JT Daniels was back under center for the Dawgs on Saturday night against South Carolina but Kirby Smart decided to rotate Stetson Bennett in after Daniels had led the team on multiple scoring drives.
Dukes & Bell talked about this curious decision and asked if Kirby Smart is mishandling the quarterback position?
Carl talked about how Kirby’s decisions now could affect recruiting in the future.
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“Kirby what are you doing? Are you playing for a national championship or not? You have a guy in JT Daniels who’s a national championship caliber quarterback. He’s back, he’s healthy. If he’s on the field he’s healthy, it doesn’t mean he’s hurt and he’s limited. Play him, let him play,” Dukes said. “And when Kirby pulled him for Stetson Bennett in the third series I literally lost my mind, I thought something was wrong. I was like is JT hurt?
"What’s going on and then you bring JT back in and things go smoothly again after Bennett comes in and throws a pick. No disrespect or maybe it is, Bennett was a walk-on, you went and got JT Daniels because you knew what kind of talent you were getting, Kirby what are you doing?”
“This is more about how you're handling your team and more importantly your quarterback room," Dukes continued. "This is how recruits are going to look at this moving forward and go 'yeah Georgia’s great but what’s going on with the quarterback room?' Because people wonder what happened with Justin Fields, you will probably continue to wonder. I don’t know if they’ll ever address it. But it gets back to trust, stability and having a quarterback that you go 'This is the guy that everyone looks to, he is your leader.' If you’re injured that’s different, nobody complained in the game against UAB because we understood the circumstances, but your dude was healthy, why are you playing games?”
