In contrast to LSU, Georgia TE is ‘everything good about college football’

The common college football fan does not know who Jaden Reddell is. Even casual Georgia fans might not be able to tell you all that much about the third-year player.

He’s from Raymore, Missouri, a suburb just outside of Kansas City. He plays tight end for the Bulldogs. He’s roommates with Georgia running back Chauncey Bowens.

Reddell has had a quiet first two seasons at Georgia as he’s made the adjustment from Missouri high school football to life in the SEC.

Most importantly, he’s had perhaps the best offseason of any Georgia player. While the average fan may not know much about Reddell yet, it’s been easy to find Georgia teammates and staffers raving about his development this offseason.

“Just being able to see him every single day, I mean, it’s just been leaps and bounds,” Bowens said of Reddell” He’s always been a really hard worker, but everything, all the work he’s put in, it’s showing up on the field. I mean, he’s just a freak of nature.

“It’s really fun to be able to watch him play and grow.”

Reddell will be a backup tight end for Georgia this season. In many ways, he represents what college football used to look like in terms of a traditional career path.

He exists in stark contrast to potential LSU reserve tight end Dae’Quan Wright. He could be where the sport is headed. Wright will wait to learn whether or not he’ll be able to play for the Tigers and Lane Kiffin this season after suiting up for the Cleveland Browns just weeks ago.

Two players in the same role, albeit having had two very different off-seasons, represent the way both of their respective head coaches would like to see the sport shift.

Reddell redshirted in his first season at Georgia, a concept that no longer exists, as the NCAA has changed its eligibility rules, granting athletes the ability to play five seasons over five years.

Athletes from the 2022 recruiting class were not grandfathered into that new landscape. That’s a large part of why Wright and others are trying to sue their way into SEC stadiums.

Wright, from Perry, Georgia, spent the last two seasons with Kiffin at Ole Miss after transferring in prior to the 2024 season. That was Reddell’s first year in Athens.

He played in four games that season, catching only 2 passes for 18 yards.

As a sophomore during the 2025 season, Reddell’s numbers didn’t get any better. His lone reception came in Georgia’s win over lowly Charlotte. In two seasons, Reddell has yet to catch a pass against an SEC foe.

“A lot of times when you’re recruiting tight ends, you project because not a lot of people play the tight end position in high school or they don’t know how to play the tight end position,” Georgia tight ends coach Todd Hartley said. “People don’t know how to use them in their offense. So they just stick the biggest, fastest dude out at X-receiver and just throw go balls to him. Well, that’s kind of what you saw on tape was he had the skill set that he could run and he could catch.

“But it was going to be very developmental.”

Given the current state of college football, it wouldn’t have been a surprise to see Reddell hop in the transfer portal in pursuit of more playing time. Wright took advantage of the transfer portal to go from Virginia Tech to Ole Miss after his second season of college football.

Yet Reddell believed his best opportunity was still at Georgia.

His belief was rewarded this offseason, largely because of the physical and mental gains he made.

Kirby Smart relayed a note from the strength and conditioning staff that Reddell was one of four players singled out for how he attacked the offseason at Georgia.

“It’s not really in words with him. He’s not a man of a lot of words, and that’s not what PFE is. People think passion, fire, energy is words. It’s really holding yourself accountable to work at the standard or above the standard of what the team is. And they acknowledged him as one of the guys who’s done that.”

Reddell had a standout showing during Georgia’s spring game, scoring the game’s first touchdown.

He finished with 38 receiving yards on 3 receptions. What was perhaps most eye-opening was a 23-yard run Reddell had while running behind fellow tight end Elyiss Williams.

Those athletic gifts that he put on display for Raymore-Peculiar High School were finally showing up with Georgia’s first-team offense.

“He still can run, he still can catch, but now he can actually put him in positions where he’s playing a traditional tight end role where he can block, he can pass protect,” Hartley said. “So he has gotten himself in position to be more of an all-around tight end, which increases his value in our offense.”

Reddell plays at perhaps Georgia’s deepest position. Even after the stellar offseason, he won’t unseat Lawson Luckie as Georgia’s top tight end. Luckie was voted Second Team All-SEC this preseason.

Reddell’s skill set brings something different to the table than that of Elyiss Williams and Ethan Barbour, as those two are more polished blockers at this point.

Reddell allows Georgia to create more explosive plays on offense, not dissimilar from what Brock Bowers did for the Bulldogs. In no way is it fair to compare Reddell to the three-time All-American and two-time John Mackey Award winner. But Georgia believes Reddell brings some of the same elements as Bowers did when he was the fulcrum of Georgia’s championship offenses.

Bowers was that good from the moment he stepped on campus.

For Reddell, he needed a little bit more time to become one of the most exciting players on Georgia’s roster. Bowers was a microwave, while Reddell is a slow-cooker.

“Now, after two years of not worrying about where should I go? How much money should I make? All the stuff that people concern themselves with,” Hartley said. “All the stuff that are distractions that actually maybe take you away from being the best player you can possibly be. He didn’t listen to any of that. He just trusted the process. He grinded it out. And now he’s got himself in a position to possibly help us in a significant role this year.”

Those concerns about money are in part why Wright is willing to blow up the sport of college football. As an undrafted free agent, Wright faced an uphill climb to make an active roster.

Even if Wright made a practice squad, he’d make $13,750 per week. If Wright were to stick on a practice squad for a full season, he’d earn $247,500.

But Wright could be cut at any time, as he ultimately was by the Cleveland Browns and former Georgia offensive coordinator Todd Monken.

At LSU, Wright could potentially earn much more than as an NFL practice squad player due to the lack of financial constraints surrounding college football. Per John Talty and Chris Hummer of CBS Sports, no school is spending more on its roster this season than LSU. They estimate LSU has spent over $50 million on its roster.

What would be an extra couple hundred thousand dollars for a tight end who is familiar with what Kiffin wants? Even with LSU having the SEC’s First Team All-SEC tight end in Trey’Dez Green, greed is good for LSU.

Prior to Thursday’s proceedings in a Louisiana courtroom, the SEC has made it clear it plans to try to stop Wright and those who fall in the same bucket from seeing the field. It remains to be seen if the league can actually do so, despite numerous threats of action.

Smart and Georgia have largely tried to stay above the fray when it comes to Kiffin and Wright. Smart and Kiffin are close friends after all.

“My thought is just, to each his own, is my thought,” Smart said. “I’m worried about our team, our organization, how we do things ”

The staff has been focused on developing players like Reddell into the best version of themselves.

No team in the SEC was better at keeping players out of the transfer portal than Georgia. Just 12 players from last season’s team left via the transfer portal.

The Bulldogs enter the upcoming season very glad Reddell was not one of those.

“So, I mean, let’s be honest, that’s rare nowadays, right? How often do you see that? But I think Coach Smart has done a phenomenal job of actually recruiting players that wanna stay, that have low portal-bility, that actually love Georgia,” Hartley said. “And trust us, and trust that we’re gonna have their development and their best interest, that their future interest is what we’re here to do. So he’s trusted us, and I appreciate him for doing that.”

Even before he catches his first pass this season for Georgia, Reddell is viewed as a developmental success story. Proof that there are still kids out there who are willing to do hard things to get better.

Georgia wants to find more players like Reddell. It prefers the high school recruiting model for this very reason.

Wright, conversely, aims to be one of the first players to go from the NFL back to college football. Doing so would not be seen as a popular move, before even going into the morality of the absurd situation.