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There’s no denying the Nick Saban influence, but Kirby Smart is starting to leave his own mark in Athens as Georgia’s new head football coach.
Smart, who succeeded Mark Richt in December, spent nine wildly successful years as a Saban assistant at Alabama — eight as defensive coordinator. That legacy recently became more obvious when the Dawgs opened up spring practice.
And we’re talking about something considerably deeper than the expected similarities in Xs and Os.
Saban never has been a big fan of open media access, and neither apparently is Smart. Like his mentor, he has chosen to keep the media at arm’s length since taking over, restricting to daily practice viewing to just 15 minutes while meticulously controlling the message getting out.
Bulldogs assistant coaches are also not permitted to talk with the media as Smart has opted for the “one voice, one message” mantra preferred by Saban. To be fair, Richt was doing likewise by the end of his tenure at Georgia as well.
Saban has always been about total control over his program, and who can argue with the results?
To his credit, Smart deftly handled the A.J. Turman situation that recently arose when word got out that Georgia would no longer allow players to transfer without restriction. The school’s policy had previously allowed a full release, meaning players could go wherever they wanted without having to pay their own way for a year.
Athletics director Greg McGarity has since “adjusted” that policy per Smart’s request, meaning that Turman, a seldom-used tailback from Orlando, Fla., will not be allowed to follow Richt and transfer to Miami or SEC rival Florida. Future cases will be handled on a case-by-case basis, but Georgia will not allow releases to fellow SEC schools unless it’s a “special” situation, Smart said, according to the website DawgNation.com.
Addressing the media about the issue and controlling the story’s narrative was shrewd move by Smart. He wisely gambled that media members desperate for more access to a Dawgs program expected to soar would be more than willing to give him the benefit of the doubt this early into his first head coaching tenure.
And he was correct, too. Somewhere in Tuscaloosa, Saban is smiling.
But Smart has also shown that he’s more than willing to be his own man. He showed a lot of flexibility after initial media complaints about the distance they were kept from the action following his team’s first spring practice. Media members were stunned on Day 2 to see that their voices had been heard and that they were allowed much closer access on the practice fields. It’s unlikely the venerable Saban would have felt much sympathy for the media and compromised in that manner.
Smart also has shown a tactical flexibility that may surpass Richt. Consider Smart’s decision last month to offer a scholarship to four-star dual-threat quarterback prospect N’Kosi Perry of Vanguard (Fla.) High School for the Class of 2017. Perry had originally committed to Miami, but opened the door for Georgia and others when he de-committed from the ‘Canes in February. He tweeted on Sunday that he has recommitted to Miami, this time for good. The Dawgs are also in the running for another four-star dual-threat quarterback in Heard County’s Emory Jones for the Class of 2018.
Richt had long been a big proponent of the pro-style offense. It’s reasonable to assume that Smart’s decision to at least consider a different path was influenced both by the scintillating performance turned in by Clemson’s Deshaun Watson against his stout Crimson Tide defense in January’s national championship game as well as the Tide’s recent offensive evolution under coordinator Lane Kiffin.
Watson, a Gainesville native who was passed over by Richt in favor of the underachieving Brice Ramsey, was easily the best individual player on the field in Arizona that night and nearly beat Alabama by himself.
That ill-fated decision to go with Ramsey instead blew up badly for Richt and was likely a factor in his departure as Georgia struggled mightily at the quarterback position last season.
Smart may be proving himself just by learning from the mistakes of his predecessor. He didn’t need Saban to tell him how to do that.
John Hollis is a contributing writer for Saturday Down South. He covers Georgia and Florida.
