Bobo Looking to "Figure Out The Pieces" to Georgia's Offense

New Georgia Offensive Coordinator Mike Bobo is using fall camp to determine what shape the Bulldog offense will take in 2023.

Much has been made of Mike Bobo's promotion to Georgia's offensive coordinator position following the departure of Todd Monken to the NFL. Considering the potency and effectiveness of the Georgia offense under Monken, the offseason was filled with questions about whether Bobo could maintain Georgia's newfound offensive excellence and how the offense would change under a new coordinator. Speaking with the media on Thursday for the first time in his second stint as Georgia's offensive coordinator, Bobo addressed many of those questions surrounding his promotion. 

While concerns about Bobo implementing changes to an offense that finished the 2022 season inside the top-5 nationally in total offense, yards/play, and scoring offense en route to a second-consecutive national championship have been multitudinous within the Georgia fan base since the former Georgia quarterback was tabbed to replace Monken, Bobo insists the changes to the offense were inevitable regardless of who was charged with directing Georgia's 2023 offense.

"Each year you try to figure out your identity as an offense. Whether I was sitting there at coordinator or Coach Monken came back, you have to figure out what pieces of the puzzle fit to what things that we did well last year and figure out what changed. Darnell was such a big impact for us, not necessarily just blocking in-line but also being able to block on the perimeter, Stetson's ability to move - we've got to figure out the pieces that fit best for us offensively and that's part of what fall camp is about."

During fall camp, those outside the program are often fixated on the competition between the Georgia offense and defense, but according to Bobo, it is the competition between the offense's various skill groups that is far more relevant to the shape that the Georgia offense ultimately assumes this season.

"Day one in the first meeting we talk about competition to our players and building depth, but it's not competition necessarily going against the defense, it's competition between position groups. There's competition between the tight ends and the receivers. Are our tight ends going to step up and we're still going to be a lot of 12 or are we going to have to be more 11? Those are the things that you're figuring out through camp, and at the end of the day, you have to put the best guys on the field to give you the best chance to be successful, and then we want to build depth."

With the Bulldogs only one week into fall camp, there is still plenty of work to be done before the Bulldogs settle on an identity, but Bobo feels as though the pieces are already starting to come together.

"We've got a good feel for it right now, but we've still got to go play on Saturday in a scrimmage and fine tune things the next 8-9 days until the second scrimmage is over.”

The competition between Georgia's skill players will rage on over the next two weeks as the shape of the Bulldogs 2023 offense continues to take form.