Bulldog's dream job

Like any other Georgia Bulldog fan, Ray Fulcher has often entered a weekend wondering who will be the starting quarterback for his favorite college football team.

However, unlike any other college football fan in the country, Fulcher has the ultimate insider's perspective. The 2003 Harlem High School graduate and current University of Georgia junior is the quarterbacks manager for the Georgia Bulldogs.

"My official title is quarterbacks manager, but I'm really (Quarterback) Coach (Mike) Bobo's right-hand man," Fulcher said.

Fulcher, who grew up a Bulldog fan in his hometown of Harlem, played baseball and football for his high school Bulldogs. He now spends his weekday afternoons helping Georgia quarterbacks Joe Tereshinksi, Matt Stafford, Joe Cox, Blake Barnes and Jonathan deLaureal on the practice field. He spends his weekends on the Georgia sideline warming up the starting quarterback and helping the backup signal-callers in any way he can.

And he gets paid for it.

"It's enough money to pay the bills and have a little extra left over, but I would have done it for free," Fulcher said. "Really, in the fall, it's a full-time job."

Fulcher said he didn't pull any special strings or know anyone with connections to land the dream job. Instead, a 10-minute interview with then-equipment manager Dave Allen in the fall of 2003 was all Fulcher needed to get a job as the running backs manager. Last year Fulcher was moved to quarterbacks manager, where he now puts in 40-50 hours per week of work in the fall.

Fulcher said he works approximately seven hours per day on weekdays performing duties during practice such as snapping the ball in one-on-one and skeleton drills and running receiver routes.

"They want perfection all the way around," Fulcher said. "I'm not a D-1 player, but when I'm in practice if I mess up one snap or drop a pass I'm going to hear about it."

His game-day duties can take up to 10 hours. For away games, the road trip begins Thursday and ends whenever the bus returns early Sunday morning.

However, the perks are just about as good as it gets for a college student.

With five quarterbacks on the squad, Fulcher evens out the teams during the traditional passing games the quarterbacks play each Thursday.

Two weeks ago, Fulcher and walk-on quarterback John deLaureal took on the other four quarterbacks in a passing accuracy game. From 12 yards apart, Tereshinski and Stafford missed the target in the last round, but Fulcher's pass was dead on for a rare win over Georgia's top quarterbacks.

"Usually Cox and Stafford blow everybody out of the water," Fulcher said. "That was my 15 minutes of fame."

The perks don't stop there. When Georgia knocked off LSU in the SEC Championship last year, Fulcher received an SEC Championship ring. He also has one from the 2004 Outback Bowl win.

Fulcher said he's also received something from the job more valuable than the hardware.

"That's why this job has worked out so well for me. I've learned what I want to do. I want to coach somewhere - coach and teach," he said. "I've already learned tenfold what I knew about football from Coach (Mark) Richt and Coach Bobo. Plus if I'm aspiring to be a coach, this is going to look good on my record."