Tuesday Tidbits: Week 5

A few bits of news and notes from Georgia's early afternoon news conference…

-- Georgia is at the bottom of the SEC in turnover ratio. LSU is at the top. But Richt said he's not concerned about those numbers. "Turnover ratios are important, but what's happened in the past I don't think is very important at all," Richt said. "The turnover ratio that's most important is what happens in this game. So I'm more concerned about the turnover ratio Saturday than what we've had to this point."

-- Speaking of turnovers, it will be interesting to see how Georgia approaches the matchup between A.J. Green and Patrick Peterson. Richt said that the combination of Peterson and safety Chad Jones gives LSU the best matchup against Green of any team Georgia has faced, but he also said that won't prevent Joe Cox -- he of the 5 interceptions in four games -- throwing Green's way. "You have to throw the ball, but every time you throw it there's a risk," Richt said. "So you've just got to play ball and work on fundamentals of ball security and good decisions. The better we block -- run block and pass block -- the less chance of us having turnovers. That's going to be a big part of it, too. We can't say, 'Gosh let's not throw it because we could throw a pick,' because we've just got to play."

-- Richt said he hasn't seen enough of either Caleb King or Richard Samuel to decide one needs to be the primary ball carrier. Looking ahead to Saturday, he said he expects it to once again be close to a 50/50 split on carries between the two, with a dash of Carlton Thomas mixed in.

-- Some injury news: Akeem Dent and Kiante Tripp will not play this week. Vance Cuff likely will play.

-- Talked with Brandon Wood. He didn't make his decision to play this season until a couple of days before the Arkansas game. He said his shoulder is about 80-90 percent healthy now, and he plans to be at defensive end the rest of the year.

-- Richt said from watching film of LSU, the defense looks extremely similar to what John Chavis did at Tennessee.

-- Richt said among his biggest concerns for this game is the matchups of LSU's tall receivers (Brandon LaFell is 6-3 and Terrance Toliver is 6-5) with Georgia's undersized corners.

-- Richt was asked how involved he is in offensive play calling this season. His answer: Not very much. He said he suggests some plays during the week, but on Saturdays, it's all Mike Bobo, with the exception of Richt's decisions on whether to go for it on fourth down, kick field goals or punt, etc.

-- Richt said he's not concerned with Georgia's poor showing in many statistical rankings because the Bulldogs haven't been able to "pad their stats" against weaker opponents.

-- Joe Cox on Marlon Brown: "Physically, he's close, and I think he could get in games, but I'm not in their meetings and I don't know exactly where he is in their process. I think he can definitely contribute, but there's a reason why he hasn't got in a lot so far, and I don't know what that reason is." I asked A.J. Green what hurdle he thought Marlon most needed to overcome in order to find playing time, and his answer was "confidence."

-- Both Georgia and LSU have struggled to run the ball so far this season with any consistency, but that doesn't change the game plan, Cox said. "They're going to be ready to come in and do what they do best, and I'm sure they're going to want to run the ball on us just like we want to run the ball on them."

-- Cox on what this game means in terms of public perception for Georgia: “If we play a great game and beat them convincingly, I’m sure everybody would say Georgia’s for real. If we struggle and eek out a win, it might not be that big of a deal. And if we lost, I’m sure everybody’d want to say, ‘Well, I knew that was going to happen because Georgia’s horrible.’ It just depends on how the game goes, and that’s why we try not to get caught up in it. People’s opinions are specifically based on your performance, and we know it can fluctuate each week. We’re just worried about getting in a good week of practice, getting a good game plan and executing on Saturday.”