reshad Jones and Bryan Evans at safety, Rennie Curran at linebacker, and Prince Miller at cornerback. This recruiting class signed two more 4 stars to help at DT (along with a couple of 4 stars and 3 stars to thicken up the DE spot), a 5 star and a 4 star for safety, and a 3 star to help out at CB (a position with plenty of talent already). We got extra help at QB, RB, LB, WR, and along the offensive line.

If this was being graded by comparison to other top recruiting classes, the grades might look a little different. But instead, this looks at the overall talent and depth on the roster, and Georgia has plenty of it from past recruiting successes, along with new commits. Overall, I think the coaches addressed the weaknesses we had with this signing class and added extra depth and talent to every position (other than TE, which doesn't really need it yet).

Despite recruiting losses, Georgia loaded at WR in 2010

So we lost a highly touted WR recruit. Now who will catch the balls between the hedges?

1. AJ Green (Jr). Career stats: 109 receptions, 1,771 yards, 14 TD. Out of high school, he was a 5 star Rivals recruit and the #2 WR by ESPN.

2. Tavarres King (R. Soph). Career stats: 20 receptions, 443 yards, 1 TD. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit and the #22 WR by ESPN.

3. Rantavious Wooten (Soph). Career stats: 10 receptions, 197 yards, 2 TD. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit.

4. Israel Troupe (Jr.). Career stats: 8 receptions, 129 yards, 1 TD. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit and the #6 WR by ESPN.

5. Kris Durham (Sr.). Career stats: 32 receptions, 450 yards, 1 TD. Out of high school, he was a 3 star Rivals recruit.

6. Marlon Brown (Soph). Career stats: 2 receptions, 15 yards. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit and #3 WR by ESPN.

Then we have 2 potential WR's signed today.

Michael Bennet, a 3 star WR (and also 6'3").

Derek Owens, a 3 star athlete who can play cornerback or wide receiver.

And then we have our tight ends (all potentially threats as pass-catching TE's).

1. Orson Charles (Soph.). Career stats: 23 receptions, 374 yards, 3 TD. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit, and the #15 TE by ESPN.

2. Aron White (Jr.). Career stats: 16 receptions, 286 yards, 6 TD. Out of high school, he was a 4 star Rivals recruit and the #6 TE by ESPN.

3. Bruce Figgins (Jr). Career stats: 5 receptions, 56 yards, 1 TD. Out of high school, he was a 3 star Rivals recruit and the #27 TE by ESPN.

We've got all of that, not to mention any walk-ons at WR who are available (and maybe even former-QB and punt fair catcher Logan Gray). Sure, it would be great to add another 4 or 5 star WR to our roster, but I still think this is one of the best receiving groups we've had at Georgia in a long time.

LOST Season Premier tonight: Remember when Hurley wrote on this blog?

You don't remember? CLICK HERE to see it. (He wrote in the comments under the post.)

It was an honor for Jorge Garcia (actor who plays Hurley on LOST) to grace this blog with his textual presence. I still can't believe that happened.

By the way, here's a link to Jorge's blog.

Hoops Dawgs Struggle: Are they a "home" team?

Fun hoops fact:

This season at Stegeman Coliseum, the Georgia basketball team is 9-2 (1-1 SEC).

Away from Athens, they are 0-7 (0-3 SEC).

It's looking more and more to me like they're a "home" team, that is, they perform well at home, but when away they're plagued by turnovers and haphazard ball handling. At least they're doing well somewhere, unlike some Georgia teams of the past.

NCAA Teams with Top Attendance in 2009 (UGA is 6th)

Yesterday ESPN released a list of the top 20 NCAA football schools ranked by average home attendance during the 2009 season.

Georgia comes in at 6th, with 100% capacity. I'm not really sure how so many other stadiums exceeded their capacity, but it sounds uncomfortable.

It's good to know that even in a down year, the fans still show up strong at Sanford Stadium.

Georgia's 2009 season: What could have been?

We're at that strange point in the off-season, where we haven't yet started the complete "next year" discussion, and we're still somewhat talking about last year. I think it would be a good time to reflect on 2009, then shove it away forever. Since I love hypothetical discussions in college football, I want to look at Georgia's 2009 season and think about what could have been. What if things had been different? What if certain circumstances were flipped? Would we have fared better, worse, or the same?

So we start with #1, and it's the biggest.

#1. What if Stafford and/or Moreno had stayed?

I told you it was the biggest. Of course this would bring us all the way back to January of 2009, while the 2009 Georgia season was only just conceived in the womb of college football. At the time, their decision to leave for the NFL was devastating, but after a while, most of us convinced ourselves that we'd be fine without them.

We were wrong.

In my opinion, either one of these players would have greatly improved our year, for different reasons.

At first glance, Stafford seems like the most important. Throughout the year, a big complaint of many Dawgs was the up-and-down performance of Joe Cox. Just imagine that first game at Oklahoma State, where a flu-plagued Cox struggled and the Dawgs fell apart after their first successful drive. Surely Stafford, in his senior year, could have brought us a victory in that contest (but then again, so could Cox perhaps if he hadn't been sick). An early problem was that we couldn't get the ball to AJ Green when we needed to most. That was Stafford's favorite thing to do. With Stafford, I think it's likely that we could have at least beaten Oklahoma State, LSU, and Kentucky (a game highlighted by QB failures). Tennessee was too confusing for me to predict, and Florida, well, was similar to 2008. With Stafford, I feel like we could have been (maybe at worst) 10-2 in the regular season.

