Guess Who's Not Coming To Breakfast

About 3 weeks ago, as the dog days of July were giving way to August, you could hear a familiar noise emanating from Columbia. It was, of course, the sound of whining. They wanted their beloved quarterback savior back on campus. Stephen Garcia still had a few weeks left on his suspension, but coming back early could give him an edge in the position battle that lay ahead. The University had a decision to make, and like clockwork, they screwed it up........again. Instead of enforcing the full punishment, that they meted out themselves, they allowed the golden child back in school a full two weeks early. Gamecock fans cheered. Ron Morris wrote a column explaining why it was a bad decision. Gamecock fans jeered. Fast forward back to the present, and Stephen Garcia is being, well, he's being Stephen Garcia. If you were to go back and read Morris' article again today, you would swear it was written by Nostradamus himself(here's a link to the article: http://www.thestate.com/gogamecocks/ronmorris/story/478914.html)

Of course, it really doesn't take any special clair'voyance to point out the obvious like Morris did. It takes just a basic amount of common sense and an ability to recall from memory things that happened less than a year ago. Unfortunately, come football season, you won't find either of these traits in the common gamecock fan. Since returning to the team, on his FOURTH chance, Garcia has found his name in the headlines often, but it isn't for his play on the field. First he appeared in Coach Spurrier's office last Sunday morning with a sprained ankle. He told his coach that he had hurt it in the previous day's scrimmage. Of course, Spurrier couldn't recall him getting hurt at all, and he could recall that Garcia looked fine as he was leaving practice. When pressed by reporters on what play it could have happened, Spurrier told reporters, "You'll have to ask him that. I've asked and I can't get a straight answer out of him. Maybe you can get one." Spurrier added, "He said he twisted it in practice. That's his story and he's sticking to it." It isn't surprising that the ol' ball coach sounds like he doesn't believe Garcia. After all, this is the same guy that lied right to his face about keying a visiting professor's car last year. It is a bit more susprising that, given his blatant distrust of the embattled quarterback, Spurrier continues to go to bat for this guy. Simply put, Garcia is making a fool of Coach Spurrier. One has to wonder how truly bad the qb situation is down there for Spurrier to keep him on the team. I just can't envision him letting this kind of thing go on when he was at Florida. But it gets better.

Yesterday a reporter asked Spurrier if there was any truth to the rumor that Garcia had missed a team breakfast on Friday morning. Here was the coach's response:

“Oh, he’s missed a bunch of them. He misses everything. He’s struggling to do things right. But that’s just him. He can’t hardly call the play right. He gets confused. I don’t know what it is,” Spurrier said. “He just has a tough time. But he’s ... a redshirt freshman, never played. He’s got some ability, though, so we’re going to keep coaching him. “Hopefully, he’ll grow up and mature. But ... he’ll do some dumb things out here. There’s no, ‘Well, wait a minute, they’ve got a bunch of guys out there, let’s just check to a run over here.’ He’ll just throw it out there. But he’ll learn.”

If you read that quote too quickly you might have missed it, but Spurrier sent out a very important message with that statement. That message is: If you're a complete jackass but you can really play football well, there is a place for you on our team.

He may has well have said that verbatim. Now, I don't know what is going on behind the scenes. Maybe Spurrier is taking a different tone with Garcia behind closed doors, but I can't see any good coming from the way he's handling it with the press. And I can't see any good coming from having Garcia remain on the team. Actually, I take that back. I can see plenty of good coming from having Garcia remain on the team. Georgia fans, Tennessee fans, Florida fans, et al., can probably see a lot of good coming from it too. In fact, just about anyone who enjoys watching the gamecocks suffer from one self-inflicted wound to another will hope Spurrier decides to keep Garcia around. If I didn't know any better, I would say that I doubt Garcia will ever play a meaningful snap at South Carolina. But I do know better, and so do you(not you, gamecock fans). And it's not like Garcia is out robbing stores at gunpoint. None of his individual acts of stupidity were overtly malicious or dangerous. It's just the fact that he doesn't get it. Nor does he care to get it. He is the epitome of a prima donna. He makes more headlines than any other player on the team, and he hasn't accounted for a single yard of offense. But what's truly sadder than all of this, is that there are gamecock fans out there still defending this guy. Maybe some will leave a comment on this blog telling me how stupid I am, just like they did to Ron Morris after he wrote his column a couple of weeks ago. Or maybe they are busy trying to decide who to blame for this latest rash of "mishaps." Don't look too hard, gamecock fans, and be careful what you wish for.


Now, I'm going to try and make up for last week's blog malfunction by giving you some hot, stinky MOAG. Remeber when I told you it would get better and better the closer we got to the season?

On possible nicknames for this year's team:

- I was trying to come up with a Garnet catch word with some impact last night since I think this team has a good chance to match the 1984 teams success . Charm is a synonymn for magic but it doesnt quite have the same impact does it. How about Garnet Liberation (not bad), Garnett Redemption (not bad), Garnet Revenge, Garnett Power (maybe), Garnet Fire (had that one before) or Garnet Conversion? Anybody want to take a shot?

