Kirby Smart on Jalon Walker: 'He's going to be a helluva player'

On3 imageby:Kaiden Smith08/31/22

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As UGA prepares for their week one opener versus Oregon, head coach Kirby Smart is focused on starting the season off on the right foot as they defend their National Championship. But this week Smart gave praise to his freshman linebacker Jalon Walker, speaking about how he’s been contributing to the Bulldog’s defense.

“Yeah he’s tough man he’s a physical player, really smart, he’s picking things up. He’s helped us in multiple roles, he’s playing inside backer, he’s playing sub-rusher, talented talented kid,” Smart said.

Walker is a 6-foot-2, 230-pound linebacker out of Salisbury, North Carolina that was ranked the No. 4 linebacker in the 2022 class according to On3 Consensus. Walker’s playing time in his freshman season may be limited due to the abundance of depth the Bulldogs have on the defensive side of the ball, but him already making appearances on the team’s third down sub-packages is a promising sign.

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Smart also discussed Walker’s intangibles and character off the field.

“What I love about Jalon is he’s a coach’s son, so I’m always particular to those guys because of the fact that I grew up in that environment. He just is so respectful and does things the right way and represents us the right way and he’s going to be a helluva player,” Smart said.

Walker was an early enrollee, arriving in Athens in the spring of this year, making him more familiar with the defensive scheme and how things operate for Georgia. It’ll be a long season, and it will definitely be worth keeping an eye out for Walker this season to see how his role on the team unfolds in his freshman year.

Kirby Smart reveals next step for freshman, new starters following fall camp

UGA‘s 2022 team will look very different than their national championship squad from last season, as they had a record 15 players selected in the NFL draft this year. Because of that, the Bulldogs will have to rely on more of their younger talent this season, and head coach Kirby Smart spoke on how many of his underclassmen he expects to contribute this season. 

“It all depends on injuries during the year, as it is now, I don’t know what you define as young if you just mean the freshman class, probably half of them will have to play a role; whether that’s special teams or a backup or a substitution role when they go in and play, some of them may start. But if you talk about young players, like guys that didn’t play last year, they’re going to play more this year. There’s certainly even a larger number and you get up into 45, 50 percent of our roster would be freshman and sophomores playing, that actually have to go play,” Smart said. 

Smart also talked about how he and his coaching staff are prepping their younger players who may be less experienced. 

“So anytime you have that you’re susceptible to lack of experience mistakes, anxiety mistakes, composure mistakes; so we try to create situations in practice to make them want to do right as much as they can and feel like they’re in a game. So that when they’re in a game, they can just relax and go play. But there’s a lot of those guys that are going to help us, I think more and more we’re finding every year there’s more freshman that have to play and contribute,” Smart said.