Georgia Bulldogs head coach Kirby Smart met with the media after Tuesday's practice to answer questions about the Dawgs.

—Establishing an identity vs. Vandy: 0:18

—Transitioning from fall camp to Vandy prep.: 0:58

—Punting situation: 3:15

—JUCO recruiting strategy: 4:25

—On Monty Rice: 6:36

—The little details in preparing for a game: 7:25

—On Brian Herrien: 8:43

—On D'Andre Swift: 10:03

—On Walter Grant: 11:26

—How linebackers are managed/rotated: 12:40

—Family-related sacrifices to coach: 15:00

—Secondary depth: 16:21

Opening Statement: “Got a good practice in yesterday. Today as well. Worked on the different facets of the week that we’re working on. We’ve got two more left. I’ll open it up.”

How important is this game in establishing identity? “It’s the first one. So it kind of is what it is. I think that you always want to establish who you are and create that identity, and you do it through camp, really, and you do it through scrimmages, and you do it through practices and meetings, and we’re (inaudible) maybe doing that. It’s starting to take on a personality as a unit on both sides of the ball and special teams. But nobody in the country knows what they’ve got until they go out there and play. There’s so many kids that haven’t had to respond the lights. It’s going to be really fun to see some of these kids grow up and play.

”What’s been your impression on transitioning from camp to prep mode? “They’ve been good, they’ve really been locked in. I think it’s like everything, if you start on it too early, they get burned out with it. And if you start off too late you wish you’d gone earlier and gotten more prep. So we’re kind of, although it’s a Tuesday, we’re kind of like a Wednesday-Thursday stage, and we’ve still got two more practices to go back and change some things, tweak some things, and try to figure out what’s going to work best.”

Justin Fields and Jacob Eason, curious to see how they do? "Yeah. I’m really focused on us. I don’t think any coach in the country would tell you any different. There’s just so much that we’ve got to prepare for. There’s so many unknowns in our game. How’s this kid going to play, how’s that kid going to play, what’s he going to adjust to, what are we going to have to do in special teams, there’s just so many other unknowns. But that’s consuming my thoughts.”

Will James Coley call plays from the field, the press box, or possibly from a cigar bar in Miami: “James will probably be on the field, is what we’ve done in the scrimmages, it’s what he and I have talked about doing. We’re open to looking at it different ways, but right now that’s probably what we’re going to do.”

What’s Georgia’s offense going to look like under Coley? “We did a lot of things with Jim here that we didn’t necessarily always do. You have more offense than you always show, and you try to use what you need. And what you don’t need you don’t use. So there’s things that we had in games that we didn’t use in the past. And I’m sure it’ll be that way now. We want to be explosive. We want to score points. I think in college football nowadays you’ve gotta be able to score points. You look at the best teams in the country they can do that. So we’ve got to be able to score points, and whatever it takes to do that, whether it’s wearing people down, or throwing the ball, we’ve got to be flexible enough to do it.”

Decided on punter yet? “Really hadn’t decided on any of that stuff yet. We’re going to closer to the game. Jake’s done a good job. A lot of those kids have punted well.”

Special teams focus in past? Any big focus this time? “We talked about defensively, we’ve got to create more negative plays. That’s been a big focus for us. In the red area, we’re not where we need to be in the country. Turnover ratio. Anywhere we didn’t make our goal is an area of improvement. And our goals are pretty lofty goals when it comes to offensive and defensive and special teams. We didn’t make many of them. That’s always an area that we try to concern ourselves with. To be honest with you, special teams is always in the forefront. Every game you watch, there are critical areas that are made in that game and our intent is to try to put pressure on our opponent in every phase of the game. That’s what special teams is, a chance to put pressure on somebody.”

