By Will Miles
Golden hired
Nobody can accuse Scott Stricklin of not being prepared or being able to make his mind. After the rapid targeting of Billy Napier after Dan Mullen was jettisoned, Stricklin did it again by bringing in Todd Golden after the departure of Mike White.
On the surface, Golden looks a lot like White; a promising young coach who has had some success at a lower-level school now making the jump to the SEC. But in other ways, Golden looks much different.
White cut his teeth under Rod Barnes and Andy Kennedy at Ole Miss. He got a reputation as a good recruiter as an assistant but the question in Gainesville has been more X’s and O’s. Interestingly, if you look at Barnes since he left Ole Miss, he has an overall record of 45-80 at Georgia State and 172-171 at Cal State Bakersfield. Kennedy has had more success at his next stop, going 49-15 at UAB.
Similarly, Golden took over for Kyle Smith at San Francisco when Smith moved on to Washington State. Thus far, Smith has a 51-43 record in Pullman. Goldman also has two good seasons (22-11 and 24-10) at San Francisco and one poor season (11-14).
But this is a cultural hire more than anything. Both Smith and Golden are well known for using advanced statistics and analytics to make decisions. That’s something that Mike White was consistently – and rightly – criticized for not getting right. That means that Florida should have an edge over its opponents it didn’t last year without having to add any additional talent.
But that’s still the question for Golden. You can have all the advanced stats you want, but if you come up against three lottery picks when you play Kentucky, you’re still going to lose. Florida now has a coach who will give it the little edges on the court, but whether that will translate to recruiting is the open question.
Spring game date change
There have been a few missteps by the Napier regime recently. Fans were excited about the return of the Orange and Blue Debut (and still are!) but it was announced last week that the game is being moved to Thursday, April 14 at night instead of Saturday, April 16 at 1pm.
The original date, announced back in late January, always confused me. I know not everyone who loves the Gators celebrates Easter, but I imagine there were a bunch of people like me who looked at the date and immediately decided to stay home because of other obligations the next day. Others however, reserved hotel rooms and made plans to make it up to Gainesville for the game.
That’s why I get the consternation of the game being moved. I think Thursday is a better day for the game. Students will still be on campus, recruits are heading into a long weekend and Florida can have the night to itself as far as televised spring games.
But this game isn’t really about the players. It’s about the dads and sons who attend without having to worry about late bedtimes, drunk belligerent fans and the cost of leaving midway through the second quarter when junior gets hot or tired. I just went through this three years ago with my own son.
So I get why it was changed. I think it’s good for recruiting. I’m at the forefront of wanting Napier to improve that aspect of the program. But it’s good to remember that the people grousing about the change have legitimate reasons to be doing so, especially that dad who now has to tell his boy that he’ll have to wait another year to see the Gators play in person.
Emoji-Gate
The other “controversy” to hit Napier is his use of Twitter emojis. In case you missed it, over the weekend there were a bunch of elite-level recruits on campus. Napier tweeted an emoji with sunglasses, something that made everybody think a commitment was coming. Then, Napier doubled down, doing it again two days later.
Yet still, we haven’t heard anything from a recruit about committing to Florida, leaving some fans disappointed at the signaling without the result.
I don’t really care what Napier decides to communicate on Twitter. But it’s a departure from the Napier who took over the program in December, preaching patience and really trying to underpromise so he could then overdeliver. He did so early on with the commitments of Kamari Wilson, Devin Moore and Trevor Etienne. But the misses on Harold Perkins and Jacoby Mathews on National Signing Day mean that his ability to recruit to the level we know he needs to do is still an open question. That’s neither good nor bad, just unanswered.
The number of elite recruits coming onto campus is impressive. Some of those are going to translate into commits. But until they do, there will be a subset of people who read too much into everything. After all, there are multiple websites whose business models are predicated on recruiting news.
Just like everything in life though, if Napier delivers, all will be forgiven. But slip up, and this will be brought up again come February. Like I said, it’s certainly a different approach.
A.J. Harris
One of the players rumored to be attached to one of those emojis was 5-star corner A.J. Harris. That would be a huge get for the Gators.
