Kirby Smart hasn’t hid from how Georgia goes about doling out dollars to its roster.

He wants veterans to make more than newcomers.

“I don’t want you to have to take a discount,” Smart recently told Josh Pate. “OK, a discount might be a little less than year one or two. We have we have traditionally paid our players junior and senior year as much as anybody at those positions. We don’t want to start [earlier] because I want you to earn it and work your way up.”

Smart acknowledges that route might hurt Georgia in recruiting. The 2026 recruiting cycle seems to reflect that. It was the first time Georgia signed a recruiting class that finished outside the top five of the 247Sports Composite rankings since Smart’s first class back in 2016. The Bulldogs had just two players finish in the top 50 of the player rankings, the fewest ever for a Smart signing haul.

Coming out of spring practice, it seems like the Bulldogs did a good job of identifying players who could fit and play immediately. Craig Dandridge, Tyriq Green, Khamari Brooks and Zykie Helton all had strong springs. None were viewed as top 50 overall prospects.

As for the top players on Georgia’s 2026 roster, most of them are in either their third or fourth seasons. KJ Bolden, Ellis Robinson, Nate Frazier and Chris Cole all signed as members of the 2024 recruiting class. Gunner Stockton is in his fifth year at Georgia and second as a starter.

Georgia’s 2026 team will be an older team compared to the one the Bulldogs had last season. Consider that Georgia started the year with only 10 members of the 2022 class on the roster and 13 players from the 2023 recruiting class.

This year, that number is up to 29 when you combine the number of players from the 2023 and 2024 recruiting classes on the Georgia roster. Georgia’s 2026 team will have 34 players with at least three years of experience in Athens. Last season, that number was just 25.

Part of the reason Georgia’s roster is a better reflection of its spending in 2026 is because it did a much better job of retaining talent with its 2024 class than it did with the 2023 group.

Going into last season, 13 of the 26 members of the 2023 recruiting class were no longer a part of the roster.

With the 2024 group, Georgia still has 23 of the 29 players it signed from the 2024 high school recruiting ranks. Georgia also has transfers London Humphreys and Xzavier McLeod entering their third seasons in Athens.

The gap between the two classes is particularly stark at the top. Georgia has not had just one of the 10 top 100 players it signed in the 2024 class depart the program before their third season in Athens. With the 2023 group, six of the 12 top-100 signees had already left Athens.

For as much fretting as there might about the state of Georgia’s current recruiting, the 2024 class was ranked first in the country. That collection of players, which Georgia has been able to keep together, is set to enter their season in Athens.

Georgia paid big to keep players like Bolden, Robinson and Frazier from entering the transfer portal. There was a kernel of truth when Smart ribbed Miami coach Mario Cristobal about sitting too close to Robinson at an award ceremony.

Robinson figures to be one of the best players in the country this coming season. We’ve often seen top recruits — CJ Allen and Monroe Freeling are examples from the 2023 class — have their best seasons in year three, before heading off to the NFL.

That is why it’s so important to keep recruiting classes together and retain talent on an annual basis. Georgia has done a better job with the 2024 class compared to the 2023 class to this point. That’s a big reason why there aren’t as many questions and concerns about Georgia this offseason compared to last offseason, even if it has made Georgia a bit boring to talk about from a national perspective.

Texas, Miami and LSU all spent big money to bring in new talent. With Georgia, it paid top dollar to keep its roster together. No SEC team had fewer players transfer out than Georgia’s 12. That offsets some concern about the Bulldogs also making the fewest additions in the transfer portal.

“We had some new guys on our roster,” Smart told Pate. “We had 26 new freshmen. We had eight new portals. So like with all that going on, we had new people. But at least we knew they were ours. And going through spring practice to me was much more enjoyable because you didn’t have this big dark cloud brewing of was he going to be here?”

Georgia still built a very successful team in 2025, as the Bulldogs won the SEC and made it back to the College Football Playoff. But Georgia has bigger goals and Smart knows it.

“Apparently, all we can do is win the SEC championship right now, so that’s not good enough,” Smart told Finebaum.

The Bulldogs are hoping that a more veteran team will set them up for even more success than they had a season ago. And that veteran element was acquired by keeping its one-time recruits in Athens for seasons three and four.