Mailbag 3/23

I get it was a scrimmage, but why were our defensive players taunting the offense during the Spring Game? Friendly rivalry, sure, but is that how we build a team? - ramblin gooner

Ben: I didn’t watch the game, but my guess would be that it wasn’t serious taunting. Just friendly ribbing.

Jake: I don’t know, I was at the NCAA Women’s Championship swim meet across campus. I have no regrets. I will use the rest of this answer to plug the Men’s NCAAs, happening this week at McAuley Aquatic Center.

Logan: I guess there are ways this can be productive... some teams motivate a defense v offense production to get both sides of the ball to try and outwork their counterpart. It’s not how I would run a team, especially at the college level. I’m not 100% sure that is what is happening though since I’m not familiar with off the current team off the field. For now I’ll assume it was friendly jabbing, but its not a good look.

Carter: I had a date night at the ASO so I didn’t see it, but my entirely unscientific guess is because tackling someone in a game of football feels awesome.

When you’re “pi**ing the night away”, how do you thump your tub?

a whiskey drink?

a vodka drink?

a lager drink?

a cider drink?

Another drink? - DressHerInWhiteAndGold

Ben: When I do drink—and it’s a bit more rare these days—I like a nice sour beer or I go for a cab.

Logan: Pi-ing the night away? I like Pecan pie. For alcohol, I like stouts and porters but you need some vodka if you’re going to go all night.

Jake: If I’m just chilling (and it is not Lent) I prefer a nice lager. Something I can drink, not sip, and something smooth.

Carter: If I’m drinking, it’s probably a beer. At the moment we are transitioning out of stout season and into pale ale season, but I’m generally good with any beer, except for saisons. If my drink is not a beer, it’s probably a tiki cocktail. So, a lot of rum. Jake, go to Halfway Crooks if you haven’t already.

Post spring practice, what does the roster look like? Before spring practice started, it seemed like there was a barrage of departures. What does the roster look like post spring practice? Will we have 85 scholarship players? Are there any position groups where depth is a major concern? - Phys99

Logan: From what I could tell... The O-line still looked bad, which is saying quite a bit in a spring game. Gibson looked better than Sims on the field, but given last year I think we expect Sims to start as Sims seems to be CGC’s boy. The D-line is where I want to see improvement on defense but it’s hard to tell how they are doing against our O-line. We still need to figure out who will take Gibbs spot, both Dontae Smith and Hassan Hall looked to be on the same level and not great. Defensive secondary looked good, they covered well against everyone but the tightends. depth wise I don’t think we are particularly short anywhere, but I think the O-line and WRs will need to toy around with with the lineup as we just don’t have any standouts. It looks like the Jackets will be trying to take more snaps under center... which could go either way but it didn’t result in many benefits for us in the spring game. I don’t know the exact scholarship count but I wouldn’t worry about that too much as we seem to have enough players to cover potential injuries at any position. The game didn’t show me much to get excited about; there is a possibility that the defense has improved, but its hard to tell when going against our offense. Watching our offense made me feel less confident about the upcoming season, but they still have time to improve before the fall so hopefully they can get a cohesive plan together that works for them.

Hello From The Rumbleseat team,

Hope your weekend treated you well. I had fun watching the NCAA tournament. My bracket is all kinds of messed up because the SEC fell on its face and I couldn’t be happier. It’s not really about the SEC losing (although I do find that pretty amusing), but I do like seeing teams such as St. Peters and low seeds like Michigan, Iowa State, and Miami proving they belong in the tournament.

Since we’re on the topic my question this week is what is your personal big underdog story. What was the time you were doubting yourself or everyone else was doubting you and you pulled off the big upset. could be in sports, school, romance, games, whatever you can think of. Let me know below. Have a good one guys,

From,

Cuppa Joe (submitted via email)

Ben: If you had told me when I moved to Savannah in January of last year that I would meet my future wife within months, I wouldn’t have believed you, but we’re now 66 days away from the big day, so I’d call that a pretty great upset myself.

Jake: This week just goes to show that the Big Ten getting more than half of its teams into the tournament is dumb, and mid majors are extremely underrated. Give the MVC or OVC or C-USA or whoever another hack or two and everyone would have more fun! As for an underdog story, I think my swimming story is pretty underdog-ish. I’m sure I might have a better one if I thought longer, but I was a chunky, not particularly athletic kid growing up. I knew it, my coaches knew it. However, for years, I went to practice regularly, eventually had baseball and basketball — which I was also just okay at, with no designs on playing in past Little League or rec league — fall away, and eventually got into decent shape. In high school, no one else wanted to swim the 500 Freestyle, and since I wasn’t particularly good at anything else, I gave it a try. I didn’t have a high top speed, but found that I could hold close to it for a long time. I made my first postseason cut the first time I swam it at a sanctioned meet. From there, it was a logical enough path to the high school varsity team. I wasn’t particularly impressive of an athlete, but I made a little home for myself in the distance events, notching AAA times a few events and eventually getting 3rd in the 1000 at College Club Swimming nationals once I got to college.

Logan: personal underdog story... I guess graduating GT would be my greatest achievement that I had plenty of self doubt in. My family never doubted me but I definitely had some struggles on the road to graduation. I started as an Aerospace Engineering major and had to change to Mechanical Engineering after the first year because it was too difficult. As an ME I failed my Statics course 2 times I believe (which is weird because Dynamics is supposed to be the hard one, but I got that in one semester)... I got so sick of taking that class. I don’t want to dig into to much of my own personal information and troubles; but I had some mental health issues arise because of Tech, I had plenty of scares about not passing my classes in time and having to retake old classes due to the GT class expiration policy, I was constantly worried about every test and assignment... plenty of other things. Thank goodness for good family and friend support. All that doesn’t matter because I graduated. All the hard work and tribulations really added some extra weight to my degree, I feel like I really earned something. I’ve dealt with plenty of other underdog situations but that was the biggest achievement where I doubted myself; anyone who graduates from Tech should be proud that they achieved something great.