By Will Miles
The Power of the Players
I’ve been wondering when players would finally realize that they have the ultimate power, even in college football. I didn’t think it would be a t-shirt to make it clear to everyone.
Oklahoma State running back Chuba Hubbard tweeted on Monday about his head coach – Mike Gundy – appearing in a photo with the One America News Network logo on it. His quote on Twitter was the following:
“I will not stand for this. This is completely insensitive to everything going on in society, and it’s unacceptable. I will not be doing anything with Oklahoma State until things CHANGE.”
This was followed up by tweets of support by Hubbard’s teammates.
I’m not here to debate whether Hubbard should have reacted the way he did. I’m also not here to debate whether Gundy should be able to wear that t-shirt with or without consequences.
What I find interesting is that Hubbard just revealed exactly how much power star players in the NCAA actually have. Hubbard is an All-American who ran for 2094 yards last season. Gundy filmed a video with Hubbard later in the day acknowledging the sensitivity of these issues both because Hubbard is his best player and because losing Hubbard would have meant losing his entire team.
Now, not every segment of players is going to be united around an issue like most players are united by this particular issue. But the days where players are told what to do by their coach are quickly coming to an end.
Just imagine if players before the playoff championship game decided to stage a sit-in unless they were compensated? Imagine if players refused to play in the NCAA Tournament unless they were given the right to collectively bargain.
We just recently had the passage of a rights and likeness law in Florida that is going to change college sports significantly. But the incident with Hubbard on Monday shows, that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the power the players now wield.
Rights and Likeness Law
As I mentioned, a law was passed in Florida that gives players the right to make money off of their likenesses while in college. Gone are the days where Tim Tebow’s face will be plastered all over the Swamp while he is unable to make a dime on his own.
Players like Tebow aren’t who I’m concerned about though. Tebow was always going to make money outside of football based on the following that he built at Florida and his legend status. Instead, this law is going to really help stars who aren’t really legends.
In extreme cases, that means compensation for guys like Marcus Lattimore or Tyrone Prothro, players who had an opportunity at significant pro careers but who were injured in college. In less extreme cases, it means compensation for guys like Brandon James or Earl Everett, critical players to the Gators success under Urban Meyer, but not significant professional contributors.
I do think this is going to add some interesting dynamics to programs. I’ve long thought that scholarships overvalued back-up and third string players while undervaluing starters. It will be fascinating to see where the likeness money ends up, and whether some programs are going to be able to leverage the new rule more than others.
Mullen the TD Generator
David Wunderlich wrote a thought provoking piece on the Gators based on a tweet by Connor O’Gara looking at QBs with 100 TDs in the SEC. There are eight, and four have been coached by Dan Mullen (Chris Leak, Tim Tebow, Dak Prescott and Nick Fitzgerald).
The long and short of Wunderlich’s piece was that Mullen runs his QBs in a way that other coaches either can not or are not willing to do, which leads to rushing TDs. The other factor is that each of those QBs stayed in school through their senior season.
This creates a bit of a catch-22. Mullen is clearly going to make you productive if you’re a QB. But he’s also going to run you quite a bit, exposing you to injury. And even his can’t miss, 5-star QB (Tebow) stayed for four seasons.
It makes for quite an interesting recruiting pitch. “Come to Florida and you’re going to be great, but you’re also not going to the pros until after your senior year with more injury risk than a traditional program.”
I happen to think the trade-off is worth it in some instances. If you’re just good through the air, Mullen is going to make you fantastic when he adds the running component to your game. And even if you’re limited (i.e. Feleipe Franks and Nick Fitzgerald), the addition of the running portion of the gameplan will open things up to help the team win games.
Of course, both Franks and Fitzgerald suffered significant lower leg injuries running that offense so this way of playing clearly is high risk, high reward.
Kyle Pitts – All American
Gator tight end Kyle Pitts was named a preseason Walter Camp First Team All American.
Pitts certainly earned the honor, putting up 54 catches for 649 yards, and really stepping up when Kyle Trask took over at QB. With Trask back, the expectation is that Pitts is going to take another step forward.
Pitts is a match-up nightmare. But ironically, that might be why he doesn’t live up to the first team honors. Mullen is a master at getting players into matchups that favor them. Last season, he had the luxury of Freddie Swain, Van Jefferson and even Lamical Perine out on the edge to open things up for Pitts on the inside.
