It is safe to say that my predictions for this game are way off.
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Goodyear Cotton Bowl: #7 Florida Gators vs #6 Oklahoma Sooners
- Thread starter Escambia94
- Start date
Not mine, as far as outcome—not really.
But NO ONE could have seen Kyle Trask seeming to come apart this way, be at the center of a debacle. And now it all seems to be affecting Mullen’s approach to calling the Gator offense here—and unless THAT gets back on track, there’ll be NO CHANCE at any kind of getting back in it. Sigh. Why am I even still “following from afar” now? It brings me nothing but mounting frustration—and any resurgence will just bring false hope!
Argh!!! Even as a “peek at tomorrow”, some glimpses of where we may be headed in at least SOME “positive ways” as we head into 2021, this is more and more a “WARNING” rather than a “PROMISE”!
Not exactly winning formula, but this is to be expected with 75% of the offense not available today.
I just want to say, before it’s over and no matter what happens—whether we manage even a “morale-boosting PARTIAL come-back” or not—I really love Kyle Trask: He measures up as a Gator and a LEADER transcending I think even that admitted bias we Gators all feel, on a level that only Spurrier and TT, each in their own separate and distinct ways, have ascended before him...In his own unique way Kyle Trask has set a standard of honor, loyalty, patience and perseverance that is, has been and in this way at least won’t likely EVER be matched again! And THAT is why I continue to monitor this game—in the forlorn hope he is able to make that work for himself, his team and ALL OF US ONE MORE TIME, and in this way perhaps might thrill us all and go out as he (eventually) came in and STAYED FOR THE DURATION—and THIS time be remembered for doing so ONE MORE TIME. But whether he manages it or not, that is how I will mainly remember and speak of him.
I mean this: At this point, I realize that Trask’s memory, legacy and SENSE OF HIMSELF AND HIS OWN ACCOMPLISHMENTS are more important than this game and/or what it may or may not tell us about NEXT season. No, by now I just want to see Kyle redeem himself—mainly in his own eyes, and in turn his life-to-COME.
I mean this: At this point, I realize that Trask’s memory, legacy and SENSE OF HIMSELF AND HIS OWN ACCOMPLISHMENTS are more important than this game and/or what it may or may not tell us about NEXT season. No, by now I just want to see Kyle redeem himself—mainly in his own eyes, and in turn his life-to-COME.
Y’all realize, of course, without those THREE 1st qrtr Trask INTs (!), we are down now 14-13. In fact, without ‘em (and any kind of defense) we’re likely AHEAD now!
But THAT could be said (or something quite similar) for EACH GATOR LOSS this season. As things stand, despite Emory’s “serviceably efficient” work in long relief, you get the feeling that ONLY a rally led by a returning-to-form Kyle Trask now in the 2nd half would give us ANY chance at a comeback WIN from here.
Now: What does Coach Dan DO? How does he look at it? Look to the future of the QB who GOT him here—send Trask back in and ask him to try and “bring ‘em BACK, Kyle!”? Or stay with Emory, begin to ready him for the Spring and (hopefully, if/when he seizes the job) his place under center leading the Gator offense?
I could make EITHER argument—but as I have already made clear, my emotions have already decided the matter:
At least give Kyle the 3rd qrtr to see if he has it in him—the hot hand HANDY to sling it around, ONE MORE TIME!
But THAT could be said (or something quite similar) for EACH GATOR LOSS this season. As things stand, despite Emory’s “serviceably efficient” work in long relief, you get the feeling that ONLY a rally led by a returning-to-form Kyle Trask now in the 2nd half would give us ANY chance at a comeback WIN from here.
Now: What does Coach Dan DO? How does he look at it? Look to the future of the QB who GOT him here—send Trask back in and ask him to try and “bring ‘em BACK, Kyle!”? Or stay with Emory, begin to ready him for the Spring and (hopefully, if/when he seizes the job) his place under center leading the Gator offense?
