Sports

Back in early June, UGA set a school record by leading the nation with 11 players selected in the MLB Draft. As the August 17th midnight deadline for teams to reach contract agreements with those drafted has come and gone, clearly next year’s team will have a lot of new faces in the starting line-up.

As mentioned in a post a few months back after the draft, out of the 11 UGA players drafted, eight were non-seniors along with six signees making decisions on whether they will go pro or play at UGA next season. Unfortunately for the Dawgs, 5 out of those 8 non-seniors left early (Jr. 1B Rich Poythress,  Jr. C Joey Lewis, Jr. 2B Michael Demperio, Jr. CF Matt Cerione and Jr. Closer Dean Weaver) and two of the six signees ( HS P Zach Dotson and HS C/1B  Miles Head) as well.

With that in mind, the Bulldogs will be replacing their entire right side of the infield, along with their catcher, DH, CF, a top SP, set-up man and closer. For a good, comprehensive look at the changes that the 2010 Dawgs will be facing, check out this recent article by the Athens Banner-Herald: http://onlineathens.com/stories/081709/bas_482470279.shtml

You know it’s football season when student ticket requests are open, sorority bid day has come and gone, and the start of the Fall semester has officially begun. While there are certainly some questions regarding what to expect from the 2009 squad, the good news is that for the 2nd time in three seasons, Coach Richt and Co. has their entire recruiting class on-campus.

In the past three seasons, UGA has received letters-of-intent from 67 players and 65 of them made it to campus on-time. One of the two that did not make it, Xavier Avery, got selected in the 2nd rd (50th overall) by the Baltimore Orioles in the 2008 MLB Draft and the other, Toby Jackson, also did  not qualify in the 2008 class initially after high school and is now at a JUCO after failing to make it into UGA a 2nd time at Hargrave Military Academy in VA.

This is huge for the 2009, especially since Coach Richt has said that he plans on letting a lot of the team’s true freshman (most notably the skill position players) to see immediate action.

And for those of you still concerned about last year’s numerous kick-off blunders (e.g. the inability for whomever was kicking to get the ball into the end zone or having the kick sail out-of-bounds for a penalty), check out this video (takes a few seconds to upload). From the looks of it, incoming sophomore kicker, Brandon Bogotay (who came to UGA via the JUCO route) appears that he might be the answer to that problem.

While the Bulldog faithful will not be able to see John Wall play live at Stegeman Coliseum for another couple of months, for those of you who wondering what was all the hype about John Wall (Rival and Scout.com’s #1 PG and player in the country for the 2009 class) a recently released video might shed some brief light on this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5UpQl18OOM

In case you were wondering, the guy that Wall dunked on was none other than two-time NBA All-star, 34-year old G/F Jerry Stackhouse. Unlike the LeBron “Dunk-Gate” episode, this is actually a pretty good video and a pretty good dunk. Enjoy.

While this is certainly old news, I feel the need to publicly get my two cents in. Needless to say, after hearing Commissioner Goodell’s ruling I am shocked to say the following: I feel bad for Michael Vick and feel that Goodell made a very unfair decision (or lack thereof).

Now, I am the furthest thing from a Vick supporter. From the numerous controversies surrounding his roller coaster career in Atlanta to the fallout that was Bad Newz Kennels and have been a big fan of Roger Goodell and his role in continuing to make the NFL the country’s best sport, but this time I think he is being out of line. First off, Vick served his time, 23 months to be exact, and like every other criminal deserves a chance to go back to the real world and make a living.

Second, Goodell has had practically two years to decide what to do with Vick in regards to re-instating him into the league and here we are two years later and we still do not know when Michael Vick will be able to play in a regular season game. This, in itself, has essentially stripped Vick of playing this year, because team owners are rightfully very concerned about signing a guy to a contract in which the player might not even be able to play in the first year of the contract.

Only time will tell how long Vick will be fully re-instated. While I may be in the minority, here is one person that hopes to see Vick back on the field soon.