- Garnet Assault (but wouldn't be popular with the PC crowd)
Garnet Bloc
Garnet Slash
Garnet Apocalypse
Garnet Fist

How about Orange Crushers!!!

- how bout "The Garnet Gauntlet"?
"The Garnet Guard"
"The Garnet Wall"
"The Garnet Repressors"

- What about "A GARNET STORM" raining on the SEC and eventually the nation. You could have the team storming the field and the fans storming the stadium. As the date nears our competitors schedule they can feel "A Garnet Storm" brewing.

Responding to a writer who picked them to go 7-5:

- 9-3 worse case.

- He is going out on a limb I see..... Sees us losing to UGA, LSU, UT, UF, AND CU...My 7 year old could have come up with that prediction

On upcoming opponents:

- I also think that you could put Clem in the W column, i wouldn't put my money on Tammy for anything, so i would also take us and the points.

- I think we have 8 maybe 9 wins going into the CU game. I also think we beat them up there maybe handliy. CU are a very fragile team. When the drop a couple to upset during the year, the wolves will be howling for Tammy's head. Anything less than undefeated coming into our game is a poor coaching effort.

- Like I have asked many times why do people think we will lose to Ole Miss I dont understand?

*editor's note - amazingly, a gamecock fan pointed out to the author of the above post that it's b/c South Carolina hasn't defeated Ole Miss since they joined the league. but then this happened

- And Ole Miss has never beaten SOS. Go Cocks!

- If we can't handle Ole Miss then we are going nowhere. We sure have a lot of doubting Thomas' on this board. 9-3. Book it Danno.

- I wonder how vandy really believes they can beat us?

- UGA, Clemson and Tenn - 50/50 chance but we should win these.

- I say we will beat ga.by 10 or more points,lsu by 2,tenn by 14 no quaterback and clemson by 3 to finish reg.season 10-2

- we beat NC ST, Wofford, UAB, UK, VandyOle, Miss, Arky, Clemson. And Upset LSU, and UT



On this year's offense:

- [It will be better]By leaps and bounds in my opinion. So many weapons compared to last year, and the offensive line actually looks good, for a change.If Beecher can keep his head on straight, the year's offense will look more like some of Spurrier's teams at Florida.

- At every position group we are improved.

- we seem to have numerous pieces on the offensive line this year. It looks like we may be 2 and even 3 deep at most of these positions and that is very exciting to me. We don't have many superstars, but if things come together as I hope they will, we could be a team with no big weaknesses. In addition, we should have enough depth to withstand a reasonable amount of injuries.

On what lies ahead:

- I really think we're getting close - sometime this year or next, Spurrier will have us there again - where we utterly destroy the teams we should beat, leaving no questions or lost opportunity or doubt on the field, and I can't wait to see it happen.

*editor's note - I don't know what he meant by "again" either.

- this season has a different feel to it and it's more than just plain optimism.Looking at this team you can't help but notice the talent and depth is a lot different from the past.SOS does has a quiet confidence about him and it is starting to show,he finally believes he has the parts in place to make a run at the SEC East.

- you ought to believe it when SOS says Beacher can be an excellent SEC QB. We have 7 QB's and TB is the best of them. Smelley is a good #2. QB will not be aproblem for us. Let the games begin.

- Absolutely no reason we can't get it done. And I mean this season....We have the coaching, depth & fan support..... No legit reasons we can't do it now....

- We have the best talent we have had since Spurrier has been here. We are two deep at essentially every position. We have the oppportunity to be good, very good. The coaches know this.

- We will begin to have CU's number beginning in 2008......

- I say 9 games but could be magical year, if we can come out of the gates like last year and not have meltdown, If we could start of strong and finish like we did the 2005 season when we beat Florida, Tenn, Arky we could see something that never has happened at USC. Go to the SEC title game.I still say if we some how some way go to the SEC title game and some how pull out a win we would be playing for the National Championship. The winner of the SEC title more times than not this decade has went on to play the NC and had won it.

- with bowl game, i say 10 wins at least.

- If you are a true gamecock fan, how could you be such a pessimist to think we will win 6 or fewer?



On NC State's fans:

- Never have I been around more crude, unintelligent rednecks (this includes Pickens county) than that God-awful cesspool of a place.

- Nasty.....nasty fans probably worse than Clemsonites. It is just that we have to deal with Clemmons on a daily basis.

- In my opinion, NCSU and LSU have the worse fans in the country period.

On lack of respect shown by the national media:

- Respect has to be garnered from the playing field, but the national media gives USC no chance to beat UGA. Other than Phil Steele, no one thinks USC is a tough game for the Dawgs. Everyone skips ahead to the Arizona State game and leaves Carolina out of the discussion. I, for one, am glad UGA will be #1 when they come to the Brice because this is a 50-50 game. I wonder if SOS and crew are aware of how they're slighted in the media? Georgia and Clemson will lose 3 plus games and Carolina would beat CU every year if they played in September!

