The Georgia Bulldogs football program has become the best in the nation the last two seasons. After not winning a national title since 1980, the school in Athens, Georgia, has won back-to-back College Football Playoff national championships — their latest coming in January of this year.
Over the weekend, the team opened up defense of its back-to-back titles with a resounding 48-7 win against a completely overmatched UT-Martin squad.
Per reports, as the team prepared to take on the Skyhawks, team staffer and former Bulldogs star Jarvis Jones was arrested on Friday night, Sept. 1, for speeding and reckless driving.
The incident is the latest in what has become an unfortunate and recurring theme in and around the Athens campus.
On Monday, head coach Kirby Smart released a statement on the matter, keeping it pretty short and to the point.
“There will be internal discipline. It’s a personnel matter, and I really can’t comment further on it,” according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Bulldogs Have Been In The News For This Type Stuff Way Too Often
Jones’ arrest is the latest in a string of arrests and even deaths caused by speeding and reckless driving that involved someone from the Bulldogs program. In May, wide receiver Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint was arrested for speeding and reckless driving; as a result he was suspended from this past weekend’s season opener.
In January following the team’s second consecutive national championship win, a player, Devin Willock and staffer Chandler LeCroy were killed in a high-speed accident near Athens. In totality, a member of the football program reportedly either has been cited or arrested a whopping 14 times since the deaths of Willock and LeCroy.
During SEC media days, an exasperated Smart pretty much told reporters that UGA isn’t the only school getting traffic tickets and that he couldn’t eradicate speeding. Maybe not, but no other program is getting them for these type of charges, and definitely not at this rate of basically two per month since January.
Jones Just Received High Honor In August
Jones isn’t far removed from being inducted into school’s Circle of Honor. It is considered the highest honor someone associated with the athletic program can receive, to “pay tribute to extraordinary student-athletes and coaches whose performance has brought honor to the school.” For Jones, this completely contradicts that honor.
Jones played under former Bulldogs coach Mark Richt from (2010-12), and still holds the school record for sacks in a season (14.5) and tackles for loss (24.5). Jones was taken with the 17th pick of the 2013 NFL Draft, but after five seasons (four with the Steelers and one with the Cardinals), he retired following the 2017 season after being released with an injury settlement by the Cardinals.
