Georgia's Reckless Driving Strategy Shift Is A Collective Copout By Kirby Smart | Glenn Guilbeau

DALLAS - Funny, that the cash cow collective servicing the overly affluent Georgia football program is called the Classic City Collective.

As in Classic Cars. They're everywhere on the Georgia campus, which is nestled amid Athens - one of the greatest college towns in America, known for live music, nightlife and fast times. 

Georgia star quarterback Carson Beck, for example, drives a $270,000 Lamborghini, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Chip Towers. Towers could host his version of the former Car Talk radio show, but he is a sportswriter who has covered the Bulldogs sports teams for decades. Lately, though, he has been on the car beat, so to speak.

Georgia football coach Kirby Smart's numerous dangerous drivers on his football team are being dealt with through fines by the program's NIL fund - the Classic City Collective. And he will not be involved. (Getty Images)

-Georgia star tailback Trevor Etienne, who recently transferred from Florida to Athens for a nice Name, Image & Likeness package, drives a $150,000 Audi RS7.

-Freshman signee Demello Jones, the No. 5 safety in the country by 247 Sports out of Swainsboro, Georgia, motors about in a late model Mercedes-Benz.

-And Georgia two-year starting senior inside linebacker Smael Mondon, along with several of his teammates, tools around in a classic Dodge Charger as seen in the Dukes of Hazzard television show of the 1980s. Hazzard is a fictional county in Georgia.

But this is not fun fiction. Georgia football players and their friends and hangers-on often race around like idiots - too fast, too reckless and too drunk. This happens everywhere, yes, apologists, but it keeps happening too much in particular in and around Athens.

TRAGEDY IN ATHENS: Georgia Football Player, Staffer Killed In High-Speed Crash

In the wee hours of Sunday, Jan. 15, 2023, after Georgia celebrated its second straight national championship in downtown Athens on Saturday, Georgia sophomore offensive lineman Devin Willock, a 20-year-old sophomore from New Milford, New Jersey, and Georgia recruiting staffer Chandler LeCroy, 24, died in a crash in the Athens area.

LeCroy was racing at speeds of more than 100 mph in a 40 mph zone in a Ford Expedition provided by Georgia with then-Georgia defensive tackle Jalen Carter, who was in another vehicle.

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LeCroy had a history of reckless driving that Georgia football's director of player support and operations Bryant Gantt painstakingly minimized as he is the program's "cleaner," often arriving at the scene of calls to the police before the police.

Georgia recruiting staffer Victoria Bowles, 26 at the time, was also in that vehicle. She survived, but with serious injuries - multiple broken bones, spinal and neurological damage from a head injury, lacerations to her kidney and liver, abdominal bleeding and a punctured and collapsed lung. 

Georgia fired Bowles last August for allegedly not cooperating with two "internal investigations" into the crash. Her attorney said she didn't cooperate partly because she thought the "internal investigations" were more cleaning expeditions of which she wanted no part. Bowles alleged in a civil lawsuit against the Georgia athletic department early this year that drinking and driving by Georgia staffers and players or recruits was common knowledge.

Georgia head football coach Kirby Smith, a former defensive coordinator extraordinaire at Alabama, has been coordinating the defense of his program by basically being overly defensive and delusional and apparently without a lot of discipline - or any discipline that worked well. 

"Disciplinary measures have been implemented in terms of education," Smart said a year ago at this time. Whatever happened to running steps? Or maybe taking the keys away?

Kirby Smart has had a lot of success on the field as Georgia's football coach, but not so much off the field. (Sam Navarro-USA TODAY Sports)

Education? Driver's Ed? Sounds like just a lot of talk, Kirby. With kids, late teens and major college athletes - many of whom take much longer to mature off the field - it takes more than that. One has to take things away.

"We'll continue to do that," Smart said steadfastly last year on "education."

Smart's players, though, continue to get Fs, which means he failed them.

OPINION: Kirby Smart Wins, But Doesn't Lead

Since Willock and LeCroy died, and Bowles was injured and fired, Smart's football players have been involved in 23 reckless driving incidents through just last week. No more deaths, thank God, but a lot of deadly risks.

Here are only a few:

-Etienne, 20, was in court just last week for reckless driving and DUI charges against him from March 24. A football lawyer cleaner got the DUI dismissed, but Etienne pleaded no contest to driving over 80 in a 50 mph zone and guilty to underage drinking. Etienne has not yet been suspended for any games in the 2024 season.

-Jones received a ticket for racing his Mercedes against Mondon's Dukes of Hazzard Charger near downtown Athens just last July 10. Mondon was arrested on charges for racing and reckless driving - 75 mph or more in a 40 mph zone - on the same date.

-The day before, police arrested freshman offensive lineman Bo Hughley for reckless driving. Neither have been suspended.  

Smart hasn't been arrested, but he has apparently been pushed aside, or he has stepped aside. Now in charge of the discipline of HIS program on the road is the Classic City Collective, which provides the cash to the players with which many of them buy fast cars. Is this SEC football, or NASCAR?

