Get your tailgating supplies at the new UGASports Store. Be sure to order by May 22nd!

Here's the LINK.

Georgia head coach Kirby Smart touched on several different subjects during an interview earlier this week with WJOX Radio out of Birmingham.

Among the questions posed, if Smart could impose one rule to help govern college football, what would it be?

His answer may or may not surprise you.

“I would probably look into something for NIL. There’s a point where certain players have the ability to make a lot of money, and I think that’s great for the guys who have earned it and are marketable, just like the same guys in the NFL earn it and get it,” Smart said. “Some schools don’t have the capacity to do NILs, they don’t have the support base to do that. But the schools that are marketable, they can do that so it would be nice to give each one something to not make it out of control where it affects the game.

"But that’s hard to do, it’s hard to manage because every situation is different, every player is different. Look, guys like Kelee Ringo, before the game, they had NIL deals. But after the game with Alabama, that changed. Things change over the course of time where the market kind of sets itself in that regard.”

As for Ringo, Smart revealed that the cornerback was one of the players who got a talking to after the SEC Championship loss to Alabama for gaining too much weight.

“He got a little heavy in that first game with Alabama. He was one of the first guys we called in and said, corners aren’t supposed to be 220,” Smart said. “But I tell you, he did a great job. To play in the playoffs at 210, 212, that’s more where we wanted him to play; he played at a higher level at those weights.”

Obviously, Ringo wasn’t the only Bulldogs who had that type of conversation.

In the days and weeks following the SEC title loss, players talked openly about not being in the kind of shape, or being as mentally prepared, as they needed to be.

However, it was those failures which Smart again confirmed served as the catalyst for his team getting it back together to eventually win the national crown.

“We talked about the cold, hard truth, and the truths were we didn’t play well in the red area, we turned the ball over, and we were really bad on third down. Those were all things we thought we could control, so we focused on those things, and we knew we had to get better,” Smart said. “We had to step up. It was the first time we had really been tested, and our guys responded well to it. We had some guys we felt that were out of shape, and weren’t ready to play, and we really focused on that.”

Smart also talked about his offense for 2022.

Although the Bulldogs lost some good players like Jamaree Salyer, Zamir White, James Cook and George Pickens, Smart sounded upbeat about what he has coming back.

“We want to be explosive, and we were last year. People talk about the defense, but it got overshadowed that we were Top 10 in explosive passes, a lot better than a lot of teams at throwing the ball down the field,” he said. “We did that very effectively because we were able to run the ball.

"We have to continue to do that. We’ve got some tight ends that we’ve got to utilize, four wideouts that we think are really good players and we’ve got some young backs that are going to help us. With Stetson (Bennett) coming back, and the other quarterbacks we have competing, I’m excited to see what we can do offensively.”

Defensively, the Bulldogs have to find replacements for eight players taken in last month’s NFL Draft. The message, however, remains the same.

“I think we sell what you do affects the other guy. We teach that as a total defense. I don’t think we do anything that anybody else in the country doesn’t do,” Smart said. “We had really good players, and talent had a lot to do with it. But they believed in each other and believed that if each one of them played well, we would accomplish more.”

Finally, Smart talked about his coaching staff, which includes former Bulldogs Will Muschamp (Co-defensive coordinator), Mike Bobo (Quality Control for Offense) and Bryan McClendon (wide receivers coach).

“It takes a lot of pride coming back to your alma mater, your university and we’ve got a great group. With the culture we have in place now, you’ve got to find players who want to play for the University, and when you have guys that did that, it resonates a little more with your team and playing FOR the University of Georgia,” Smart said. “That’s what we had last year. Kids were playing FOR UGA, not independently, not for a contract, not to try and find NIL deals, they were playing for and cared about the University of Georgia. When you find that and sell that as a staff, it makes it that much better.”