FLORIDA
The Cocktail Party rivalry is as heated as ever on the recruiting trail.
Florida and Georgia fought to land the commitment of 4-star DB Kaiir Elam. Momentum appeared to swing in UGA’s favor when the Bulldogs hired Florida cornerbacks coach Charlton Warren, Elam’s primary recruiter at UF. The Under Armour All-American ultimately decided to follow in the footsteps of his uncle, former Gator All-American DB Matt Elam, and head to Gainesville.
A product of The Benjamin School in North Palm Beach, Fla., Elam made his announcement live on ESPN2. For a brief second, it looked like the Warren hire might have paid off for UGA. Elam first pulls up a Georgia hat, only to then put on a Florida hat and announce his commitment to UF, the type of fake-out that has become a National Signing Day tradition.
@GatorsFB locked up Kaiir Elam. #GoGators pic.twitter.com/N0iF822hL5
— Dennis Johnson (@DennisPatJohn) February 6, 2019
Low quality–should’ve thrown it across the room or something. Best of luck, though.
See you in Jacksonville. Big win for Mullen.
Really SDS! He did not troll UGA! He was just having a little fun with his too two schools. Big pick up for Florida. I really wanted this kid he looks like he will be a big time player!
$600k Whiff for Smart.
lol – exactly… Kirby Dumb is prob trying to fire him already…
Last 2 years, combined 78-24 so if Kirby is Dumb then UF is what???
And the only whiff was Saban missing the top two players from the state of Alabama. They will both be in Athens this fall.
Florida wins that game with a healthy secondary… hard to beat a team like Georgia down 2 first round NFL corners and your nickel back…. game was much closer than the final score… you know how the sugar bowl was a complete butt kicking but looked close to the naked eye… hook em horns!
UGA signed like 3 out of the top 20 players from the State of UGA… Also one of those “top” players from Bama you signed may be heading to JUCO…
UF only rallying cry is a Texas win. Last time I checked, the final score was all that mattered. By the way, time of possession, total yards, 3rd down conversions, QB rating, yards per carry, sacks and tackles for loss ALL were won by UGA.
Yeah, there’s no way on earth you were winning that game with “a healthy secondary”, and if anything the game was much less close than the final score, and someday I’ll figure out how the Sugar Bowl is ever going to be relevant to UF, other than the fact that you haven’t been there in a while.
How are people so dense? UGA needed a DB coach and went out to get one of the best in the SEC. Warren’s hire was bigger than Elam.
Let’s be honest here. Calling Warren one of the best in the conference is a but of a stretch. Solid, yes. Top of the conference, not so much. As far as it being about Elam, I’m sure that it wasn’t 100% about one recruit. However, if that one recruit wasn’t an enormous factor, there’s no way they triple his salary or make the move with the timing that it happened. If we’re being completely honest, Smart pulled a slick move (dirty in some minds), but it actually worked in Florida’s favor. They got the recruit, and upgraded the position coach at the same time.
Maybe I exaggerated a bit, but Warren is a very good coach with a clear upward trajectory. He will have more responsibilities that just being the DB coach at UGA — hence the raise. Smart has never shown himself to be so short-sighted as to hire a coach on account of a single recruit; that’s a yarn spun by Gators fans. And as for upgrading the position coach, I think it too early to declare that.
I was mainly judging by his history at Florida in the same capacity as he was hired this go round.
Too much common sense for Georgia fan
Imagine Bama and Georgia hiring your 2 worst assistants and then beating them out for 2 players at those positions lol….See ya in JAX
Cool stuff! Maybe you can beat them on the field too?
haha maybe you guys can beat Vandy? lol… kys
Just pointing out that your bragging about beating a rival OFF the field knowing full well that both teams would skull drag you guys on it.
DBU DBU DBU!
3rd and Grantham! 3rd and Grantham! 3rd and Grantham! Fromm just threw ANOTHER TD pass.
Now let’s not be salty here. Urban didn’t call out UGA
They gotta be salty my man… they dropped 600K on a crap coach just to get Elam…. nice job KirbyDumb!
They could dress a dog in UGA gear, call it a DB coach and Felipe Franks would still go 14/32, 105 yds, 0 TDs and 3 INTs.
Y’all hired the DB coach who gave up all those touchdowns
And we got the 5 stars to back him up. You had a secondary getting run over by Swift. Chauncey Gardner still limpin.
Very true, Kirby is a hell of a recruiter. Hopefully Mullen has another good year, I think if he does we compete with y’all and Bama in 2020.
That DB coach did the best he could with what he had but now he won’t ever have to play against UGA. Smart move by him.
smsatUGA, so you try to taunt with “3rd and Grantham! Fromm just threw ANOTHER TD pass” as a way to refute a UF fan’s claim to DBU, as if to say that Florida is not DBU and their DB’s are bad. But you’re team,so proudly, just hired the guy that was in charge of those DB’s and gave up the TD passes you brag of. This was done as a means to secure a key recruit against a rival, which was a battle that UGA lost. And yet you attempt a boast?
Hey, UGA had a helluva class this year. So to be certain, UGA has a lot to brag about. But in this thread, however, you don’t have a leg to stand on.
So then explain how it is DBU if the coach is a pile of crap. UGA didn’t hire for ONE recruit. That is stupid. There are already more 5 stars in the UGA secondary than on the ENTIRE UF defense. And, since you clearly know nothing about football, converting on third down is about also protecting the QB, not allowing UF pass rush to effect Fromm.
