Former UGA quarterback Hutson Mason looks to pass against Georgia Tech in a 2013 double-overtime win in Atlanta. In other news, I really need newer photos. (Photo by Larry Wynn)
There’s an old saying in football: If you’ve got two quarterbacks, you’ve got none.
If you’ve got three quarterbacks, it’s better than two in a bush. Wait, no. It’s gotta be your bull.
Obviously this saying has a few weak spots that can be picked at, not the least of which being its refusal to adhere to basic mathematics.
While I am generally not a fan of the quarterback carousel, the situation at Georgia this year is nothing at all like what some clever persona had in mind when they coined our little arithmetically-awkward aphorism. And just so we can set the record straight right from the jump, there is no quarterback controversy.
We came into this season with a clear understanding that the transfer from USC, JT Daniels, was going to be our starter. Going into the game with Clemson, it was obvious that Daniels was the man. Nobody questioned it.
Admittedly, sitting in the stands in Charlotte, I could tell that Daniels seemed a bit lackluster. The offensive game plan was simple and left a lot to be desired. It was only later that we learned how Daniels was hampered due to an injury.
Cue the Mailman, Stetson Bennett. I won’t deny that I was previously excited about Bennett just based on what I heard about him back in 2017. People close to the program were so quick to heap praise on Bennett as the fourth man in the depth chart, saying how quick he was getting the ball off and that he had real ability.
With all of this hype around a not-even-backup, I was hardly surprised when he jumped ship and hit the JUCO circuit. It was obvious he was never going to see action behind Jake Fromm or Justin Fields. And I held no grudge against Bennett, but I was going to miss him.
So imagine my surprise when it’s announced just a year later that he was coming back! We would get our over-hyped backup back and still probably never see him play. Then the hands of time tied their little knots and created a little chaos, and…one global pandemic later…Stetson Bennett was the starting quarterback for Georgia football for much of the 2020 season. And he was the only quarterback to lead Alabama at the half of a football game until Mr. Calzone last week, so that’s a solid little laurel to put on the mantle.
The problem is that most people seem to remember the awkward starts and the occasional bad half of football. People remember the poor performance in the second half at Tuscaloosa and the terrible throws down in Jacksonville.
Because of these painful memories, a large portion of the Georgia fanbase has taken to slandering Bennett. We’ve wondered why he was starting over Carson Beck or Brock Vandagriff.
Jumping back to the events of Week 2 against UAB, Stetson Bennett had the kind of performance in relief that makes people shake their heads in astonishment. At one point, Bennett had amassed four touchdowns on just five passing attempts. He ended the day throwing 10-12 with five scores and 288 yards.
I don’t care that the opponent was UAB. Those numbers are unbelievable.
But hey. Even Greyson Lambert looked good once.
“Lambert. Lambert! Why did you say that name!?” (Photo by Road Trip with Raj on Unsplash)
A week later, Bennett was benched in favor of Daniels, the original starter who was supposedly healthy again. Daniels started the South Carolina game before Bennett came in for a drive or two and looked…bad. He looked bad. It’s that simple.
Once again, the quarterback wheel of fate rolled around and around and around. After Daniels had his own gaudy display against the Gamecocks, throwing 303 yards with three touchdowns against one interception with 23 completions and 31 attempts, we knew who the starter was. There was no controversy.
Daniels barely had to break a sweat against Vanderbilt, but Bennett came in to do some load management as Daniels was still fighting off injury. And Vanderbilt is the game where you just know your backups are all going to get work in.
Still, there was no controversy.
Then we all start looking forward to the big showdown between 4-0 Georgia and 4-0 Arkansas. The Razorbacks had just upset Texas A&M and attained a Top 10 ranking for the first time in almost a decade. And they were coming to Athens with a chance at playing spoiler.
To make matters worse, there were rumors that Daniels would not be starting at quarterback. That someone else might take the reins. So many fans wanted to see Beck or Vandagriff. Anyone but Bennett. Bennett’s a liability!
