Watching these spring game highlights and all I see is spread formations and RPOs and I just shake my head. You want to know what made Georgia football tough back in the 80s under Coach Dooley? We ran the otion. Not this fancy zone read stuff where everyone is spread out and the quarterback is just making a read on one defensive end. I mean a real triple option where the fullback is taking a pounding between the tackles and the quarterback is sprinting down the line reading two defenders every single play. The 1980 National Championship team could run the wishbone and make you pay for overcommitting on any single back. That is football. That is toughness. You cannot simulate that in practice.
Nowadays these kids come in through the portal and they want to throw it 45 times a game and run these cute little perimeter screens. The option offense taught you discipline. It taught you that every single player on the field had a job to do and if one man missed his assignment the whole play broke down. Coach Goff and Coach Donnan both understood that. We might not have won titles every year but by golly we could grind out a 14-10 win against Auburn in the rain and it meant something because you earned every single yard. The option is about willpower and football IQ not about who has the fastest 40 time or the biggest NIL deal.
I miss watching a quarterback tuck the ball and make a linebacker miss in the hole. I miss seeing a fullback lower his shoulder and fight for three tough yards on third and short. The option offense is a lost art and that is a shame because it taught toughness that these spread offenses just cannot replicate. Give me a good old fashioned option keeper on a cold November Saturday over any of this modern stuff. That is real football.