Coach Mark Richt didn’t name names, but he shared the story Friday of a recruiting prospect committed to Georgia that the Bulldogs cut loose because of his behavior.
“He had some stuff on social media we didn’t like,” Richt said Friday. “We keep an eye on all that. We told him and we told his coach we don’t condone that. And then he persisted. He changed his little handle and continued to do that kind of thing thinking we wouldn’t find out, and we cut him.
“We rescinded that offer to him because if he’s not going to do what we say to do at that point, what’s going to make us feel like he’s going to do it once he gets here?”
Richt offered the anecdote at Georgia’s preseason football media gathering Friday after finding himself inundated with questions regarding the disciplinary reputation of his program. The Bulldogs are coming off an offseason in which they had five players arrested and three players dismissed as a result of their off-field actions, and Richt was asked straight up whether his program has a discipline problem.
“Well, the guys that misbehave have a discipline problem,” Richt said. “That’s why we discipline them. The rest of the guys don’t. Some are still here, and some aren’t. That’s just part of the consequences for not doing what you’re supposed to do when you’re supposed to do it.”
He also contended that the Bulldogs sufficiently screen recruiting prospects not just for their athletic and academic ability, but for their character.
“If you look at who we sign, they’ve got offers from five to 20 schools that we compete with,” Richt said. “Other schools have players that have an offer from Georgia and a lot of different schools. It’s not that we’re all recruiting bad guys. We’re all doing our homework. … There’s definitely a vetting process we’re very serious about.”
Georgia’s disciplinary issues made national news in recent weeks as two players were jailed for serious offenses. On July 26, redshirt freshman Davin Bellamy was arrested at 5:02 a.m. for DUI and speeding. That came just three days after sophomore Jon Taylor was released on a $5,000 bond from Athens-Clarke County for felony aggravated assault. Taylor also was among four players who were arrested in March and charged with for theft-by-deception for double-cashing meal reimbursement checks from UGA. Three of those four players are no longer on the Bulldogs’ roster.
Another player, starting safety Josh Harvey-Clemons, was dismissed in February for multiple infractions of UGA’s marijuana-use policy.
That’s just the football team’s issues. Basketball player Brandon Morris was dismissed from UGA earlier this summer after his arrest for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute.
All that created a cascade of negative headlines for the Bulldogs from February to August and a bunch of headaches for athletic director Greg McGarity.
“I’m greatly disappointed, just like everybody else,” said McGarity, Georgia’s AD since 2010. “As the athletic director, it’s a reflection on me. I’m the leader here. It’s my problem to solve. And that’s the mode we’re in now: What do we do to fix it?”
Actually, Georgia has a fairly extensive support system for what amounts to 85 scholarship football players and 20 walk-ons. The athletic association employs two full-time administrators whose job description places player behavior and citizenship in their purview: John Eason, director of player development; and Dave Van Halanger, director of player welfare. Bryant Gantt, a former Georgia player and longtime investigator for an Athens law firm, was hired as a program coordinator in 2011 with the directive “to provide advice and counseling in the areas of life skills, personal accountability and personal development,” according to his UGA bio.
Including Richt and his assistants, there are 10 full-time coaches and four graduate assistants. There are also four strength-and-conditioning coaches and at least a half-dozen “quality-control” specialists all devoted to football.
“This is not an area we’re skimping in,” McGarity said. “We have the right structure in place. We have enough people involved in our program to deliver the message and to monitor. So it’s not a factor of resources.”
As the Bulldogs conducted their first official practice of the season Friday, the volume has been turned up on that message.
Richt and McGarity both addressed the players when they reported for camp Thursday afternoon. A players-only meeting was called in the Bulldogs’ locker room two days after Bellamy’s arrest.
”It wasn’t to single anybody out; it wasn’t to rag on guys,” senior cornerback Damian Swann said. “It was just let guys know that we’re all in this together and everybody needs to deal with this situation together. We need to hold ourselves accountable and let small stuff turn into something big and keep happening over and over again.”
Said senior quarterback Hutson Mason: “The thing I’m preaching is … it’s our responsibility as leaders to say, you know what, ‘He made a mistake, but I made a mistake because I wasn’t there for him. I made a mistake because my teammate didn’t feel like he could pick up the phone and say, ‘Hey, Hutson, I need a ride.’ There has to be accountability. It’s not just pointing fingers.”
The Bulldogs’ players talked a lot Friday about “player-led leadership.” Senior wide receiver Chris Conley said the players are directly involved in whatever team-issued discipline to which their teammates are subjected.
“We decide what those punishments are going to be and we enforce them,” said Conley, a member of the NCAA’s student-athlete advisory board. “The players have had a hand in that. We’ve met with those players as groups and as individuals. We explain to them: ‘This is what you’re doing wrong, this is what you’ve got to do to fix it, this is what’s going to happen if you don’t fix it.’
“The fact that it’s coming from players and less from coaches I think is a good thing. I think this team is going to take a turn for the better as a result.”
