Jay Hayes was considered to be a coup for Georgia when the Notre Dame defensive lineman decided to transfer late this spring. Demetris Robertson was an even bigger addition a couple months later, a dynamic receiver coming home to Georgia after two years at California. Two transfers, each a potential difference-maker on their side of the ball.
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Five games into the season, it hasn’t happened yet.
Both have played in every game. But neither has started or had a huge impact: Hayes has two tackles, while Robertson has yet to record a catch, though he has three carries, one a 72-yard touchdown in the season opener. Since then Robertson’s role has seemed to decrease, with no passes thrown his way against Missouri or Tennessee over the past two weeks.
It’s certainly much less than what was expected when Robertson, who had 50 catches as a freshman at Cal two years ago, committed to Georgia in mid-July. Or what was expected of Hayes when he flipped from Oklahoma to Georgia.
“They’re part of a team that’s bigger than their individual goals, and they’re both improving,” head coach Kirby Smart said.
Indeed, No. 2 Georgia is unbeaten this season, and it can hardly be said that Robertson is missed in the passing game, where Mecole Hardman has become a star, Riley Ridley a very good No. 2, and Jeremiah Holloman and Tyler Simmons have also emerged. Robertson also joined the team in mid-July and only found out he would be immediately eligible after a week of preseason practice.
Hayes has seen a bit more action than Robertson, but not much more. The role of a defensive lineman in Georgia’s system is to eat up blocks as much as it is to make individual plays. Still, there are nine defensive linemen who have recorded more tackles than Hayes.
“He’s coming to a whole different system, so I think just learning that in itself is different,” junior defensive lineman Michael Barnett said. “It takes time. Some people learn it quicker than others.”
Hayes only joined the team in June, after four years (one a redshirt) at Notre Dame, where he had 27 tackles last season, including a sack, and 39 tackles in 26 career games overall. Hayes’ importance to Georgia may not be individual plays, but depth, especially on a defensive line that lost two big contributors last year and likes to play six to eight defensive linemen per game.
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“We’ve put in things, and he’s really trying to hone in and trying to process everything,” Barnett said. “I think he’s actually doing pretty well.”
Smart, asked about Robertson and Hayes, painted the picture of two players helping the team in ways the public may not understand.
Demetris Robertson scored a 72-yard rushing touchdown on his first touch of the season but has only two touches (no receptions) in four games since. (Dale Zanine / USA TODAY Sports)
“You don’t see them as contributors. I do,” he said. “I see them as, in my opinion, major contributors, because what they do in special teams and what they do in practice helps develop our team. I don’t know what the expectation would be. For me, it is to get the best we can out of those guys and for them to help us and also achieve their goals. I think both of those guys are working really hard, doing good things for us.”
Fields and Fromm, again
The first two questions, and four of the first five, at Smart’s news conference Monday were about Georgia’s quarterbacks. There is no controversy: Fromm is clearly the starter. But the rotating of quarterbacks in the Tennessee game has resulted in some public debate over how they’re being used. Smart took the chance Monday to clarify what he meant when he said there was no plan on when to use Fields.
“You have to understand that the plan is there is no plan means that we don’t have a plan going into the game,” Smart said. “You can’t have a plan, because we don’t know how the game is going to go. That doesn’t mean we don’t have a plan in practice and it doesn’t mean we don’t get certain reps for certain guys. If you sit here and think that we know exactly when Justin is going to go in or when Jake is going to go into the game, or the third series of the fourth snap in the second quarter, the game doesn’t work like that.”
Fromm is second in the SEC in completion rate (72.5 percent), yards per attempt (13.2) and passing efficiency (180.06). Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa is first in each category. Fromm also is 17-2 as Georgia’s starting quarterback.
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But Fields offers a tantalizing skill set, with his three rushing touchdowns now second on the team.
“It just allows us to run a couple different plays,” offensive tackle Andrew Thomas said of Fields. “And the defense, they always have to key on him, so they can’t just key on the running backs. So that helps us.”
If it was a video game, it would easy to rotate the quarterbacks. But how does the team make sure it doesn’t affect the rhythm of the offense?
“If I’m being honest with you, I don’t even know when they change quarterbacks,” Thomas said. “They come and I hear them say the play. But from an offensive line standpoint, we block the exact same.”
Redshirt update
Now that Georgia has played five games, we know for sure who cannot redshirt this season. The following freshmen appeared in their fifth game last Saturday:
OLB Adam Anderson, P Jake Camarda, CB Tyson Campbell, RB James Cook, OLB Brenton Cox, QB Justin Fields, G Trey Hill, OL Cade Mays, ILB Channing Tindall and ILB Quay Walker.
The following true freshmen have played four games or fewer: TE Luke Ford (4), DB Otis Reese (4), G Jamaree Salyer (4), DT Jordan Davis (3), S Christopher Smith (3), WR Kearis Jackson (3), TE John FitzPatrick (2), WR Tommy Bush (1), OLB Azeez Ojulari (1), C Warren Ericson (0), OT Owen Condon (0), RB Zamir White (0), CB Divaad Wilson (0).
Random stat that isn’t random
Georgia has a plus-6 turnover margin this season, which is tied for eighth nationally, Alabama being among the teams also at plus-6. Nine of the SEC’s 14 teams are in plus territory in turnovers.
How important is turnover margin? Important. But how indicative? That’s harder to say. It’s been five years since Georgia was in negative territory, at minus-7 in 2013, the only time this decade they’ve been in minus territory, and the Bulldogs were 8-5 that year. But when they were 8-5 two years ago, the Bulldogs were plus-8, their best turnover margin this decade.
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And finally …
Rodrigo Blankenship has gotten more attention than expected for a made extra point. Both after Saturday’s game and on Monday he was asked to dissect how he stopped, re-adjusted and then pooched an extra point over the crossbar after a bobbled snap.
But another stepping incident got some notice recently: Blankenship tripped walking up the steps to UGA’s Grady Journalism School a couple weeks ago. Someone was filming it (for some reason), got lucky when Blankenship tripped and put the video on Facebook.
“It got about a thousand likes or something like that,” Blankenship said. “So it kind of just lets me know the platform that I’m in, as well as everybody that’s a part of our team, when we have success everyone is on a platform, everyone’s got their eyes on them at all times. So you need to be on your best behavior and not trip up the steps.”
Blankenship was then asked by an enterprising reporter (me) what went wrong when he tripped up the steps.
“I sneezed right when I was about to take the step up, so my eyes were closed,” Blankenship said. “So my toe caught the edge of the steps.”
(Top photo byJohn Adams / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Seth Emerson is a senior writer for The Athletic covering Georgia and the SEC. Seth joined The Athletic in 2018 from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and also covered the Bulldogs and the SEC for The Albany Herald from 2002-05. Seth also covered South Carolina for The State from 2005-10. Follow Seth on Twitter @SethWEmerson
