Kirby Smart visits the Paul Finebaum Show: On tampering, NFL Draft
Kirby Smart joined the Paul Finebaum Show on Friday at the Regions Tradition charity golf event.
Smart and Finebaum covered a ton of topics, and I’ve been a good steward below in case you missed it.
Here’s a summary of the top discussion points and interesting insight Kirby Smart shared on the show.
We don’t get to hear from the football team all that much this time of year, so this is a great opportunity to check in on how things are going in a rapidly-changing College Football landscape, as well as Smart’s reflection on just how important the NFL Draft was.
Kirby Smart says SEC spring meetings in Destin will be about controlling CFB’s changes
“What can we do to protect our game? It’s really tough because the naysayers out there think we’re trying to limit kids or take opportunities away. That’s not anybody’s intent. No coach wants to take an opportunity away from his players who play a tough, physical rugged sport,” Kirby Smart said.
“I just want to make sure that the game stays at a point where we can control it. I think everybody would agree that college football’s one of the greatest sports there is. It’s very pure. It’s amateur. And now it’s drifting the other way. It makes it tough. So I’m all for the players – we’ve had a lot of players get an opportunity in Name, Image and Likeness. I would just not want it to be a decision’s based on where ‘I’m going to the highest bidder.’ And if we can control that some kind of way, it would be much better.”
Paul Finebaum asked Kirby Smart about tampering in College Football
“It’s part of the game. I don’t believe there’s as much tampering as people think. What I think is, there’s kids who grow up thinking that, ‘If it doesn’t work out here, I should go somewhere else.’ But tampering comes from the player that’s searching somewhere else, not from a coach reaching out,” Smart said.
“Look, I’ve had kids reach out to me from other programs, and call, and say things. You can’t talk to them. So I know it happens from our place out, from other places. So I don’t worry as much about tampering as much as I do about, ‘Are we doing the right thing for our kids when they have adversity or things are tough to be able to walk away.”
“We had a group of 15 Draft picks that all felt like they had a chance in their career somewhere, they might have left. If they’d have left, they would have missed out on a National Championship. They would have missed out on getting drafted. They would have missed out on graduating. I think those things are critical to success.”
On the residual effect of Georgia’s historic 2022 NFL Draft class
“It was pretty impressive. It was a credit to the entire organization. Our university, the strength staff, the nutrition staff, the player development staff. So many people had a role in those kids’ lives. To have that good a group at one time was really unique. I’m excited for the next group we’ve got coming up, but the Draft was really special,” Smart said.
“It was an infomercial for our program and what they’ve been able to do.”
On momentum, adrenaline pushing Georgia football’s way right now
“There always is. A lot of that will go into the Oregon game, a lot of it will go into how we play next year. But we’re a program that is built to sustain. We weren’t built on one-hit wonders We weren’t built on one guy, one player. Our program is not going to be ‘make or break’ by one player,” Kirby Smart said.
“We think we’ve got really good infrastructure. We got a great thing to sell, and great education. Play in a great conference. I mean look at our state. We had 30 players drafted from our state, which is incredible from the state of Georgia for the number of people in it. So there’s a great product being put out there by our high schools, and we get the blessing of that being the state university.”
On potential shift to a ‘defense-first’ philosophy – like Georgia football’s 2021 unit – in college football
“I think it’s who we were that year. We’ll be a different team this year. We won’t have five first-round defensive players coming back. It’s not going to be the case. I don’t think it’s going to be replicated very often. I still think it’s an era of throwing the ball. It’s an era of scoring points. We’re going to have to do a better job of that, and continue to do it,” Smart said.
“We want to play defense better than everybody else. What that number looks like, I don’t know. We just want to be number one in the country. We want to be good at it. But we want to score points. And to do that, you’ve got to have skill players that can make plays, and we think we’re in a good position to do that.
“Do you feel like you’re constantly on a treadmill these days?” – Paul Finebaum
“I wish I was on a treadmill. I don’t get on the treadmill near enough, which is what my wife tells me,” Smart said (Laughter ensued at this point, which was a good break in the action).
“The world we live in in college football is changing so fast. I’m hoping there are some guide rails kind of put in to help college coaches love the game and enjoy it, because right now you’re chasing your own players. You’re chasing players that are not at your place in the portal. And then you’re chasing recruits. So you’re getting pulled in a lot of directions, a lot of demands. It’s 24/7 all the time. Look, I got in this game because I like the relationships and coaching. It’s not the chasing.”
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