All roads lead back to Georgia for Mike Bobo, the essence of a DGD

ATHENS, Ga. – In the lexicon of Georgia football, earning DGD status is about as good as it gets.

For those not of the red and black persuasion: Damn Good Dawg.

It’s a way of branding someone Georgia to the core, and along the way, highlighting someone who’s made a life of putting Georgia first, someone who’s helped Georgia chase excellence and someone whose journey inevitably leads back to Georgia even when there are detours.

And sometimes, a DGD can be underappreciated on the outside of the Georgia locker room walls despite endearing himself to coaching colleagues, staff members and players within those walls.

Welcome to Mike Bobo’s world.

Good luck in finding somebody more deeply rooted and invested in Georgia football than Bobo and his family. In his second stint as Georgia’s offensive coordinator, Bobo is a finalist for the Broyles Award as one of the top five assistants in college football. It’s the third time in his career he’s been a finalist.

“He will never be given the credit he deserves, sadly, but once he helps lead UGA to a natty, I hope fans will fully appreciate everything he has done for the university,” said ESPN analyst and former Georgia quarterback Aaron Murray, who set the SEC’s career record for passing yards (13,166) while playing under Bobo from 2010-13.

Bobo, 51, is in his 25th year at Georgia as either a player, assistant coach or offensive coordinator. His father, George, and mother, Barbara, both graduated from Georgia. His son Drew was a second-team All-SEC center at Georgia this season. His wife, Lainie, whom he met at Georgia, is the niece of Georgia Hall of Fame coach Vince Dooley. As Georgia’s quarterback from 1994-97, Bobo ranks eighth all-time in career passing yards (6,334). He’s been on staff at Georgia for a national championship and five SEC championships and worked under three different head coaches – Kirby Smart, Mark Richt and Jim Donnan.

“It’s a hell of a story, just the sacrifices Mike’s made in his journey, and now he’s come full circle back to Georgia,” Smart told On3. “I think he appreciates things more this second time, sort of a he-knows-what-he’s-fighting-for kind of deal. Mike ain’t about all the fluff. He’s about winning and doing it within our system, and we’re in lock step in how that happens.

“It’s about running the ball, stopping the run and being physical. It all fits together.”

Smart said what is lost a lot of times in what he wants from his offensive coordinator is the commitment to play complementary football in concert with the defense and special teams, while still being balanced on offense and capable of generating explosive plays.

The Bulldogs were second in the SEC and tied for 10th nationally this season with 36 plays from scrimmage of 20 yards or longer. They were one of five teams in the league averaging 220-plus passing yards and 180-plus rushing yards per game, and did it against a schedule that featured six nationally ranked opponents. Ole Miss will be the seventh on New Year’s Day in the Sugar Bowl in the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff. The two teams already faced off once this season with Georgia winning 43-35 on Oct. 18 in Athens.

“You have to be able to run the ball to win a championship, and we didn’t do that last year. So we kind of went back to square one this offseason, every rule, every fundamental, and went back to the basics,” said Bobo, whose offense struggled in the running game a year ago and finished 102nd nationally and next to last in the SEC in rushing offense (124.4 yards per game).

“It sounds cliché-ish, but we made a commitment to running the football, and that’s been a big emphasis since we got back with our team after last season ended. Then the other thing is we have a group of kids that believe in themselves, and the way they prepare gives them confidence to play well in key moments — fourth down, fourth quarters. Because, quite frankly, Coach Smart puts us in the fourth quarter and fourth down every day around here.”

Smart said Bobo has never been consumed with putting up flashy numbers, running a ton of plays to inflate those numbers or leading the country in scoring.

Case in point: Georgia kept the ball away from other teams this season and ranked third nationally in time of possession, and once in the red zone, the Bulldogs were lights out. They finished second nationally in touchdown production with 42 touchdowns in 53 attempts.

And on critical downs, nobody was better than Georgia. The Bulldogs led the NCAA in fourth-down conversions (13-of-17) and were 5-of-6 against nationally ranked teams.

All this despite losing four starters on the offensive line, top running back Trevor Etienne and the two leading receivers from a year ago, not to mention six offensive players selected in the 2025 NFL draft. Plus, quarterback Gunner Stockton was entering the season as a first-time starter.

And yet, Bobo was a regular target of fans on message boards and talk shows, as well as the media, when it came to explaining why Georgia had the “audacity” to go a second straight season last year without winning a national title after winning back-to-back titles in 2021 and 2022 and winning an SEC-record 29 straight games along the way.

“A hundred percent,” Smart told On3 when asked if Bobo has received more criticism than he deserved over the years. “It was that way when I was at Alabama. We went against him a couple of times. He doesn’t go fast to run up numbers. He’s very efficient, and his teams are physical. And then you talk to other people, and it’s like, ‘Man, he’s a pain in the butt to play against because he changes things up on you.’

