DALLAS — Carson Beck was looking fine Tuesday as he made his rounds here at the Omni Hotel Downtown Dallas on Tuesday. It’s a good thing because, so far at least, no player attending SEC Football Media Days has garnered more attention than Georgia’s star quarterback.
A 22-year-old fifth-year senior, Beck was rocking a powder blue suit with a high-collar, button-less white shirt and a white pair of luxury, custom-designed sneakers. Accentuating his look was a diamond-encrusted neckless with matching cross and an equally opulent jewel-studded watch.
If chic is a word that can be used for football players, Beck was the “chiciest.”
For such luxurious fashion taste, Beck was making no apologies. He’s well-compensated now through his name, image and likeness deals, and he’s going to be even better compensated next spring. He projects to be a first-round NFL draft pick and possibly the first quarterback selected.
For now, Beck’s not interested in talking about the riches that have come his way or those that might await him. He insist his narrow focus at the moment is on nothing more than leading the Georgia Bulldogs to as many wins as he possibly can in his final college season.
“I like to put my focus on the team around me and focus on what’s actually important,” Beck said Tuesday. “When you focus on the team and you really put other people before yourself and you are selfless and you focus on your wide receivers, you focus on the O-line, you focus on the tight ends, you focus on the defense, you focus on the team as a whole, it kind of takes all that outside noise and pressure of these individual awards and individual statistics and it puts it on, ‘OK, let’s win this week and let’s win the next week’ and so on.”
Big things are expected of Beck this season, and for good reason. After a year of seasoning and an off-season that has seen Beck attend the Manning Passing Academy and work almost daily with his current group of potential passing targets, his numbers should only increase in Year Two as a starter.
In his first season as a starter last year, he completed 72.4% of his passes for 3,941 yards and 24 touchdowns with just six interceptions. Though he lost some key pieces in NFL first-rounder Brock Bowers and second-rounder Ladd McConkey, the thought in Athens is there might be an even greater amount of skill-player talent surrounding Beck this year.
“Yeah, I think there’s so much depth on our offense, and there’s so much talent that there’s not one or two names that I could really point to right now, which makes me excited as a quarterback,” Beck said. “I’m very excited to see who those guys are going to be that step up and make those big-time plays and those big-time moments. We have a lot of big games coming up this year. So, who’s going to step up, who’s going to be that guy, who’s going to be the go-to guy, or is there one? Is everybody going to contribute equally, which is kind of what we saw last year. There’s a lot of guys that stepped up in different games and contributed.”
Credit: Chip Towers
Credit: Chip Towers
Beck said he believes the Bulldogs’ offensive line will the best in college football. Georgia added dynamic running back Trevor Etienne and All-Pac-12 tight end Ben Yurosek from Stanford.
Beck will have more tools at his hands besides. Division I football this year is allowing coach-to-player communication via microphones in helmets and access to video replay via sideline computer tablets.
Beck has been working with offensive coordinator Mike Bobo’s microphone in his helmet but did not know until Tuesday that iPad use has received final approval.
“I’m actually super-excited to hear about that; that’s super cool,” Beck said. “Going back and watching film this past year, I wish we’d had iPad’s on the sideline this past year. There are so many situations that happen in games that repeat and defensive coordinators repeat calls. So, being able to see those things and maybe having one step on a defensive coordinator, I think that’d be super-cool.”
As for the boisterous Bobo constantly being in his ear, Beck’s not so sure about that one.
“I don’t think he even realizes how loud he talks,” Beck said of his position coach. “He’ll be yelling, and I’ll literally take my helmet off and I can still hear him. I’ll take my helmet to the equipment guys and say, ‘Can y’all turn this down?’”
Beck also has made some physical improvements since last year, according to his head coach.
“Reports I’m getting from the weight room are he’s in the best shape he’s been in his career,” coach Kirby Smart said. “He’s a little bit lighter. He’s running well. I’ve seen some of his running stuff.
“But I feel comfortable with Carson because of how much he loves football and how much he likes to watch it and take wideouts out to throw with him. He checks all the boxes.”
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