Moore versus Murray

When putting up Moore's college numbers versus Murray's there is not really area that Moore doesn't win. Touchdown to interception ratio, wins, total yards, completion percentage, and every other number you can look at all favor Moore. He has three years experience to Murray's one as a starter. There is one area where Murray can hold his own. Last year Moore faced 3 defenses in the top 31 (Utah 31, Virginia Tech 26, and Utah 24). Murray also faced 3 top 30 defenses (UCF 8, Miss. State 21, and Florida 29). Slightly harder for Murray but not a ton of difference.

After that the difficulty level for Murray was much harder than what Moore faced. I threw out the worst defense each team faced because UGA played a 1-AA team so they were not in the defensive (points per game allowed) rankings and so to be fair I threw out the lowest ranked defense (115) that Boise faced. After the top 3 defenses Boise faced only one other team in the top half of defenses in the country, Hawaii at 58. Georgia faced 5 more teams with defenses in the top half of the country. That means that 8 out of Murray's 13 games as a starter were against quality defenses. Moore faced only 4 top 50% of the nation defense all year.

This doesn't mean that Moore would not have performed well had he played Georgia's schedule. It is not unreasonable to think that Murray's numbers, 3049 yards passing, 24 tds and 8 ints would have been better had he played against 10 defenses ranked 58th or lower as opposed to only 5. This is no knock on Moore and his great numbers from last year, 3845 yards passing, 36 tds and only 6 ints, but instead a basis for comparison of the two quarterbacks.

Almost every game Boise has gone into the last few years they have had a clear advantage at quarterback. In Moore’s three years as a starter Boise has faced at best seven teams with quarterbacks that could come close to matching up with Moore; Dalton from TCU twice (1-1), Massoli from Oregon (0-2), Kaepernick from Nevada (1-2) and Taylor from Virginia Tech (0-1). Moore was an impressive 6-2 in those games but those two losses where Boise’s only two losses in the last three years and none of those games were blowouts for Boise. For only the 9th time in Moore’s college career will he be lining up against a quarterback that that can match him. That gives UGA as good a chance as any team to give Moore his 3rd college loss.

Production replacement - QB

This is the easiest position to replace as the only two players who attempted a pass last year are back. Murray will be the starter and get every snap that matters at qb (not counting any wildcat type plays we may run). Murray took the first snap of his career last season and came close to breaking every single season record at Georgia, not for freshmen but for any class. Although he was not great in every game he only had two games that anyone could consider bad, UF (who he still had maybe his best half a game of the season against) and UCF. With a year of starting under his belt he should improve from last year to this year. He could be even better this year as the coaches will most likely lift the restrictions they had on him early for being a freshman. He also will most likely be given a bit more free reign as Bobo won't have to protect him as much as it will have more depth at the position than a year ago. Look for Murray to have a huge year and be the unquestioned leader of not just the offense but the entire team.

Speed versus Accuracy in Reporting...Aaron Murry

Today it was first reported that "sources" inside the atheletic program at UGA had said that Murray had broken his ankle in two places. Later it came out that broken in two places really meant that he had sprained his ankle. While it is not good that Murray sprained his ankle it could be healed to close to 100% before spring practice really gets into swing as opposed to if he had broken it in two places Murray might have missed all of spring. The point though is not about how long it will take for his injury to hear but to ask the question. In today's world of instant feedback on everything at what point is getting a story first worth the tradeoff of not getting it right? I wonder how many people that read the initial story are still passing it on to friends that Murray broke his ankle in two places because they never read the follow up and correction of the details.