Signing junior college players like DJ Daniel and Jermaine Johnson, do you project them as guys that can have an influence right away? “We want those guys to be able to play right away, but we’re not always right. Sometimes they have an extra year they can redshirt and still play two. I don’t think anybody in the country will tell you they’re going to take a junior college player to not play him. That’s no intent in that. You’re able to see what you’re getting better because he goes against better quality competition and also they can come work out at your camp. When you get a kid that can come work out at camp, you have to be careful because you’re comparing him to high school kids, but he has to look like your current players and he has to be able to perform at a high level. We thought both those guys were good football players and they’ve done a good job at camp competing for us.”

On bowl practice and DJ Daniel: “I don’t know that bowl did, I think it was overwhelming more than anything. I think spring practice is when he started to really mature and learn. Bowl practice, guys, weren’t out there trying to coach him, he wasn’t able to play. He got to play scout team and cover really good wideouts, that’s the good thing, but we didn’t get to really develop him. He developed during the spring. He’s done a nice job, but DJ’s got a ways to go, too. He’s a guy who’s growing in our system and our system is not easy to learn. He’s done a good job trying to grind, meet at it and meet with Coach Warren a lot.”

Difference Monty Rice would have made last year had he been healthy? “He’s smart, he’s bright. He plays with toughness. He probably plays better in the games than he does in practices because he plays hard and with such good effort. He’s a difference maker for us because we don’t have a ton of speed at that position, which is lightning fast compared to what we had with Roquan (Smith) but he’s a guy who can run as fast as them. He’s a high 4.6 guy, and does a good job for us. His future is bright as far as being a leader for our defense and we need him to play well.”

When do you get away from all the details and say we have everything in place for this game? “That was probably even three or four days ago when we started on Vanderbilt, making sure that we feel good about our ability to manage the clock, our ability to get the signals in, our ability to get the kicking game in and do it in an efficient manner, our depth charts and kicking game. It doesn’t stop ever and it doesn’t start anywhere because it’s a continuum, but I certainly think the closer you get to a game the more you heighten your awareness as a head coach because you’re always trying to see everything. Sometimes you try to see too much that you don’t see anything at all so you’ve got to be careful.”

On Scholarships and giving any to a walk-on: “I don’t really talk about the 85 numbers. A lot of times things aren’t accurate out there and people don’t understand when guys transfer how that counts, grad transfers, initials, mid-year. There’s a lot of information involved in that where we just keep it in-house.”

On Brian Herrien: “Brian since he’s been here, he practices and plays with unbelievable toughness and effort. Every cut-up we watch on special teams and doing drills he’s at the front of the line, he’s competing. He doesn’t play on a lot of special teams but he develops, it’s like that’s become a part of his trade to do those things. As a running back he’s picked up pressures better than he ever has, he runs really hard, gets tough yards, has caught the ball well out of the backfield. He’s kind of always done that but he’s never really been in the limelight and I think this is a great opportunity for him. He’s a guy who has had a really good camp and run the ball tough. He’s just been waiting on his opportunity and his opportunity is now.”

Brian Herrien playing with a chip on his shoulder: "Well, he's tough, he's physical. I don't know that he feels like he's got a chip on his shoulder. I know he plays the game in a violent way when it comes to contact. He doesn't shy away from contact. He seeks people out and he's really elusive and he's got great hands. Guy's been a really good athlete for a long time."

D'Andre Swift and his workload: "I can't speak to high school, so I don't know that. I can speak to the time here he's been in the backfield with some good players. We obviously know his freshman year and we know last year with the guys we had in the backfield with him -- two, three guys, there may not be an opportunity for a guy to get 25-30 carries. The game is not built like it used to be for guys to carry that. The people hitting these guys are bigger, faster, stronger. There's a lot more licks. Just may not happen that way. I know that should it be that way, that he has to carry the ball 25 times a game to way, I have no doubt that D'Andre Swift can do that, but it all goes back to is that necessary? You do what you have to do to win. Sometimes other guys have good skillsets. Sometimes other guys are fresher. Sometimes it's a rotation pattern. Some of our games haven't dictated where a guy can get that many carries because some of our games have been lopsided and you don't get a chance to get guys that many carries."