I say that not just because Harris is a 5-star player. I also say that also not because he’s a player who is attending high school in Alabama (though taking players from that state is a huge plus). I say it because Florida seems to be in pretty good position with fellow 5-star corner Cormani McClain from Lakeland.
That would mean that in 12 months, Napier would have completely reshaped the defensive back room. The addition of Corey Raymond as coach was something we thought would pay dividends, but to have three players in the top-44 nationally in Harris, McClain and 2022 signee Kamari Wilson would really set the baseline for the return of DBU.
For fans who have watched Florida’s defense get torched the last couple of years, that would be an embarrassment of riches.
Of course, Napier still has to close the deal. It’s easy to forget, but it seemed like Dan Mullen was in on a lot of elite players right when he got to Gainesville, but those players never really chose Gainesville. I think Napier is going to be different, but until we see it, I understand the hesitation. Harris would be a great start.
Culture Change
One thing that we did hear repeatedly out of the weekend was that the culture in Gainesville is now completely different under Napier.
That’s not a surprise given the toxic nature of the program that was described after Mullen let Grantham and Hevesy go (most prominently by Saturday Down South’s Neil Blackmon). It also isn’t a surprise given the article in The Athletic that essentially called the team soft. Nobody on the outside wants to join a team where players are having their toughness questioned from the outside.
A fresh start was good, but what Napier is able to do with that fresh start is going to go a long way. The biggest thing I heard from various players is how individually involved Napier is with each players’ recruitment. That’s a huge deal given how Mullen did not seem fully invested in the recruiting process, at least at times.
Again, I’m wary to assign too much credence to a full culture change until the commitments start rolling in, but having a coach who is prioritizing recruiting, meeting with high school coaches and making players feel welcome is a good start. That’s really all you can ask at this point.
Collectives and NIL
You might have seen the article in the Orlando Sentinel by Mike Bianchi titled “College football’s latest scam: Getting fans to pay players via NIL collectives.” I found this one interesting because Bianchi is advancing a commentary that I’ve put in these notes over the past month or so: it seems galling that programs should ask their paying fans to then support what essentially amounts to their products’ payroll.
Of course, the fact that the Sentinel is behind a paywall does make the argument ring a little bit hollow. But that’s sort of the point. There is a business model here where everyone makes money. The mom & pop stores in Gainesville do well on game day. The hotels are full every Friday before a home game. Newspapers sell content based on having news and opinions about the team that are differentiated.
But each of those businesses pays its employees to provide those goods and services.
Far be it from me to defend the Orlando Sentinel. I obviously believe there is a need for alternative media out there, otherwise I wouldn’t have started my own website. But we all see the giant TV contracts that these schools are inking, the huge contracts the coaches are getting and somehow, it is the booster’s job to ensure the school is competitive with recruits.
I have no issue with the idea behind the Gator Collective. I’m glad there are people who support the university to the level that they feel good about contributing. And I’m glad that money ends up with the kids who are out there doing the yeoman’s work on the field.
I just wish that was a much smaller portion of the pie going the players’ way.
Jones enters transfer portal
After saying that Billy Napier recruited him back to Florida after he had already decided to enter the transfer portal after the Gasparilla Bowl, Emory Jones announced this week that he is headed to the transfer portal after all.
That announcement wasn’t really a surprise. I noted here last week that I expected Jones would probably move on after the spring. That it happened after just three practices was really the only surprise.
Jones has been nothing but classy for his tenure at Florida, and his commitment to Florida coincided with me starting my own site, so in some ways, his departure strikes me in a little bit different way. He was the hope when Mullen came in that things were about to change. He chose Florida instead of Ohio State. He was a dual-threat QB who seemed to fit Mullen’s offense perfectly.
And then things all came crashing down to the tune of 13 interceptions and ugly losses to Kentucky, LSU, Georgia and especially South Carolina. It was the South Carolina game that sealed Grantham and Hevesy’s fates, but it really sealed Dan Mullen’s too. He survived until the Missouri loss, but the tide had turned at that point on Mullen as well.
