Bits & Pieces: Florida vs. Vanderbilt

[cover2]

Despite the better play in the last couple of games, I couldn’t help but have a bit of a feeling that what was on display in Nashville yesterday could happen. It wound up being a day mostly that whatever could go wrong went wrong and what most thought unthinkable, a loss to Vanderbilt, perennial SEC cellar dwellers, played out before us. And just like that, poof, any goodwill that the team and Coach Napier had banked was gone.

If you didn’t watch the game and simply looked at the box score and compared total yards, you’d see UF with 445 and Vandy with 283. You might ask yourself “How in the heck did we lose?!” There wasn’t one factor. In fact there was a laundry list that when you look at them all, it was maybe surprising that we actually had an opportunity to win or tie at the end:

• Let’s start with Special Teams, that weren’t very special. A muffed punt return that was recovered by Vandy in the end zone for a TD was paramount among the gaffs. Our guy misjudged the trajectory and when the punt was sailing over his head he tried to reach back for the ball only to have it bounce off his finger tips into the end zone, where it was recovered by Vandy for the score. Add to that a missed PAT and a couple of short kickoffs that led to 62 combined return yards and great starting position and you have a failure in the third phase of the game.
• Defensive penalties, mostly untimely, were a huge factor. I believe we had been averaging six per game and while the eight we had might not seem significant just scanning the stat sheet, 3 or 4 times (I forget specifically) we turned third down stops into new life for the Commodores and they took advantage, either eventually going on to score or putting us in a field position disadvantage. Perhaps the biggest of these was the targeting call that put Ventrell Miller out for the remainder of the game (he had 11 total tackles at the time), but more importantly will keep him out of the F$U game for the first half on Friday. We shot ourselves in the foot penalty-wise and made Vandy’s path to victory that much easier.
• Vandy could run it, we couldn’t. Their 175 doesn’t sound dominating, but several were conversion runs that moved the chains. We couldn’t consistently stop them off-tackle and their back #2 rushed for 122. We were actually in a sound alignment with our LB/DE for most of the afternoon, but too often the LB (often Burney) tried to play inside out or took a shallow angle, giving up the edge. #2 also had a lot of yac, as he was tough to bring down on first contact. In the case of our inability to run the ball (45 total yards), maybe the biggest factor wasn’t necessarily our inability to block Vandy at the point of attack (which was significant), but the fact AR ran only 4 times for 25 yards (more on this later). All told, what has been our bread and butter was no factor and as we were witness, we can’t win without it.
• We gave up 3 scores through the air and 2 of those were to TEs. Just seems like we have a hard time covering what are the biggest and least speedy receivers on the opposing rosters. From a yardage standpoint, their guy didn’t exactly carve us up (10/16 for 108 yards), but he made it count when they were in the red zone.
• AR continues to perplex. While 25/42 for 400 yards with 3 TDs was significant, I believe his most important stat was the aforementioned 4 rushes for 25 yards. Without a play sheet I can’t know for sure, but it appeared that he was reluctant to pull and run it on the inside option (that mostly netted 20 rushing yards by our backs). Maybe Billy told him to give and not pull? I have a hard time believing that as the backside DE had crashed frequently. And we started the second half with a couple of of relatively successful AR runs, but quickly went back to the same old same old that Vandy was stopping. Despite a big yardage day passing, without his legs being a big part of the offense, AR is more average overall and seems to have several glaring misses each game or makes mistakes at critical times. To wit, the last possession wound up being a crap fest with his second to last pass being a low ball that kept our receiver in bounds and causing our last play (which was a gift) to result in a throw 20 rows up into the end zone instead of a jump ball that would at least give us a shot to tie/win. The guy is a phenomenal athlete and can play with a lead and everything rolling smoothly, but he can’t seem to play under pressure consistently and all too often, as my Nole brother in law commented yesterday, seems to frequently be disinterested. All told, if he is unwilling to use his legs, we might just as well give Kitna a shot.
• We didn’t seem particularly well-prepared mentally and couldn’t get the switch turned on when it was clear that Vandy was playing like they expected to win. This is on Billy. Listening to the postgame, Billy acknowledged as much, took responsibility, but didn’t really get into the specifics. Regardless, that can’t happen. I’ll further add that it is more than clear to me now that Billy needs an OC/QB coach. You guys that have pointed that out previously can give yourselves a pat on the back! He might possibly have been able to pull the multiple roles off if he wasn’t having to play both coach and counselor to his QB/man child, but that point is now beyond moot. His strengths are programmatic organization and recruiting, though with the fickle nature of high school kids intensified by the whole NIL influence, he may well be pressed in that area. Understand when I tell you that I’m not advocating for a change as the only consistent we’ve had coaching-wise since Meyer’s last season is inconsistency and coaches heading into the bunker before they were fired and/or ran off. It may not be optimal in the eyes of some, but Billy’s got to have at least two years to get things turned, the speed of which makes even the most ardent and patient of fans raise a little hell.