Walter Grant and a bigger role: "He's in a very similar role. He's playing outside backer/STAR type deal. He plays on third down as one of the JACKs. He's very intelligent. He plays well in space. He understands our system probably better than anybody in that room, so it's a very valuable role in depth and experience that makes you feel comfortable that he can adjust to formations people get in."

HOW DIFFICULT OF A ROLE IS IT WHEN YOU PUT WALTER GRANT OUT THERE IN SPACE? "It depends on who you are matched up on, if you’re out there on Mecole (Hardman) it’s different than if you’re out there on Charlie Woerner. What we’re asking him to do, hopefully, is like bodies , and the difficulty increases based on what personnel they’re in, and the difficult increases based on what we ask him to do. But we try not to put him into doing things that he can’t do that Mark (Webb) and Divaad (Wilson) maybe can do. There’s a role for him there, and he does a good job playing it."

HOW DOES THE LINEBACKER ROTATION WORK: “Outside is really a fresh thing, because I look at the outside linebackers as part of the defensive front, so you don’t play any of those guys every single snap, they roll in by series, they roll in by circumstances. Inside backer is based on if they have two tight ends in the game, do they have one tight end in the game, do they have no tight ends in the game, (or) is it third down? There’s a lot of decisions. Some guys play better in space, some guys play better in the box. Some guys just play better altogether. And each guy has his strength, and we try to put our strength on the field based on what the other team is doing, so being that I don’t know Vanderbilt’s game plan, I can’t tell you the rotation of the linebackers. But, should it be a bunch of box it will be these guys, should it be a bunch of open it will be these guys, if we get them to third down, which I hope we do, it will be this guy, but that’s basically how it’s going to work out."

IT IS A LUXURY TO HAVE THAT DEPTH AND TALENT AT RUNNING BACK: "The biggest benefit is our practices, because everybody is going against a good back at all times. when you’ve got one good back, that’s great and all, but you’re not actually wanting to hit him. You’re not actually wanting to practice against him because you’re scared to death and then your whole defense suffers. So I’d like to think, if you’ve got five or six good backs, and you send a couple of them down to defense for periods, your defensive players get to thud and play on good backs. And plus your special teams take a huge jump because you’ve got good football players playing on those. So, there’s a lot of advantages, and then the tough thing is the management of it because every back wants the ball, lets be honest. You guys want every guy to get 1,000 yards and 1,000 carries, we don’t have enough balls to go around and do that. I’m trying to keep them happy and y’all keep talking about how many of them are going to have 1,000 yards."

On if he can get away with the family one last time before the game: "Do I want to? Yeah, but there’s not going to be a time between now and the game.”

On if he has gotten used to being away from the family in the coaching profession: “Yeah. Every coach in America, high school all the way down to any level, you sacrifice parts of your family because I spend countless hours in this building that I don’t get to be with my kids and my family, but when I do, I’ve got to be present, it’s got to be quality time. It’s quality over quantity. They understand the sacrifices. There’s a lot of benefits that come with it too.”

On if it’s hard to turn off during the season: “It’s hard to turn off during the season because you’ve got recruiting, you’ve got this, you’re always thinking about what might happen during the game, what are you going to do next. It’s definitely hard to turn off. If you don’t, you’ve got to be careful. You’ll burn yourself out and not get rest. That’s not good either. So you’ve got to find a happy medium. And most of the time, it’s really intense, stressful up to Thursday, and then I say, ‘When the hay’s in the barn, you’ve got to let it go and you’ve got to go play.’ And you’ve got to rest a little bit and recover so that you can be sharp on game day.”

On deciding the difficulty of deciding a starter at CB: “They all three rotate, so everybody came up today making a big deal, but Eric Stokes runs with the twos just as much as DJ Daniel, just as much as Tyson Campbell. Those three guys have all rolled. Tyrique Stevenson has done a good job. Ameer Speed’s had a good camp. So those five guys have really worked hard, they’ve grown. We’re not really settled on who the starters are going to be in terms of that, because those guys will rotate and play. We haven’t decided who’s going to be out there. I’ve got to go look at this practice to figure some of that out, because we don’t have many practices left to decide that.”