ATHENS – The story of Justin Fields in Georgia has been told many times and will undoubtedly be confronted during the broadcast of the Alabama vs. Ohio State college football game on Monday night.
The story always ends the same way, with Fields being transferred to Ohio State and Bulldog fans mourning his departure from the program before he could realize his talents in red and black.
Another twist in the story was recently revealed after Coach Kirby Smart was asked in a recent podcast whether Fields should have stayed in Georgia.
“That’s a great question,” said Smart, knowing better than anyone that Fields’ decision to leave UGA remains one of the most polarizing moments in Georgia’s recent sports history.
The Fields that people see now is not the same player who came to freshman Athens, of course, now three years older, wiser, stronger and better.
In fact, and many do not know or forget that Jake Fromm took UGA to the brink of a national championship the season before Fields arrived.
Fromm had the benefit of a full season of experience and success executing the multi-faceted Pro-Style attack after taking office when titleholder Jacob Eason was injured in the opening game of the 2017 season.
RELATED: NFL Head Coach Bruce Arians Shares Ideas About the Georgia QB Room Entering the 2018 Season
So, while Fields was the most talented quarterback in Georgia 2018, he was not yet to the best team’s quarterback, so he didn’t win the title.
Smart champion fields
Smart never gave up on keeping Fields, despite the false narrative that Georgia just let him go.
RELATED: Smart at Justin Fields: ‘We’d like him to stay’
Smart has so much respect for Fields that he allowed him to attend a friendly match last August, before the state of Ohio resumed its football season. This created a hint of dismay among some UGA donors who were not allowed to attend, as well as the families of some players at the time.
RELATED: Fields’ presence in closed offices in Georgia creates a wave in media reports
By the time the season began, the Bulldogs already had enough other quarterback dramas to make attending Fields’ training a distant memory.
RELATED: No Doubt From The JT Daniels Family About Defender Management
“(Fields) is a great boy, his sister plays softball here, he is a very strong and complete boy ”, said Smart in a recent podcast ‘All Things Covered’ presented by his friend, Bryant McFadden. “Many players on the team really loved him.”
Fans and the media were enthusiastic about Fields as well, and expectations followed him to Georgia.
“With the new era of recruiting that we live in and the enthusiasm that follows number one top player, he and Trevor (Lawrence) were really the two best players in the country,” said Smart. “And (they) were 30 miles from each other, and a lot of comparisons took place between Justin and Trevor.”
Smart revealed for the first time that Fields felt additional pressure to take the field early because of the success that Lawrence was having in his true freshman season at Clemson.
RELATED: Trevor Lawrence Wins FWAA First Year, Eliminates Alabama
“IIt was very evident to us at the beginning of the year that, as Trevor succeeded and started playing, and in the Texas A&M game (second of the season) he came in and played more and more, Justin felt the same thing as, ‘Hey, I’m so as good as he is and should have the opportunity to play, ‘”said Smart.
“And at the time, we had Jake Fromm, who was playing very well.”
Lawrence won the title of Clemson in the fifth game of the season, while Fields was in action in 12 of the 14 games as a substitute.
Flashback to Jake Fromm
Fromm was the country’s fourth in passing efficiency in the first six games of the 2018 season, completing 72 percent of his passes with 12 touchdowns and 2 interceptions.
Georgia came in second in the national ranking and seemed to be returning for another chance for the national championship. Bulldogs averaged 485 yards per game and 42.1 points per game, despite running out of time in the fourth win period.
How could Smart or any coach have changed the quarterback back then?
But then came a 36-16 loss to an emerging LSU star named Joe Burrow in Game 7.
Many wondered if a change could be taking shape during the farewell week that preceded the important game in Florida against the Gators.
But others, like Kirk Herbstreit and Tim Tebow, do not.
RELATED: Tim Tebow Ponderes the Situation of Georgia’s Quarterbacks When Entering Florida
RELATED: Kirk Herbstreit Explains Why Georgia Should Stay Fromm Over Fields
Fromm responded with a 36-17 win over the Gators, 17 out of 24 passes for 240 yards, 3 touchdowns and no turns.
Georgia lost the SEC championship game to Alabama that season, 35-28, but Fromm was 25 out of 39, moving to 301 yards with 3 touchdowns and no interception against the tide.
“(In) I was playing good football and we played Alabama in the SEC Championship game, and we didn’t play very well in defense, ”said Smart. “But Jake did a lot of good things. It was really a difficult situation to manage because Justin is extremely talented. “
RELATED: Comparing Justin Fields’ First Year with Your Tagovailoa in Alabama
The infamous fake
Fields was so talented that Smart worked on a fake year-round punt game designed for the Alabama punt return team. Fields would run out of a formation that Georgia had never revealed.
The Bulldogs trained repeatedly and again for the exact situation they found themselves at the end of the game against Alabama.