I could make EITHER argument—but as I have already made clear, my emotions have already decided the matter:
At least give Kyle the 3rd qrtr to see if he has it in him—the hot hand HANDY to sling it around, ONE MORE TIME!
Sigh. For the moment, I might switch over to a movie and meanwhile do some online “shopping” on Amazon!
Sort of sorry I postponed hitting Twin Liquors or Specs earlier today, picking up a bottle of Remy, postponing it til tomorrow instead! I figured on waiting until New Year’s Eve—knew I might get into it deeper than planned if this game went south (as I knew it might), and I didn’t necessarily WANT to drink that heavily two nights in a row. Rather have it for New Years, then MAYBE have a few fingers left in there for another evening. Craving it now, though—I admit it. Would suit things as they stand so far.
Sort of sorry I postponed hitting Twin Liquors or Specs earlier today, picking up a bottle of Remy, postponing it til tomorrow instead! I figured on waiting until New Year’s Eve—knew I might get into it deeper than planned if this game went south (as I knew it might), and I didn’t necessarily WANT to drink that heavily two nights in a row. Rather have it for New Years, then MAYBE have a few fingers left in there for another evening. Craving it now, though—I admit it. Would suit things as they stand so far.
Yeah. “UNCLE”. I think we were on our way to a bear-down in this one regardless, as I feared—BUT:
Not like this. This only harmed us—every ONE of “US”. Up to and including BITH quarterbacks, I’m afraid. Going by the evidence on the field tonight, I don’t know that we yet HAVE another “fleet of receivers” ready to step up and in; but we are losing the best QB by far in more than TEN YEARS, since Tebow HIMSELF (and he has to go out humiliated and fill of self-doubt and self-BLAME???), and the guy who is supposed to finally step in and replace him, though (as I’ve noted) eminently “serviceable”, well the best we can say so far is that based on tonight’s extended performance, “he still has a long way to GO, it seems...”. Emory Jones IS a confident kid, though—so he won’t likely let this game set him back. Still: not once tonight did I get the feeling tgat anyone but Lyke Trask could pull things together on offense and lead us back.
I’m afraid that’s an overall accurate summation of the Jones/led offense versus the now-ending Trask-led one.
And with the current Gator/Grantham-built and -directed DEfense, we are clearly SCREWED!
As a “peek into the FUTURE Gator reality”, this has been a depressing, possibly even TERRIFYING revelation.
It must be avoided!
I can only HOPE that it has served to inform/reveal itself similarly for Dan Mullen’s benefit!
I don’t know what exactly it will all add up to in HIS perception and conclusions—but it surely MUST change any lackadaisical tendency towards complacency...There is no fooling ourselves now, no “pussy-footing around the clear truth”: We’ll need a whole new offense AND defense heading into 2021.
This WON’T be like simply losing Feliepe Franks. The whole personality of this team will need to change—and it won’t be accomplished by changing out just one or two guys! This will require our Head Coach’s biggest and most thoroughly complete and pervasive adaptive reworking of his team and program—STARTING NOW!
And (as I say) this must include the DEFENSE as well! If he pulls it off, and we are able to take that crucial “NEXT STEP” after ALL, it will take (and well deserve) a “Best Coaching” Award!
For everyone’s sake, let’s hope he is MORE than up to it—EVERYTHING depends on it.
Not like this. This only harmed us—every ONE of “US”. Up to and including BITH quarterbacks, I’m afraid. Going by the evidence on the field tonight, I don’t know that we yet HAVE another “fleet of receivers” ready to step up and in; but we are losing the best QB by far in more than TEN YEARS, since Tebow HIMSELF (and he has to go out humiliated and fill of self-doubt and self-BLAME???), and the guy who is supposed to finally step in and replace him, though (as I’ve noted) eminently “serviceable”, well the best we can say so far is that based on tonight’s extended performance, “he still has a long way to GO, it seems...”. Emory Jones IS a confident kid, though—so he won’t likely let this game set him back. Still: not once tonight did I get the feeling tgat anyone but Lyke Trask could pull things together on offense and lead us back.