We’ve got two games remaining, the last of which is inconsequential at this point beyond the extra practice time it will afford. The next game is the most important of the current tenure. The Noles are feeling pretty good after recent wins, they’re scoring points and giving up very few. We’re playing in Tallahassee, which hasn’t made much difference lately, but could be a factor on Friday. The spotlight will clearly be on Billy and staff to see how they respond. I’m always pulling for us to win, as I know you all are, and nothing could serve us better than for the troops to show up well-prepared and play hard while minimizing mistakes and closing a back-and-forth season with a victory over a big rival. Our program needs a turning point where we finish strong and set the tone for next season and beyond. We’ll see…

Go Gators!

 

[Gatorbait25]

Well said as usual cover . Burney was out of position most of the afternoon . He even had the defensive holding on the 3rd and 14 throwaway out of bounds . Dreadful showing to say the least .

 

[Gatormac2112]

First

Damn it: second

Agree with everything cover! I too had an uneasy feeling about this game and selected the gators not to cover in the pool and unfortunately it played out worse than I had imagined. Very frustrating to watch.

 

[stephenPE]

Inexplicable.............just like the 2nd half of the BB game in tallacrappy. Or the UT game. But im gonna defend AR. When he lost his best WR and was down to 2nd and 3rd teamers he had good game passing. I think they said we aint gonna let you run and they did it. Our def lost that game. Not AR. Oh yeah, a gdmmmm penalty at the worst time it seemed too often. Def Help is on the way.........

 

[NOLAGATOR]

View attachment 51312

Despite the better play in the last couple of games, I couldn’t help but have a bit of a feeling that what was on display in Nashville yesterday could happen. It wound up being a day mostly that whatever could go wrong went wrong and what most thought unthinkable, a loss to Vanderbilt, perennial SEC cellar dwellers, played out before us. And just like that, poof, any goodwill that the team and Coach Napier had banked was gone.

If you didn’t watch the game and simply looked at the box score and compared total yards, you’d see UF with 445 and Vandy with 283. You might ask yourself “How in the heck did we lose?!” There wasn’t one factor. In fact there was a laundry list that when you look at them all, it was maybe surprising that we actually had an opportunity to win or tie at the end:

• Let’s start with Special Teams, that weren’t very special. A muffed punt return that was recovered by Vandy in the end zone for a TD was paramount among the gaffs. Our guy misjudged the trajectory and when the punt was sailing over his head he tried to reach back for the ball only to have it bounce off his finger tips into the end zone, where it was recovered by Vandy for the score. Add to that a missed PAT and a couple of short kickoffs that led to 62 combined return yards and great starting position and you have a failure in the third phase of the game.
• Defensive penalties, mostly untimely, were a huge factor. I believe we had been averaging six per game and while the eight we had might not seem significant just scanning the stat sheet, 3 or 4 times (I forget specifically) we turned third down stops into new life for the Commodores and they took advantage, either eventually going on to score or putting us in a field position disadvantage. Perhaps the biggest of these was the targeting call that put Ventrell Miller out for the remainder of the game (he had 11 total tackles at the time), but more importantly will keep him out of the F$U game for the first half on Friday. We shot ourselves in the foot penalty-wise and made Vandy’s path to victory that much easier.
• Vandy could run it, we couldn’t. Their 175 doesn’t sound dominating, but several were conversion runs that moved the chains. We couldn’t consistently stop them off-tackle and their back #2 rushed for 122. We were actually in a sound alignment with our LB/DE for most of the afternoon, but too often the LB (often Burney) tried to play inside out or took a shallow angle, giving up the edge. #2 also had a lot of yac, as he was tough to bring down on first contact. In the case of our inability to run the ball (45 total yards), maybe the biggest factor wasn’t necessarily our inability to block Vandy at the point of attack (which was significant), but the fact AR ran only 4 times for 25 yards (more on this later). All told, what has been our bread and butter was no factor and as we were witness, we can’t win without it.
• We gave up 3 scores through the air and 2 of those were to TEs. Just seems like we have a hard time covering what are the biggest and least speedy receivers on the opposing rosters. From a yardage standpoint, their guy didn’t exactly carve us up (10/16 for 108 yards), but he made it count when they were in the red zone.
• AR continues to perplex. While 25/42 for 400 yards with 3 TDs was significant, I believe his most important stat was the aforementioned 4 rushes for 25 yards. Without a play sheet I can’t know for sure, but it appeared that he was reluctant to pull and run it on the inside option (that mostly netted 20 rushing yards by our backs). Maybe Billy told him to give and not pull? I have a hard time believing that as the backside DE had crashed frequently. And we started the second half with a couple of of relatively successful AR runs, but quickly went back to the same old same old that Vandy was stopping. Despite a big yardage day passing, without his legs being a big part of the offense, AR is more average overall and seems to have several glaring misses each game or makes mistakes at critical times. To wit, the last possession wound up being a crap fest with his second to last completion being a low ball that kept our receiver in bounds and causing our last play (which was a gift) to result in a throw 20 rows up into the end zone instead of a jump ball that would at least give us a shot to tie/win. The guy is a phenomenal athlete and can play with a lead and everything rolling smoothly, but he can’t seem to play under pressure consistently and all too often, as my Nole brother in law commented yesterday, seems to frequently be disinterested. All told, if he is unwilling to use his legs, we might just as well give Kitna a shot.
• We didn’t seem particularly well-prepared mentally and couldn’t get the switch turned on when it was clear that Vandy was playing like they expected to win. This is on Billy. Listening to the postgame, Billy acknowledged as much, took responsibility, but didn’t really get into the specifics. Regardless, that can’t happen. I’ll further add that it is more than clear to me now that Billy needs an OC/QB coach. You guys that have pointed that out previously can give yourselves a pat on the back! He might possibly have been able to pull the multiple roles off if he wasn’t having to play both coach and counselor to his QB/man child, but that point is now beyond moot. His strengths are programmatic organization and recruiting, though with the fickle nature of high school kids intensified by the whole NIL influence, he may well be pressed in that area. Understand when I tell you that I’m not advocating for a change as the only consistent we’ve had coaching-wise since Meyer’s last season is inconsistency and coaches heading into the bunker before they were fired and/or ran off. It may not be optimal in the eyes of some, but Billy’s got to have at least two years to get things turned, the speed of which makes even the most ardent and patient of fans raise a little hell.