With 45 minutes before kickoff and Sanford Stadium about 2/3 full, we got word that Bennett was going to be the starter against Arkansas.
And there goes the season. Right?
Admittedly, Bennett had to do almost nothing. He looked questionable doing it, but he did almost nothing. He went 7-11 with just 72 yards. You never see a game where your quarterback has those kinds of numbers and the team wins by more than four scores. You just don’t.
And…obviously…there was no controversy.
However, the Mailman once again delivered a gem last weekend in the dismantling of Auburn. The offense was put on his shoulders again, and the Mailman brought plenty of goodies all the way from the post office. And yes, we’re going to ride this Mailman train until it ends.
On the plains, Bennett was 14-21 with 231 yards and two touchdowns. Not to mention the massive downfield balls he threw to set up two rushing touchdowns. Bennett looked really good and he brought home the win.
So now there’s a controversy?
Listen. I will say this as someone who has been a fan of Bennett since 2017, before I saw him throw a single pass. There is no controversy in Athens, and I’ll tell you why.
JT Daniels is the starter and he is the better quarterback. As good as Bennett is, Daniels is better. If Daniels is healthy, he is the starting quarterback for the University of Georgia.
People will point to whatever intangibles they can think of, whatever “unmeasurables” that make Bennett the better option, but there just aren’t any. I’m no expert, but I’ve been around sports long enough and I’ve talked to enough coaches to know that attitude and heart and work ethic really are the difference makers when it comes to great athletes.
The problem you’ll run into trying to propel Bennett above Daniels based on these intangibles is that both Bennett and Daniels measure up. Daniels is the quarterback who takes his linemen to little restaurants in the middle of nowhere so they can all cash in on the NIL money together. Daniels is the quarterback who talks about his team unselfishly and leads his players to success on the field.
Admittedly, I’m not 100 percent sure that Daniels could have found Campton Restaurant on his own without a little assistance from some Georgia natives. (Photo posted to Facebook by Campton Restaurant)
You can generally tell when a quarterback (or any highly-touted star athlete, for that matter) is using the school as a jumping off point. You can tell when their head is elsewhere. You can tell when they see their current job as nothing more than a launching pad to “The League!” Shoot. Sometimes they’re dumb enough to say it out loud.
I have never gotten that vibe from Daniels. Not for one second. If I thought he was lacking in the attitude department, I would be one of the loudest voices calling for Bennett to take his place. Because everyone is right when they say that Bennett displays the toughness and the heart and the work ethic that you want from a quarterback and a team leader.
However, so does Daniels. And Daniels is also the superior talent.
Let’s just play the numbers for a second. On the season, Daniels is 54-71 with just two interceptions, 567 yards passing, and five touchdowns. That’s in just three games played, including one against the No. 19 defense in the country, Clemson. That’s a 76.06 completion percentage.
In his five games, Bennett is 43-62 with eight touchdowns to two interceptions and 746 yards passing, all amounting to a 69.35 completion percentage.
These numbers are shockingly similar. I’m really left wondering what I was trying to prove. Once again, a third of Daniels’ stats came against a stingy Clemson defense that averages just 4.21 yards per play, good enough for sixth in the country.
Most of Bennett’s work came against a UAB defense that is just outside the Top 50 defensive teams in the country. Admittedly, Bennett also had a pretty good day against Auburn, and Auburn is 33rd in total defense.
Let’s focus in on the major shift in Bennett’s performance between Arkansas and Auburn. Do we think that Bennett looked so much better on the road at Auburn than at home against Arkansas because the Hawgs are just that much better?
Probably not. As a matter of fact, Arkansas actually ranks worse than Auburn by a slight margin in defense. The Razorbacks are 39th in total defense, allowing an average of 337.7 yards per game, to Auburn’s 320.7 yards per game. Admittedly, Arkansas is in the top 10 for passing yards allowed, giving up an average of just 156.0 yards per game, while Auburn is 52nd with 216.0 yards per game.
“Assuming both quarterbacks are healthy on Saturday, you play the one who practiced for Kentucky all week.