NEWS: Georgia's Collective Disciplining Players, Too?

"Our Classic City Collective for over a year has been substantially fining guys for those things," Smart revealed for the first time to his beat reporters in a separate meeting before his main press conference at SEC Media Days on Tuesday here at the Omni Hotel. "That’s something that’s been ongoing outside of my jurisdiction that they decided to implement and have done to a considerable amount. The incidents that have been happening off the field are not something we condone."

Oh, wow, thanks for that one. Mighty big of you. You're against it. Great. How about, quit fostering it via a lack of apparent discipline?

"It's very unfortunate," Smart droned on. "Disappointing, I guess, is the best word. I always talk about processing outcomes in wins and losses."

How about life and death instead in these situations? Get off the field, Kirby. You're leading a program, not just coaching games.

Former Florida running back Trevor Etienne has only been at Georgia for a matter of months, but he appeared in court just last week on DUI and reckless driving charges. (Getty Images)

"We try not to base things on outcomes," he continued, so desperately needing some media coaching. "In this case, the outcomes are very disappointing."

Maybe it is a good strategy to let someone else take over this disciplinary part of Smart's program, since he obviously does not have the tools to do so, or chooses not to, so as to keep his rich supply of talent around for more national championships.

But is the collective the right choice? The modus operandi of all collectives in college football is to pay top players well enough to keep them from getting more money from another program and transferring there. So, this same group is going to be fining wayward driving players?

Are you familiar with the fox guarding the hen house? That had to be in a Dukes of Hazzard episode.

Smart did not specifiy the amount of fines. He only said, "substantial" and a "considerable amount." Surely, they depend on the seriousness of the violation more than how seriously good the player is, right? And considering the amount of NIL money a lot of Georgia players receive, and considering how some of them throw money around in their youth for fast cars, how much is a fine going to change their behavior? Fines are often laughed at by rich pro players and will be by rich college players. 

If the Classic City Collective of Cars really wants to keep a player, how "substantial" is the fine really going to be? And if the collective wants to keep the player more than Smart, it probably will.

"That's something that's been ongoing outside of my jurisdiction," Smart said.

Outside your jurisdiction? You're the freakin' coach, Kirby. What else is going on outside your jurisdiction? Who's running the Georgia program? A bunch of boosters who formed a booster bank - aka a collective? 

This is a collective copout by Smart, period.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban had a habit of not suspending players who were disciplinary problems, and apparently his former assisthat coach Kirby Smart is following suit. (Getty Images)

Kirby Smart won two national championships just recently in 2021 and ‘22. Nick Saban retired from Alabama after last season and after not winning one since 2020. Smart is the new man of the SEC. He could be the next Saban. And he’s letting a bunch of boosters run his program? Saban wouldn't let that happen to the degree Smart is.

Apparently Smart, though, is following some of Saban's softer footsteps with regard to discipline - don't kick a guy off the team who can go to another team and beat you. 

Smart still has a lot of talent and will continue to have a lot of talent. He can afford to jettison some players from his program routinely so he doesn't have another tragedy like Jan. 15, 2023.

OPINION: How Nick Saban Mishandled Jermaine Burton

Saban could and should have kicked more players off his team, too, but he never had the volume of major disciplinary issues that Smart has now.

And all Smart can do is brag about his discipline? He did on Tuesday announce the ejection of starting senior safety David Daniel-Sisavanth outside of the collective. Daniel-Sisavanth was charged with reckless driving and speeding in his 2021 BMW M340i in downtown Atlanta last Feb. 24.

But then later Tuesday, Smart brought up a player he suspended for one game last season - wide receiver Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint, who was ticketed for speeding three times in nine days from May 15 through May 23 in 2023. He was going 60 mph in a 50 mph zone, 71 in a 40 and 90 in a 45. That's faster each time, so he's not learning.

Why Is Kirby Smart Bragging About His Discipline?

"As far as I know, there’s not one team in the country that’s ever suspended a player for traffic violations," Smart boasted Tuesday. "I don’t know if anybody’s ever kicked somebody off the team for that. And we have that. And we’re going to continue to be proactive."

You didn't kick him off the team, Kirby. You should have, but you didn't. You copped out. Admit it.

Nearly two dozen reckless driving related incidents - some death defying - since the death of Devin Willock and Chandler LeCroy on Jan. 15, 2023, and Smart has kicked one player out of the program.  

Wow, Kirby, you should try a career as a Marine sergeant if this football thing skids off.

Wonder if the Classic City Collective will step up and suspend and remove players from the team as well? 

And who knows, maybe one of Georgia's boosters will start sending plays to Smart on the sideline. 

Smart - with two national titles and more to come - can afford to dish out more public discipline with more suspensions and removals. He could set an example for the other weakening coaches at discipline and change the behavior of those disciplined.

By doing this, he may just save a life or two before it's too late.