Oftentimes, the defense last season decided to risk leaving Pitts open in favor of preventing the wide receivers from running wild. But often, the defense decided to focus on Pitts (think 2nd half vs. LSU), opening up things on the outside.
Florida has a less experienced receiving corps coming back in 2020. Kadarius Toney, Trevon Grimes and Jacob Copeland have a lot of ability, but they don’t have the pedigree of Swain, Jefferson and Cleveland, at least not yet.
You had better believe that teams are going to gameplan for Pitts in a way that they didn’t last season, especially early on. That means I think there is an opportunity for someone like Copeland or Grimes to have a huge season because of Pitts, even if Pitts’ individual numbers are somewhat down.
The Tennessee Mirage
The “Tennessee’s back” articles are coming. You know they are.
The Vols are currently ranked 3rd nationally in recruiting for the 2021 class, 1st in the SEC. But that is a mirage. The Vols 247Sports average is 89.96 with a nearly full (24 commits) class. Last season, that same average was 89.92, good enough for 10th nationally and 7th in the SEC. That’s pretty much where they’re going to end up.
The Vols went 8-5 last season, improving from the 5-7 season in 2018. The Vols were undoubtedly a better team last season, but that 8-5 record is also a mirage, but maybe not for the reasons you think.
Most people cite the level of competition that Tennessee played towards the end of the year. After losing to Alabama on October 19, Tennessee ran off six straight wins against South Carolina, UAB, Kentucky, Missouri, Vanderbilt and Indiana. But that 6-0 run also included three one-score victories, which typically end up as a 50/50 proposition.
That was a theme for the season for Tennessee though, who averaged 24.2 points per game scored against 21.7 points per game allowed. That typically would end up with a team winning 55 percent of its games, or seven games. And that incorporates the Vols’ 45-0 win over Chattanooga.
And the Vols’ run didn’t come because of Jarrett Guarantano improving. Guarantano had a QB rating of 141.8 in August, 151.3 in September, 146.5 in October and 153.2 in November. So he was the same guy at the end of the season who got pulled in September.
I do think Tennessee will be better in 2020 than they were in 2019. But anybody who expects them to have closed the gap that resulted in 34-4, 43-14 and 35-13 losses to Florida, Georgia and Alabama much at all is expecting too much.
Watch out for the West
So if Tennessee isn’t going to be significantly improved in 2020, does that mean Florida just has to beat LSU and Georgia to waltz to Atlanta?
Well, I do think people are overlooking Ole Miss in 2020 a little bit.
Florida is (hopefully) going to be coming into the game against the Rebels after just having beaten LSU and with a bye week before Georgia. Ole Miss will have taken on Vanderbilt the week prior.
But more than that, if John Rhys Plumlee takes over at QB, he is the exact kind of player who has given Florida fits over the past few years. And you know that Lane Kiffin is going to find a way to utilize Plumlee in a way that he probably wasn’t used the year prior.
The 2019 Rebels gave up 26.5 points per game. Kiffin has only averaged less than 30 in one season as a head coach, his first at Tennessee. If Kiffin can get Ole Miss to 32 points per game and the defense can remain as effective as it was in 2019, that’s an 8-win team.
Certainly, Florida should beat an 8-win SEC team in 2020. But going on the road to Oxford isn’t going to be the cupcake I think some expect based on Ole Miss’ 4-8 record in 2019.
Mullen on going Undefeated
Recently on the Pat McAfee Show, Dan Mullen said the following:
“I expect us to go undefeated this year. I’m not guaranteeing it because I’ll be honest with you, I have two championship rings here at Florida and we didn’t go undefeated in either of those two seasons. We still won a national championship.”
I love it.
Mullen should think like this. He should expect to go undefeated. Those are our expectations as well. And it certainly sets the expectations for the players as well.
One of the things that I criticized Jim McElwain for was that I felt he left Feleipe Franks – and other players – out there to answer for unfulfilled expectations rather than taking the heat himself. Mullen has clearly taken the bullseye off of his players’ backs and put it squarely on his own.
That’s exactly where it should be. You shouldn’t be able to make $6 million and avoid that sort of scrutiny while your players have to take the heat.