But then again, Moreno was perhaps even more important. Although many complained about problems at head signal-caller, the Dawgs also lacked a consistent running game through at least half of the season. Imagine our season opener with Knowshon at RB, instead of Richard Samuel and Carlton Thomas (with a lack of an injured Caleb King). Remember the LSU game, where Georgia had 45 yards rushing TOTAL, and practically none in the 1st half? A pinch of Moreno would have fixed that right up. Once again, it's hard to imagine us losing against LSU, Oklahoma State, or even Tennessee with a star runner like Moreno. In all 3 games Georgia had less than 100 total rushing yards. Kentucky is a bit more in question, because by that point we had the running game going pretty smoothly. But once again, a 10-2 season looked very possible with just Moreno returning.

And if they had both come back? We can only dream of crystal footballs in 2009. I would have predicted at least a BCS bowl for that fictional Bulldogs squad.

#2: What if Caleb King wasn't hurt to start the season?

The Georgia running game was a mess for much of 2009. Before the season began, there was much debate over who would be our lead running back, Caleb King, Richard Samuel, or maybe even Carlton Thomas. Just before the season opener, King injured his hamstring and was sidelined. We were left with 2 running backs that looked poised to play: Samuel and Thomas. They did a decent job at first, but we just weren't where we needed to be on the ground. King appeared briefly in the third game (at Arkansas), but was playing second fiddle to Samuel. Just as he started to build up his reputation, his jaw was broken vs. LSU, and he was limited again (helping to stifle our rushing in that game).

It seems likely that having King healthy and ready to start the season would have improved our running game from the start. As we all know, Samuel didn't last at RB, and Thomas was very limited throughout the year. A more polished rushing attack could have led to a couple of wins in games that we just couldn't move on the ground. But King wasn't the only one who brought our ground-game back to consistency...

#3: What if Washaun Ealey had played from the start?

Clearly the true freshman was a spark that the Dawg's rushing offense needed. He was quick, powerful, and even hopped up quickly after a big hit, reminding us immediately of our past star #24. But we didn't see him until the fifth game of the season, against LSU. He averaged over 4 yards per carry in 7 of 8 regular season games, and with a healthy King along, we had a great one-two punch that brought us the consistency and power we needed. What if Ealey had started the season at 1 or 2 on the RB depth chart? It could have saved us in our season-opener in Stillwater, or things could have been about the same. But it's fun to dream.

#4: What if AJ Green hadn't been injured vs. Auburn?

Ok, so this one isn't quite as important for the season as a whole. Toward the end of the season, star receiver AJ Green injured his shoulder at home versus Auburn. He left the game early, but the Dawgs still managed an impressive win over our West rival. But this left Green sidelined for the last two games of the year, including a disastrous Kentucky game. Remember that Kentucky game? Yes, I do too. Although we'll never know how that game would have gone with AJ leaping 50 feet into the air to bring down wavering passes from Cox, I feel like we probably could have (should have) won it. It's hard to imagine us not pulling through against the Wildcats with AJ on the field. That would have put us at 4 losses on the season, and probably at least a Chick-Fil-A bowl rather than Shreveport. Not a huge deal, but it matters.

On the other hand, what if Green had played against Georgia Tech? Would we have scrapped the power running game and instead get pass happy with Green downfield? Would that have led to us blowing out Tech, or could that have hampered us, and perhaps even lead to a loss? We'll never know. Obviously I like to think we would have blown them out. But that's just me.

#5: What if Aaron Murray didn't get injured at some point?

I say "at some point" because it's not really clear when exactly he was hurt. All I know is that sometime before the Tennessee game, Murray injured his elbow in practice. This likely caused concern in the coaches, who, if forced to make changes at QB, were suddenly very, very limited. While many of us were complaining by that point that Logan Gray should get a shot, the Tennessee game (and then Florida) gave us a glimpse that maybe this wasn't the best idea. But Murray?

I'll admit that this number is completely hypothetical, considering we still have no idea how good Aaron Murray is. We don't even know if he'll start, or if that duty will be given to Zach Mettenberger. But the general "feeling" of the Bulldog Nation at that point was that Murray could be the next big thing for Georgia, while Cox was struggling and the Dawgs were losing. Especially after the Tennessee game, when we still had half a season to salvage, many were shouting that we should put in Gray full time (probably a bad idea) or even to go ahead and play Murray. But Murray was hurt to some extent.

If Murray hadn't been injured, would the coaches have considered playing him after Tennessee, or even later after Florida? Would this have helped the Dawgs to prevail in games that we instead flopped? Would it have made us even worse? Or would things have been about the same (except Murray would get some valuable in-game experience)? We'll never know.

#6: What if certain coaching changes had been made... earlier?

So what if Georgia had made a change at defensive coordinator after 2008? What if we didn't see so much soft zone coverage throughout 2009? This is one that many Dawgs would be most heated about, but I really don't know. We have yet to see how/if our defense will improve with changes in our coaching staff, and honestly, we don't know for sure how 2008 would have played out with a different defensive scheme/coach. Most would probably say we would have been much, much better. Granted, a more stiff defense probably could have brought us wins in every game, especially a disastrous Kentucky. We probably would have put up a much better fight against Oklahoma State, Tennessee, and Florida. Despite all of our discussion of what could have been at QB or RB, defense wins championships, and a stout Georgia D could have completely changed 2009.

That's all I've got for now. What do you think?