Thoughts of the Week
…as brought to you by David Parker (PD on our forums)
A Real Thanksgiving
On Thursday, we all broke bread and gave thanks for all our blessings in life. On Saturday, the Gator broke FSU (and broke their 5-game win streak over UF, their 42-year streak without a losing season, and their 36-season bowl streak), and Thanksgiving for Gator fans went nuclear.
Now that we are at the end of the regular season in Dan 2.0, The Re-Set, it’s time to take full stock of just how fortunate we were to land Dan Mullen. We thought we would get Chip Kelley. We thought we would get Scott Frost. Some of us even thought we would get Willie Taggart. And when we got Dan Mullen, so many of us lamented missing out on any or all of those three. And you know who thought they would get Dan Mullen? Tennessee. Before they got rolling downhill in the calamity of being turned down by over 20 head coaching candidates, and having to un-hire the only one who accepted their offer, Dan Mullen was poised to accept their huge offer on the table. But he patiently waited for Athletics Director Scott Stricklin to call, as he knew he would, and when he did, he called Tennessee and politely declined. The rest is all history. After going 9-3 in his first regular season of the big rebuild, the rest is now all future.
And those other three coaches, one or more of whom most Gator fans preferred more than Dan? While Dan was busy winning 9 games this year, Chip Kelley, Scott Frost and Willie Taggart combined for 12 wins, winning 3, 4 and 5, respectively, in far weaker conferences. And while Dan is shooting for win #10 in a New Year’s 6 bowl, those other 3 coaches will be shooting the breeze. All punctuated by the win on the field that might prove to be the most crucial recruiting statement since blowing out FSU in Dan Mullen’s first year as the Florida offensive coordinator in 2005. That’s a Thanksgiving weekend for the ages.
Please pass the gravy.
The “Oh? Meh” Hire Becomes the “Oh MYYY!” hire.
I have said it before: I was one of those who responded to the announcement of Dan’s hire with an emphatic “meh”. Partially because I was caught up in the prospect of hiring the ESPN darling candidate, but I think mostly because I didn’t realize who we actually hired.
That was my big failure: I envisioned we were getting the 2008 Dan Mullen (it’s been so long that I may have even thought we were getting the 2006 Dan Mullen). One too unseasoned and with too much attitude and immaturity as a coach to drive a big-time program like UF to championships.
However, we obviously didn’t get the 2008 Dan Mullen. We got the 2018 Dan Mullen. And he’s a much different coach and I think a different person from having to spend 9 years on such an impossible, highly restrictive job site as MSU. It was humbling and very educational, no doubt. He learned to be an elite coach where nobody becomes an elite coach.
And another thing he gained: a real appreciation for how awesome it can be at UF, and he apparently learned where he wanted to be the rest of his career. That’s why he turned down many advances from Power 5 programs the last few years, and why he had no qualms about telling a previously (and potentially future) elite coaching position like Tennessee to wait on hold until he heard from Florida.
All of this seemed so clear when he emerged from the team plane in Gainesville with his ear-to-ear smile and the enthusiastic Gator chomp. So clear that many (like me) were no doubt thinking, “How did I not see this already?” This was a question that has continued to tap my mind on the shoulder and all I can do is shrug.
Well thank goodness one man DID see it already. Saw it all. Tip o’ The cap to you, Mr Stricklin, for bringing Dan back home.
Reading Signs
You want signs? Besides the one I just mentioned about the symmetry between rolling FSU in Dan’s first year in Gainesville and doing it again in his first year back as the HBC? Besides handing FSU their first losing season since 1976, the first season they were coached by Bobby Bowden, who started a new and enduring era of elite football in Tallahassee…paralleling perhaps the start of a new and enduring era of bad football in T-town?
How about a little numerology? Does the score 41-14 ring a bell?
It was the BCS national title game at the end of the 2006 season when the Gators won their second national title, their first with Dan Mullen onboard, when the Gators memorably sacked Heisman Trophy winner Troy Smith 5 times en route to routing #1 Ohio State that night. The Gators threw up the same 41-14 score against FSU, and while Deondre Fracois will not be winning the Heisman this year, the Gators sacked him 5 times as well.
There were some differences, of course. While the Gator defense didn’t match the 82 yards they held Ohio State to in January 2007, the offense more than balanced that out by racking up a gaudy 536 yards against FSU (in the ‘original’ 41-14 game, the Gators only needed 370).
And in truth, the Gators should have scored a lot more. They went for the touchdown on 4th-and-red zone twice and were stopped, and settled for another field goal. All inside the 7 yard line. If they score a touchdown in just two of those drives for 14 total points instead of 3, they would have finished with 52 points. Had FSU not committed 3 illegal shift infractions on the same play, a long touchdown pass would have stayed on the board and given them 20 points for the game.
Would anyone doubt that they would have missed the extra point to make the final score 52-20? “Straight blowout.”
Want me to read Dan Mullen’s palm?
