This week’s question to the DawgNation team sparked a lot of fun conversation and memories: Who’s the best Georgia player people may have forgotten was so good?
I added the caveat that the answer doesn’t automatically have to be pulled from way back in the history books. It could also be a more recent player who we want to refresh the memory of what made them so great for the Bulldogs.
The answers for this week were awesome, and I hope you’ll enjoy reading them! As always, we’ll have some football news and our trivia question toward the bottom of the newsletter:
Jeff Sentell: “When folks start talking about all-time UGA great running backs, the same names come up. Walker. Chubb. Hearst. Gurley. Michel. The one that doesn’t come up often enough is Rodney Hampton. Hampton ran for 227 yards against Ole Miss in his first start. He filled in for an injured Lars Tate that day. The freshman from Texas broke Herschel Walker’s record for most all-purpose yards in a game (290) for the day. That’s quite a debut.
“Hampton averaged 7.1 yards per carry and ran for 890 yards in his first season. He broke the 1,000-yard mark as a junior on Ray Goff’s first team and was taken in the first round after that season by the New York Giants. He had five consecutive 1,000-yard seasons in the NFL. While those stats shine, the way Hampton played is what stands out. He was so smooth and a rare blend of speed, power and acceleration. His name needs to come up more on that first tier of all-time ‘RBU’ greats for the Bulldogs.”
Brandon Adams: “My example of a Georgia player who was better than people realize goes back to the early days of the Kirby Smart era. Outside linebacker D’Andre Walker had 13 total sacks and 24.5 tackles for loss during the 2017-18 seasons. That’s a prolific performance that gives Walker among the best stat lines of any defensive player for the Bulldogs in recent history.”
Georgia linebacker DAndre Walker sacks Tennessee quarterback Jarrett Guarantano during the second quarter of a NCAA game on Saturday, Sept 29, 2018, in Athens. (Curtis Compton/AJC)
Georgia players (from left) Jonathan Ledbetter, J.R. Reed, DAndre Walker, and Deandre Baker celebrate beating Georgia Tech 45-21 in the final minutes of their college football rivalry game on Saturday, Nov. 24, 2018, in Athens. (Curtis Compton/AJC)
Connor Riley: “There has only been one safety under Smart who was a unanimous First Team All-American. He came up with turnovers in both of Georgia’s national championship wins. In terms of big plays and accolades, he is the best defensive back to play for Georgia under Smart. I am talking, of course, about the great Christopher Smith, who gets lost in the shuffle for not being a 5-star recruit or top draft pick.
“You could realistically get eight or nine names deep from the 2021 defense before remembering to list Smith. But in terms of what he did on the field in his time at Georgia, his resume is as good as it gets.”
Georgia defensive back Christopher Smith kisses the trophy after Georgias win against TCU in the 2023 College Football Playoff National Championship at SoFi Stadium, in Los Angeles. Georgia won 65-7. (Jason Getz/AJC)
Georgia Bulldogs defensive backs Christopher Smith (left) and Javon Bullard celebrate in the end zone during the College Football Playoff National Championship at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on Monday, Jan. 9, 2023. (Jason Getz/AJC)
Mike Griffith: “Many Georgia football fans hear the name ‘Ray Goff’ and think of a former Bulldogs’ head coach who once produced an SEC all-time leading passer (Eric Zeier) and recruited college football’s preeminent head coach (Smart) to UGA. But Goff was also a great player at Georgia after a Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame career at Moultrie (now Colquitt County).
“Goff is one of only eight Georgia players to have won the SEC Player of the Year award (which existed between 1933 and 2001) after quarterbacking the Bulldogs to an outright SEC championship in 1976. Georgia utilized Goff in its run-heavy veer offense in that era, scoring wins over Florida, Alabama, Clemson, Auburn and Georgia Tech, among others, in a 1976 season that ended with a loss to Pitt in the Sugar Bowl.
“Goff also finished seventh in the Heisman Trophy voting that season, and his 1,434 career rushing yards ranks as the second-most for a UGA quarterback behind Andy Johnson (1,799, 1971-1973).”
Georgia coach Kirby Smart shares a laugh with former head coach Ray Goff at the Chick-fil-A Dawg Bowl 2024 at Showtime Bowl in Athens. (Jeff Sentell/DawgNation)
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Kaylee Mansell: “This was a tough one, but for my best forgotten player … give me Isaiah McKenzie. Even though McKenzie did not have the most flashy career stats, he was a Swiss army knife that UGA could use in almost every facet of the game.
