After giving the matter much thought, I have come to conclude that the Georgia Bulldogs need a new head football coach.

I have not lightly arrived at this opinion; I greatly respect the Red and Black’s skipper, and I cannot deny that his 14 seasons on the job have contained some impressive highlights. He took over a program that could boast only one ten-win season in the previous eight years and proceeded to win two SEC championships in his first five seasons, while his teams have finished an autumn under .500 just once.

However, the writing is on the wall. Our head coach has gone 1-3 in his last four bowl games, and this season has only compounded Bulldog Nation’s discontent. Following a 1-0 start this fall, the Classic City Canines dropped the campaign’s second contest in a tight ballgame against a Palmetto State rival the Bulldogs were expected to beat. That loss set the tone for an uneven season consigned to the doldrums by late losses to the Florida Gators, whose mediocre campaign would feature just six victories, and the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, who entered the season-ending outing with a record identical to the Athenians’. This year’s setback in Jacksonville snapped a three-game series winning streak for the ‘Dawgs.

The direction of this program, regrettably, is clear. Even a recent one-loss regular season cannot obscure the unfortunate reality, as evidenced by the fact that even that successful campaign was marred by a postseason defeat at the hands of the eventual national champion. One state to our west, the Alabama Crimson Tide, led by arguably the greatest college coach in the history of the game, are 11-1 after their fourth campaign of at least eleven wins in the last five seasons. If our current head coach can’t keep up with that pace, it’s time to replace him with someone who can.

Therefore, as I sit here, at the end of the 1977 football season, I have no choice but to conclude that it is time for Georgia to part ways with Vince Dooley, whose best days obviously are behind him.

Wait . . . you didn’t think I was talking about Mark Richt in 2014, did you? Hey, who knows what the future holds? I’m just telling you that, if Vince Dooley hasn’t won a national championship or dominated the SEC by 1977, it ain’t never going to happen. Fire the bum, already; I’m tired of tolerating mediocrity from a guy who only won with Johnny Griffith’s players.

Go ‘Dawgs!

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