The father of kicker Rodrigo Blankenship has been very outspoken about his son’s lack of a scholarship but his comments Thursday in an email to beat writers were his most critical yet.
In an email to media outlets, including the Athens Banner-Herald, Kenny Blankenship sent out an extensive statement where he criticized head coach Smart, calling his decision not to award his son a scholarship an “injustice.”
“Our son being refused a scholarship is an injustice to him as well as a crushing hardship for his family. Coach Smart suggested we take out some student loans since he did not have a scholarship available,” the elder Blankenship wrote. “That was a half-truth; there are scholarships available, just not one for our son, and we do not accept his justification for withholding one.”
Rodrigo Blankenship did play a key role for the Bulldogs last fall.
After taking over for the now departed William Ham, Blankenship went on to convert 14 of his 18 field goal attempts – including 10 in a row – and all 26 of his extra point attempts.
“In two months, Coach Smart went from “We have a damn good field goal kicker over there” to “I’m not sure if we trust Rodrigo to be the player we want in that position.” That was the excuse/rationale/explanation he employed in our meeting on Jan. 2 after delivering a well-planned and well-conceived litany of deficiencies regarding our son’s practice, injury and emotional “issues.” This would be AFTER he trusted our son enough to kick field goals and extra points for the last 10 games of the season,” Ken Blankenship wrote. “At the same time Coach Smart was focusing on negative issues (that we have labeled as flimsy and contrived and weightless compared to all of our son's positives), he was also discounting, minimizing and ultimately dismissing all of Rodrigo’s on-field contributions and accomplishments, noting that they weren’t good enough to deserve a scholarship and that “somebody else” could have done the same. At no time did Coach Smart mention anything about scholarship numbers, other than to say that he never puts anyone on scholarship mid-year.”
Ken Blankenship also cited the recent departure of Rico McGraw, Juwuan Briscoe, Shaquery Wilson, Kirby Choates, Isaiah McKenzie, and Shaun McGee, claiming Smart has had plenty of time to make good on a scholarship to his son.
“It is very distressing to us that our son, who has ALREADY made fairly significant, valid and measurable contributions to this program commands a lower priority than those who have yet to provide a single play or single point for that same program,” Ken Blankenship said. “Isn't Rodrigo a somewhat viable candidate for future contributions? Has he not established a somewhat impressive track record on which to base future projections?”
His letter didn’t stop there.
“Our only conclusion, based on Coach Smart’s obvious pre-meeting preparation with intent to tear down our son’s case for a scholarship and during the meeting his dismissive categorization of our son’s achievements, is that there has never been a consideration for our son to receive a scholarship. We have to give Coach Smart credit where credit is due: just like a business manager refusing to give a raise to an employee during a sit-down meeting, he was extremely well-prepared with his list of grievances. At least employees receive a salary; our son is an unpaid employee who is actually paying his employer (that would be the University of Georgia) for the privilege of working for it,” he said. “Aren’t there any alumni out there just a little bit peeved over this scenario, given Rodrigo’s apparent popularity?”
Neither Smart nor officials with Georgia have responded for comment.
“By denying a scholarship, Coach Smart is telling us that Rodrigo’s value to the program is exactly the same as any non-playing walk-on – realistically that would be zero, equivalent to the amount of money the program has invested in any walk-on. Would Coach Smart like to inform Dawg Nation that Rodrigo "Respect the Specs" Blankenship currently has zero value to his program? Can Coach Smart deny that his appreciation level of our son is currently zero?” Blankenship said. “Many observers would argue, of course, that Rodrigo had just as much to do with UGA’s success as any offensive, defensive or special teams teammates who are on scholarship – and certainly more to do with that success than the numerous scholarship players who do not play at all. Isn’t it difficult to rationalize having scholarship players sitting on the bench every game and a starter actually helping to win games on the field remaining a walk-on? And yet here Rodrigo is, an All-SEC performer who just triggered his tuition payment for spring semester.
“If Coach Smart had simply said, whether truthfully or not, that it was a numbers issue, it would have been much better than the tearing-down tactic with our son sitting there beside us. What did he do for you ON THE FIELD, Coach Smart? For us, there exist no acceptable rationalizations or explanations for denying our son what he has deservedly earned: an athletic scholarship to continue playing football at the University of Georgia.”