I’m afraid that’s an overall accurate summation of the Jones/led offense versus the now-ending Trask-led one.
And with the current Gator/Grantham-built and -directed DEfense, we are clearly SCREWED!
As a “peek into the FUTURE Gator reality”, this has been a depressing, possibly even TERRIFYING revelation.
It must be avoided!
I can only HOPE that it has served to inform/reveal itself similarly for Dan Mullen’s benefit!
I don’t know what exactly it will all add up to in HIS perception and conclusions—but it surely MUST change any lackadaisical tendency towards complacency...There is no fooling ourselves now, no “pussy-footing around the clear truth”: We’ll need a whole new offense AND defense heading into 2021.
This WON’T be like simply losing Feliepe Franks. The whole personality of this team will need to change—and it won’t be accomplished by changing out just one or two guys! This will require our Head Coach’s biggest and most thoroughly complete and pervasive adaptive reworking of his team and program—STARTING NOW!
And (as I say) this must include the DEFENSE as well! If he pulls it off, and we are able to take that crucial “NEXT STEP” after ALL, it will take (and well deserve) a “Best Coaching” Award!
For everyone’s sake, let’s hope he is MORE than up to it—EVERYTHING depends on it.
From LSU onward...Down, down, down
Three losses in a row to take the season from “very good/ALMOST great” back down to “didn’t measure up after all”.
But if our Coach can somehow learn enough and be spurred on by greater insight as a result of it, perhaps all worth it??!
Here’s the thing:
For this and a host of related reasons, I don’t wish to read about, wallow in or have rubbed in my face ANY more of the details. ALL I care about is where we’re at, where we’re going, and anything we are doing or CAN do to rebuild and return to full strength and truly promising improvement and contention in EVERY PHASE OF THE GAME.
Talk to y’all here soon. That is, it might be “here and now”, or SOON, but it WILL be ABOUT 2021 and what we’re doing to get better and get READY for it!
Otherwise, “HAPPY NEW YEAR!” and “Be Seeing You”—or at least “Talk to ya soon, Boys!”...”Go Gators!”, and “See you on the other side!”
(For now, bottom line:
I am WORRIED about all this...
Concerned for our program’s immediate future.)
I am WORRIED about all this...
Concerned for our program’s immediate future.)
Try not to look too deep into this loss. I figured Shorter, Fraziars, and Weston would step up, but this obviously was not the case. The Gators did not use all of the available receivers and running backs for some reason. Yes, it was embarrassing, but this team will look nothing like this next year. As ugly as the loss was, this was the Gators’ second team receiving corps and defensive secondary against Oklahoma’s first team everything. Trask had the worst game of his career due to lack of practice with these receivers. Fraziars and Weston had their first receptions in this game. Henderson and Shorter showed why they were the backups, but both showed they could perform better with practice. Zipperer and Gamble had really bad days. The only other tight ends available had already been converted to defensive linemen. There certainly is room for debate on the coaching decisions. It appeared that the coaches were lackadaisical with game prep, or maybe they just were exhausted from the continuous grind of the SEC schedule. In the end these are all excuses, but I will be the one in the minority who will write this loss as a casualty of 2020 and not as a sign for 2021.
Honestly, I am okay with the decision to play. The coward's way out would be to use COVID as a way to avoid a loss. It sucks for the Gator fans who have to live with the embarrassment of losing on national television, but in the end it was the athletes who benefited from playing one more game. If I were Dan Mullen I would have done one thing differently: tell Kyle Trask that he gets 1 series to start the game before handing the reigns of the team over to Emory Jones.
