Why are fans obsessed with Stetson Bennett?

Despite no career NFL games, Rams fans seem obsessed with QB Stetson Bennett

Stetson Bennett is probably the first quarterback who can confidently say that he had to win two national championships to get respect. Now that he’s entering his second year in the NFL, but in many ways is still a rookie, it seems that Bennett is not just surviving on reputation…He’s thriving on the mystery of being a drafted quarterback who could still have a future with the Los Angeles Rams, as both Sean McVay and Les Snead have given positive remarks on his return before the franchise opted to draft zero quarterbacks in 2024.

Or could just as easily make as many game day rosters as Eric Crouch did.

Regardless of Bennett’s past or future, his present suggests that Rams fans remain enamored with the former Georgia walk-on who helped the Bulldogs win the national championship in both 2021 and 2022. Whenever we write a new story on Stetson Bennett here at Turf Show Times, whether the news is small or really small (because there hasn’t really been a “big” Bennett story since he was placed on the NFI list last season), many thousands of fans huddle together at the website to read the latest updates.

More than the number of page views that would we might get for a story about starting quarterback Matthew Stafford or new backup Jimmy Garropolo. More than Sean McVay or Les Snead would get in most stories that don’t mention Stetson Bennett.

So what is it Rams fans? WHY do you love Stetson Bennett so much?

Reasons fans might be obsessing over Bennett

He’s a QB

Quarterbacks rule the sport and command the most attention when it comes to the media and fan interest. Mock drafts center their headlines around how many QBs go in the first round. ESPN, PFF, and all other outlets will track the progress of quarterbacks after the draft more than all other positions combined. The Falcons drafting Michael Penix commanded ten times the interest than if a team had drafted any other player in the top-10 who was blocked at his position.

He’s a national champion x2

Though I can’t say that Bennett made headlines in college to the extent of Tim Tebow, Johnny Manziel, or Cam Newton, he still won two national championships. Football fans don’t usually doubt that Bennett won those titles because of Georgia’s defense, but he was still on the biggest college football stage in back-to-back years. It doesn’t matter if he’s the first pick like Cam or a fourth round pick like himself, he’s still going to have those college football fans following him for his entire career and after his career is over.

He’s mysterious

What HAPPENED to Stetson Bennett in 2023? We still don’t know the full story. Bennett entered the 2023 draft with some questions about his character, then had a backup job all but handed to him as long as he didn’t tank his opportunity. By all accounts and without transparency on the part of the Rams, what other choice do we have but to assume Bennett lost focus last season? He was placed on the Non-Football Injury list and no comments were made to the reason why, but now he’s back with the team in offseason meetings and workouts. Bennett has lost the backup job to Garoppolo already, but the team still needs him to step up with Garoppolo suspended for two games.

Waiting to hear ANY piece of relevant news explaining his absence and where he’s been could also drive more interest to updates and stories about Bennett.

One thing that I know is NOT driving interest in Stetson Bennett is NFL performance. He hasn’t had any and his preseason appearances in 2023 were bad enough to think that skeptics might be right regarding his size and arm strength holding him back from being a pro quarterback, among other things like decision making, which might have been his biggest weakness in the 2023 preseason.

Still, fans like Stetson Bennett news regardless of how he does and like all quarterbacks, he will get more credit than he’s due because he’s a quarterback. If you believe in Bennett, it’s the team that sucks. If you don’t believe in Bennett, then he must be the one who is doing poorly. That’s fandom.

And it’s fandom that seems to be driving up Stetson Bennett’s stock even when he’s not around.