Examining why multiple highly-recruited Georgia players entered the portal

Some might be surprised, or maybe even a tad concerned, about some of the names that have decided to leave Georgia this offseason in the transfer portal. However, while he knows it’s not all good, DawgHQ’s Jake Rowe understands it had to happen in some sense and, as such, isn’t terribly concerned about it in that respect.

Rowe joined on during Sunday’s episode of ‘Andy Staples On3’ to discuss the current list of 17 players that have chosen to leave Athens via the portal. On one hand, he does think several of them are players that the Bulldogs’ staff would’ve liked to keep. Even so, he also realizes that everyone in there and their respective circumstances made it an easier choice when you consider the program’s revolving door of talent.

“Listen, I’m not going to sit here and tell you that, ‘Man, Georgia is just cleaning house! They’re telling all these guys to go and they don’t want any of them to come back.’ – A.J. Harris, Austin Blaske, Marvin Jones Jr., Jamon Dumas-Johnson. They’re all guys that they would have loved to have kept around,” said Rowe. “But you look at 15 transfers to this point? I think there was writing on the wall for pretty much every single one of them.”

“I think J.D. PicKell kind of hit the nail on the head. Nobody knows the talent as well as the players who work out with these guys and do it,” Rowe said.

Georgia has built a factory of productive college players and eventual highly-selected pros. That’s why, with new freshmen and other transfers coming in, it’s hard to keep players around who want to see their snaps go up but can’t run the risk of staying if they’re likely to go down.

“Georgia has to have this happen, one way or the other. They’re signing a class of 26, 27, 28 guys. They’re going to want to bring in probably a half dozen guys via the portal,” Rowe explained. “You can’t do that unless you have attrition.”

“Most of these guys are guys who spent some time at Georgia, spent two, three, four years at Georgia. Ghey’re like, ‘Alright, listen, I gave it my all, it hasn’t worked out to this point. I can’t bet on next year being the year anymore. I’ve got to go somewhere where I can maybe get some assurances and the path of least resistance,'” said Rowe. “Some of these guys are doing that and kudos to them for doing it.”

A few of these players who have defected would have seen more time for the ‘Dawgs next season. Some of the others likely wouldn’t have. That’s just the way of things now, especially in this era of college football.

All in all, though, Rowe doesn’t want anyone to panic about who or what may have walked out the door through the transfer portal so far.

“I don’t want to say that all of this is completely insignificant. But if I’m sitting here and you’re like, ‘Alright, let’s take the temp. 1-10, how worried should Georgia fans be about the transfers?’? I would put it at a two maximum to this point,” said Rowe.