“You get respect from the people you compete against and what they say about you and not what the armchair quarterbacks say about you.”

Bobo quit worrying about outside criticism a long time ago, not that it ever weighed very heavily on him. It comes with the territory when you play quarterback in the SEC and when you call plays in the SEC.

In his first stint as Georgia’s offensive coordinator under Richt, Bobo remembers Richt repeating a phrase handed down from Bobby Bowden.

“It’s an occupational hazard,” Bobo recounted. “Criticisms are aimed at the coach, not the person. That’s what makes college football what it is, especially the SEC, because people are fanatical. I’ve never looked at it as people attacking me as a person. Fans have every right to criticize me if we don’t score. That doesn’t bother me. But at the same time, there were always opportunities to go to other places, but I didn’t want that. I loved the University of Georgia and didn’t want to be moving my family around. Coach Richt always gave me the stability to be able to stay here and allow me to grow, which I appreciate so much.”

When Bobo got a head coaching opportunity in 2015 at Colorado State, he took his shot. Other than a year at Jacksonville State in 2000 as quarterbacks coach, it was the first time he had been away from Georgia since stepping foot on campus as a freshman in 1993.

It’s in Fort Collins where Bobo stared adversity squarely in the face, and it had nothing to do with football or his 28-38 overall record.

As he entered his fourth season at Colorado State in 2018, Bobo had knee replacement surgery that spring and began having pain shooting down his right leg and into his feet that summer. It then went to his left side. He initially thought maybe there were complications from his knee replacement surgery.

The pain worsened to the point where Bobo had trouble holding a pen and taking notes during a preseason scrimmage.

“All my extremities started losing feeling,” Bobo said.

Doctors admitted Bobo to the hospital, and he was there for 10 days during preseason camp as they tried to assess what was wrong with him. He was diagnosed with Churg-Strauss Syndrome, a rare autoimmune disease attacking both his respiratory system and peripheral nerves.

Bobo coached the 2018 opener from the press box and gradually worked his way back to the sideline. He said he was fortunate that he ended up in a hospital in Denver with one of the leading doctors in the world that dealt with his issue. As he fought back, he weathered asthma and underwent breathing treatments and steroid packs.

“All the nerves coming back just takes time,” Bobo said. “The bottom of my feet still tingle a little bit, and I’ll be on medication for the rest of my life. But if I think about where I was this point last year or two years ago, I’m a hundred times better.”

Soon after last season ended, there was a radio report out of Atlanta that Bobo would be stepping down in his role as Georgia’s offensive coordinator. But the reality was that he was more determined than ever to get back on the field with his players and get the Bulldogs’ offense back up to speed.

“You look at everything he’s gone through, and Mike’s toughness and resolve mirror what we’ve always wanted to instill in our program,” Smart said.

Bobo and Smart have known each other since they were young kids when their dads were high school coaches in the state of Georgia – Sonny Smart at Bainbridge and George Bobo at Thomasville. They both played for their dads in high school and went on to be teammates at Georgia for three seasons playing under Donnan.

Anybody who truly knows Smart knows he’s not into the charity business when it comes to hiring coaches. But when Todd Monken left for the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens after the Bulldogs’ second straight national championship in 2022, Smart never blinked. Bobo was already on the staff as an offensive analyst after being fired as offensive coordinator at Auburn the year before.

“No, didn’t hesitate a second just because I felt very strongly at what he had done.” Smart said. “His track record offensively wherever he’d been was really good. Yeah, South Carolina and Auburn had down years when he was there, but when we played them, they had good schemes. They didn’t have great players, but his offenses were sound. Plus, he sat right here in all the meetings with (Monken), and Todd would come to me and be like, ‘Bobo has some really good ideas.’ Mike brought a lot to the table, and I knew he would be able to call it. I rely on people that I trust. I called Nick (Saban), called (Will) Muschamp. I called several people when I had that opportunity, and they all said that you’ve got to go with your gut. I already had somebody in my building who had done it in big games, and calling games in the SEC is high pressure. Mike is used to that pressure.”

One narrative about the Smart-Bobo relationship, at least among fans, is that perhaps Smart and Bobo are too close and Smart simply promoted his “buddy” when Monken left for the NFL. Smart scoffs at any suggestion of such and said the fact that he was able to bring back all 10 of his on-field assistants this season has only strengthened the foundation of the program.

“Mike has made it very easy to work with because he understands the dynamic and he’d been a head coach,” Smart said. “I think if he had not been a head coach it would be harder for him. But he’s been a head coach where you have to sit in that seat, make tough decisions and all that, and he makes it easier on me. He doesn’t act and behave as a friend inside this building. He knows that he works for me and he’s working for Georgia. That makes it much easier. The offseason is just like every other offseason we’ve had when I was at Alabama, he was at Colorado State, all those other places when we’d take trips together.”

