Kirby Smart shares how Baker Mayfield went from foe to ‘good friend’
ATHENS — Kirby Smart ended Baker Mayfield’s legendary college career when Smart’s Bulldogs beat Mayfield’s Sooners in the 2018 Rose Bowl.
Mayfield, who won the Heisman Trophy in 2017, was an easy villain for Georgia fans to root against. He was cocky and brash and great. After Rodrigo Blankenship missed an early field goal in the 2018 Rose Bowl, cameras caught Mayfield flashing a choke sign at Georgia.
Georgia would get the last laugh, thanks to Sony Michel’s walk-off touchdown run in double overtime. After the game, Georgia linebacker Davin Bellamy saw Mayfield on the field and told the Oklahoma quarterback to “humble yourself.”
As Georgia and Oklahoma get set to face each other for the first time since that iconic game, Mayfield has once again become one of the subplots of the game.
Not for anything he’s said or done, but because of a surprising detail revealed by Smart. The Georgia head coach shared this week that he and Mayfield are now good friends.
“We’ve just crossed paths from time to time,” Smart said on this week’s SEC coaches teleconference. “I have a lot of respect for him as a player and his family and the community work they do down in Tampa.”
Smart’s mother is originally from Plant City, Florida, just outside of Tampa. Smart shared earlier this year that he spent a lot of summers as a child in the Tampa area.
Mayfield was taken with the first overall pick of the 2018 NFL draft. He spent his first four seasons in Cleveland, where he played with former Georgia running back Nick Chubb. Chubb was also drafted by the Browns in the 2018 NFL draft.
After bouncing around during the 2022 season, he found a home with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He’s made the Pro Bowl twice while leading the team to multiple playoff games. Mayfield recently signed a three-year, $165 million contract to remain with the franchise.
Smart isn’t the only one who seems to have softened his stance on Mayfield. Bellamy himself revealed how Mayfield earned his respect both during and after the game.
In the fourth quarter of the Georgia win, Bellamy shared an anecdote of Georgia defensive lineman Julian Rochester landing on Mayfield. Rochester, at 6-foot-5 and 300 pounds, dropped his knee on Mayfield’s ribs.
“You could hear the breath leave, you know, Baker’s body,” Bellamy said on Wednesday. And he got up, and he was grabbing his rib. And he looked at us and said, you know, is that all y’all got?
Bellamy noted that his retelling was the family-friendly version of what Mayfield said.
Still, even Bellamy recognizes how impressive Mayfield has been. He began his career as a walk-on at Texas Tech. He’s now an established veteran quarterback in the NFL.
“That right there, that showed me, man, we can’t break this guy,” Bellamy said. “And you see that now in the NFL, you know, he plays with a torn labrum, man. He plays with, you know, broken ribs, and he just will not, you know, come out of the game. So, just going warrior for warrior, you respect, you know, a guy that goes out on his shield.”
Mayfield has a game against the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, meaning he almost certainly won’t be in attendance when his alma mater takes on Georgia.
The Bulldogs and Sooners are set for a 3:30 p.m. kickoff, with ESPN broadcasting the game.