Georgia football starting quarterback Stetson Bennett has had quite the start to the 2022 season. He is already an early Heisman Trophy contender and continues to join elite company each week when he puts up impressive numbers. Each week, we will break down his performance and grade it since Bennett is someone that continues to draw attention.
It’s his last season in Athens, and it has been nearly perfect throughout the first four games, so let’s break it down and grade his fourth performance.
Bennett earned A’s throughout those first three games because he looked invincible. However, this fourth game saw him make a couple of mistakes, which brought him down from an A+ to an A-. We are being nitpicky with his performances because we’ve seen just how good Bennett can be, so it’s part of the ebbs and flows of a season.
We’re looking at his performance by stats, under pressure, rushing situations and decision making. Bennett’s performances are usually under scrutiny regardless of how well he does, so let’s break it down and show that some of these couch coaches are just flat-out wrong about him.
Georgia football quarterback Stetson Bennett earns A- in Week 4 performance.
In Week 4, we saw Bennett complete 75% of his passes against Kent State, but he dropped in grading because of the interception and a few overthrown passes. Many of his deep balls were dropped by receivers, so it wasn’t all on him, but Bennett wasn’t at the top of his game.
Against Kent State, Bennett went 27-of-36 for 272 yards and one interception. He finished with a 132.9 passing rating and a 70.4 quarterback rating. Bennett scored one touchdown on the ground as he finished with five rushes for 13 yards.
Stetson Bennett's #Power5 ranks through 4 games:
— Brent Rollins (@BrentRollinsPhD) September 26, 2022
4th in overall grade = 90.7
7th in passing grade = 88.4
9th in rushing grade = 78.2
8th in adjusted comp% = 82.5%
3rd in yards = 1,224
9th in yards/att = 9.8
On the season, Bennett has gone 92-of-124 for 1,224 yards, five touchdowns and one pick. He also completes 74.2% of his passes and holds a 168.8 passing rating and an 87.4 overall quarterback rating which ranks No.7 among all college football programs.
As the tweet above shows us, his performance through four games is one of the best among all Power 5 quarterbacks, yet so many people still don’t give him credit. Saturday’s game wasn’t his best, but it was far from one of his worst.
To go three games without a pick is huge because not many other quarterbacks have made that happen. The interception is why Bennett earned an A- because while it was the receiver’s fault, Bennett could have placed it a little better. He also drops in grading because he didn’t throw a touchdown pass against the Golden Flashes. If he threw at least one, that would have canceled the interception and kept him at an A+.
Bennett got sacked once against Kent State, so that was another moment that wasn’t great because he should have thrown it away before losing the yardage. He keeps an A grade, though, because he scored a touchdown with his legs, which gives him four straight games with at least one rushing score.
Consecutive games with 250 pass yards and 1 rush TD in SEC since 2004, per @ESPNStatsInfo
— Brandon Zimmerman (@BZSEC) September 17, 2022
--2007 Tim Tebow 4
--2022 Stetson Bennett 3
--2012 Johnny Manziel 3
His 272 yards through the air also joined elite company as he and Tim Tebow are the two quarterbacks to throw for at least 250 yards and one rushing touchdown. That stat should tell you what kind of year Bennett is having.
Bennett did have an interception, but it wasn’t detrimental to Georgia’s overall performance. While it wasn’t great, it wasn’t the end of the world. The Dawgs played sloppy, and it didn’t feature a top-notch Bennett, but he still made history, so Week 4 sees him with an A- and, hopefully, Week 5 will see him get back into the A+ range.