Georgia Football: Center of Attention in Spring Position Battles
The Georgia football program will be breaking in another new quarterback this season, but perhaps even more importantly, they’ll have a new center for the first time in three years.
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For seven seasons, Ben Jones and David Andrews held the position of center for the Georgia Bulldogs, and held it well. Now new offensive line coach Rob Sale must find a new player to snap the ball to the new quarterback in a new offensive system.
That sounds rather foreboding for the Dawgs offense.
This will be a crucial spot to fill and one of the position battles that will be watched closely this spring and on into fall camp this season. The leading contenders are senior Hunter Long, and sophomores Isaiah Wynn and Josh Cardiello. It was also reported by 247 Sports that left guard Brandon Kublanow did a little work at center in this week’s practices.
Most probably believed that Long, who was Andrews’ backup for two seasons, was going to have the inside track, but Mark Richt has stated that Wynn is a top contender.
Right now the battle is wide open, and it’s still anyone’s to win, but in looking at Wynn’s athleticism in practices and how teammates respond to him, you’d have to believe that he’s going to be the guy the rest are gunning for. Kublanow is left-handed, and many coaches (Rob Sale included) shy away from southpaw centers.
Sale will probably give all the current linemen a few snaps at center just to have a look-see and to determine what he has, but in the end this battle will probably come down to Long and Wynn.
Long has a bit of size and height advantage on Wynn, running 6’4 and 302 lbs to Wynn’s 6’2 and 283 lbs, but Wynn’s footwork may be better than the veteran Long right now, and his power at the point of attack is quite impressive.
Regardless of who wins this battle, they’re going to be snapping the ball to a newly anointed starting quarterback, so the comfort level between center and QB will have to be established in a hurry.