Football news: The OL is set, positions are switched, and Pruitt is making adjustments

Georgia football is still a bit of a ways away from spring practice starting. It actually gets going after spring break, which begins today or this past weekend depending on how you look at that sort of thing (so cross your fingers and toes, and hope these kids can stay away from the specially baked goods, and out of Mudcat's car while cruising through rural Alabama, etc).

In the meantime, Seth Emerson has some good stuff to keep you from getting too scared. I'll let you click the link to get the good work he did on some of the changes Jeremy Pruitt is having with the defensive side of the ball. Some of that stuff will be music to a Dawg fan's ears after last season's struggles. One of those adjustments is in size, which while we'll still have some 3-4 looks, is to be expected with DL adjusting to more of a 4 man front. As Pruitt is quoted by Emerson, “We’re trying to get a lot of our bigger guys down. Personally we feel like everybody’s a little heavy. We’d like everybody a bit faster. That’s our preference. We’re trying to slim up just a little. Including the coaching staff.”

Positionally, we've got a few adjustments to go through. The starting OL will be most fans' primary concern offensively, aside from how well Hutson Mason can take over the reigns from the record setting Aaron Murray. The unit getting the first shot to protect Mason will be at John Theus at LT, Mark Beard at LG, David Andrews in the middle, with Watts Dantzler and Kolton Houston lining up as RG and RT respectively. The somewhat unexpected part there is sophomore Brandon Kublanow not being LG, while Theus is moving from RT to LT and Houston taking over as RT full time. But expect this to be a fluid thing, with the aforementioned Kublanow, as well as guys like Greg Pyke, Xzavier Ward, and others still pushing the starters, and then more competition once Isaiah Wynn, Dyshon Sims, and Kendall Baker arrive on campus in the summer.

Depth issues will cause Quayvon Hicks to work at TE, since we'll be without an injured Jay Rome, a departed senior in Arthur Lynch, and incoming freshman Jeb Blazevich and Hunter Atkinson aren't on campus yet. Expect fans to speculate on this being a sign that we're going to use the FB less going forward.

As far as defensive positional moves, the shift to more 4 man fronts means bigger OLBs James Deloach and Josh Dawson are sticking their hands in the dirt to stay. I'm not sure Dawson actually played any OLB last year though, as most of his snaps appeared to be as a DE in nickel groupings. Also, as was guessed and then debated back in January here, two freshman who worked on the offensive side of the ball last year will be in the defensive backfield this spring. Redshirt freshman Tramel Terry's bowl practice switch from WR to S is going to continue. While the addition of Sony Michel and Nick Chubb has given the offensive backfield enough quality depth to allow Camden County's J.J. Green to work at CB.