I never said he was a pile of crap. I’ve reread my comment and can’t seem to find that line. If you’d like to rebut, please at least get it right. I mean my comment is just a few spots up. It’s kinda like failing an open book test.
But hey man, you’re right. I know nothing about football. Just a casual observer. Maybe you can help me. So I get that a QB can’t complete a pass if he is tackled. A sack is what I think it’s called. But once the ball is in the air, isn’t that where the DB comes into play? If I’m not mistaken, I think more than one of the TD’s you speak of were thrown against a converted receiver. I can’t imagine that would be an extremely complicated feat. But what do I know. I’ll bow out to your immense knowledge and in depth on field experience.
@smaatuga
You’re barking up the wrong tree, dumbass.
Hey blitzer, Georgia fan doesn’t deal in logic or truth, he thinks Kirby Dumb already built a dynasty similar to Saban’s in 2 short years
And what’s going on at Florida, bud? You got anything to talk about over the last two years?
If you wanna see a skull drag go watch the Gators game when they went in Neyland and sent all the hillbillies home at halftime
His comment was spot on. Florida did have a great 2019 but your team is not yet in the same company as Bama and Georgia. It would lose rather handily. He never said that Tenn did not get mashed by Florida.
Let’s Go!!!!!!
This was a really nice get for UF, Gray and Mullen. I don’t like the hat swap stuff, but they’re kids on stage at a big moment and he didn’t do anything crazy. I was hoping this would happen – especially after UGA took Charlton Warren away and had him on campus when Kaiir took his official visit to UGA. Getting Khris Bogle was also big. Like I said before, no disrespect to Bama or UGA. You both have plenty of great recruits, as do many SEC rivals. This is a really good day for UF.
Getting Elam is a big time get for UF. I feel like he’s going to be a big time player in college.
Would’ve loved to have gotten Kaiir, but we’ve got a lot of young talent at DB. I think he was more a cherry on top rather than a necessity like Pickens and Brett Seither. He should be a good player for UF.
With Kirby I doubt you will be hurting for talent anytime soon. He’s a hell of a recruiter.
Yeah, UGA is loaded. Smart isn’t going to let the well go dry. Good thing for UGA is that he isn’t one of those Defensive coaches that forgets about the other half of the team. He locks up studs everywhere. UGA will be fine.
Still a good get for UF, both from an on the field perspective and an optics perspective for winning a high profile battle with UGA. The East is starting to be fun again!
Nailed it!
Between claiming Warren was hired to get Elam and that Florida coulda/woulda/shoulda won the game in Jacksonville shows are deeply delusional Gators fans are. I guess being lost in the backwoods of the SEC producing multiple 4-win seasons will mentally affect an entire fan base.
Yeah man I agree,those guys are nuts. They’re almost as crazy as all the folks saying UGA got screwed out of the playoffs. It’s unbelievable the insanity that goes on here. Thanks for the level headed insight. Glad someone on here can call it like it is!
Seems as if winning only 8 times in the last 29 years against UF may have affected the mental stability of some UGA fans as well. No ifs and buts from me. We lost last year but I have a feeling things are about to get interesting. So, enjoy it while you can boys…
Oh yeah, hiring our DB coach and main recruiter of Elam WHILE HE’S ON AN OFFICIAL VISIT to your school is obviously just a super coincidence and delusion on our part. Typical classless act out of Athens. I’m glad Elam and family saw through it.
UGA’s won 5 of the last 8 and 6 of the last twelve. Spurrier and Meyer are long gone, and so are the UGA coaches they owned between the ears. We’re almost a decade into a new era of the WLOCT – come along a join us!
It’s amusing see a gator fan call Athens classless. Didn’t Urban recruit and keep a bunch of morally repugnant players?
No duh they timed the hire for Elam, but you can’t stand before us and seriously claim that Warren wasn’t getting hired if say, Elam had already committed & signed in December. Warren was immediately named as a likely candidate for the job along with LSU’s DB coach when the main candidates started coming forward.
If you think Georgia shelled out $600k or however much it was for a 4 star CB, you’re wrong. All they did was time the hire when a recruit was in town.
Stop being so UCF bro, 2 year “dynasty”.
Lol you know what happens when you try to spit straight up? UGA is above you, if you wanna try to spit on someone, make it Vandy or Arkansas.
Again, 2 year “dynasty”. Last time you came in so overconfident Texas ran all over you, go ahead and keep it up.
Any fool who thinks the real Dawgs showed up in New Orleans is just that – a fool. The team was still reeling from Bama’s comeback in the SECCG and just had no spirit or interest. Same crap happened to Bama against Oklahoma and Utah in past bowl games. It happens. It’s happened to elite Florida teams in n the past (Michigan in 2007, for one). The playoff has changed bowl dynamics and team psychology, along with the increasing focus on an injury-free NFL payday. Using non-playoff bowls as a gauge of a team nowadays isn’t wise.
MD… The problem with that is the UGA players were talking $hit as they should be in the playoffs so they didn’t want to prove that? They didn’t care? Doesn’t seem plausible with all the talking done by UGA after the ND game…
Not implausible at all. If you saw the game, it was obvious in the first half. I have reasonably close ties to the program, and I posted here on SDS just before the game that my worry was the team’s’ mindset and motivation. It was a huge blow to the team psyche when Deandre Baker announced he was not going to play and focus instead on the combine. “Not important enough” was the message.
As to players responding to media questions on missing the playoff (the actual version of your “talking sh$t”), they just parroted what most CFB talking heads and your own coach had already publicly stated.
They were posting on social media not responding to questions…