My beaten license plate

I have a Georgia Super G license plate on the front of my SUV. I had a wreck a couple of years ago and severely bent and scratched the plate. With a little help from my brother, we made some basic repairs to it and then put it back on the car. Over time, the replacement paint we used has chipped and a crack has become noticeable.

I am sure there are some people who are bothered by the fact that I haven't replaced one of the symbols of our school with a plate that is in good shape. I have thought more than once about shelling out a few bucks and doing that. It occurs to me frequently, however, that there is a sad reason that some of the shiny, new "G" plates have been cropping up on cars the last few years. I leave my beaten up plate on my car as proof of the fact that I didn't begin liking Georgia just last week, and as a suggestion that I won't be converting to the flavor of the week when fortunes change.

I hate losing, and I really hate losing games that we are expected to win. I get mad when our team and coaches do things with which I disagree, and I sometimes vocalize my disappointment when those things happen (ie - Why do we line up in an I with no wide receivers on third and long?). I often find myself unsatisfied with the answers that our coaching staff gives for our mishaps of late. I am not sure that the personnel we have in place are the ones that give us the best chance to win. I share the confusion that a lot of people have about where we are right now.

However...

None of us is in a position to know what needs to happen right now. If our head coach had misgivings about the service being provided by our defensive coordinator, he wouldn't be telling us about it. He shouldn't be telling us about it. He should be publicly supportive and defend the man who I am quite sure is doing everything he can to correct the problems that have arisen lately. He should publicly make every reasonable excuse for him, and present every reason imaginable that he shouldn't be going anywhere.

And in private he should be managing things the way he knows to manage them. Perhaps there are knock-down-drag-out discussions taking place about the problems that are plaguing us. Perhaps there is a gut feeling in our head coach's stomach that he is going to be forced to make a personnel change at the end of the season. Perhaps he knows that the talent level with which our defensive coordinator is working is unusually low. He certainly can't say so out loud if any of these things are the case. There can be no "Playoffs?"-esque hissy fits or public executions. The only choice he has is to take responsibility for our problems and move on with the season. If he gets to a time and situation in which he decides that he can and should make a change, I am quite sure he will.

I can guarantee two things about our head coach:

1. He wants to win more than any of his critics.
2. He knows more about football than any of his critics.

Those fans who are demanding the heads of coaches in the middle of a rough spot have no understanding of personnel management. Those fans who are proclaiming the end of our season when we are 5-2 are of a disgustingly childish brand of quitter. Those fans who boo our players and coaches are spoiled ingrates.

When we lost to Tennessee in 2004, I thought carefully about what to say to the band. It has been recently brought to my attention that the phrase I gave them was resurrected last week, and I think it bears sharing with anyone who cares about our school and our brand of football. The reminder is, "You're still from Georgia, and they're still not."

No one enjoys losing. But the ones who are genuinely Georgia People are also the ones who are capable of putting a loss or a disappointing season in the context of the wonderful blessed totality of being a Georgia Person. And the ones who are screaming and crying are posers and johnny-come-lately's who I'll bet have shiny new "G" plates on their cars.

And I'll furthermore bet that they been tempted by that flat-head screwdriver since the minute they got home last night.