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re: Who destroyed Florida Gator football?
Posted on 2/22/24 at 11:45 am to AwgustaDawg
Posted on 2/22/24 at 11:45 am to AwgustaDawg
quote:
The period of success the enjoyed with spurrier and shortly after is the anomaly
If Tennessee had offered Spurrier in football instead of basketball, Florida probably never has him as a player or coach.
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Posted on 2/22/24 at 12:00 pm to AwgustaDawg
quote:
The period of success the enjoyed with spurrier and shortly after is the anomaly
It's pretty rare for a team to be consistently good for more than a decade or so.
Spurrier did something that's generally pretty rare: consistent success over a long period.
Not too many programs can say that: Bama over the last 15, Florida for 12, Texas 1990s-mid-2000s.
Florida had success before then but not enough to win titles. Even Georgia petered out in the mid-1980s.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 12:12 pm to jonnyanony
quote:
Who destroyed Florida Gator football?
The Florida Gators destroyed Florida Gator Football
not but seriously the Dan Mullen hire was supposed to be a slam dunk get them out of the weeds and back into contention hire and he did such a bad job recruiting they've been playing catch up since he left
replacing Meyer was nigh impossible and the hires directly after weren't great but Dan Mullen left that program in an recruiting 50 foot deep hole
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:01 pm to Wallacewade04
quote:
not but seriously the Dan Mullen hire was supposed to be a slam dunk
I really never saw Mullen as that and I don't think most Gator fans did either.
The hope was that he'd avoid the 4-win seasons and while I think he was ultimately completely capable he gave up on the job.
In retrospect, yeah he sucked at recruiting, but I think UF was caught completely flat-footed about changes in recruiting. We didn't put much effort into it in early 2020 and by the time NIL came into place UF basically sat out a year, I guess thinking it wouldn't last.
Mullen wasn't a good recruiter but UF also refused to give him the tools necessary to do so in a post-NIL world and has clumsily scrambled to catch up since.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:23 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
The "Shoe Throw". Game. it was all downhill from there..
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:25 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
quote:
What was the pivotal moment triggering the downfall?
Will Grier getting popped for steroids was a big moment, IMO. Their 2015 team looked pretty legit with him at QB.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:36 pm to VADawg
quote:
Will Grier getting popped for steroids was a big moment, IMO. Their 2015 team looked pretty legit with him at QB.
That hurt a lot, yeah. We still carved out 10 wins but we were night and day with Grier over Treon. It was the first time we looked competent on offense post-Tebow.
How we kept it within 2 touchdowns in the SEC-CG is amazing. Have to imagine it would have gone differently with Grier in there.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:38 pm to LordLouisiana
quote:
In all seriousness, I think the shoe toss played a significant role
I concur, and I think we can also drill it down to Mullen deciding to not play Kyle Pitts in that same game, as some assumed he was choosing to rest him for Alabama.
IMO that decision was overshadowed later by the shoe, and so he was never fully brought to answer for it by the media.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:41 pm to AwgustaDawg
quote:
The actual question is how in the frick did Steve Spurrier make Florida Football anything other than the SEC doormat it always was and is again?
It was a matter of time before the Florida schools got good. The growth of the state = growth in home grown football talent.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:42 pm to paperwasp
The shoe toss was more symbolic of something Florida fans had been watching with Mullen for weeks previous.
General lack of interest, "we'll do recruiting after the season" type comments, etc.
2020 was pure autopilot. We had Trask, Pitts, Toney, and a good running game. Mullen might as well not have even been there.
General lack of interest, "we'll do recruiting after the season" type comments, etc.
2020 was pure autopilot. We had Trask, Pitts, Toney, and a good running game. Mullen might as well not have even been there.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:53 pm to Tolbert1906
quote:
Tim Tivo, Percy Harvey, and Corch Irvin Mayas.
For those who haven't had the privilege to watch ebonics in action:
Go Gata.
This post was edited on 2/22/24 at 1:54 pm
Posted on 2/22/24 at 1:58 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
I blame Saban since 2009 was our last great team.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 2:16 pm to jonnyanony
quote:
General lack of interest
I think you're right, Mullen certainly did himself no favors, and trended a bit odd there for a while.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 4:26 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
Corch Erskine Mysirs had something to do with it, I think.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 4:30 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
The kid that threw the shoe helped put one of the nails in their coffin
Posted on 2/22/24 at 5:14 pm to Arkapigdiesel
That never gets old!
Posted on 2/22/24 at 5:45 pm to LordLouisiana
quote:
In all seriousness, I think the shoe toss played a significant role. Florida was #6, on a 6 game win streak (including against UGA) and needed to win for a shot at their first playoff appearance.
Instead, they lost to a 3-5 LSU because of the shoe toss, then lost a 1 possession game to Bama, and got pounded by OU by 35 points in the Cotton Bowl. Went 4-5 the following season before they fired Mullen. OOF.