Through it all though, Jones remained remarkably upbeat. His relationship with Anthony Richardson could have been strained but we haven’t gotten a whiff of that to this point. He endured much of the ridicule that Feleipe Franks did in 2017 and 2018, but he didn’t tell his own crowd to quiet down when he scored.
Instead, he quietly went about his business. Perhaps that isn’t the leadership that the 2021 Florida team needed, but it definitely seems true to who Emory Jones is. I’m not sure where Emory Jones is going to end up next fall, but I’m not sure that matters. I wish him all the luck in the world, but if the point of college is to teach you how to deal with adversity and come out stronger, I’d say mission accomplished.
That doesn’t mean a statue or a brick outside the stadium, but that’s not the only way to define a win.
End of the Mullen era
Jones leaving really does put a cap on the Mullen era. That 2018 class that contained Jones now is only represented by Richard Gouraige, Amari Burney, Trey Dean, David Reese, Dante Zanders and Griffin McDowell. The only star to come from that class (and he was a supernova) is Kyle Pitts.
The 2019 class still has a few solid players left behind (Ethan White and Kingsley Eguakun come to mind), but with Kaiir Elam, Mohamoud Diabate and Ty’Ron Hopper leaving, the chances of any true stars coming from that class are relatively limited.
In some ways that’s a good thing. Even while Kyle Trask was succeeding in 2019 and then especially in 2020, it was concerning that Mullen was having to rely so heavily on Jim McElwain’s recruits. I mean, both the leading tackler (Ventrell Miller) and the leading receiver (Kadarius Toney) in 2020 were Mac recruits, excelling a full three years after McElwain was gone.
It seems somewhat sad, but the health of the program relies on there being turnover and younger players getting a chance to displace some of the established starters. That’s why recruits like Wilson, McClain and Harris are so important. I think Tre’Vez Johnson played pretty well last year. I though Rashad Torrence was excellent at times. But if they are fifth year seniors leading the team in tackles three years from now, we have issues.
Baseball takes 2 of 3 from Alabama
Florida’s baseball team went into Tuscaloosa and took 2 of 3 from Alabama over the weekend. Combined with a 3-2 win over Bethune Cookman on Tuesday night and the Gators are now at 16-5 overall, and 2-1 in the conference after the Alabama series.
The loss to the Tide came on a walk-off after giving up 3 runs in the last two innings after going into the bottom of the 8th with a 7-5 lead. This after Florida gave up 3 runs in the bottom of the ninth in the opener (a 6-4 win) after getting 8 innings of one-run ball from Hunter Barco.
This is starting to become a trend. The Gators gave up six runs in the 9th inning of a 11-9 win against Seton Hall. That before falling to the Pirates the next day 6-4 while surrendering 5 walks and 2 HBP. The last two games against Alabama included 9 walks and 2 HPB.
You just can’t give teams that many free bases and expect to prevent runs effectively. Combine that with the four errors the Gators made in the three games and you’re going to have to outscore some people. Against Seton Hall and Alabama, the Gators averaged 9.5 runs per game, but they surrendered 6.2. Based on that spread, you’d expect them to win about 70% of their games.
Lo and behold, they’ve gone 4-2.
Softball takes 2 of 3 from Texas A&M
Florida softball took 2 of 3 from Texas A&M over the weekend. That follows up taking 2 of 3 from Mississippi State the weekend before. Just as with baseball, anytime you take a series in the conference, that’s not anything to sneeze at.
But, Texas A&M is now 17-10 and 1-5 in the SEC. Mississippi State is 19-10 (4-2 SEC). These are good, but not great, teams. At 25-3 (.893), this Florida team is ahead of last year’s pace (45-11, .804) overall. But the vast majority of the losses last season (all but one by my count) came against ranked opponents. A&M and Mississippi State don’t fit that description.
It’s not time to panic, but I would be a little bit concerned. The fact that the 5-0 loss to A&M came after giving up 4 runs on a grand slam in the first inning is one thing. But the fact that two of the runners were on because of walks to start is another.
I think this is a really good team, but we’re about to find out how good. Ten of the next 13 games rae coming against ranked teams, with Florida State and Alabama both ranked in the top-5. Florida is currently ranked 4th. We’ll know soon whether they deserve that.