Florida’s 2021 offense will go far if the offensive line is able to remain functional. It’s still not completely settled with a possible fall lineup change in the offing compared to the spring, so it’ll be an ongoing focus of concern for the third straight season.
Beyond those well-trod worries, what are the biggest questions for Dan Mullen’s offense in the new season? Here are the three major ones heading into the season.
Quarterback
We know Emory Jones will run more and throw less than Kyle Trask did. How exactly the balance will work out is the big question. Jones’s accuracy, along with the ability of his targets to get open and haul in passes, will go a long way towards determining the mix. So will the number of RPOs and whether defenses prefer to live and die by the R or the P.
One big factor is about Mullen’s reflections on the pass-centric offense he put together for Trask the last two seasons. You could tell at times when the head coach was wanting to lean on his run game, often to no avail behind a line that couldn’t run block much. The pass worked spectacularly well last year even without a good run game to balance it, and there’s no reason why Jones couldn’t do some of the newer things that Trask did.
Here’s how I try to triangulate things. Is Jones a better rusher than Feliepe Franks? Absolutely. Franks’s one full season starting for Mullen saw him throw 322 times against 110 combined rushes and sacks (sorry, I don’t have sack figures split out of the rushing attempts). A knee-jerk reaction would be to saw that Jones will have more rushes and fewer passes than Franks did.
Well, maybe. You know who threw more times in 13 games than Franks did? Nick Fitzgerald and his 54.3% completion rate in 2016. He had 361 tosses that year. The next season, Fitz threw just 286 times in 13 games. His backup in 2017 did have 20 more attempt than his backup in 2016, but that’s not enough to cover the 75-attempt drop year-over-year.
The difference was that the ’16 Bulldogs weren’t that good, eking out a postseason bid at 5-7 thanks to a high APR. The 2017 Bulldogs, armed with a vastly improved defense, went 9-4. A struggling team will tend to throw more than a good one. As Aaron Schatz of Football Outsiders memorably put it, “You run when you win, not win when you run.”
If Florida’s defense doesn’t improve a lot over last year, Jones will have a higher pass count as the Gators find themselves in closer contests than expected all year. If the D does improve and UF can go into fourth quarters against the 2021 season’s second-tier opponents like Kentucky, Missouri, and FSU with leads, then he’ll throw less as Mullen will try to use the run to close out games.
Just as instructive is the two starting seasons by one Rayne Dakota Prescott. Dak threw 396 times in 2014 with a 1,200-yard rusher by his side. In 2015, with three underwhelming tailback options sharing carries, he threw 477 times.
UF’s glut of great backs should tend to push Jones’s pass attempt figure downward. A defensive improvement will do that as well. Another sub-Gator Standard defense would do the opposite, and the general advantage that passing has — along with the lessons Mullen learned crafting offenses for Trask — would tend to make the pass numbers rise as well.
Where all those factors find equilibrium will determine how often Jones puts the ball in the air this fall.
Running back
Despite Florida going pass-heavy and only playing 12 games last year, the 2020 season was only the fourth time in 12 years that Mullen as a head coach had three running backs get at least 50 carries: Dameon Pierce (106), Malik Davis (66), and Nay’Quan Wright (54). The other seasons when that happened were 2010, 2016, and 2018. Pierce’s was by far the lowest total for a leader in this kind of platoon, but the feat still occurred.
The carry distribution was most similar to that of 2010, when Mullen similarly had one back with a clear lead over the rest and a secondary back with a clear lead over the third guy. In ’16 there was one running back who was by far the top rusher with a near-tie for a very distant second. Then in ’18, Lamical Perine and Jordan Scarlett basically tied for first with Pierce having about half either of their rush totals.
In other words there are several different models of how this season might go, but Mullen has never had five promising options at once. Davis playing some slot receiver could help break the logjam, as would playing more two-back sets. Mullen could also go entirely situational.
Using Pierce’s own assessment of the room, the Gators could use the versatile Davis and Wright early to keep defenses off balance, transition into employing Lorenzo Lingard and Demarkcus Bowman as speed guys to try to hit big plays to stay in games or extend leads, and then hit them with the “bruiser” of Pierce down the stretch when the defense is tired to close out games.
How Mullen handles this group is the single biggest mystery about the offense heading into the season. It’s not a question of whether there’s something there but how to handle arguably too many good options, and if someone like a Lingard or Bowman doesn’t end up in the regular rotation, will he stick around or leave?
Receiver and tight end
Despite Mullen being a long-time devotee to the run game, the best of his attacks have been flying circuses. The more genuine pass targets on the field, the better the whole thing works regardless of whether the current play is on the ground or in the air.
All signs point to Jacob Copeland being ready to take over the true No. 1 receiver role. The youth are impressing with Daejon Reynolds a bright spot in the fall and Nick Elksnis and Marcus Burke showing promise in the fall.
Last year was something of an anomaly on this front with a generational talent at tight end and a future first-rounder with truly unique moves at receiver. Even as those two soaked up most of the attention, though, five other players averaged at least a catch-and-a-half per game. It was rather a lot like Mullen’s 2015 offense at Mississippi State with the best receiver in program history Fred Ross and size mismatch De’Runnya Wilson way out ahead but five guys hitting that same catch threshold. In both instances, a running back (Davis, Brandon Holloway) was third on the team in receptions.
It’s not hard to imagine, though, something like the 2019 season in terms of distribution. Van Jefferson (49 catches, led team in yardage) and Pitts (54 catches) were the top two guys, though by a smaller margin. Three players had at least 30 catches, and three more had at least 20. Toney might’ve also gotten to 20 had he not missed significant time to injury.
Copeland figures to be the focal point in ’21, but there is a long list of players in competition to be the next guy. If Kemore Gamble really is going to be the best tight end in the SEC as Tim Brewster predicted earlier this week, maybe it’ll be him. Xavier Henderson has the highest ceiling among the wideouts, while Justin Shorter played extensively last year and is a big dude.
Those guys plus Davis have a good chance to be the top five players on the team in receptions, but there are other receivers like Trent Whittemore, longtime Jones practice squad target Rick Wells, and speed threat Ja’Markis Weston who will see the field plenty. Then there are other non-receivers like Keon Zipperer, Wright, and eventually Elksnis who will get some targets, and then there are the up-and-comers of Jaquavion Fraziars, Reynolds, and Burke.
The regular receiver rotation will probably go at least six deep, the tight ends may go three or even four deep depending on Jonathan Odom’s progress, and some running backs have earned real targets. It’s a lot of mouths to feed, and it’s easy to to assume that anyone under a certain experience level, Henderson aside, will simply not get much action.
There being maybe too many options here as at running back is a good problem to have, but it’s a usage balance and roster management challenge to keep everyone happy and developing. UF is in a good spot with Mullen, Billy Gonzales, and Brewster managing these positions, but how the ultimate distribution goes is an open question.
Biggest unknown is the play of the OL.
We know Jones can play.
We know the RBs have game.
The question really is are they going to be using their energies dodging defensive players 4 yards behind the line of scrimmage or running through holes into the secondary.