Jinks Presser

Had a chance to catch up with the Jinks presser from yesterday.

First, from today's Blade, the Falcons had a scary situation with Caleb Bright.  It was very hot there on Saturday and Caleb got sick after the game and the training staff reacted quickly and got him to the hospital.

He's recovered and is back in BG.  Jinks gave credit to Dani Coppes, our head trainer and Dr. Noftz, who is the team physician.  They took quick action and protected our player's health as a top priority.

It's an excellent reminder about the heavy responsibility many people have who work for our football program.  It might be a pulled hamstring, it might be a potentially fatal heat stroke.  Most of us don't go to work with that responsibility, and here's a moment to appreciate those who do.

He's recovering.  He's unlikely to play Saturday, but everyone has the right attitude, which is that Caleb's health and well-being is the first priority.  He has his whole life ahead of him.

Caleb's dad took to twitter with a message of thanks.  Also, not to forget the Georgia Tech trainers as well.

On football matters, Coach didn't have any real news.  The biggest takeaway is that his passion is back.  I noted that he seemed a little beaten when he was asked if he was still the right guy last week.  He was back to normal this week. 

He says he is "ticked" at himself for listening to "outside voices" as it relates to the program.  I get that.  It cannot be easy.

He still got some hard questions, especially from The Blade reporter.  At one point, he was asked about what BG had to do to run the ball better, and he said something like "why you gotta ask me that now" before saying "we have to block 'em."

He talked quite a bit about the rivalry game.  He seems to get it.  I'm never sure about these people with no connection to our program.  They can talk about it but they don't really seem to have the blood hatred you need for this rivalry.  Again, he seems to get it and the players seem to get it.  We tend to play better against UT, which is a sign of a rivalry game.

He also said that he thought the defense began to show that they were internalizing the new defensive system back in the Miami game.  He says stuff like that quite a bit.  We'll see.

Just a couple points.

First, a win--however unlikely, BG is a 20 point underdog--would do wonders for the overall morale around the program and indicate that the progress Coach says is happening is actually happening.  In fact, he noted it can be season defining...you go from being a team that can't beat Miami to a team that beat the defending champ and rival on the road.  Of course, it has to actually happen.

Second, for as upset you might be as a fan (and me), I think it's important to remember that the feelings Coach has are 10x higher, at least.  It's hell.  I guarantee you, he's not sleeping, can't taste what he's eating.  "Losing sucks," he said yesterday.  "It takes all the fun out of this game."  He's not asking anyone to feel sorry for him and he did choose this line of work, but I think it's worth remembering that this is way tougher for him (and the team and the assistants) than us.