Dan Mullen's first year was 2018. Went 10-3 in 2018, 11-2 in 2019, and were 8-1 in 2020 going into that LSU game. They were 24-6 against P5 teams under Mullen going into that game. The remainder of Mullen's tenure (he got fired after the Mizzou game in 2021) they went 2-9 against P5 teams, one of them being Vandy and the other being 7-6 Tennessee in Heupel's first year. Overall they are 10-23 against P5 teams since that game.
In reality there's never really just one singular reason for these kind of collapses, but it's hard not to point to that 2020 LSU/Florida game as where it all began. It was all going very well for 3 seasons up until then and then the bottom dropped form under them.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 6:12 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
Just like we did, Gata is now firmly in their decade of wandering the wilderness. Poor coaching hires are the biggest factor, but not the only one...and the semenholes rising back up recently hasn't helped matters.
One thing Longhorn fans learned the past painful decade is past success can only sustain you for so long, at some point you must make real fundamental changes to right the ship. For the first time Since Mack Brown was gently given the nudge, we now have alignment between not just the fanbase/BMD's and AD and coaching staff, but also University President as well. That last one is more important than most realize...get an academic bookworm who only has a fleeting interest in sports in the top office and that trickles down to the football program as well.
Flarda will rise again, they won't go the way of Nebraska as a forever has-been, but I don't think it's gonna happen with Sunbelt Billy steering the ship. Next coaching hire has to be the right guy..otherwise the wilderness wandering can drag on for another decade. Just for example, we think Sark is the right guy and the next 3 seasons or so will prove us right or wrong, but if he fails it won't be because of the other factors I mentioned. We're all in alignment now, that's what Gata must do. Having said that, keeping Billy for another season may be a setback, but it also could pay off beyond Gata fans wildest dreams if he happens to get through the meat grinder '24 schedule with only 2 or 3 losses. Will be interesting to watch if nothing else.
One thing Longhorn fans learned the past painful decade is past success can only sustain you for so long, at some point you must make real fundamental changes to right the ship. For the first time Since Mack Brown was gently given the nudge, we now have alignment between not just the fanbase/BMD's and AD and coaching staff, but also University President as well. That last one is more important than most realize...get an academic bookworm who only has a fleeting interest in sports in the top office and that trickles down to the football program as well.
Flarda will rise again, they won't go the way of Nebraska as a forever has-been, but I don't think it's gonna happen with Sunbelt Billy steering the ship. Next coaching hire has to be the right guy..otherwise the wilderness wandering can drag on for another decade. Just for example, we think Sark is the right guy and the next 3 seasons or so will prove us right or wrong, but if he fails it won't be because of the other factors I mentioned. We're all in alignment now, that's what Gata must do. Having said that, keeping Billy for another season may be a setback, but it also could pay off beyond Gata fans wildest dreams if he happens to get through the meat grinder '24 schedule with only 2 or 3 losses. Will be interesting to watch if nothing else.
This post was edited on 2/22/24 at 6:13 pm
Posted on 2/22/24 at 8:03 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
Destroyed? Shits running perfect in my book.
Posted on 2/22/24 at 8:41 pm to Harry Rex Vonner
My take since Urban:
Will: Could not recruit at the same level on offense as defense and tried to run his offense to compliment his defense too much.
Jim Mac: Decent football coach on gameday. Overrated as an offensive strategist. Accomplished what he did by using Muschamp's defensive recruiting and improving offense slightly. Seemed the offense could make some plays in big moments when needed more often even if comparison to offensive production in Muschamp era wasn't much better.
Dan: Couldn't recruit with the elite, but great playcaller. Needed better defensive staff. I honestly think he would've turned it around if they had stuck with him, but he would've never gotten them back to national title contenders so he was gonna be fired at some point anyway.
Billy: Just an utter disappointment. Thought he would've been better. Insanity these days to expect any coach who has never shown elite coaching traits at the FBS level to be great. But I did think he'd be good with the possibility of being elite.
Will: Could not recruit at the same level on offense as defense and tried to run his offense to compliment his defense too much.
Jim Mac: Decent football coach on gameday. Overrated as an offensive strategist. Accomplished what he did by using Muschamp's defensive recruiting and improving offense slightly. Seemed the offense could make some plays in big moments when needed more often even if comparison to offensive production in Muschamp era wasn't much better.
Dan: Couldn't recruit with the elite, but great playcaller. Needed better defensive staff. I honestly think he would've turned it around if they had stuck with him, but he would've never gotten them back to national title contenders so he was gonna be fired at some point anyway.
Billy: Just an utter disappointment. Thought he would've been better. Insanity these days to expect any coach who has never shown elite coaching traits at the FBS level to be great. But I did think he'd be good with the possibility of being elite.
This post was edited on 2/22/24 at 8:43 pm
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