“To this day, he is still the only UGA player to return a kickoff and punt for a touchdown in the same game and he still holds the UGA records for punts returned for a touchdown and career return touchdowns. The story isn’t necessarily that McKenzie was Georgia’s most statistically dominant receiver.
“It’s that he was one of the most unique weapons of his era.Every time he touched the ball, there was a chance for something explosive and that translated into a long NFL career.”
(Hyosub Shin/AJC)
(Curtis Compton/AJC)
And here’s my answer: Wide receiver Chris Conley. Amid so many Georgia greats over the years, it can be hard to stand out, but Conley is tied for fifth in school history for touchdown receptions in his career with 20 from 2011-2014. He was a weapon and a steady presence for the Bulldogs.
Former Georgia coach Mark Richt told DawgNation: “Chris came to one of our football camps, and he just torched everybody out there the first session. We as coaches talk between sessions, and we decided to try to start matching up the best corners in camp with him, and Chris lit all of them up, too. We were like, ‘We’ve got to get this kid.”
Chris Conley finished with 117 receptions for 1,938 yards and 20 TDs for Georgia. He had five 100-yard receiving games for the Bulldogs. (Curtis Compton/AJC)
Georgia senior wide receiver Chris Conley in a game against Kentucky. (Brant Sanderlin/AJC FILE)
Trivia time
Through its first four games, can you guess Georgia’s scoring differential this season?
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Smart’s history with 5-star QBs is messy. Yet he will keep recruiting them.
The first big recruiting win for Smart involved 5-star quarterback Jacob Eason. Days after Smart took the Georgia job in 2015, Eason reaffirmed his pledge to Georgia instead of flipping to Florida.
The top player in Georgia’s 2018 recruiting class, the first No. 1 overall class Smart signed using the 247Sports Composite rankings, was quarterback Justin Fields.
Georgia began its 2021 season with former 5-star prospect JT Daniels as the team’s starting quarterback.
And for much of the 2026 recruiting cycle, Smart seemed to have his next 5-star signal caller lined up in Jared Curtis.
Yet Curtis enters Saturday’s game playing for the opposing Vanderbilt Commodores. Eason, Fields and Daniels all ended up transferring out of the program, as they opted to finish their careers elsewhere.
Smart has always made it a point to have the most talented recruits in the country at Georgia. The quarterback position is no different.
The Bulldogs have repeated success with other 5-star position players, but the quarterback spot remains elusive.
Dating back to the 2016 signing class, the Bulldogs have signed 51 5-star high school recruits, per the 247Sports Composite rankings. All four quarterbacks counted among those 51 ended up transferring out. By comparison, only nine of the other 47 players have done the same.
Eason and Fields ended up transferring for effectively the same reason. Neither could beat out Jake Fromm.
Fromm himself was no slouch as a recruit, finishing the 2017 recruiting cycle as the No. 44 overall recruit. Add in the instant success he had as Georgia’s quarterback, and it was hard to justify going to either of the quarterbacks with the perceived higher ceilings.
Eason would end up back in his home state of Washington, while Fields left for Ohio State after just one season.
After Fields left the program, Georgia wouldn’t get back into the 5-star quarterback business until January 2020. Shortly after Todd Monken arrived in Athens as the new offensive coordinator, the Bulldogs landed a commitment from 5-star prospect Brock Vandagriff.
In May of that same year, Daniels joined the roster after transferring in from USC. He would miss the first six games of the 2020 season as he recovered from a knee injury he suffered at USC. Once cleared, he took over for Stetson Bennett as the team’s starting quarterback and won Georgia’s final four games of the 2020 season.
A strong close to that year inflamed expectations going into 2021. Yet a preseason injury led to a less-than-stellar showing against Clemson. Daniels would miss the UAB game, where Bennett threw five touchdowns on 12 pass attempts.
Vandagriff was on the roster for the 2021 season as a true freshman. But whereas Eason and Fromm started during their first seasons in Athens, Smart had built up the Georgia machine to the point that it no longer needed to take that risk.
After Daniels left the game against Vanderbilt with another injury, he would join Vandagriff on the bench. Georgia rode Bennett the rest of the way, and while it was far from perfect, Bennett played a major part in Georgia beating Alabama in the national championship this time.
