Georgia OL Kelton Smith retires from football due to medial reasons
Georgia has its second medical disqualification of the 2024 offseason. According to sources, redshirt freshman offensive lineman Kelton Smith is retiring from football due to medical reasons. Details regarding the specific ailments Smith is dealing with are unavailable at this time but per persons with knowledge of the situation, there are multiple issues.
The Bulldogs announced back in March that fellow 2023 signee Pearce Spurlin would be hanging up the cleats due to a heart condition. Spurlin is expected to carry on a normal life outside of the game and he’s still in school at Georgia and helping with the team.
Smith’s Georgia career ends without him taking a snap. The Carver High School (Columbus, Ga.) native didn’t play at all in 2023 and didn’t even dress out for most, if not all, games. He was one of five offensive lineman signed by the Bulldogs in the 2023 class. There are three of those players still on campus — Monroe Freeling, Bo Hugley, and Jamal Meriweather — after Joshua Miller elected to transfer after the end of the 2023 season.
At 6-foot-4 315 pounds, Smith was ranked as the No. 187 overall prospect in the country and the No. 13 interior offensive lineman in the 2023 class according to the On3 Industry Ranking, a weighted average that includes all four websites that publish recruiting rankings. He was the No. 15 player in Georgia.
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The On3 in-house rankings viewed him as the nation’s No. 106 overall prospect and the No. 8 interior offensive lineman. Smith was the No. 8 player in Georgia per those rankings. Despite the fact that he was tabbed as an interior offensive lineman coming out of high school, Georgia listed him on the depth chart last season as a tackle.
The Bulldogs might have had Smith’s medical situation in mind in 2024 when they signed six offensive linemen — Daniel Calhoun, Nyier Daniels, Marques Easley, Marcus Harrison, Malachi Toliver, and Michael Uini. They have also lost three of the five offensive linemen signed in the 2022 class to transfer. Only Earnest Greene and Drew Bobo remain from that class as Griffin Scroggs, Jacob Hood, and Aliou Bah have all left the program over the past two years.
Georgia currently has two offensive linemen committed in the 2025 class. Both Mason Short and Dontrell Glover are four-star prospects who project as interior guys at the next level.
