by Jay Bookman, Georgia Recorder, [This article first appeared in the Georgia Recorder, republished with permission]

July 3, 2025

If I wanted a failed football coach as my U.S. senator, I’d move to Alabama.

And I’m not moving to Alabama.

Seriously, what in Derek Dooley’s resume makes him think his next job ought to be serving Georgia in the U.S. Senate? At age 57, his sole asset as a political candidate is his legendary last name, gifted to him by his late father, the longtime football coach and athletic director at the University of Georgia. 

In football, that name opened a lot of doors for the younger Dooley, but once inside those doors he wasn’t able to stay long. His career peaked with a surprise hiring as head coach of the University of Tennessee, where he was fired in 2012 after building the worst record of any Volunteer coach since 1906.

Yet to hear Dooley tell it, mediocrity in other fields might be the perfect qualification for government work. He apparently aspires to be a generic candidate, spouting generic rhetoric, and in that sense at least he is already off to a grand start.

Consider his announcement of interest in the race:

“Georgia deserves stronger common-sense leadership in the U.S. Senate that represents all Georgians and focuses on results — not headlines. I believe our state needs a political outsider in Washington — not another career politician — to cut through the noise and partisanship and get back to real problem solving.”

Excited yet?

In that statement, Dooley refers to himself “a political outsider,” which is one way to put it. Another is to describe his potential candidacy as a political version of stunt casting, where producers put an unqualified celebrity in a role in hopes that name recognition will make up for a lack of actual skill or talent. It shows disrespect for the audience and disrespect for the craft, but sometimes it works, if only for a short period of time.

It worked for Republicans in Alabama, where Coach Tommy Tuberville leveraged a mediocre football career into a seat in the U.S. Senate, and now reigns as the dumbest member of that once illustrious chamber. It didn’t work so well in Pennsylvania, when TV’s Dr. Oz was the candidate. It also didn’t work here in Georgia in 2022, when the GOP ran a far more famous football celebrity, Herschel Walker, as their candidate for U.S. Senate.

As we know, Walker then proceeded to embarrass himself, his party and his state, losing what could have been a winnable race against Raphael Warnock. So, given that recent history, why would Georgia Republicans risk burning their hand again on the same hot stove, this time by considering Dooley? 

Well, there are reasons.

To Republicans, Herschel’s appeal as a candidate went beyond high name recognition. With a friendship with Donald Trump but no history in politics, he could be presented to the public, and more specifically to the GOP base, as a vacant slate, which he pretty much was.

At the time, GOP leaders feared that a highly competitive primary would unleash forces within the base that general-election voters would find disturbing, particularly with candidates competing to outdo each other for Trump’s approval. Walker was their way of side-stepping all that.

In 2025, three years later, that danger hasn’t gone away, and with Trump back in the White House it has intensified. Look at U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter of Savannah. While Dooley dithers about whether to run, Carter has jumped into the Senate race and is campaigning hard for the attention of the one man who matters most.

For example, when Trump says he wants to seize Greenland as American territory, Carter proposes to seize it and rename it “Red, White and Blue Land.” When Trump bombs Iran, Carter wants to nominate Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. It’s shameless groveling of the sort that Trump loves, that GOP primary voters love, but many other Georgia voters will not.

But if your name isn’t Dooley, that’s what you have to do to get noticed.

Georgia Recorder is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Georgia Recorder maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jill Nolin for questions: info@georgiarecorder.com.