Fittingly, Georgia Bulldogs’ first full-contact practice comes in ‘House of Payne’

PRACTICE OBSERVATIONS

ATHENS — The Georgia Bulldogs held their first practice of preseason camp inside the William Porter Payne and Porter Otis Payne Indoor Athletic Center — more succinctly called, “The House of Payne — on Tuesday. Lightning from nearby thunderstorms chased the Bulldogs indoors.

But that did nothing to quell the intensity. The yells of coaches and players and made the 102,000-plus square foot building a noisy din as Georgia conducted its first full pads, full-contact of the fall. Offensive players dressed in red jerseys took one end of the field and defensive players in white took the other. Later in the workout, the units would come together for the live 11-on-11 work.

Here’s a just a few items of note from the 15 minutes of observation time allotted the media on Tuesday:

• Senior wide receiver Terry Godwin appeared full go. The Bulldogs’ leading returning pass -catcher from last season had been limited in the first four practices due to a knee injury. On Tuesday, he was first up in pass-skeleton drills along with fellow wideout Riley Ridley and appeared to be moving without restriction. He was wearing only a sleeve over his knee.
• Speaking of offense, coordinator and tight ends coach Jim Chaney does get enough notice for being a yeller. At least he was doing a lot of yelling Tuesday, anyway, as he put his position group through the paces. It’s more of a baritone growl rather than a yell.
• Chaney’s shout was easily distinguishable from that of his co-coordinator. James Coley, who is now coaching quarterbacks, was yelling a lot, too. And his howls were much more of a high-pitched variety. So at least the players can always be sure who’s yelling at them.
• Watching the quarterbacks, neither Jake Fromm nor Justin Fields were showing any signs of arm fatigue. Though the Bulldogs are only five days into game, over-throwing and too many reps can quickly affect quarterbacks, especially the younger ones. But both the scholarship signal-callers were looking sharp during pass-skeleton work.
• As for the walkon quarterbacks, of the three, redshirt freshman John Seter has a very smooth throwing motion and appears to deliver a lot of accurate passes. He also has some decent size at 6-foot-3, 180 pounds. The other two quarterbacks are freshman Mason Wood of Douglasville (6-foot, 200, Alexander High) and Matthew Downing (6-foot, 195, Alpharetta).
• Speaking of size, the increased size on Georgia’s offensive line is not limited to the scholarship guys. Georgia has four walkon linemen and they’re all huge. Sophomore Daniel Gothard of Dunwoody is 6-6, 327, freshman Blake Anderson of Alpharetta is 6-4, 340, freshman Blake Watson of Roswell is 6-6, 300 and senior Sean Fogarty is 6-4, 295. All the better to give Georgia’s defensive a line a good look.
• Georgia has a decent number of defensive linemen to choose from this season. There were 13 working out in Tuesday’s drills with coach Tray Scott. They include defensive ends Jonathan Ledbetter, David Marshall, Malik Herring and Justin Young defensive tackles Tyler Clark, Michael Carter, Jay Hayes and Devonte Wyatt and noseguards Julian Rochester, DaQuan Hawkins-Muckle and Jordan Davis. The Bulldogs also have two walkons in Koby Pryz and Kolby Wyatt.
• Senior outside linebacker D’Andre Walker was announced as being on the “watch list” for the Butkus Award on Tuesday.

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— Georgia Football (@FootballUGA) August 7, 2018