Georgia football sees 13 players on Athlon Sport’s preseason All-SEC team
Georgia football is no stranger to having players land on preseason All-SEC teams, but this year there are 13 that land on the Athlon Sports version.
The Dawgs may have lost 15 guys to the NFL Draft after winning the 2021 National Championship, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have talent behind those players.
Most of the ones on this preseason list were key contributors in the 2021 title run, so it makes sense why the experts are excited about them this year.
Georgia football sees an impressive 13 players named to the preseason All-SEC team.
The list is made up of a first team, second team, third team and fourth team option.
Georgia had at least two on each of those teams.
13 Dawgs named to the @AthlonSports Preseason All-SEC Team!#GoDawgs pic.twitter.com/KXkHfY6Lu3
— Georgia Football (@GeorgiaFootball) June 16, 2022
Georgia has Brock Bowers, Broderick Jones, Jalen Carter, Nolan Smith and Kelee Ringo on the first team.
This group of five all deserve to be first-team players, and I will say the only one missing is Warren McClendon, but he is one of the 13. Still, he is worthy of being on that first team because he is a veteran right tackle that rarely gives up a sack and deserves more respect.
Kenny McIntosh, Sedrick Van Pran, Christopher Smith and Kearis Jackson are on the second team.
This group is a solid second-team selection as McIntosh will look to handle more reps at running back. Jackson is returning from a season of injuries, and the other two are generally solid players. It won’t surprise me if Van Pran is on the first team by the end of the season.
The two guys on the third team are McClendon and Robert Beal. Beal led the Dawgs in sacks last season after taking over for Adam Anderson, and we already mentioned how good McClendon is. Athlon Sports got these two guys wrong in placing them where they did.
However, it’s this publication’s opinion, and those two will prove them wrong and could be first-team All-Americans by the end of 2022.
The final two guys landed on the fourth team All-SEC team, and they are Adonai Mitchell and Arik Gilbert. This placement seems understandable because Mitchell came on strong but had some ups and downs throughout the year — plus, he was a freshman, so 2022 will see a more experienced version of the talented receiver.
As for Gilbert, he didn’t play last year but impressed us all in the G-Day Spring Scrimmage Game, so to see him make this list makes us proud.
Next. Georgia football: Jalen Carter is the anchor of the 2022 defense. dark
Georgia has a large group of preseason All-SEC players, and all 13 may wind up being on the lists that matter after the end of the 2022 season. There is a long way to go before that, but this group is full of guys that should take full advantage of the upcoming season, maybe even see some of them be high NFL Draft picks.