Georgia's imitation flattering, but Alabama is still Alabama

They say imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. And understand that everything Georgia has done since hiring Kirby Smart in 2016 has been in imitation of Alabama. There's not an original idea to be found in Athens these days.

And why wouldn't you frankly? By the time Georgia hired Smart, Alabama had just won its fourth national championship in a seven year stretch. Other schools went on to try and fail to copy the Saban formula, but only his most loyal padawan was able to find the right mix of flavors to make things spicy.

Well, formerly loyal padawan, I should say. The first move Kirby made as head coach of the Bulldogs was to take a photo of Alabama's recruiting board in the facility and sent it out to recruits to negative recruit against his mentor. A snake always reveals himself eventually. A man with a $10 haircut and $100 million dollar facilities at his disposal waged war on Alabama - the place he'd have been nothing without - from the jump.

He was hell-bent on getting Georgia back to the mountaintop after wandering the wilderness for so long even Moses was starting to get worried. And, inevitably, he did it. He won back-to-back national championships at a place that hadn't won a title in 40-years, awakening one of the most insufferable fanbases in the sport. Grown men barking like dogs at children in opposing fan's gear now had a right to be cocky along with insane. It's the Edgar Allan Poe quote of "I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity" come to life. We thought these people were sane for 40-years because they had no reason to be cocky - up until the 2021 title their trophy case resembled Ole Miss' more than it did Alabama's.

But they got the 2021 title. And then the 2022 title. And they were on the track barreling toward a three-peat, a feat never accomplished by Saban and Alabama. But like the young kid Kirby's haircut resembles, when you've gotten too big for your britches, daddy has to step in.

And the rest of the college football world - long tired of the Crimson Tide - should frankly be thankful. If you thought Alabama's reign of terror was bad, Georgia's would be exponentially worse. But Alabama has always been there to stop it, and in the back of their minds you know it eats at the Bulldog faithful to know that during the best stretch in program history, they've gone 1-5 against the team they wanted to replace on top of the mountain.

They did finally beat Alabama once. And good for them, it was about time. They all know how fluky that one win was, though. Alabama dominated that same Georgia team just a month prior while full strength thanks to Jameson Williams' virtuoso performance. He blew his ACL in the title game right after victimizing the Georgia secondary for a big play.

They know it. We know it. Alabama wins that game with a healthy Jameson Williams. They won't admit it, but I know it's there deep down. And the second title they won was a product of another injury of a star WR for Ohio State. It's a deep-rooted insecurity they get angry to hear brought up. Simmer down, now, because we're just getting started.

The national media seems to have handed over the keys to the college football castle to Georgia. The narrative all offseason was that somebody in the SEC has to prove they can beat Georgia. Silly me, really, because somewhere in my memory bank is last season's SEC Championship Game. Who won that game again?

Frankly, Georgia still has to prove it can beat Alabama. It's not the other way around. There's one team with anxiety heading into this matchup because of the history, and it ain't the team from Tuscaloosa.

On Saturday night on the newly minted Saban Field, Alabama can prove that college football still belongs to them. Kirby and the national media has delivered delicious rat poison.

In a now famous speech prior to the 2018 CFP National Championship Game, Nick Saban took aim at the disrespect emanating from Athens.

"You guys talk about respect all the time, well Kirby says we ain't what we used to be," shouted Saban to his team. "By God I want to prove something different. And I don't want to see a smile on that face after the game. And the ultimate disrespect is when someone tries to take what's yours."

I'd go a step further and say it's even more disrespectful to be handed something you haven't earned. And Georgia thinks they are the standard of college football, without ever proving they can consistently beat the Crimson Tide. Nobody has gotten more mileage out of one single victory over Alabama this side of Hugh Freeze. And even the right reverend Hugh got two. Hell, Jimbo Fisher and Ed Orgeron beat Saban once. So did Gene Chizik. Those coaches and those programs never claimed to be the kings of college football like Georgia has.

The same stuff is being said to recruits now, too. The "Alabama ain't what they used to be" narrative has been loud and vociferous. It started before Saban retired, though you have to go all the way back to 2010 to find a season Alabama lost more than two football games. It grew louder when Saban retired.

While imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, even Kirby knows that you'll never best the original. So while Georgia has excelled copying the formula, Greg Byrne knew the likleihood of dong the same in finding Saban's successor was unlikely.

Kalen DeBoer is decidedly not Nick Saban. He does things his own way, unafraid of making changes and putting his own spin on the program right away instead of trying unsuccessfully to do the same things that made Alabama great. Because no matter how hard you try, it won't ever be the same.

Now Kirby is faced with a new reality in a new era of college football. No longer can he feast on a weak SEC East schedule. This year he takes his Bulldogs to Tuscaloosa, Austin, and Oxford; easily the most challenging schedule he's faced in his time in Athens.

As great as this run has been, Georgia hasn't beaten a Top-10 opponent on the road since 2012 when Kirby was still just a cog in the Crimson Tide machine as Saban's defensive coordinator and Mark Richt was the Georgia head coach.

So if Georgia wants the crown, they're going have to come and take it. Nobody likes it, and nobody wants to admit it, but Alabama is still Alabama, and that point gets driven home tomorrow night.

Georgia might be built by Bama, but they'll never be Bama.