Graduate transfer Malik Zaire didn’t come to Florida to sit the bench. He said that much at the Florida Gators’ media day back in August.
The once Notre Dame quarterback graduated and waited for the SEC to back off a graduate transfer rule that would allow him to go to Florida. He passed up other opportunities, namely Wisconsin, Texas, North Carolina and Harvard.
Jim McElwain and Doug Nussmeier, despite Feleipe Franks’ inefficiency and poor play, gave Zaire a couple quarters against Michigan and then a couple of drives over a month later against Georgia.
That’s all. The lefty has thrown just 23 passes this season but that appears to be changing with interim head coach Randy Shannon. The once Miami head coach is getting a chance to run a program again and he’s doing it his way, opening up a quarterback battle, something that should have happened more than a month ago.
“Malik will take a period at 1s, and then the next time we go to another period Feleipe will take one. It’s good,” Shannon said Tuesday. “You see those guys compete, talking and communicating. The best thing about it is when you compete every day it brings the best out of you.”
Shannon hasn’t made a decision on which quarterback will play on Saturday. He’ll determine that Wednesday or Thursday but Zaire has to be encouraged by even getting an opportunity. Despite what McElwain has said publicly it was obvious that Franks was their starter. Poor performance after poor performance didn’t shake his confidence or stance.
Zaire has been patient. He came to Florida with aspirations of learning a pro-style system and getting an opportunity to put that on film with hopes of impressing a NFL team.
“He’s a good quarterback. That’s one of my best friends on the team. I’m excited to see what he can do for the rest of the season. I’ve always been excited about what he can do.”
The Gators are currently 3-4 with four game left. They need to win three more games to earn bowl eligibility — although there is a chance they could go to a bowl game at 5-6 based on the school’s APR score.
Shannon and the team have see what the offense can do with Franks and it’s a 3-4 record. Florida owes it to itself, to Zaire and to the fans to give the graduate transfer a shot to lead the team.