Now we’ve seen growth. Now there’s tangible evidence.

The last time Carson Beck was in this situation, with the starting quarterback job at Georgia in his grasp, he couldn’t handle the enormity of it all.

This time around? He was nearly flawless.

“Against our defense,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart says.

That should say plenty.

Two years ago, after starter JT Daniels sustained a core injury, Smart named Beck the starter for the Week 2 games against UAB. Beck practiced poorly all week, and Smart and then-offensive coordinator Todd Monken decided to go with Stetson Bennett — who won games in 2020 before Daniels got healthy and won the job over the last month of the season.

Bennett never gave up the job, winning back-to-back national titles and leaving for the NFL after last season.

This time around, Smart told Beck early last week that he had won the starting job, and Beck had most of the week to practice and prepare for an important 2nd scrimmage of fall camp. The scrimmage that typically sets the 2-deep depth chart.

Beck nailed the practice week, then came out and completed 26-of-35 passes for 310 yards and 4 TDs. And no interceptions.

If Beck had that type of response 2 years ago when he had the opportunity, he’d likely be in an NFL camp competing for a starting job — instead of preparing for his first season as a starter for Georgia.

But that more than likely will make this time around even sweeter. His team, his time — his chance to set a college football modern era record by leading Georgia to its 3rd straight national championship.

The last team to win 3 in a row was Minnesota in the 1930s, when they ran the single wing formation and the passing game was an afterthought. Now it’s everything.

Now Beck gets his chance with former Georgia offensive coordinator turned new OC Mike Bobo, where everything old is new again. The same Bobo who developed quarterbacks David Greene, DJ Shockley, Matthew Stafford and Aaron Murray.

The same Bobo whose pro style, play-action offense set Georgia and SEC passing records. A prototypical pocket passer, Beck couldn’t be a better fit for an offense.

“Carson is ahead of the other guys in terms of what he understands about the offense,” Smart said. “I was really impressed with the other 2 quarterbacks throughout camp and how far they’ve come in terms of improvement.”

There’s only 1 player improvement that mattered this fall camp, the 1 player who needed to embrace the role and squeeze the life out of it. Beck put in the work over the summer, then arrived at fall camp where no one could touch him.

He worked for 2 years to get to this point, never choosing the path of least resistance by hopping in the transfer portal and playing for another SEC team. A source close to Beck says he was “crushed” after losing the job 2 years ago during preparation for UAB, and decided then that he wasn’t leaving Georgia.

There’s only 1 quarterback; every other quarterback on the roster sits. But in an era where the position demands that players who aren’t starting leave for the portal to find a place where they can play, Beck is the rarity.

This is his 4th year in Athens, a season many elite quarterbacks of the game never reach because they leave early for the NFL. (Three QBs in Beck’s 2020 recruiting class already are there: Bryce Young, CJ Stroud and Anthony Richardson.) If all goes right, Beck will attempt more passes in 2 body bag games to begin the season (UT-Martin, Ball State) than he has his entire career (58 attempts).

It will be a season of firsts, on the road to finding a way to get Georgia back to the Playoff and in position to do the unthinkable.

— 1st SEC game (vs. South Carolina), Sept. 16.
— 1st SEC road game (at Auburn), Sept. 30.
— 1st Cocktail Party (in his hometown of Jacksonville), Oct. 28.
— 1st Clean, Old Fashioned Hate (at Georgia Tech), Nov. 25.

Those are the known entities — while those that aren’t are the key to the season.

How does Beck respond to his first road deficit in the 2nd half? How will he respond to adversity, and more important, to success?

How does he take all of the intangibles that Greene, Shockley, Stafford and Murray — and yes, Bennett — took multiple years to figure out, and cram them into 1 season with everything on the line?

Though Smart says he was impressed with all 3 quarterbacks, 1 staffer told Saturday Down South that Beck took control from the first day of camp, never regressed and “I’d be shocked if he didn’t have a big season.”

The common misconception of the past 2 seasons is Bennett was simply a caretaker of the offense, managing the unit and not screwing it up while the best defense in college football cleaned up any mistake. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In the 2 SEC Championship Games and Playoffs alone, Bennett had 22 TDs (3 rush) against only 3 interceptions. Georgia averaged 41.3 points per game in those 6 games.

Beck is replacing a Georgia legend, where the only acceptable response is to win it all again.

Earlier this summer at SEC Media Days, Georgia center Sedrick Van Pran said Beck has been “laser-focused” all offseason. He knows what awaits him.

“This is our team, a new team,” Van Pran said. “We haven’t won anything.”

Beck did. He won the starting quarterback job for the first time in 4 years.

That may end up being the easiest win of all.