As Kirby Smart was finishing up his time at the podium, he appeared to take a shot at Tennessee head coach Butch Jones. Smart didn’t name any names, but the dots are pretty easy to connect.
Smart was asked about his 21 returning starters — which he initially laughed off.
Reporter: "You have 21 starters coming back..."
— Andrew Lopez (@_Andrew_Lopez) July 11, 2017
Kirby Smart: 21? Wow. We had 3 senior offensive lineman, not sure how that math works out.
But Smart didn’t let the opportunity slip by without taking a little bit of a shot. Smart continued by saying "we had one coach that told us we had better talent. Then he had 6 guys taken in the 1st 4 rounds and we had 1 player drafted.” This, of course, is Butch Jones — who always has his positive stats ready. This was one of his talking points yesterday.
Kirby Smart: "We had one coach that told us we had better talent. Then he had 6 guys taken in the 1st 4 rounds and we had 1 player drafted"
— Sports Radio WNML (@SportsRadioWNML) July 11, 2017
This wasn’t the haymaker that Steve Spurrier used to throw at Tennessee every year, but it was a minor punch directed at Butch. We don’t see too much of this anymore, which is a shame. I’m not sure when or where Butch said that Georgia had more talent, maybe that was behind closed doors.
Smart also noted that his eight win season was a disappointment, just hours after Butch Jones said his nine win season was not a disappointment. Stark contrast there in attitude.
Maybe Kirby is still a little upset about the miracle Tennessee pulled off between the hedges last year. I hope he is. Rivalries are a good thing — we need more jabs like this.
Kirby Smart throwing shots!?Great,Love it. Better than coaches cuddling at mid field, going on vacay together in offseason &sharing recipes
— Jayson Swain (@SwainEvent) July 11, 2017