As some of you know already, I like to take the time to lay out my thoughts on how roster management could be approached relative to the circumstances we are in. I also enjoy all feed back so please comment and start a dialogue. I would first like to start off with the idea that we need to temper out expectations with the finish to the class. I know Billy is known as a dynamic recruiter, but he just isn't giving himself enough time to really make a big impact because he is staying on to compete for an outright conference championship. Something he and his team have absolutely earned the right to do. In fact, during this wild and crazy coaching carousel, Billy is the only coach to be doing the right thing imo. He has built a ton of relationships with his players, that administration loves him, and all his coaches seem to have the utmost respect for him. I'm very excited for what we could have in Napier moving forward as our HC.
- First thing Billy needs to do is recruit his current roster at Florida. We have talent on this team. The cupboards are not bare. But we need to focus on securing a couple of position groups or we might be in trouble next year and the following year. The SDE room is very important right now. I have always felt like Florida has struggled under the previous coaching staffs to land a lot of quality depth at the position. Well over the past couple recruiting cycles we have been able to do get some young talent at the position. Princely, Boone & Sapp (I heard rumblings in season he was already starting to look elsewhere, Billy needs to lock him up imo. If we flip Mason Taylor, maybe the STA pipeline keeps him here). With no a lot of quality depth at the DT positions, you can not also start off your tenure with a lack of depth at the SDE position as well. If you look at our recruiting board right now we have a SDE in Nolton committed, and are currently recruiting Wiggins and hopefully get into a better position to land Nyjalik Kelly but Billy doesn't have a lot of time to recruit these kids once he puts on the Gator logo Sunday.
- We could be in a really bad spot at the RB position next year. Pierce & Davis are gone. Nayquan just had a bad injury and you don't know how he is going to bounce back. Leaves you with Bowman & Lingard. Lingard seems to be bought into to staying at Florida while Bowman looked checked out all season. Currently we have no RB commits. Etienne looks to be deciding between Florida & Clemson and maybe we get into the recruitment of Citizen, who knows? But we could be a tough spot next year from a depth perspective at RB. Jason just mentioned another Louisiana back committed to TCU. Have to keep the 3 guys on the roster for next season or things could get dicey.
- I'm not sure EH came over from the old site but he was always great at letting us know how many spots were going to be available for each class. How ever many guys we end up taking, Billy is going to want to make sure these guys are exactly what he wants from a program perspective. He doesn't want to collect talent but he wants to build a team. At least, that's what I've heard him say a ton of times. That means guys will have to check all the boxes he has before they become a take. I'm not so sure we need to just rush into trying to sign all of our commits just yet. I wouldn't be surprised if 3 current commits don't get the opportunity to sign next week, and I wouldn't be surprised if a commit or two want to wait until February to get to know Billy. I'm saying all of this because I think we are about to see the craziest year of recruit/player shuffling than we have ever seen. Because the 2020 class was never able to make OV etc, that class is about to be extremely abundant in the portal. Mix in this being a huge coaching shuffle year and you're going to have a ton of kids who de-commit, flip, and or wait until February to sign.
- It looks like Miami might've had the right recruiting philosophy this year. They have been pretty outspoken about how they weren't going to try and recruit HS kids and were gonna focus much more on the portal. As we see in just a short 3 days, there has been almost 300 kids entering their names into the transfer portal. There is a lot of big time names in the portal and there is going to be a lot more of them once the coaching shuffle is complete. I'm hoping a lot of the more talented transfers take their time in the transfer process. Gives Billy a chance to try and vet these kids. There is also going to be transfers based off of other transfers. You this with a 5 star WR like Theo Wease, Alabama isn't going to try and land that kid? If Jahmyr Gibbs picks Bama, what high end RB is going to hit the portal because they don't want to wait anymore? Prolly not.
I think after the December signing period we will be talking about a lot more kids that we aren't even thinking about right now. I wouldn't be surprised if this class is composed with a lot more transfers than we were expecting. Shoot Billy can bring his starting DB and stud freshman RB on over imo lol. Just my two cents. Go Gators!
- First thing Billy needs to do is recruit his current roster at Florida. We have talent on this team. The cupboards are not bare. But we need to focus on securing a couple of position groups or we might be in trouble next year and the following year. The SDE room is very important right now. I have always felt like Florida has struggled under the previous coaching staffs to land a lot of quality depth at the position. Well over the past couple recruiting cycles we have been able to do get some young talent at the position. Princely, Boone & Sapp (I heard rumblings in season he was already starting to look elsewhere, Billy needs to lock him up imo. If we flip Mason Taylor, maybe the STA pipeline keeps him here). With no a lot of quality depth at the DT positions, you can not also start off your tenure with a lack of depth at the SDE position as well. If you look at our recruiting board right now we have a SDE in Nolton committed, and are currently recruiting Wiggins and hopefully get into a better position to land Nyjalik Kelly but Billy doesn't have a lot of time to recruit these kids once he puts on the Gator logo Sunday.
- We could be in a really bad spot at the RB position next year. Pierce & Davis are gone. Nayquan just had a bad injury and you don't know how he is going to bounce back. Leaves you with Bowman & Lingard. Lingard seems to be bought into to staying at Florida while Bowman looked checked out all season. Currently we have no RB commits. Etienne looks to be deciding between Florida & Clemson and maybe we get into the recruitment of Citizen, who knows? But we could be a tough spot next year from a depth perspective at RB. Jason just mentioned another Louisiana back committed to TCU. Have to keep the 3 guys on the roster for next season or things could get dicey.
- I'm not sure EH came over from the old site but he was always great at letting us know how many spots were going to be available for each class. How ever many guys we end up taking, Billy is going to want to make sure these guys are exactly what he wants from a program perspective. He doesn't want to collect talent but he wants to build a team. At least, that's what I've heard him say a ton of times. That means guys will have to check all the boxes he has before they become a take. I'm not so sure we need to just rush into trying to sign all of our commits just yet. I wouldn't be surprised if 3 current commits don't get the opportunity to sign next week, and I wouldn't be surprised if a commit or two want to wait until February to get to know Billy. I'm saying all of this because I think we are about to see the craziest year of recruit/player shuffling than we have ever seen. Because the 2020 class was never able to make OV etc, that class is about to be extremely abundant in the portal. Mix in this being a huge coaching shuffle year and you're going to have a ton of kids who de-commit, flip, and or wait until February to sign.
- It looks like Miami might've had the right recruiting philosophy this year. They have been pretty outspoken about how they weren't going to try and recruit HS kids and were gonna focus much more on the portal. As we see in just a short 3 days, there has been almost 300 kids entering their names into the transfer portal. There is a lot of big time names in the portal and there is going to be a lot more of them once the coaching shuffle is complete. I'm hoping a lot of the more talented transfers take their time in the transfer process. Gives Billy a chance to try and vet these kids. There is also going to be transfers based off of other transfers. You this with a 5 star WR like Theo Wease, Alabama isn't going to try and land that kid? If Jahmyr Gibbs picks Bama, what high end RB is going to hit the portal because they don't want to wait anymore? Prolly not.
I think after the December signing period we will be talking about a lot more kids that we aren't even thinking about right now. I wouldn't be surprised if this class is composed with a lot more transfers than we were expecting. Shoot Billy can bring his starting DB and stud freshman RB on over imo lol. Just my two cents. Go Gators!