Fourth to 11 in the 50-yard line, game tied at 28-28, 3 and a half minutes to play.
Fields was late on the snap and quickly gave up on the shot, fighting for a 2-yard gain in the swap.
“I thought it was there, and it was there today, ”said Smart at the time. “We were going to grab the ball fast. It took us a long time to catch the ball. They didn’t have a covered guy. We had a very open guy. It took us so long to get him out that they recognized and covered the guy late. “
In fact, longtime fighter Nick Moore shared that the piece had been crafted specifically for Tide.
RELATED: Georgia players were bought on a fake punt call, it was there
“We were practicing this piece for two years,” said Moore. “It was designed for Alabama’s safe punt.”
Some still question the connection, but whoever watches the replay sees the Mecole Hardman receiver running open and recognizes that the biggest problem was the execution.
Fields indicated immediately after the game that he planned to return to Georgia and compete.
Fields said at this week’s CFP Media Day that he doesn’t remember much.
“All I remember is that I left the game, everyone shouted my name and the game didn’t go the way we wanted,” said Fields. “This is the only memory I have of that piece.”
Transfer of Fields to the State of Ohio
Fields was so talented that Smart brought him with the team to the Sugar Bowl, although Fields announced that he was entering the transfer portal before the team left Athens for New Orleans.
ESPN analyst Chris Fowler said at the time that Fields’ transfer technique outside Athens could be a game changer in college football.
RELATED: Chris Fowler Says Fields Transfer Could Open Pandora’s Box
Many felt that Georgia bringing Fields shared the locker room. As Smart noted, Fields was and is hugely popular with all of his Bulldogs teammates.
The UGA players, still upset about being despised by the College Football Playoff Committee, fell in the 28-21 loss to Texas.
In addition to the transfer of Fields being a distraction, Deandre Baker, chosen in the first phase of the NFL draft, also came on the trip, although he informed the team that he did not want to play so as not to risk injury.
In addition, it proved to be the last game trained by offensive coordinator Jim Chaney, who would sign an almost double deal in Tennessee.
RELATED: Chaney Says Leaving Tennessee ‘An Easy Decision’
It was no exaggeration to say that the Sugar Bowl was not Georgia’s best game plan.
RELATED: Jim Chaney says Georgia ‘acted right’ with Justin Fields QB’s plight.
Since then, Smart has changed its policy, not bringing players to bowling games who have chosen not to participate or are about to transfer.
The era of transferring defenders has really arrived, as the last three players who drew attention to winning the Heisman Trophy – Burrow, Kyler Murray and Baker Mayfield – were all transfer defenders.
But while Georgia’s attack struggled in 2019, Fields’ career took off with the Buckeyes.
“You can’t say that (the transfer) didn’t benefit him, because he had to go to a very good program, and he had to play immediately, and he played a lot more football because he chose to go there,” Smart said. “So, you can’t say it was right or wrong, but I would say what you said before, the factor of responsibility and the guys struggling, sometimes it’s worth doing it. Especially in other positions. “
Smart could have used some retention in the receiver’s position after the 2018 season, for sure.
Many of the national critics who attacked aimed at Smart for not finding a way to keep Fields did not bother to mention the two main reasons why the UGA pass game fell in 2019:
• Five of the team’s first six pass catchers of 2018 were no longer on the list.
• Six Georgia recipients on the 2019 team lost playing time due to injuries.
Smart called the “merry-go-round” of receivers when explaining why the Bulldogs’ passing game was inconsistent.
Georgia finished “only” 12-2 in 2019 with Fromm in the center, ranked No. 4 in the country.
RELATED: Tim Tebow Shares Thoughts on Jake Fromm’s Criticism, Transfer from Justin Fields
Georgia QB transfers, coming and going
The Bulldogs had a quarterback transfer out – and an inward transfer – in 2020 as well.
When Fromm made the surprise decision to leave after the 2019 season – perhaps exhausted by constant social media criticism and comparisons to Fields’ success in Ohio’s friendly broadcasting scheme – Smart dived into the transfer portal.
Jamie Newman was the choice, Wake Forest QB wanting to play in a more friendly NFL offensive scheme.
The Covid-19 pandemic intervened, however, forcing Georgia to cancel spring practices. This cost Newman the time to learn the manual and terminology that came with the new offensive coordinator Todd Monken.
RELATED: How Jamie Newman went from Heisman’s hype to opt-out
The Bulldogs plunged into the transfer portal again in May, landing JT Daniels, a quarterback who qualified for the 2018 class after skipping his senior season, and was ranked 3rd behind Lawrence and Fields.
“The quarterback is unique because there is only one, you can only have one in the field,” said Smart. “You go to DB, if I’m not the best corner, then I need to go play safely, or I can play nickel, or I can play dime, so many other places to play and grow as a player and develop, where you can be patient .
“Quarterback, it’s difficult, because there is only one of them on the field.”