"That's not normal" - College football insider defends Kirby Smart's hands-on approach

Georgia coach Kirby Smart was designated the top dog in college football last year after former Alabama Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban retired in January. Despite winning the Southeastern Conference championship last year, the Bulldogs were dumped out of the college football playoffs by the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.

Smart, who hails from the Nick Saban coaching tree has received criticism about his hands-on approach in every aspect of the Bulldogs' day-to-day operation rather than delegating to his assistant coaches. On Friday, college football insider David Pollock defended the coach's way of coaching in a clip posted on X.

"There's not a coach in America that's more hands-on," David Pollack said. "Like, there might be some that are close. Kirby is in special teams meetings answering questions. I'm not lying. He's in special teams meetings in the front row or close to it and he's dialed in, listening. Because, it's important to him and when it's important to you, it's important to your players.

"I think he's one of those guys that has a pulse on every single thing, offense, defense, special teams. He's sitting on the sidelines with a headset and he's talking and he knows formations. If somebody is supposed to be on, supposed to be off, he's yelling at them. That's not normal."

Kirby Smart refuses to hire a general manager

In the era of the revenue-sharing model in college football, more teams are hiring general managers to oversee the operations of NIL development and matters of the transfer portal. Alabama Crimson Tide coach Kalen DeBoer hired Courtney Morgan to the position last year and new North Carolina Tar Heels coach Bill Belichick hired Michael Lombardi to implement an NFL-style approach to recruitment for the program.

While speaking to reporters last week, Kirby Smart revealed that he would not take the same path by hiring a general manager for the Bulldogs.

“We’ve got a lot of people in charge of roster management, including myself, including our football ops staff, is involved, our operations-player development, player personnel staff," Kirby Smart said. "Everybody gets involved in that. It’s a team effort.

“I’m not ready to run off and go hire somebody that’s just going to make all the decisions for that goes on on the football field. I think I’ve got to stay involved in that heavily. We’ve got the capacity and the quality of people in the areas that I think we need. So I think we’ll be fine in that world as it changes.”

The position of general manager has become even more widespread due to the House vs. NCAA settlement which designated student-athletes as employees entitled to a revenue-sharing agreement with their schools. The famously detail-oriented Kirby Smart has shunned the role instead opting to stay hands-on in the running of the team.