I have a theory on why Trask had a bad day: the offense is different when Trask is at QB compared to when Jones is at QB. The combination of Trask, Pitts, Grimes, Toney, and Copeland have worked out their timing over 2-3 years, with the last 2 years being a "Gator Raid" offense. That Gator Raid is not what the other receivers were recruited for or not what they have been practicing with. Justin Shorter and Xzavier Henderson do not run the clean routes necessary for a Gator Raid, so they are not at the position where Kyle Trask expects them to be...and then they let the ball bounce out of their hands (maybe that can be fixed with more practice). Ja'Quavion Fraziers and Ja'Markus Weston had their very first receptions, and they also struggled with routes (and securing the catch), but they were recruited to run the more run-oriented, zone-read/RPO-based Mullen offense (which has morphed significantly from the old Utah Spread that he used with Urban Meyer at Bowling Green, Utah, and Florida). The reason that Emory Jones had better luck with completing some of those passes is that his completions came with "inside passes" done with a simple zone read / RPO where the receiver was not running a complicated route (basically the old Utah Spread with RPOs added from Mississippi State). The Gators were so shorthanded at receiver that defensive back Trey Dean III ran a few routes, which can work in a simple offense like the Utah/Mississippi State Spread. The Gator Raid offense that was molded around Kyle Trask was much more complicated for the QB and the wide receivers, and Pitts, Grimes, Toney, and Copeland had all worked out the complexity of those Gator Raid plays over 2-3 years. The Utah/Mississippi State Spread is less about timing and more about creating mismatches, so it can be used with newer receivers.
Here is a breakdown of Emory's successful passing plays using the Utah/Mississippi State Spread:
- 1Q 6:46 E. Jones 25 YD to WR Trent Whittemore (out route to left sideline, zone read)
- 2Q 12:20 E. Jones 18 YD to RB Dameon Pierce (screen play, zone read)
- 2Q 9:57 E. Jones 5 YD to WR Rick Wells (hitch, zone read)
- 2Q 9:28 E. Jones 12 YD to WR Xzavier Henderson (slant?, zone read)
- 2Q 8:29 E. Jones 13 YD to WR Rick Wells (flag or hitch?, zone read)
- 3Q 1:15 E. Jones 9 YD to RB Malik Davis (screen play, zone read)
- 3Q 14:24 E. Jones 4 YD to RB Nay'Quan Wright (screen play, zone read)
- 3Q 14:12 E. Jones 0 YD to WR Rick Wells (hitch, zone read)
- 4Q 3:18 A. Richardson 27 YD to WR Jordan Pouncey for TD (post, multi-read)
I think the offense we see in 2021 will look a lot more like the old Utah Spread, but with a lot more RPOs instead of pure zone reads. Then again, if Emory Jones can work out some Trask-like timing with Copeland, Henderson, Shorter, Pouncey, Whittemore, Fraziars, and Weston then this offense can be a potent "Gator Raid" again, if that is what Brian Johnson and Dan Mullen want. I think that with Emory Jones and Anthony Richardson it makes sense to run two different types of offense as a way to throw off the defenses. Maybe the following year when Jones graduates, Richardson can take over and not have to swap out with Jones because he is a capable of running both the Utah Spread and the Gator Raid.
I’m laughing—to take a break from GNASHING MY TEETH!
But that’s a good line, LF—and really just about the only even-handed, sane and balanced way of reacting to this belated news: Yeah...”Um, we really didn’t even have to PLAY in this late-developing fiasco!” “—Really? NOW they tell us!”
LOL. Yeah, Good one, Gator!
That is I THINK “I agree”...I sure as hell HOPE you are right, E—, or 2021 COULD turn out to be a floundering search to REfind ourselves after all!
It WILL be that on Defense—but depending on what steps our Coach takes and how the decisions made and personnel already on the way we already knew that regardless...
No, NOW we may well be facing it on OFFENSE as well.