We’ve got two games remaining, the last of which is inconsequential at this point beyond the extra practice time it will afford. The next game is the most important of the current tenure. The Noles are feeling pretty good after recent wins, they’re scoring points and giving up very few. We’re playing in Tallahassee, which hasn’t made much difference lately, but could be a factor on Friday. The spotlight will clearly be on Billy and staff to see how they respond. I’m always pulling for us to win, as I know you all are, and nothing could serve us better than for the troops to show up well-prepared and play hard while minimizing mistakes and closing a back-and-forth season with a victory over a big rival. Our program needs a turning point where we finish strong and set the tone for next season and beyond. We’ll see…

Go Gators!

Spot on as usual.
Napier needs time and the Nation is tired of waiting.
But I think our time is coming.

 

[G8trwood]

Thanks Cover. AR not pulling with no defenders outside was perplexing, as well as coaches not recognizing the safety at the line.

Defensive bad angles and light boxes oh my. A lot of new faces out there, but damn, Vandy. We couldn’t tackle Vandy.

Not sure if ETN was hurt, 4 carries? With the WR all hurt, who are our playmakers? Run a two backset and put one of them in motion and perhaps throw to them? Most of our WR motion and PA is ignored anyway.

Thanks again

Go Gators

 

[cover2]

Inexplicable.............just like the 2nd half of the BB game in tallacrappy. Or the UT game. But im gonna defend AR. When he lost his best WR and was down to 2nd and 3rd teamers he had good game passing. I think they said we aint gonna let you run and they did it. Our def lost that game. Not AR. Oh yeah, a gdmmmm penalty at the worst time it seemed too often. Def Help is on the way.........

Coach, I agree with your points, but I steadfastly believe that if he either pulls and keeps 4-5 times and exits the pocket a few times and gets in LB and secondary levels, we likely win the game. But heck, it’s all debatable on Sunday morning. They didn’t let us run and we didn’t win and a 400 yard passing day couldn’t change it. That much is certain.

 

[Gatorraid81]

Couldn’t agree with you more on AR, he’s very frustrating to watch. Hopefully he’ll move on after Friday.

 

[Bernardo de la Paz]

Looks like the only bright spot out of this is that yesterday's cluster fuchs didn't scare off @cover2 again.

Thanks for the analysis, spot on as usual.

 

[stephenPE]

Coach, I agree with your points, but I steadfastly believe that if he either pulls and keeps 4-5 times and exits the pocket a few times and gets in LB and secondary levels, we likely win the game. But heck, it’s all debatable on Sunday morning. They didn’t let us run and we didn’t win and a 400 yard passing day couldn’t change it. That much is certain.

Yep, at least 3 times a game I think "IF he kept the ball that time he is running for big yards" But I dont see the field from his perspective. And the last two games his RBs have absolutely killed it. How do we crush USCe and then they score 63 on UT.

