Happy Birthday to Rodarius Jaiquan Thomas! But not really. It certainly is a pickle to be arrested on charges of family violence and having your 22nd birthday the very next day. The level of tensions in Georgia is at its peak and the head coach is choosing to not care about his birthday, in the hopes of making the message clear that there is no sense of positivity attached to what Thomas did.

Kirby Smart, the HC for the Georgia Bulldogs, has indefinitely suspended Thomas from the team as the WR awaits a bond hearing. This is the 2nd time that Thomas has been charged with such counts, the first one occurring in early 2023, where he was charged with family violence and false imprisonment but the case was later dismissed. Another thing that is being dismissed is his birthday and that too, at the hands of Kirby Smart himself.

Kirby Smart takes back his birthday wish for RaRa Thomas

Amid all the waves that the arrest of RaRa Thomas caused in Georgia, Kirby Smart took a subtle dig at the wideout by wishing him a happy birthday today and then deleting it minutes after. This might be the first of the HC’s efforts to try to be more firm with the players who have had encounters with the authorities.

As per ‘Brett McMurphy’ and his latest tweet, the birthday wish was deleted exactly 10 minutes after posting. The tweet had a sarcastic undertone to it and said, “He must not want Thomas, arrested Friday for cruelty to children-family violence (2nd degree felony) & 2 misdemeanor counts of battery-family violence, to have a Happy Birthday 🤷🏻‍♂️” Everyone has their share of concerns about how the program is going to ensure that nothing of the sort arises in the future and maybe this is how Smart is beginning his movement of reformation. Additionally, with more and more players ending up on the charge sheets of the authorities, here’s what Smart had to say about issuing suspensions for his players.

“We have suspensions,” as per the Bulldogs’ HC

The crime rate within the team has been on a nasty rise ever since 2023. Since January 2023, the team has made an astounding number of 25 arrests, and the fact that players like Thomas have been arrested twice sends out a message that the team isn’t being too strict with their disciplinary course of action. Names like Jalen Carter, Smael Mondon, Bo Hughley, Trevor Ettienne, Sacovie White, and others continue to tarnish the reputation of Smart and how he plans to fix this aura of frenzy within the program and here’s what he had to say.

During his appearance at the SEC Media Days, Smart talked about how the team does have suspension measures in place. He said, “We don’t talk about the suspensions. We have them. I think it’s pretty obvious that we’ve done them in the past. You guys know when we do them. Each of those cases is very different and they’ll be handled in different ways.” Though there’s a long way to go from having a team of players that exist without any prior history of criminal charges, the Georgia fans trust Smart to implement the right plans to ensure no talents of the team end up on the wrong side of the road anymore.