Agreed. Several people here for a couple years have opined that she would challenge for a starting job. I never thought so and I'll say why. I watched her play a ton of games for Mercado in her "junior" year playing third with Lefty on short. I was reasonably impressed. Thought she had potential to improve. I watched a ton of Mercado games her "senior" year, with Lefty gone, and Alyssa fairly often being rotated at third. She was average, at best, the entire season. At that point I felt she certainly wouldn't challenge for a position coming in and I had my doubts about the long term. Her dad is a big-wig with Mercado. And, yes, she has also battled injuries. I hope she finds a good place and can find some success.
I was one of those who thought Hovermale would be a big time player for Florida, but that was based solely on reading about her high school and travel ball career and what Tim Walton said about her when she signed. If I remember right, she was pretty highly ranked by the recruiting services, too. You, obviously, had more direct insight by actually watching her play against top tier competition and it turns out your observations were correct. She seems like a great young lady and I wish her the best in her future. Another poster said CTW's exit interviews may have been today and that makes sense if true. I've always thought Walton was/is a straight shooter and she has to know that if she wants to be a regular player it has to be somewhere else.
One of my biggest pet peeves. I don't know how they really do the rankings but I strongly suspect in many cases it is simply some kid that has gotten a lot of pub, deserved or not, and a phone call to her high school and travel coach. Neither who are going to say about their kid, "she's really not as good as the pub...she's overrated". There is no way all of these ranking services have intently watched 100's of kids play multiple games. Same goes for Tim. What would he say about a kid coming in other than, "I'm excited. She's a really good player." I don't pay a lot of attention to that. I do pay attention when he says about Taylor, "she's one of the best hitters I have ever seen", or about Red, "there is no ceiling".
Ultimately, it’s not that big of a deal because Walton usually constructs a competitive team each year. But I guess it is a little disappointing how many “top 5”/“top 10” recruits coming out of high school have come into our program the last few years and then left contributing next to nothing. Pollard, Roe, Lamar, Hovermale. Any one of them living up to half their potential could have really helped this program.
And Pollard, Roe and Lamar were all kids who committed very young before the rules changed. Doing that was a crapshoot as you really have no idea how they will progress. Thankfully, you can't do that anymore. Edit: It isn't just us that took a shot with these kids....and we did it when they were "babies". Oregon takes a shot on Pollard and she was there for a redshirt year and left for San Diego State never playing an inning. She is almost old enough now to be a grandmother and she has played a total of about 1/2 season. Louisiana, at the time probably the best mid-major program in the country, takes a shot at Roe. She was OK there her remaining years. Low power numbers. Pretty much a decent player but not more. And don't forget she mainly played the rest of her career against lower level programs and still didn't really shine. Glasco raided the program and took the best to Texas Tech. He didn't take Roe with him.
You think it is bad there,,,,geez....try living here. Between the soft ball and the gymnastics team for OU it is freaking terrible.
Parental interference, I can see that. Anyone who’s ever been to a little league baseball games seen it. Money and influence talks. I for one am overjoyed how broken the silly ranking systems are. If the rankings were actually accurate we probably wouldn’t have gotten Taylor.
She isn't leaving. Her mother pretty much confirmed it with the comment "she will be playing with new girls next year". But she was complaining about bringing in new kids over what we already have. It wasn't meant that she would be on a new team. Plus, she told Phil she is staying in Gainesville this summer and working on things to improve her game instead of playing in that summer college league she did last year.
I never said Mia is leaving. Was it a possibility? Very much so. The mom situation and the NIL offers. Ive said the whole time she seems all Gator. But until a player says they're not leaving it's always a possibility. Especially when their mother goes postal and can cause team issues.
