What Kirby Smart liked, and didn’t like, in Georgia’s first football scrimmage
Football returned to Sanford Stadium on Saturday.
Georgia held its first team scrimmage of fall camp between the hedges. After the first live action for the Bulldogs since the Sugar Bowl on New Year’s Day, Smart said his team looked “behind.”
“I don’t know if I’ve ever come out of a first scrimmage and felt good,” Smart said. “We have a long way to go. We look like a team that didn’t go through spring practice. We look like a team that is young at a lot of positions. We were really sloppy, to be honest with you.”
Smart added that his team did show an added mental toughness that he thought had been lacking so far in camp. That made him proud, but it didn’t make up for the overall poor execution.
Here are some other thoughts from Georgia’s head coach after his team’s first scrimmage, which was closed to fans and media:
UGA quarterback competition still open
Anyone hoping to use Saturday’s scrimmage to decode who has the lead in Georgia’s quarterback competition will be disappointed.
Smart said just about every quarterback, with the exception of Stetson Bennett, got some work with the first-team offense at some point. The reps between transfers Jamie Newman and J.T. Daniels came out just about even.
While neither Newman nor Daniels has separated himself in the competition yet, Smart did mention some factors that could tilt things Newman’s way. While Daniels has been cleared to practice and scrimmage in his rehab from a torn ACL, he has yet to be approved for full contact, which is Smart’s definition of cleared.
As far as mobility in the pocket goes, Smart said it can be tough to evaluate that skill set in a quarterback without going live. Newman has had a chance to show what he can do with his legs while Daniels hasn’t.
While Newman may have a slight edge at the moment simply due to health, there’s still nearly a month left before the season kicks off in Fayetteville against the Arkansas Razorbacks.
“I don’t have a timetable for that,” Smart said. “It’s got to happen.”
Georgia still searching for explosive plays
Explosive plays have been a talking point for the Bulldogs for years now. New offensive coordinator Todd Monken fit right in when he met with the media on Tuesday, noting several times the Bulldogs need to find ways to consistently generate explosive plays. In scrimmage number one, the offense showed it’s not quite there yet.
While there have been some in practice, Smart said there were very few big plays through the passing game on the field Saturday. For a team that in 2019 ranked 69th in the nation at 12.24 yards per pass completion, that will have to improve before the season kicks off.
The run game had a bit more success, with both redshirt sophomore Zamir White and junior James Cook breaking some long runs. However, those mainly came against the second-team defense, and the defensive-minded Smart seemed to lean toward chalking those up to missed assignments by the defenders.
Smart comments on Georgia offensive line
After losing three starters from last season’s unit, Smart updated the status of the offensive line competitions Saturday.
Senior Trey Hill is locked in at center, while junior Jamaree Salyer is holding down left tackle. Right tackle has been the fiercest battle, with redshirt sophomore Owen Condon and redshirt sophomore Warren McClendon emerging as the two front-runners.
Smart praised Condon on Saturday, calling him a “pleasant surprise in terms of competitiveness, intelligence, toughness.”
The guard spots currently have upperclassmen as the leaders, with seniors Justin Shaffer and Ben Cleveland getting the lion’s share of reps at left and right guard, respectively. Smart declined to lock them in as starters, noting the competition they have in redshirt sophomore Warren Ericson and redshirt freshman Clay Webb, among others.
During his time in Athens, Smart has made a point to play the best five offensive linemen he has and not pigeonhole players into one position. After one scrimmage, he and offensive line coach Matt Luke are still searching for that perfect combination.
“We’ve got a little bit of musical chairs going on there, but Matt’s handling it well and those guys are competing,” Smart said. “We have a good quality of depth there. We don’t have the elite players we had last year.”
Bulldogs adjusting to altered timetable
Like everyone else across the SEC and college football, Smart and his program have had to adjust to the new schedules brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Normally at the time of their first scrimmage, the Bulldogs would be three weeks away from their season opener. After today, Georgia is four weeks away from kicking off the season Sept. 26.
The tradeoff, however, is in the amount of practices. The NCAA requires that teams give players extra off days during fall camp this year.
“Our practice numbers that we have left are less than we would traditionally have at this point, but we also have a little time to recover and get better,” Smart said.
When Smart says the team is behind, he is referencing the lack of spring practice. That is the main benefit of freshmen enrolling early, but they didn’t get to participate after spring drills were canceled. The same can be said for transfer quarterback Jamie Newman, who transferred to Georgia in January.
That deficit was somewhat mitigated by players spending more time than normal at their schools over the summer. Still, the entire conference is racing to play catch up with the season now less than a month away.