Georgia Bulldogs Countdown to Kickoff: Day 22
The Georgia Bulldogs kick off against Oregon in just 22 days, as I write this. Still, a lot can change for these teams between now and then.
Fall camp humbles some players, and it unlocks the true potential of others.
Just take a look at this Georgia football player.
The year was 2017.
He was a freshman walk-on back then. Came in to play quarterback – but no one ever expected him to do so unless the game was in hand.
His name is Stetson Fleming Bennett IV. And he wears jersey #22. Everyone says he’s from Blackshear. Pierce County High School.
But the real South Georgians know he’s from a map dot called Nahunta, Georgia.
It has a Piggly Wiggly and a gas station.
Bennett could probably throw a football from one end of town to the other. He could probably beat a lot of people in a foot race from either side of town to the other, as well.
But Jacob Eason, and eventually, Jake Fromm, are the quarterbacks this year.
Bennett will serve a purpose, sure. He can run scout team, and did a fine job of it when Georgia prepared for its first Rose Bowl since World War II.
He does a mean Baker Mayfield impersonation.
But that’s it. Starting quarterbacks in the SEC are bigger and taller. They usually don’t wear #22, either. Bennett’s grandfather, Buddy, wore it as a quarterback for the South Carolina Gamecocks from 1958-60. It’s rarely anyone’s first choice anymore, though.
Something sleek in a single digit, or something that starts with a ‘1’ are more likely.
2017 isn’t Stetson Bennett’s year for playing time with his beloved Georgia Bulldogs
So he transfers. Goes JUCO.
So long, #22. Thanks for everything.
Wait.
What’s that?
Billy Napier recruited him at Louisiana, but #22 wants to come back and play for the Georgia Bulldogs?
Of course he does.
He’s wanted to do this his whole life.
So he cashes it in – eventually, not right away – into the most unlikely story anyone could have ever predicted for #22 a few years ago:
a National Championship. As the starter, and offensive MVP.
He did it with the #13 on his back this time around. Not too superstitious, evidently.
And the year in which he won the Championship Game?
’22.
It’s almost like he predicted it.
Now, 13’s back for one more rodeo.
One more mail route.
He shaved his head for fall camp and hit the gym in the offseason. A far cry from the days of a bushy-tailed (and bushy-haired) walk-on freshman.
But 22 is still in there, somewhere. How could he possibly forget how far he’s come?
And what’s he got in store for us in 2022?
