Any of a number of things could have happened in Omaha’s Rosenblatt Stadium on Tuesday night with Georgia football coach Mark Richt on hand to watch the baseball Bulldogs in the championship round of the College World Series.
The Bulldogs could have shown up wearing black jerseys. They could have cranked that Soulja Boy during the seventh-inning stretch. They could have rushed the field and danced on the pitcher’s mound after scoring the first run against Fresno State.
Ever since the football team’s end zone macarena against Florida last fall, Georgia athletes and fans have fed off the swagger that the normally mild-mannered Mark Richt instilled with an assortment of risky motivational ploys.
He became Georgia’s athletic Answer Man, stripping away a rival’s aura of invincibility with end zone choreography and instilling intimidation by putting his team in touch with its dark side.
Oddly enough, he spent this week trying to learn from others, trying to tap into the sort of magic that factored into the baseball team’s joyride to the finals of the College World Series.
He was supposed to be in Macon on Tuesday to talk football at the Pigskin Preview, the annual gathering of state coaches and players held at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. Instead, he talked baseball over his cell phone hours before watching the Bulldogs play for a national championship.
ledger-enquirer.com
6/25/08
