Chester Adams signs

I saw where Chester Adams agreed to a four-year contract with the Chicago Bears yesterday. I'd think that's a pretty good sign for Chester, particularly since he was a seventh-round draft pick and those guys are quite often on shaky ground as far as making a team.

Correction

I was a bit premature in something I posted here earlier. That little nugget wasn't officially supposed to be floating around just yet, so I've taken it down. Thanks to those who wrote and said something nice. It was highly encouraging to hear from all of you.

Last batch of coaches photos

Auburn photographer Todd Van Emst sent out his last batch of photos tonight from the coaches tour of the Middle East. I'm not posting all of them, but I'm going to post a bunch that I found the most interesting. (I really like the first one a lot. It's a great shot).

Again, click on the picture to see the full-size image.

Spring grades

Forty-five UGA football players were among the 261 Georgia athletes to earn at least a 3.0 grade point average in the spring semester.

From the UGA release:

Football: *Andrew Davis, Tallahassee, Fla.; *Ty Frix; Calhoun; Fernando
Velasco, Wrens; +Casey Nickels, Tignall; Antavious Coates; Greenwood, S.C.;
Ricardo Crawford, Fair Bluff, N.C.; Matt Degenova, Kenner, La.; Kris Durham,
Calhoun; Eric Elliot, Kennesaw; Andrew Jensen, Snellville; Brian Mimbs,
Dublin; Richard Samuel, Cartersville; Brandon Wheeling, Dallas; Asher Allen,
Tucker; Josh Bagby, Canton; Quintin Banks, Warner Robbins; Roderick Battle,
Atlanta; Clint Boling, Alpharetta; Drew Butler, Duluth; Shaun Chapas, St.
Augustine, Fla.; Trent Dittmer, Cartersville; Bryan Evans, Jacksonville,
Fla.; Bo Fowler, Union Point; Drew Gully, Vienna, Va.; Akeem Hebron,
Gaithersburg, Md.; Devin Hollander, Gainesville; Andrew Johnson, Athens; Ben
Jones, Centreville, Ala.; Tavarres King, Mount Airy; Jeremy Lomax,
Jonesboro; Mohamed Massaquoi, Charlotte, N.C.; Christian Norton, Athens;
Zach Renner, Monroe, Conn.; Derek Rich, Gainesville; Craig Sager, Marietta;
Joshua Sailors, Athens; Brannan Southerland, Dacula; Matthew Stafford,
Dallas, Texas; Kiante Tripp, Atlanta; Kade Weston, Red Bank, N.J.; Charles
White, Columbia, S.C.; Drew Williams, Blairsville; Tony Wilson, Daytona
Beach, Fla.; Brandon Wood, Buchanan; Jarius Wynn, Lincolnton

Even more from the coaches tour

Again, credit for these shots goes to Todd Van Emst of Auburn University.

Before I get to that, I met Adam Cantrell, the baseball coach from Providence Christian, today when I was covering his team's Class A semifinal against Pacelli Catholic in Columbus. He was clearly a big Georgia fan and told me he reads the blog all the time...It was fun to meet a somebody who was so enthusiastic about this thing, so thanks to him for that. It was really encouraging to meet someone who seemed excited about the stuff I do.

Anyway, on to the pics...Click on the image for full-size view.

Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville gets a tour of a Navy CH-53 helicopter by Auburn alum and pilot Mickey McCullough before leaving for the USS Nassau.

Miami coach Randy Shannon poses for a picture with USS Nassau crew members Friday.

The coaches talk outside the Oval Office after meeting with President Bush Monday. From left are Randy Shannon, Mark Richt, Charlie Weis, Jack Siedlecki and Tommy Tuberville.

Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville, center, talks to the media affter meeting with President Bush at the White House Monday. Standing behind him are Mark Richt, Charlie Weis, Randy Shannon and Jack Siedlecki.

Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville talks with Lt. Ike Stutts on the flight deck of the USS Nassau. Stutts is from Decatur, Ala.

Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis, Georgia's Mark Richt and Miami coach Randy Shannon talk on the flight deck of the USS Nassau Friday.

Airman Romaine Taylor runs the shuttle event on the deck of the USS Nassau. The crew ran an NFL combine-style competition Friday afternoon.

The coaches pose for a picture on the flight deck of the USS Nassau Friday, from left Auburn's Tommy Tuberville, Yale's Jack Siedlecki, Notre Dame's Charlie Weis, Miami's Randy Shannon and Georgia's Mark Richt.

