5-star running back says commitment to UGA isn’t about the money. Here’s why.

“I’ve seen the comments,” Spell said. “I know what some are thinking. But I don’t react to them. That’s just not my place.”

The fans are not out of bounds in their thinking. Georgia has traditionally not been competitive in the financial races for the nation’s elite running back prospects over the last several years. Georgia has signed just one of the nation’s top three running back prospects (current junior Nate Frazier) since James Cook and Zamir White became Bulldogs in 2018.

There’s also the matter of the schools that have won those bidding wars. There is a segment of the fan base that worries about those programs offering a market-resetting sum for the 5-foot-10, 212-pound rising senior. They’ll see the 1,755 yards and 32 touchdowns he put up last fall despite missing five games and cut an even bigger check.

Spell did average 12.9 yards per carry last season. If he signs, Spell will be the highest-rated running back commit of the Kirby Smart era in Athens.

That’s if a Miami, Notre Dame, Penn State, or USC doesn’t swoop in right before it is time to put pen to paper.

“Uh-huh,” Spell said while soaking all of that in. “I’ve seen it.”

What does Spell have to say about that?

“I want you guys to know that I’m not going to Georgia for the money. I’m going to Georgia to be a Dawg and win a national championship.”

Spell said that he’d probably be committed to Georgia right now even if James Franklin never got fired from Penn State, the in-state school he was committed to last season.

“I feel like I made that decision too early in my recruitment,” Spell said. “I feel like this is the right time. I’m home. I’m a Dawg.”

Every prospect seems to have a different version of the term “committed” these days. What will “committed” look like for Spell?

Spell said he will take his official visit to Georgia on May 29, but that won’t be the only official visit weekend he will attend.

Look for him to be back in Athens this spring on multiple official visit weekends for other priority targets. The 5-star wants to take that matter seriously to help build Georgia’s class of 2027 around him.

“I am committed committed,” he said. “I have canceled all my other visits to get down to Athens every week in June. Basically. So for all the fans out there, yes, I am ‘committed committed,’ and I love Georgia.”

Spell, who has no intentions of visiting other schools, insists that “it’s not the money part for me.”

“I have three checklist boxes that I go by with every school I go to,” Spell said. “I want to be coached hard. I want to be treated like family and the money is last for me.”

When he visited UGA two weekends ago, he wasn’t planning on committing even though Georgia was the runaway leader in his recruitment. He was either going to commit in July or December of this year.

“I got there,” he said. “I got to see it all there to see it was a great program. We sat down and went over the guys they got drafted, what they did through the season, the prostyle offense plays that the NFL runs.”

“I sat down and actually saw what Georgia is. It felt like home. I was being loved on every time I went there. And then after that, we had the money conversation. I told Georgia specifically I didn’t want no money conversations until I felt like I was home. And we just had that conversation before I left after that weekend when I committed.”

On his flight back home to western Pennsylvania, Spell knew it was time to make his decision public.

“It’s a great situation for the running back room. So we get off the plane and then a couple of days after, I get on the phone with coach Kirby and made it official.”