Gamecock fans break down their season, game by game:

- NC State- 34-17 Carolina finally comes out an executes a good gameplan in a season openerat.
Vanderbilt-W 31-10 Vandy really lost a lot of quality talent
Georgia-W 21-20 Our D is good enough to keep Stafford rattled all game. Moreno will put up his numbers but I think UGA will be one dimensional.
Wofford-W 38-7 Ellis Johnson prepares for an offense that could possibly do well against us....Gamecocks don't have too much trouble and slowly build a big lead.
UAB-W 24-7 Gamecocks come out slow and the offense struggles to run the ball as well without MD
at. Ole Miss-W 28-20 Carolina comes from behind and avoids and upset.
at. Kentucky-W 45-24 We continue out dominance in football over UK
LSU- L 21-34 LSU jumps out to a big lead with a solid all around performance on both sides of the ball. We make a run in the second half but its not enough.
Tennessee-30-17 We finally play mistake free football for the most part and beat Tennessee as well as we should have beaten them the past two years.
Arkansas- 21-6 Arkansas struggles all season especially on offense and we continue to win.
at. Florida- 31-44 Florida's offense is too talented. We keep up in the shootout until the 4th when the gators pull away.
at. Clemson- 35-17 I would just love to see this..

season record-10-2

- nc state- W 38-10-offense and defense too much for wolfpack to handle
vanderbilt- W 31-13-defence looks strong offense relys mostly on running game but makes long passing plays to mckinley
georgia- W 14-13 first real test of how good we will be this year wofford- W 42-7 backups get good amount of PT/defense gets 3 sacks
UAB- W 24-10 culliver runs one back/brinkley and norwood too much for UABs offense to handle
ole miss- W 17-7 beecher is efficient and jason barnes grabs a fade into the end zone to put the game away in the 4th quarter
kentucky- W 27-9 loss of QB and RB to the NFL proves too much of a blow to UKs offense
lsu- L 14-17 heartbreaker but we remain in the top 10
tennessee- W 28-17 they run pretty good on us but it is not enough b/c their passing game sputters
arkansas- W 21-13 they get less than 75 yards rushing and we rattle their QB into making costly mistakes
florida- W 28-24 our 4-2-5 is tebows kriptonyte/ brinkley says hello to harvin behind the line of scrimmage on numerous occasions/ we get the W and u can hear a pindrop in the swamp
clemson - W 27-24 is used to having a party with opposing defenses until now/norWOOD lays the wood on spiller and he becomes a non factor/culliver and captain each get a pick and one goes to the house this swings the game in our favor and death valley becomes "deaf valley"

play auburn in sec championship game

- NC State- 34-9, defense is stout, offense is steady...solid winat.
Vanderbilt- 45-3...payback time yo
Georgia- Ryan Succop hits the first big FG of his career as time expires to win 24-23
Wofford- Wofford won't get into FG range until the 4th quarter. Gamecocks win 59-7
at. Ole Miss- Ole Miss will be a lot better this year...but they're not good enough...27-17at. Kentucky- UK lost too much...and they'll lose this one too...38-13
LSU- 27-31...a great effort...but come up just short
Tennessee- po'd from the LSU loss, UT catches the brunt...Gamecocks win 35-10
Arkansas- This game will be really tough...oh what's that you say, DMAC and F. Jones are gone? nevermind, we win it 31-6
at. Florida- What's that Queen song now? SEC-East Champs 19-17at.
Clemson- Ryan Succop hits another last second FG...to make the score 66-17.

season record- 11-1 SEC-East Champs...go 'Cocks!!!

On what it will take to be a champion:

- I've seen two Olympic Gold winners give their reasons for winning. When 7 Gold winner Phelps was asked about it, he responded that he always believed he could win it all and tie Spitz record. Another winner said her mom raised her to believe she could.We must believe we can win, believe we will win and toss all that negative garbage out of our minds when it comes to mind. Refusing to accept thoughts about curse BS and such is the first step and accepting thoughts that we can do it is the other.When we toss out the negative thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts, we will win. It's the MIND and what we believe!...

editor's note - someone pointed out to the above poster that it would take more than happy thoughts. here is how he responded

- Until people like yourself who dwell on the negative and call it reality are outnumbered we won't win big. ----------->What the hell has history got to do with the present? NOTHING!<---------- This team is a bunch of guys and coaches who play football and play it well. Surrounded by idiots who continually drum up garbage about a curse, history etc is bad for the team. Reality is what we make of it. It doesn't matter what you think, being positive and refusing to accept the nonsense that we can't win is good for the team. Negativity is something that can be overcome but it takes the acceptance of knowing it can be done. Winning will help. Consistent winning will help tremendously. Believing the past determines the future is idiotic and about as realistic as Santa!

On not being ranked in the pre-season top 25:

- We're in a perfect spot,lurking in the shadows ready to step up and have that special season.

- Pitt being ranked is a joke and speaks to how weak the Big East is. They have zero playmakers on offense.