UGA will host baseball regional

Got this release from UGA earlier. Figured I might as well post for FYI purposes:

SEASON TICKET HOLDERS ONLY

All-Session tickets to attend the 2008 NCAA Baseball Athens Regional are on sale now online via www.georgiadogs.com until the priority ticket order deadline of Monday, May 26 at Noon.

GENERAL PUBLIC TICKET SALES

All-Session ticket will be available online starting Monday, May 26 at 2 pm and at the Athletic Association Ticket Office window or by calling 1-877-542-1231 (toll free) beginning Tuesday, May 27 at 8:30 am.

All-Session Reserved tickets are $60 with the all-session general admission price set at $50. Both All-Session ticket packages include a ticket to all Athens Regional games including Game 7 if necessary and provides fans with a discount off the individual game ticket prices.

All tickets ordered for the regional will be distributed via Will-Call. Patrons may claim their tickets prior to the regional from the Athletic Association Ticket Office on Thursday, May 29, between 9am & 4pm and again on Friday, May 30, from 8:30am until noon. Regional tickets will also be available for pickup at the Foley Field ticket windows beginning at 1pm on Friday, May 30.

For more information, visit www.georgiadogs.com and click on the link for tickets or call the Ticket Office at 1-877-542-1231. Visa, Mastercard and Cash are all accepted forms of payment.
Currently, the Bulldogs are 35-21-1 including going a school-record 20-9-1 in the league to win the 2008 SEC title. The action at Foley Field begins Friday. Georgia will play in the first game Friday at 3 p.m. with two more teams slated to play at 7 p.m. The Bulldogs won thrilling NCAA Baseball Regionals in Athens in 2001, 2004 and 2006 on their way to the College World Series. This will be the fourth time that Georgia and Foley Field play host to an NCAA Baseball Regional. The Bulldogs will be making their eighth appearance in an NCAA Regional, and the Bulldogs have advanced to the College World Series five times (1987, 1990, 2001, 2004 and 2006) including winning the national championship in 1990.

The other regional hosts are Arizona State, Cal State Fullerton, Coastal Carolina, Florida State, Long Beach State, LSU, Miami (Fla.), Michigan, Nebraska, North Carolina, N.C. State, Oklahoma State, Rice, Stanford and Texas A&M.

Boling arrest

I'm sure this has been making the rounds all day, but Georgia offensive lineman Clint Boling is probably going to miss at least a game or two after his arrest last week for suspicion of driving under the influence. Northfulton.com broke the news a day or two ago, but I can't say I've really been keeping up with UGA news lately. I'll have to get around to explaining why that is sometime soon.

Anyway, he was pulled over in Alpharetta while reportedly driving erratically, then refusing a breathalyzer test. UGA rules would require him to miss at least one game. Mark Richt could give him more if he decides to do so.

I'd expect that you'll see a lot of Vince Vance and Justin Anderson at guard -- or maybe Chris Davis there instead of center, if the coaches decide Ben Jones is ready to play a lot early in the year. Boling is especially valuable after winning Freshman All-SEC honors and starting 10 games last year at guard and tackle, but something tells me they'll probably be able to get by without him against Georgia Southern in the opener.

More photos from the Coaches Tour

Again, these pics were shot by Todd Van Emst of Auburn University. Many thanks to him for sending these out.

First pic is a group shot of the coaches taken Thursday at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. The second is of Mark Richt talking with Carlton Reynolds of Atlanta at Camp As Sayliaha on Thursday. The third is of the coaches taking part in a Q/A session Thursday night at Al Udeid Air Base. The last shot is another pic from the Q/A session. You'll notice ESPN's Ivan Maisel (a fellow Mobilian) at left serving as the emcee.

Click on image for fullsize view.

Photos from Coaches Tour

Auburn does a really smart thing by having a photographer on staff, Todd Van Emst, whose job is to basically send out photos to media outlets from all of Auburn's sporting events. You don't have to call them and ask for his photos...he just does it. It's really a media-savvy thing to do, because the easier you make it for a paper to get photos from your events, the more likely they are to show up in the paper. As a former page designer/copy editor at the Ledger, I always appreciated how easy they made things for us. I don't know of another school that does that.

Anyway, he's on the Coaches Tour of the Middle East that inclues Mark Richt, Tommy Tuberville, Notre Dame's Charlie Weis, Miami's Randy Shannon and others.

