Kirby Smart will take to the podium this morning at 10:05 eastern to kick off day two of SEC Media Days. With Nick Saban likely out on a lake or golf course somewhere this fall, Kirby is perhaps the top draw among the coaches (and also the league’s second longest tenured coach, which still blows my mind). As such he’ll likely be fielding questions not only about his roster, expectations, and Athens-area traffic enforcement, but also about the state of college football in general.
At 10:55 the Big ‘Dawg will be joined at the podium by Carson Beck, Malaki Starks, and Mykel Williams as Georgia’s player representatives. Beck will of course be asked about the Heisman hype surrounding his upcoming season, and all three will be challenged not to say anything noteworthy, scandalous, or capable of ending up on a bulletin board.
You can watch the festivities live on SEC Network, SEC Network+ or the ESPN app. We’ll be adding live updates here as well as the morning progresses. Until later…
Go ‘Dawgs!!!
Updates
* Kirby starts with a joke, noting in a nod to Nick Saban being briefly turned away yesterday that ““I got in here today without a credential.”
* As expected, he also has some serious thoughts on his old boss, saying of Saban “what he’s meant to myself and my family as a mentor, as a friend, as a competitor that drives you to get better. There was never a day in eleven years I worked for him that we didn’t share a room in some sort. Whether that was the defensive room, the defensive back room, staff room.” Smart did quip that Saban has started responding to his text messages again as opposed to previous years. “Either somebody has got his phone or he has learned how to text” he chuckled.
* As a committed Gen X’er Kirby says he asked his players how stores don’t sell out of the new EA CFB game, and reports “Mykel and Malaki just fell out laughing, and were like ‘coach, they don’t sell those things in stores anymore,’ and I was so embarrassed. But I was glad they got a kick out of it.”
* Smart is mum on punishments for the summer’s rash of driving-related arrests. “We don’t talk about the suspensions. We have them. I think it’s pretty obvious that we’ve done them in the past. You guys know when we do them. Each of those cases is very different and they’ll be handled in different ways.”
- Kirby reports that Smael Mondon is still working his way back from the foot surgery that kept him out for spring practice and may not be fully ready when fall camp begins.
- Branson Robinson is still rehabbing the knee injury that kept him out for the entirety of the 2023 campaign. Robinson “looks really good. I won’t say he’s 100 percent cleared. But man, he looks great out there running,” Smart enthused. “His weight is down, which I think is going to put less pressure on that injury and those knees. Looks good running around out there. I’ve been really pleased with the way he’s looked. I don’t know if he’ll be 100% at the start of camp, but I feel like he’ll be close.”