Jalon Walker joins elite Georgia company, wins Butkus Award
ATHENS, Ga. — Georgia has become known as LBU, and Wednesday’s announcement of the Butkus Award only furthered that point. Linebacker Jalon Walker joins the Bulldog company of Roquan Smith and Nakobe Dean, becoming the program’s third-ever winner of the award that goes annually to the nation’s top linebacker. Only Alabama and Oklahoma have more winners with four each, neither having one since 2016 though.
Walker, a junior out of Salisbury, North Carolina, has put together a spectacular season. He ranks first on the team in tackles for loss with 10.5 and is tied for the team-high in sacks with 6.5. Waker is fourth in overall tackles with 57 total stops.
All three of those totals are career-highs for Walker, who had more flexibility in his position this season. Georgia made it a point to use him as a “hybrid” linebacker to best utilize the skillset of the 6-foot-2, 245-pounder as a pass rusher and allow him to get after opposing quarterbacks.
Walker has been productive before this season though. He finished as the team-leader in sacks last season with five in 14 games. Walker played in all 29 games as a freshman and sophomore, totaling 29 tackles in that span, and is projected by several publications as a first round pick in the 2025 NFL Draft should he choose to declare at the end of this season.
“He’s an unbelievable kid, Christian, believes in his thoughts and processes, and he was raised in a wonderful family where he has a lot of confidence in himself to stand up, talk to the team, command leadership, demand respect, do things the hard way, and set a standard the right way,” Georgia head coach Kirby Smart said about Walker after he was named a finalist for the Butkus Award. “I mean, he is a great young man. I would be hard measured to say what his greatest attribute is, because his could be character. His could be the ability to run, the ability to strike people and be violent and hit and flip a switch on the field. But he’s elite in all those things. This kid is a very, very special person on and off the field first. But he’s also very talented. So I’m very honored and happy for him, he deserves that.”
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Fellow finalists for this year’s Butkus Award were Barrett Carter of Clemson, Chris Paul of Ole Miss, Carson Schwesinger of UCLA and Danny Stutsman of Oklahoma.
Walker and his Georgia teammates take the field again on January 1st as the No. 2 seed in the College Football Playoffs. The Bulldogs await the winner of Notre Dame and Indiana in the Allstate Sugar Bowl and quarterfinal round. Kickoff time from the Caesar’s Superdome in New Orleans is set for 8:45 p.m. ET on ABC/ESPN.
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