ATHENS – Folks in Pierce County aren’t at all surprised about Stetson Bennett throwing out the ceremonial first pitch before Georgia baseball’s season opener Friday. If not for some personal choices, they know he might be playing college baseball.
Bennett was the Class 3A Player of the Year in high school. He was a shortstop and still holds the Pierce County High record for stolen bases. But his dream always was to play quarterback for the Georgia Bulldogs.
He achieved that, you may have heard.
The walk-on turned legend was invited to throw out the ceremonial first pitch before the Bulldogs’ season-opening baseball game against Albany (N.Y.) at 2 p.m. Friday at Foley Field.
The cool gesture came together quietly and organically over the past few weeks.
“There’s no real story behind it,” Georgia coach Scott Stricklin said Thursday. “We just reached out to football to ask for guys to do it and he wanted to.”
Oh, yeah. Bennett was all over it.
Baseball remains one of the great unknowns for Georgia’s star quarterback. He was a four-year starter at shortstop for the Bears and led them to the state championship finals as a senior. He also ran track and played some basketball, but many who saw him play back then thought that should have been his sport of choice.
“He was player of the year and obviously there’s only one of those per year,” said his father, Stetson Bennett III. “That’s pretty good. So, yeah, he could have played in college.”
This football thing turned out all right, though. After coming to Georgia as a preferred walk-on in 2017, Bennett redshirted and gained notice within the team as the scout-team quarterback. He decided to transfer to a junior college to get more game-day experience and played a year at Jones College in Mississippi before coming back to Georgia. This time he was on scholarship.
After spending 2019 as Jake Fromm’s backup, Bennett was pressed into duty and started five games as a junior before getting sidelined by injury and losing his spot to JT Daniels.
Taking over for an injured Daniels this past season, Bennett locked down the No. 1 spot by the fifth game of the season. He led the Bulldogs to two fourth-quarter touchdown drives in the 33-18 win over Alabama in the College Football Playoff Championship game. It was Georgia’s first national championship in football in 41 years.
Since then, Bennett has appeared on “Good Morning America,” ridden on top of a fire truck during UGA’s championship celebration, had a parade thrown in his honor in Blackshear, and is scheduled to pick up an award at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame in Macon on Saturday. Bennett can’t attend because of football team commitments, so Dink Nesmith, co-owner of Athens-based Community Newspapers, Inc., and a longtime family friend, will be standing in on Bennett’s behalf.
Now Bennett gets to throw out the first pitch for a Georgia baseball game. Knowing well of Bennett’s previous baseball exploits, Stricklin also invited him to participate in batting practice with the Georgia baseball players before Friday’s game. Bennett gladly accepted.
Somewhere nearby coach Kirby Smart likely will be praying that Bennett doesn’t strain an oblique swinging a bat.
Perhaps Bennett playing baseball with the Bulldogs will gain some favor with another member of the Bennett clan. Knox Bennett plans to play baseball in college and is listed as a 6-foot-3, 205-pound, hard-hitting prospect by Perfect Game.
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