Here are a couple of the photos he's sent out in the last couple of days. The first photo is of Gen. Arthur Lichte talking with the coaches at Scott Air Force Base. The second is Mark Richt and Miami's Randy Shannon autographing posters for the troops (looks like coach Richt's kicking some dogtags there). The third pic is Col. Al Hunt talking to the coaches before they leave on a nine-hour flight back to Germany on Tuesday. Pictured are Notre Dame's Weis and Shannon.

Click on images for fullsize view.

If you're really bored...

You could check this out. Not sure when I came across this Hulu Web site, but it's awesome. Since I work at night pretty frequently when it's not football season, I miss a lot of the shows I like to watch...in this case, The Office and 30 Rock. Well, this site has all sorts of clips and TV shows (and movies) that you can watch for free like the day after they air. Pretty awesome.

Anyway, I was messing around on there today and noticed that you can watch all of last season's BCS bowls in their entirety, obviously including Georgia's Sugar Bowl win over Hawaii. I watched a second of the broadcast tonight and it brought back some good memories...not so much of the game as much as the crazy week leading up to it, which was quite a lot of fun. I could never live in New Orleans. No self control.

CSU going national

I was online this afternoon and came across this piece on CBS College Sports, formerly CSTV. I know I've mentioned on here several times that when I'm not covering Georgia football, I spend a lot of my time in Columbus covering the local Division II college, Columbus State. Their baseball team was national runner-up last year and they're playing the No. 1 team in Division II, Mount Olive, tonight at 7 in the second round of an NCAA regional.

CSU's leading hitter, Columbus' own Rodney Rutherford, has been absolutely killing the ball this season. He leads the NCAA at all levels in home runs (at least he did last time I checked) with 26 and has already broken the school single-season records for home runs, RBIs and extra base hits this year.

So anyway, they did a piece with Rodney, including a little home run derby into a strong wind, and posted it on their Web site. Here's a link. I'd imagine we'll see him drafted next month, although I thought someone might take him a year ago after his junior season and it didn't happen. His numbers are hard to ignore.

Ping pong?

I saw where Georgia's Knowshon Moreno and the other members of Playboy's preseason all-America football team were in Phoenix over the weekend for the magazine's photo shoot, awards dinner and a team sports competition.

According to Playboy team member Andre Smith, the star offensive lineman from Alabama, the highlight of the weekend was the sports competition, "where we competed in several different events like basketball, ping pong, long drive, home run derby, putt-putt and throwing a fastball."

I hope Andre is omitting some details to keep the press release G-rated. When I think of a Playboy celebration, I picture mansion parties with models in lingerie (or less) by the grotto. James Caan would probably be there. Putt-putt competitions don't usually come to mind. Not unless we're talking about naked putt-putt...Just kidding. I'm sure it was a lot of fun.

For those of you who like a little football mixed in with your smut, the Playboy all-America team issue comes out in mid-August.

Three Bulldogs on Nagurski list

Three Georgia players were named today to the watch list for the Bronko Nagurski trophy, which is awarded each year to the top defensive player in college football.

Georgia's Jeff Owens, Geno Atkins and Dannell Ellerbe are all on the 88-man list, which was released today by the Football Writers Association of America. You can see the full list here.

Georgia gains 11th commit

Georgia picked up a commitment from Valdosta outside linebacker Michael Gilliard after his visit this weekend. The 6-foot-3, 205-pounder gets a four-star grade from Rivals.com and a three-star grade from Scout.com after making 112 tackles and eight sacks last year.

Scout ranks him as the No. 20 weakside linebacker in the nation. Rivals has him as the No. 19 prospect in Georgia. He had offers from approximately 20 schools, including several from Southeastern Conference schools, but told the recruiting sites he picked Georgia over Georgia Tech and Florida in his final three.

Uga documentary reairs Sunday

If you missed the documentary "Uga and His Family" last night on CSS, it will reair Sunday at 5 p.m. The filmmakers followed Uga and his owners, the Seiler family, through last season to give a sort of inside look into what it's like for them. I meant to watch it last night, but I missed it and will have to catch it Sunday.

A marketing rep from the company that produced the film, Southern Outdoors Productions, told me in an e-mail today that the movie will go on a tour of the state through local affiliates this summer, so if you don't have CSS, maybe you'll be able to see it in another way later.

