The Dan Mullen era had a lot of distinctive characteristics, but one that’ll always stick out to me was the coaches’ preference for seniority. I knew it was coming from having covered Mississippi State some for a full-SEC site I used to work for, but it’s different when it’s the team I follow most closely.
The seniority preference manifested in a lot of ways, but one of them was the relative lack of true freshman contributors. Sometimes a lack of depth plus an injury or two would require a Trey Dean or a Jason Marshall to play a lot in their first years. Less often, a Gervon Dexter would be so great an athlete that there was no keeping him off of the field (though D-tackle was generally thin during Dexter’s time too).
I don’t think it was all a seniority matter, though. Mullen and his staff just didn’t land a ton of players who were ready to go on Day 1. It’s not like half of their classes were true projects or anything, but it wasn’t that often that insiders or beat writers were marveling at how some true freshman or another looked like a college player from the jump.
That situation has really turned around under Billy Napier. He has taken some players who everyone from the third-party recruiting analysts all the way up to the head coach knew would need a year or two of seasoning, but he had also secured commitments from a lot more college-ready players than Mullen did.
The top five players in the 2022 class by 247 Composite ratings were Kamari Wilson, Shemar James, Chris McClellan, Trevor Etienne, and Devin Moore. James and Etienne made the SEC All-Freshman team. McClellan looked like a veteran by the end of October. Wilson took some lumps as freshman DBs tend to but also played a lot of good football and should parlay that into a starting role this year. Only injury could get Moore off the field.
By the end of the season, part due to good play and part due to other roster circumstances, we were seeing a fair amount of Caleb Douglas, Miguel Mitchell, and Jack Pyburn. Trey Smack took over kickoffs, even as he didn’t win the place kicking job. Thai Chiaokhiao-Bowman also saw increasing playing time, though he was a JUCO transfer and not straight out of high school.
That’s a pretty good number of instant contributors from a small, transitional class that Napier nearly zeroed out upon his arrival. James had committed to the Mullen staff before decommitting for a time, and McClellan puzzlingly committed to the interim staff. Napier did have to convince them to re-commit or stay committed, but he had the help of their prior decisions as a tailwind. The rest, though, were fresh commitments to Florida in the Napier era.
Spring practice is already bringing reports of 2023 signees who are looking like they’re going to contribute right away. The top three early enrollees by Composite rating – Kelby Collins, Ja’Keem Jackson, and Aiden Mizell — have all received rave reviews at times. Thinness on the edge of the defensive line and a lack of standout playmakers at wideout make an easier path for Collins and Mizell; Jackson has more competition at corner but is making a strong go of it.
The guy who raised the most eyebrows the earliest was fellow receiver Andy Jean. He physically looks the college part already, more so than the skinnier Mizell. He also is apparently quite polished in his route running. If you follow the recruiting scene, this all is a little funny since Jean was a borderline 3/4-star recruit. The analysts get it right in the aggregate but do miss on individual players frequently.
Elsewhere on offense Knijeah Harris is competing for the starting left guard spot while Baylor transfer Micah Mazzcca rehabs from surgery through the offseason. It’s rare to find true freshmen who can even compete strongly for what ultimately is a backup spot with Mazzcca probably returning to duty around the start of the season, but UF found one in Harris. And then on defense, Jaden Robinson has used the thinness and injuries at middle linebacker to make a case for some real playing time.
This all should be exciting to you since a couple of the most talented players haven’t even arrived yet. Eugene Wilson probably has the highest ceiling of any of the freshman receivers, as his high school tape makes him look faster than Jean and more elusive than Mizell. Safety Dijon Johnson, a flip from Ohio State, also could fight for some playing time at a thin position in the backfield.
Napier’s turnaround effort really depends on getting a lot of new players in a lot of positions. Mullen’s recruiting was lacking, but it also was of a piece in a general plan of signing players with the intent of redshirting them and bringing them along slowly before they burst forth as upperclassmen. No, I don’t know why he kept that very Mississippi State-level strategy at Florida, but he did. It meant that if there was an exodus after his ouster, such as the one that happened beginning in November 2022, a lot of the younger remaining players wouldn’t be ready to step up and generate some SEC-caliber tape.
Napier is more going the Urban Meyer route of getting guys who can play quickly and putting nothing in their way if they’re good enough to win a spot. It’s a welcome change that reverts Florida back to what it always should be doing from a talent acquisition standpoint.