Yes, when you break it down and lay it all out in detail, complete with close scrutiny and analysis of the various QBs’ and receivers’ strengths, weaknesses, relative amounts of experience and “what they bring with them to the field at this level” overall, I begin to see that we don’t HAVE to just “HOPE” it adds up to something: Given the time, work and process already begun with this game’s prep, time with Mullen and getting past the shock of the much greater SPEED-OF-THE-GAME at this level hitting them in the FACE for the first time, and everything that will now be POURING IN, ON AND OVER THEM day-by-day, moment-by-moment as they are immersed in it in the coming months, well, it’s “sink or SWIM” now, boys... If Coach has recruited as well as he has intended, it WILL bear results!
So yes: Your position and outlook is NOT without merit or foundation.
It’s no “certainty”, however—not that it ever IS when you’re still in process of building to chase the elite.
But until the very end of this season, the last 2 or 3 games, I truly hadn’t realized how far out on “the razor’s EDGE” we were balanced:
It really COULD go either way from here.
I DO find cause for hope in your “dual threat”/“Two headed monster” approach with Jones dominant THIS season, morphing to the fully-installed “FUTURE KING” in Richardson NEXT season...in its ideal, most optimistic manifestation, we’d make the Playoffs THIS (coming) year (2021), then our full ascendency coming to pass in 2022!
Of course, this all not only assumes certain successful realities coming to pass on OFFENSE, but everything similarly “successfully addressed” on the otherwise DEFENSIVE side of things as WELL—hardly a certainty where none of which has specifically been ADDRESSED so far!
But it’s doable—and knowing our Coach’s skills, attitude and moves thus far, it doesn’t seem an unreasonable stretch to assume this is his plan. So Thankyou, E—: I believe this is a reasonable, AND hopeful starting point from which to pivot and begin to look ahead with some optimism after all.
“Go GATORS! in 2021!”
I really AM done with the 2020 Season now though. My only continued “monitoring” (as in “watching, listening and analyzing what ANY of it means to US, the University of Florida Football Program”) will be extremely limited and narrow in its depth had/or outlook.
I MEAN it, I’ll hardly be even FOLLOWING THE REST OF THE GAMES—especially the PlayOffs this year. I’m just not INTERESTED.
Even now, I’m finishing up these “LAST POSTS” as a kind of exercise in “housekeeping”—wrapping up a few “stray thoughts”, “loose ends” that required tying up here I thought:
Sitting here with the “American Heroes Channel” on (running through the gamut of modern weapons and their developmental history, along with that of various “Special” operations parallel development...it’s an annual presentation this time of year, one I always tend to watch—on in the background now while I sip brandy and hang out here on “GE” with y’all.
Not going anywhere this year—just Gonna drink, listen to music, watch a movie or two, order in some food and so on...and hope that maybe we’ll ALL have plenty to choose from among the MANY offers and invites to WILD, “LET’S CUT THE JAMS: IT’S FINALLY OVER!”-type Parties come NEXT New Year’s, right???
A better, “it ain’t over YET!” outlook for us and our Football team will hopefully be a part of that TOO...
For now, this will just have to DO!
I MEAN it, I’ll hardly be even FOLLOWING THE REST OF THE GAMES—especially the PlayOffs this year. I’m just not INTERESTED.
Even now, I’m finishing up these “LAST POSTS” as a kind of exercise in “housekeeping”—wrapping up a few “stray thoughts”, “loose ends” that required tying up here I thought:
Sitting here with the “American Heroes Channel” on (running through the gamut of modern weapons and their developmental history, along with that of various “Special” operations parallel development...it’s an annual presentation this time of year, one I always tend to watch—on in the background now while I sip brandy and hang out here on “GE” with y’all.
Not going anywhere this year—just Gonna drink, listen to music, watch a movie or two, order in some food and so on...and hope that maybe we’ll ALL have plenty to choose from among the MANY offers and invites to WILD, “LET’S CUT THE JAMS: IT’S FINALLY OVER!”-type Parties come NEXT New Year’s, right???
A better, “it ain’t over YET!” outlook for us and our Football team will hopefully be a part of that TOO...
For now, this will just have to DO!