 

[Mr2Bits]

My take :

• Special teams are absolutely terrible and have been all year. If we’re not being penalized on kickoffs, we are missing field goals (now xp) and have now moved into muffed punts…**** this squad, burn it to the ground and start over
• AR is just terrible! He has our RBs crashing into two tons of bodies when it’s wide ****ing open if he pulls it…we also have the fact that he’s throwing Hail Marys into the stands
• How many WR screens so we need to call for 2 yards this year, believe we’re up to 20 at this point?
• The Miller targeting call amongst other penalties were bull****

Rant over…hope we get our **** together

 

[chferg]

Yep, at least 3 times a game I think "IF he kept the ball that time he is running for big yards" But I dont see the field from his perspective. And the last two games his RBs have absolutely killed it. How do we crush USCe and then they score 63 on UT.

Lack of prep by the coaching staff and team plus a QB that was playing his last home game and wanted to show out and after that he is content with playing scared.

 

[5-Star Finger]

Welcome back, coach!

It's not a popular opinion, but I think if the defensive scheme was a stock, it would be Enron. It isn't all on the players (as some here want to pin it) for reasons I and others have gone into elsewhere. If we just keep dismissing guys until we have the scout team QB playing linebacker, we can then probably just blame the players. Maybe that is the plan. Either way, if our young coach is going to be a coach when he is old he's got to learn a bit quicker than he seems to be learning.

When I hire a contractor that tells me he can do a job, I generally trust him to do it until his results tell me otherwise. I think it is clear that CBN shouldn't be both calling plays and coaching the QB.

 

[AuggieDosta]

@cover2 that was a perfect analysis.
Everybody says that coffee is better with your post game coverage and I'd agree except I accidentally left my cup next to the sink just outside my reach at the moment.

 

[SGG]

My take :

• Special teams are absolutely terrible and have been all year. If we’re not being penalized on kickoffs, we are missing field goals (now xp) and have now moved into muffed punts…**** this squad, burn it to the ground and start over
• AR is just terrible! He has our RBs crashing into two tons of bodies when it’s wide ****ing open if he pulls it…we also have the fact that he’s throwing Hail Marys into the stands
• How many WR screens so we need to call for 2 yards this year, believe we’re up to 20 at this point?
• The Miller targeting call amongst other penalties were bull****

Rant over…hope we get our **** together

The WR screen and the bootleg play are hot garbage. That shyt doesn’t work in middle school ball even.

AR may be a bigger head case than Driskel, Franks, Treon, Emory and Brantley combined. I’ve never seen anything like it. One second he launches a dime 30 yards down the field, the next he sends one into the dirt at 100mph 5 feet away from him. I hope next week are his last snaps in a Gators uniform, one way or the other.

I get that the team is bad, I do, but to show unprepared mentally, emotionally and physically for this game is absolutely sickening and inexcusable.

 

[Since65]

It’s no great insight but I have finally concluded that AR is a great athlete playing QB and not a natural QB. Yes, he can do amazing things running the ball (when he chooses to) and occasionally demonstrates a world class throwing arm. However he does not seem to demonstrate any natural understanding of the position.

This might explain some of the “inexplicable “ things we have seen from Napier this season. The “middle school” offense, the simplistic passing route trees and the incomprehensible clock management at the end of halves. It appears he doesn’t trust AR to do “quarterback-y” things that involve reading the field or that come with a higher level of risk. The highlight reel plays for AR this year have mostly come from improvisation or athletic ability efforts.

Not sure there Is any way to even attempt to make a QB change at this point especially when you look at AR’s stat line from Saturday. I just think that it has become clear (to me) the reasons behind some of Napier’s frustrating decisions. I would be surprised if AR is back next year though it would be beneficial to his development.

My 2 cents. Thanks for the clear consistent commentary! Cover. Great stuff!

 

[GatorCatsi]

All told, if he is unwilling to use his legs, we might just as well give Kitna a shot.

He is, and we should.

 

[gardnerwebbgator]

Excellent as usual.

AR has checked out. Glad the dunce made of glass is going pro.

Play calling is ****. Game management is ****. Going for two early and chasing points all second half. Billy is a Sun Belt level coach. Simple as that. Doesn’t matter the recruits he brings in, all of them are getting equal or better coaching where they are in high school right now.

 

[cover2]

He is, and we should.

It’s been mentioned (unofficially) that Wake’s QB might be available via the portal for one year. I have no idea if he would be interested or even if we are. However, if we don’t want to use Kitna, who‘s shown a couple of glimpses, then Hartman would arguably be a great get. As the late Charlie Murphy once remarked in a Chappell Show skit “that cat could ball!” I’d really be shocked if AR returns and doesn’t take his potential to an NFL payday. He‘d be foolish not to unless the “Gator Collective” makes him the richest resident of Alachua county, which would be counter-productive to Gator football moving forward I believe.

 

[sminings]

Spot on analysis.