You can’t ignore the importance of game-week prep. ”
The biggest difference in those two games had nothing to do with the opposing defense on Saturday and everything to do with what happened Monday through Thursday.
You have to remember who the expected starter was going into Arkansas. And it wasn’t Bennett. According to all the reports, Georgia expected Daniels to go against Arkansas, meaning he had all the first-team reps in practice. Bennett practiced with the reserves, as usual.
With such a last-minute change, you can’t adjust the game plan on the fly to accommodate an entirely different guy. Especially against a team that defends the pass that well. We went conservative on offense and ran the ball, playing smash-mouth offense and wearing down the opponent.
Going into Auburn, we knew Bennett was going to be the starter, and so he was better able to genuinely prepare for the game.
So here’s why I say there is no controversy, part 2: Assuming both quarterbacks are healthy on Saturday, you play the one who practiced for Kentucky all week.
I don’t know who that is. I don’t know if Daniels is close enough to healthy that he was able to go all week or if Bennett was taking the first-team snaps in practice.
Even though I think Daniels is the better quarterback, and is equal to Bennett in all the “unmeasurables” that people want to talk about, you can’t ignore the importance of game-week prep. If Daniels needs a little more time without contact to heal up, give the ball to Bennett. He has proven that he can get the job done almost as well as Daniels, and he can lead the team.
Bennett threw the ball for less than 75 yards against Arkansas because he was never supposed to start that game. When he came in ready to go against Auburn, though, Bennett was lighting it up and playing his game.
Daniels, even injured, had an efficient 22-30 performance with 135 yards and just one pick against a Top-20 defense on the biggest stage in college football. He had an entire offseason to prepare for that game, and he was ready. Looking at South Carolina, he did the same thing. With time to prepare, knowing he was going to be the starter, he was ready.
If you want a bad example of quarterback flipping, look no further than UGA in 2018. The Fromm/Fields experiment was all but a bust. We saw how it went trying to utilize them both as Starter A and Starter B, largely because nobody really knew who was supposed to fill what role. When Coach Kirby Smart gave the job over to Fromm for good, the Georgia offense rolled. Almost all the way back to the College Football Playoff.
With Bennett and Daniels, we know the roles. Daniels is the man, but Bennett is the man who’s ready to go at a moment’s notice. And I say with no hesitation that Bennett is the best backup quarterback in the country. If nothing else, he’s surely the most seasoned.
As for the final wrinkle, the young guns waiting in the wings, I get it. In Mark Richt’s 15 years, he had a freshman-to-exit starter at quarterback for 11 years. We went from four years of David Greene to three years of Matthew Stafford to four years of Aaron Murray. Then, in the four other years, you had a 2005 SEC Championship season with D.J. Shockley, who was a long-tenured Richt guy, a lackluster 2009 season with Joe Cox, a four-year Richt player, and a better-than-remembered 2014 season with Hutson Mason, a four-year Richt guy. The only real curveball on the list is the aforementioned Greyson Lambert in 2015. And the less said about that one, the better.
“Listen. I’ve been driving around for hours trying to deliver these tickets, but how am I supposed to find an address like ‘The Knotty Pine Beside a Quiet Brook?’” (Photo by Joel Moysuh on Unsplash)
We got so used to these freshman starters under Richt, and then we rolled right into three years of Jake Fromm after one season of freshman Jacob Eason, that we forget you don’t have to play your freshman right away. Giving Beck and Vandagriff time to grow behind players like Bennett and Daniels will pay dividends down the road. I know that meaningful playing time and real-game experience would be nice, too, but we also need the best hands on the ball. Right now, that’s not the freshmen.
So as we go into the surprisingly important game against Kentucky this week, can we do so without stoking the fires of an imaginary quarterback controversy? Because just like Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and the Wog, you won’t be seeing one in Athens this weekend.
Besides, I don’t think cryptids can use StubHub, so I’m not sure where they would buy their tickets. Maybe they just need a good “Mailman” to deliver them.