ATHENS — It’s easy to make the transfer portal into the fall guy for every problem in college football.

Teams don’t have as much experienced depth as they used to. You have to worry about keeping players happy in their role, while also fending off other teams from poaching away talent.

It doesn’t explain all the problems a team might have. But in specific instances, it can illustrate areas of need. And leave breadcrumbs for future issues.

Georgia’s pass rush has become a recurring problem for the Bulldogs this season. Georgia has just 5.0 sacks through four games and all of them come from inside linebackers.

It has become a consistent talking point when Kirby Smart and Georgia players speak to the press.

“We take it seriously,” Georgia defensive lineman Jordan Hall said. “Honestly, we gotta do a better job of being effective on our games. When a play is called, execution is the biggest thing for us of how we execute in a play. Certain times we was in a game and certain things didn’t get executed well. And that’s on nobody, it’s not on the coaching staff, it’s not on the scheme, it’s on the players out there. So we gotta do a better job of taking accountability of going into practice and working on pass rush.”

If it’s on the players, consider that Georgia saw two outside linebackers and a defensive lineman exit the team via the transfer portal this past offseason.

Outside linebacker Samuel M’Pemba is now at Texas A&M, while defensive lineman Jah Jarrett is at USC.

But the biggest absence is Damon Wilson. Not just because he was the most productive of those three players at Georgia last season but because he is thriving for the Missouri Tigers.

Wilson leads Missouri in sacks with 3.5 through the first five games of the season. That already equals his total number of sacks from the 2024 season at Georgia when he was playing with Jalon Walker and Mykel Williams.

“Damon’s been an awesome addition to our team,” Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz said of Wilson on this week’s SEC coaches teleconference. “He’s a great worker. He’s a guy who really has gelled well with that edge group. Obviously, he’s a menace, creating pressure and havoc on the quarterback. We’ll see as we continue in the SEC how his game continues to evolve.”

Wilson announced his plans to enter the transfer portal on Jan. 6 and ended up announcing he would continue his career at Missouri on Jan. 14. That came late in the process for Georgia, as the transfer portal first opened on Dec. 9.

Georgia didn’t think it needed to add at the outside linebacker position prior to Wilson’s transfer.

But after that, the outside linebacker position became a clear need. Which is why the Bulldogs added Elo Modozie from Army.

Wilson was able to go through spring practice with Missouri, Modozie was not able to do so with the Bulldogs. Georgia landed him in the spring transfer portal window.

The Army transfer has been playing catch-up from the moment he got to Georgia. Which is why he has 0.0 sacks on the season.

“He’s getting better each and every week,” Smart said. “He’s a guy that, you know, was not here for spring like our other guys, and he continues to grow and get better. His greatest attribute is his speed and his athleticism. We got to be able to use that more and give Q (Quintavius Johnson) some rest and continue to develop him. I think he knows that, and we got to find ways to get his skill set out there on the field.”

The loss of Wilson has clearly impacted Georgia’s pass rush. It’s hard to say why Wilson ultimately left, given the theoretical role he would’ve had at Georgia.

But Georgia is trying to patch things together in terms of impacting the opposing quarterback.

Smart praised the way Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson played against Georgia, as he got the ball out quickly. Georgia didn’t make the necessary coverage adjustments until the second half.

At the same point in time, Georgia just simply has to be better with the horses the Bulldogs have.

“Some of it was really good quarterback play, really good timing, and give them credit, shake their hand, and go get better for the next one,” Smart said. “So we got to find ways to affect the quarterback. But we had some in there that we executed, and they out-executed.”