Bobo joked: “He’s the boss. I say, ‘Yes sir.’ I don’t think anybody else says, ‘Yes sir.’ But I say, “Yes sir” to him. There’s respect. I don’t want anybody to ever think that I’m just Kirby’s college buddy. He’s the head coach, he’s in charge. I get my ass ripped just like everybody else at times. And then in the offseason, we’re more buddies like we were in college. We’ll play golf and talk about our families. We rarely talk about what’s going on here at the University of Georgia. I think you’ve got to keep it that way, and I’m sure it’s probably not easy for him at times.”

The families are equally close. In fact, Drew Bobo was the ringbearer at Kirby and Mary Beth Smart’s wedding in 2006, and Smart gushes about Drew, one of Bobo’s five children, including triplets.

“There’s a lot of pride in Georgia in that whole family, and then you look at the way Drew came here for nothing and made himself into an All-SEC player,” Smart said.

There was an emotional moment between father and son following Georgia’s 28-7 pummeling of Alabama in the SEC championship game last month. They found each other and embraced. Drew was unable to play in the game after injuring his foot the week before against Georgia Tech and isn’t expected to be able to play the rest of the postseason.

“I grew up red and black, remember going to the family dinners on Sunday nights at the complex,” Drew said. “It was emotional for both of us because all I’ve ever wanted to do was beat Alabama in an SEC championship game. I grew up losing to Alabama all those times in Atlanta and crying in the stands as a kid. Not being able to be out there and playing was hard, but we ended up winning and that’s all that matters.”

Drew Bobo and Stockton are roommates, and both were set to play under Bobo at different schools at one point. Drew was going to play for his dad at Auburn before he was fired, and Stockton was set to go to South Carolina before Muschamp was fired. Bobo was Muschamp’s offensive coordinator.

Murray isn’t the least bit surprised that Stockton has blossomed the way he has under Bobo. Stockton’s only meaningful action prior to this season was when he filled in for Carson Beck after Beck was injured in the SEC championship game a year ago. Stockton’s first career start came last season in the 23-10 playoff loss to Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl.

But this season, he went from one of the supposed question marks on Georgia’s team to finishing seventh in the Heisman Trophy voting and one of only 10 Power 4 quarterbacks to pass for more than 2,600 yards (2,691) and rush for more than 400 yards (442) while accounting for 31 touchdowns and throwing just five interceptions.

“Coach Bobo is a dream coach for a quarterback,” Murray said. “Because he played the position, he understands the mental and physical pressure that goes into playing the position. His coaching is very collaborative. He allows us as quarterbacks to have a true voice in the game plan each week to make sure we are comfortable going out and executing at a high level.”

Stockton was at his best in clutch situations. See his fourth-down touchdown pass to London Humphreys in the 44-41 overtime win at Tennessee. See his fourth-quarter numbers, period, against ranked teams – 29-of-32, 319 yards, six touchdowns and no interceptions.

“Coach Bobo knows how I am and he knows how I operate, so he gets the best out of me,” Stockton said. “That’s the coolest thing, having him pushing me every day the way he does and the trust he has in me.”

That trust goes both ways. On just about every drive, Stockton said he can hear Bobo’s familiar drawl in the back of his head.

“Don’t turn a bad play into a catastrophe,” a smiling Stockton repeated.

Stockton, a redshirt junior, is well-versed in the Bobo way. Bobo’s father, Georgia, trained Stockton and taught him how to throw from the time he was 6 growing up in Rabun County in northeast Georgia. At the time, George Bobo was working as an assistant under Kirby Smart’s late father, Sonny Smart, and Stockton was just starting grade school.

“I knew about Gunner when he was young because my dad was always talking about Gunner,” Bobo said. “We’d both be at my son (Drew’s) game and my dad would be on his phone also watching Gunner’s game at Rabun County at the same time.”

Bobo is a big believer that things happen for a reason. Had it not been for Tank Bigsby mistakenly running out of bounds and stopping the clock in the 2021 Iron Bowl, Auburn likely would have beaten Alabama in regulation, and the game would have never gone into overtime, which Alabama won in four overtimes. Bobo was fired two days later.

It didn’t take long for Smart to scoop up his old teammate as an analyst to work under Monken in 2022 and Bobo was eager to get back to his alma mater despite having at least one other opportunity as an offensive coordinator.

“You’ve heard Kirby say it a million times, that we’re going to play with fire, passion and energy,” Bobo said. “Those aren’t just words around here, and in this day and age with kids getting paid, and rightfully so, those words still mean something if you’re going to play on this team and represent Georgia.

“The same goes for me.”

Especially when all roads lead back to Georgia.