Jordan Davis and Jalen Carter — the Georgia train wreckers and havoc makers of yesteryear — are about to unleash on the NFL this season.
Davis and Carter, who will line up beside one another on the interior of the Philadelphia Eagles defensive line, will be playing elevated snaps together this season with the retirement of veteran Fletcher Cox, per a Delaware online article.
Already, they are proving capable to the task.
Carter and Davis are dominating early fall practices in the same manner they wreaked havoc as part of Georgia’s historic 2021 defense, anchoring a unit that allowed only 6.8 points per game during the regular season — the fewest since 1986 Oklahoma.
Reporter Martin Frank shared a moment from a recent Eagles’ practice that Georgia football fans can easily visualize when reminiscing about the Bulldogs’ “No-Name” defense of yesteryear.
“So there was Carter, literally tossing aside (Eagles) center Cam Jurgens, then blowing past left guard Mekhi Becton to flush (Jalen) Hurts from the pocket,” Frank penned. “Hurts started running to his left, where Davis was giving chase after he had gotten past his man.”
It led to Hurts throwing incomplete to his former Alabama teammate, DeVonta Smith, who was out of bounds.
“There were a lot of bodies flying,” second-year player Carter said with a laugh, not wanting to share which offensive line teammates he had beaten on the play.
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Davis, now 6-foot-6 and 350 pounds, enters his third season in the best shape of his football life, continuing to build on a career Kirby Smart helped launch when he recruited him as a 3-star prospect out of Charlotte, N.C.
“When you’re not tired, you can bend a little more,” Carter told Frank. “When you get tired, that’s when you start to slack off in your technique and stuff like that.”
Current Georgia defensive tackles Nazir Stackhouse and Warren Brinson would do well to heed that lesson, as Smart and the Bulldogs desperately need them to have the best seasons of their respective careers in 2024.
Georgia dropped to No. 18 in the nation in run defense last season, a far cry from the top two ranking it had attained the previous five seasons with the likes of Carter, Davis and 2023 NFL Draft first-round defensive tackle Devonte Wyatt patrolling the A Gaps.
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Smart said he was pleased Stackhouse and Brinson elected to return for another season rather than turn pro as mid-round picks last April.
But, the Georgia head coach said, he didn’t want them coming back just for the sake of coming back.
The Bulldogs’ scheme gives its defensive tackles ample opportunities to make plays — part of the reason why projected first-round pick Mykel Williams takes snaps on the interior — as well as at end, and, this season on the edge — to change things up on offensive linemen.
Carter said as much in the recent Delaware Online article, explaining that a new defensive system orchestrated by new defensive coordinator Vic Fangio.
“We’re just excited to play in this scheme, moving a lot more,” Davis said. “We have a lot more opportunities to make plays … It just kind of feels familiar for us — me and Jalen — because that’s the kind of scheme that we played at Georgia.”
Carter, typically a man of few words, brings a renewed energy and confidence into the season — good news for the Eagles, and bad news for opponents.
“What’s new?” Carter asked rhetorically. “I’m about to show you on the field.
“I know what my potential is, and what I could do on the field is have a big impact.”
NFL quarterbacks will surely be aware, and many Georgia fans who follow Philadelphia — former UGA stars Nakobe Dean and Nolan Smith are projected starting linebackers, and Kelee Ringo has been getting first-team snaps at corner — will also be tuned in on Sundays.