There are things that still concern me about Mullen. Sometimes I think the organization of the program and communication looks disjointed. I’m concerned that his recruiting suffers from the same affliction.
But I have no doubt that he is going to get up there on the podium and defend his players when it is warranted. That’s someone you can be proud to call your schools’ head coach.
Trask or Emory?
Get ready, Gator fans, because this debate isn’t going to end until the season is over.
Athlon Sports has a section about QB battles and lists Florida as a program that could have one. The magazine cites the fit of Jones in Mullen’s offense and his success in limited playing time.
I fail to see how this is a serious position.
Trask beat out Jones last year for the backup job. Trask then outplayed many of his contemporaries in the SEC, all on a knee that was aching after being rolled up on during the Auburn game. He improved throughout the year, and by the end of the season, his average play against Virginia was a big surprise given what he had done earlier in the year.
Is Trask perfect? No.
But I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect the Gators offensive line to take such a big step forward that the team is going to be able to run the ball at will. That means that Jones’ skill set doesn’t fit this particular Mullen offense as well as some may think.
Trask gets the ball out fast, and he gets it out to the right receiver. If Jones can develop that ability, then maybe he can unseat him as the starter.
But I suspect instead we’re going to see an expanded role in the running game for Jones, but not enough that anybody actually thinks Trask is at any risk.
Mullen isn’t Spurrier. He doesn’t yank guys regularly looking for the hot hand. He sticks with the guy he makes a decision on, as was illustrated by his loyalty to Franks two years ago.
Often, he is repaid for his loyalty by QBs who aren’t looking over their shoulder. I wouldn’t expect Trask to have to look over his shoulder either.
Overlooked Difference Maker – Defense Edition
The most important player on the defense this year is someone who has frustrated Gator fans at times over the past two seasons.
Trey Dean played a ton of cornerback his freshman year, and while he got burned a few times, he showed enough that there was belief that he would be a key cog in the defense last year.
That didn’t happen, as Dean played at the Star position regularly but had to be replaced often as he struggled with being in the right place and making the play when he was in position.
But Dean came to Florida as a safety out of high school. And it just so happens that safety is a place where Florida has struggled as well the past couple of years.
Kaiir Elam really stepped up last season. Marco Wilson clearly wants to play on the outside. And Amari Burney is big enough to help in the running game in a way that a coverage safety cannot. So keep Burney at Star, move Dean back to safety and let Wilson and Elam man the boundaries with Chester Kimbrough, Jaydon Hill, Jahari Rogers and Ethan Pouncey manning the nickel.
Florida has a ton of depth at corner. There’s a way to take advantage of that and increase depth at safety as well. Dean may end up being someone who we look back at after the season and realize what a difference he made.
Reche Caldwell
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the unfortunate passing of former Gator Reche Caldwell, who was shot outside of his home in what police are describing as a targeted burglary. I’ve already written about what Caldwell meant to me as a player, but one thing really stood out when I took a look at his Gator career.
Caldwell and his receiving mate Jabar Gaffney combined for 132 catches in 2001’s near Heisman season from Rex Grossman. In fact, Grossman was probably one more big play away against either Tennessee or Auburn from bringing home that hardware.
With Gaffney and Caldwell gone in 2002, Grossman threw the ball 108 more times, but threw for 494 fewer yards. Some of that is attributable to the arrival of Ron Zook, but some of it was definitely the subtraction of Gaffney and Caldwell.
In fact, I think that’s one of the things that Gator fans took for granted in the Spurrier days. Gainesville churned out elite-level wide receivers repeatedly, and because many of them didn’t go on to make major dents in the NFL, I do think there’s a perception that they were products of Spurrier’s system rather than truly great receivers.
I think that’s wrong. And in the case of Caldwell, I know it is. He may not have been a Pro Bowl receiver in the NFL, but he caught 61 balls in 2006 with a Patriots team that nearly made it to the Super Bowl.
Regardless, as someone who was in college at UF at the same time Caldwell was putting up highlights there, his death struck home a little bit differently. He is near my age. He has kids that are near my age too. It really forces you to ask some questions that maybe you push to the back of your mind when the person passing is older.
Time is precious. Am I using it wisely?
RIP Reche. You will be missed.