More Symmetry
The 41 points were the 3rd-most Florida has ever scored in Tallahassee against FSU. The most? 45 points in 2008, Dan Mullen’s last season as Florida’s offensive coordinator. This also marked the 3rd-straight game where Florida amassed over 500 yards of offense, a feat they haven’t accomplished since 2008 (also done then against South Carolina, a cupcake and then FSU). The 27-point victory margin was the largest for Florida in the series since beating FSU by 27 in 2009, the last year that Florida had a Dan Mullen-developed quarterback running the Gator offense. The four games of over 500 yards total offense are the most in a season since 2009, as well, when they did it 5 times. Incidentally, those 4 games with over 500 yards of offense is more than the Gators accumulated in the entire 3-year tenure of the previous coaching regime, combined. The 47 touchdowns from scrimmage this year is the most since 2009. Finally, Jordan Scarlett and Lemical Perine both rushed for over 700 yards apiece this year, which hasn’t been done by a Gator duo since 2009, when Jeff Demps and Tim Tebow turned the trick.
Mullen Magic
Just how significant was this first-year turn-around? In terms of Florida football history, it stands alone.
Dan is the first head coach in school history to win at least 7 games in his first season inheriting a tea with a losing record. Dan’s +5 win improvement is the most for a first-year head coach in Gator program history. Dan is the first head coach of any tenure to lead the Gator program to 9 wins following a losing season. Ever.
Franks-ly Speaking
Sometimes when a player turns a corner in his career, you can pinpoint the game or even the play where he planted his foot in the turf and cut. It isn’t ever really one game or play where the change is made, when the lights come on, but it’s the one game or play when it becomes evident to the fans that the corner has been turned. But sometimes the evidence of that change is not even visible at all to the fns until it’s already in the past.
At some point next year, Gator fans may be looking back at the end of the 2018 season and recognize that at some point or many points over the last three games, Feleipe Franks quietly snuck his way past several developmental benchmarks. And if so, my how quickly things can change direction in college football.
Because this three-game streak started with Gator fans diluting their beers with tears over the untimely season-ending injury to backup Kyle Trask, effectively removing the hotly anticipated quarterback controversy before it started. Prior to that, Franks played poorly against Georgia in the first loss of the season since being awakened by Kentucky in week 2, and then a game later struggled mightily in the Homecoming loss to Missouri. Many folks were ready to flip the switch and close the book on Feleipe Franks. Then a funny thing happened on the way to ending the young man’s career: he started to play like the quarterback we all hoped he would be this year.
Against South Carolina, he played a pretty sterling second half to help lead the Gators back from 17 points down to victory, probably his best game as a collegiate. Then he played even better the following week in putting the game away against Idaho in the first half. Then Franks for the third-straight game eclipsed all his past career performances in the dominating win over FSU.
If you want equivocation or objections to this observation, there is no shortage in Gator Nation. Level of competition is the most prevalent citation. South Carolina fielded a bad defense this year, and were a few hands short or gimpy when they played; Idaho is an FCS team; and FSU is simply white hot garbage. But these are the kinds of defenses that used to vex Franks without much trouble. And it wasn’t the competition that changed the performance, because the improvements Franks made over the past 3 weeks were not just doing the same things he had been doing, repeating the same bad habits, but getting away with them because of the lesser opponents. He played better – much better – on an empirical basis.
He refused to make the bad throws into coverage. He extended plays, directed traffic and hit receivers; sometimes on the run, sometimes for touchdowns. He used the middle of the field and hit mid-range routes. He exercised better mechanics and was more accurate downfield. He made the right choices with RPOs and chose the right give/keep options between him and the running backs on straight running plays. He ran with a quicker eye for the hole and with complete authority and ball security. Basically, for the last three weeks Franks has played like the quarterback we have been waiting for since Tim Tebow left and only got to see for a handful of quarters before Will Grier’s suspension. “Just give us a quarterback who can execute the offense, move the chains and win games,” we said. Franks just did three games in the road.
If the level of competition can be credited with the performances, the most likely impact was not a diminished defensive complexity or lesser athletes in the back 7, but the ability for the offensive line to keep Franks’s jersey clean and allow him to keep his focus crisp and footwork sound. And in the future, that is what we will expect the Gator offensive line to do for their quarterback against any level of competition. And truly they gave Franks that kind of protection for most of the year; he just never turned it into the kind of output he did the last three weeks.
Now, none of this goes to suggest he was flawless in the last three games. Far from it. He still doesn’t see or won’t throw to open receivers, still throws some passes late, still struggles with accuracy. But he has done all of these things at a significantly diminishing rate, and most importantly has gotten better as the game goes on in each game over the last 3 weeks.
And when you consider that not only was his redshirt freshman season a complete waste, but it actually set his clock backwards because of all the bad coaching he had to un-learn and all of the on-field shellshock he had to un-remember, this was for all practical purposes the end of his redshirt freshman year, not redshirt sophomore season. If we viewed his performances and his progress in 2018 as that of a redshirt freshman, in fact one who spent his entire redshirt year on injured reserve and didn’t start getting to practice under real coaching until his second spring, then this would look like a pretty darn good developmental arc.
