I gotta be honest. Living up here in Dawg Country I had bought into all the "Richt always chokes in the big games," hype, and wasn't completely sold on him. I mean, I also understood--not being a UGA homer and all that--that saying CMR choked against Bama in the SEC Championship is about the same as saying Dan Reeves choked when the 49ers waxed the Broncos. It wasn't evident so much at the time, but Reeves got the Broncos INTO big games they had no business being in and no chance of winning The same way Richt got UGA into big games they'd never been in before and didn't belong in. You didn't know at the time Saban was on his way to being put in the books as maybe the greatest coach and recruiter in history just the same as you didn't know how many future NFL Hall of Fame guys were on that 49ers team. Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, John Taylor, Roger Craig, Ronnie Lott, Charles Hailey...add in the likes of Bill Romanowski, Matt Millen, Pierce Holt, and Brent Jones, and the 20/20 lens of history clearly says Elway and the Broncos had no chance.
But I'd be lying if I wasn't nervous as **** about his hire here. At the time I held out hope that he would fare better with access to the superior athletes available to him now, and I believe that hope is being brought to fruition.