APR numbers released

The NCAA released its annual academic progress rate (APR) report today and Georgia came out pretty well. The main thing is the Bulldogs ranked first in the Southeastern Conference in football (a four-year average of 965), second in men's basketball (958) and third in women's basketball (971).

Overall, all 20 UGA teams represented on the report ranked ahead of the 925 cutoff (score below that and you're subject to penalties). Fourteen of the 20 were above the national average for that particular sport. You can view UGA's complete results on the report here.

So that's good. While obviously these numbers are important, it's awfully dull to write about national averages and academic retention and eligibility rates in a way that would prevent the average reader from nodding off -- and me from wanting to do so while writing it.

So let's talk about who took a swift kick in the rear because of today's results. That's more fun, right? Here are the dirty details of why the numbers matter, as best as my little pea brain can explain my understanding of them:

* If any school has a team that scores below 925 (which represents about a 60 percent graduation rate), the school has to come up with an academic improvement plan.
* If a team scores below 925 and has a player leave while academically ineligible, the school will not be allowed to fill that scholarship the following year.
* If a team scores below 900 for two straight years, it faces "historical penalties" that can include restricted practice time or loss of scholarships. Starting next year, a third straight year with a sub-900 score can bring a postseason ban along with the scholarship and practice restrictions.

A few programs that are of some level of local interest that were hit with scholarship losses:
* UAB football (where former UGA offensive coordinator Neil Callaway is now head coach) lost NINE scholarships. UAB scored 869, down from 906 last year when it lost a single scholarship. That's the highest number of scholarship losses for any sport at any school. Idaho and Washington State football tied for second with eight scholarship losses apiece.
* Georgia Southern football lost 3.51 football scholarships and a third of a men's golf scholarship because of 905 and 913 scores.
* Mercer men's basketball lost a men's basketball scholarship
* Tennessee lost a men's basketball scholarship and 1.17 in baseball.
* South Carolina lost one in men's basketball
* LSU lost 0.34 in baseball
* Auburn saved itself from men's basketball penalties by scoring a perfect 1,000 over the last year, raising its multi-year average to 905. The demonstrated improvement kept the program from being sanctioned. Truthfully, however, I wonder how much a loss of a scholarship would be reflected in Auburn's record? Not much, I'd wager, which does irritate me a bit as someone who very much enjoyed watching Auburn hoops as a student.
* Auburn didn't exactly fare well, though, as four teams scored below 925 and only six of 20 scored at or above the national average for their sport. Football was one of the few to score better than the national average, with Auburn's 953 exceeding the national average of 934.

Overall, 218 teams at 123 different schools received some level of sanction. Out of that group, 113 face an immediate penalty like a scholarship reduction. Twenty-six of those teams have two straight years of sub-900 scores and will face a postseason ban next year if they don't fix the problem.

See, isn't that academics stuff a lot more interesting when you talk about penalties?

LINKAGE:
* Here's the story I wrote on the APR data. Went through the numbers for Auburn, Alabama, Georgia and Georgia Tech.

* While we're at it, check out Troy's column on David Pollack from yesterday's charity golf tournament. I thought Troy did his standard excellent work.

David Pollack interview

Our columnist, Troy Johnson, and I spoke with former Georgia defensive end David Pollack today at the SEC Charity Golf Classic at the Country Club of Columbus. I figured some folks might like to listen to the conversation, so we uploaded the interview here. There's a little gap in the middle where he stopped to talk to Russ Tanner, but I thought he had some interesting stuff to say about his foundation, his future and a little about UGA football at the end. Judge for yourself...


If the player is not working download the mp3 here.


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UGA-Az. State to air on ABC

I'm on vacation this week, but I just happened to come across an e-mail announcing that ABC will carry the Georgia-Arizona State game with an 8 p.m. kickoff. That's great news for all us folks at Eastern Time Zone papers because we'll have a chance to get it in the paper on the first run now. If it kicked at 9 or later like I was expecting, there was little to no chance of that happening.

Here's Georgia's release:
The Georgia-Arizona State football game in Tempe on Saturday, Sept. 20, will be televised by ABC TV with airtime set for 8:00 p.m. ET.
The game will be Georgia’s fourth of the season having played Georgia Southern, Central Michigan, and South Carolina before traveling to Arizona State. The Bulldogs play Alabama in Athens the following week (Sept. 27).
This will be Georgia's 67th appearance on ABC all time. Georgia’s all-time record on ABC is 40-24-2.