This would look like a quarterback who is right on schedule, right on time, coming to life at the end of his first year playing at an SEC school.
Perhaps Franks is just a placeholder until either Emory Jones or Jalon Jones is ready to take the reins. But the last 3 weeks has certainly made me look at his projected future in a much different light. My mind is now wide open again as to the future of Feleipe Franks, and the future of the Gator program with him as their starting signal caller.
If he continues this level of play in the bowl game, which will be in a New Years 6 matchup and will not have any element of diminished level of competition, I am willing to bet even more Gator fans join me in this new perception of our quarterback.
Seems I recall another Gator quarterback not too long ago who was booed on the field by his own fans and then went on to defy all disgruntled projections from the stands…even led the program to rarified air.
Sometimes you just have to let things play out and enjoy the show.
Chomps from the GC Staff & Columnists —
ANDREW SPIVEY
Now that the regular season is over Florida will spend the next three weeks on the recruiting trail before the early signing period starts. That all started on Sunday when they hit the road. Just a reminder that assistant coaches can visit prospects once a week and Dan Mullen can visit a prospect once.
Nay’Quan Wright was a huge get for Florida at running back as he was a top target on the board for the coaching staff. Had Wright played his junior year, he would be a top 100 or maybe even a top 50 kid.
The priority for this staff is finding more offensive linemen and defensive linemen as the staff expects at least one of Jachai Polite and Jabari Zuniga to leave early if not both of them.
NICK DE LA TORRE
How did that feel? After five years of losing to that school out west the Gators did the thing on Saturday. Every single aspect of the game was executed well. Offense, defense and special teams the Noles had no answers. Every win over the Noles feels great but a 41-14 beat down feels even better.
Now, on to some playoff talk.
The Gators cracked the top-10 of the CFP poll this week, coming in at No. 9. Florida is ahead of LSU (10) and Washington State (13). None of those three teams will not play in a conference championship this weekend, meaning there’s no way they will jump over the Gators.
Even in the event that there is an upset in a conference championship game this week (Northwestern beating Ohio State or Pittsburgh beating Clemson, for instance) Florida would stay ahead of those two teams and qualify for a New Year’s Six Bowl.
The likely destinations are The Cotton Bowl and the Peach Bowl due to the Sugar Bowl getting the highest ranked SEC team that isn’t in the playoff. Both of those games are on December 29.
On to some future notes about the draft. Chauncey Gardner-Johnson already declared for the NFL Draft and he will not be the only one. I think Jawaan Taylor will test the waters but I don’t think he’ll leave. He might be swayed to given that his high school teammate and good friend in Chauncey is leaving but ultimately he has a lot left to prove. He’s never played on the left side of the line and his tape is wildly inconsistent.
I expect Jachai Polite to leave early for the draft and Jabari Zuniga to test the waters. I expect Jordan Scarlett to leave but Lamical Perine will stay. I don’t know where the buzz about him leaving early has come from. I expect Tyrie Cleveland and Van Jefferson to return.
DAVID WUNDERLICH
Florida won 10 games and the East in Jim McElwain’s first season, but it felt hollow given how poorly the team performed down the stretch. The Gators won the East again and would’ve won ten his second year if not for a weather-related cancelation, but a poor finish against FSU and Alabama again soured the season.
After the Georgia and Missouri games, I was concerned that the same fate would befall Dan Mullen’s first year. The Gators were all right for three quarters against the Bulldogs, but the fourth in that game and all four against Mizzou were dismal. It took a while even into the South Carolina game for them to shake off the funk, but they were able to do so.
The fourth quarter against the Gamecocks through the FSU game were some of the best football we’ve seen all year. The team actually finished strong. Even though the Gators didn’t win the East and didn’t get to ten regular season wins (give or take a cancelation) as they did in McElwain’s first two seasons, this has a completely different feel. There were some smoke and mirrors this year, but not nearly as many and none in the final two weeks. This Florida team is just plain good, and it’s been a while since Gator fans could say that after the FSU game.
ERIC FAWCETT
Florida basketball hasn’t been off to a great start and though it’s largely due to the poor play of the upperclassmen it’s the injuries to young bigs that have a lot of chatter going on behind the scenes. After Isaiah Stokes, Chase Johnson, and Gorjok Gak all missed significant time (or all of) last season due to injuries, the same problems could still be there. Stokes’ knee did not respond well to the early season toll of playing games, and that makes you wonder when he’ll ever be able to play consistently unless he can make drastic changes to his weight. Johnson struggling with mysterious concussion systems is also troubling and without an expected return date, while it seems like the first few months of Gak’s season could be a wash after it was once thought he’d be ready for opening night.
It doesn’t look like help is coming soon so it will be up to the guys currently in the roster to turn things around.
That’s all, folks!
We’ll send you off with our photo of the week below. Until then, see you in your inbox next Wednesday. : )
All the best,
Your friends at Gator Country…where it’s GREAT to be a FLORIDA GATOR!
