On to the Goal

Last week, Orson Swindle waxed eloquent on football, life and life as it relates to football. In particular, he talked about the precise moment at which “you realized the game had some kind of parasitic, infectious grip on you that no amount of treatment would undo.” For him it was one of the more gut-wrenching moments in the last 20 years of Gator football:

Painful, yes, but what did we learn? As it turns out, that play was also a textbook example of the Smash Route passing concept, which you may remember from its previous coachporn disection at the hands of Chris a.k.a. Smart Football.

X’s and O’s are a relatively new addition to my football life. I’ve been a college football fan sincelikeforever but only began to focus on its actual machinations about five years ago. That’s why Smart Football is such a service to the community. For those of us who didn’t play but want to know more about the schematic brilliance behind the game, he is a beacon of light in a world full hopelessly inept color commentators.

So even when the examples have dreadfully, horribly awful results, it’s nice to know that we can derive at least some benefit from them. I’ll be studiously watching for examples of the Smash, Shallow-Cross and Levels concetps this fall.

Perception is reality, but to perceive something, you actually have to observe it. And often in life, we simply choose not to observe. We are content to stroll down our safe, tree-lined streets, blissfully unaware of the fact that somewhere just across town someone is smoking crack or getting robbed at gunpoint. (If you live in Washington D.C., these things are actually occurring in the alley behind your house.) We make our own perception and thus our own reality.

The defending champs return 11 starters on defense and perhaps the greatest college football player ever at quarterback. Life is good for the Florida Gators. Just so long as we don’t think about those instances in which it’s not so good.

As a fan, my initial reaction to Florida being labeled the new “Thug U” for having 23 players arrested in Urban Meyer’s four-year tenure was to recoil in defense. “Other schools have plenty of guys arrested! We’re talking about young males here, things are going to happen! Florida has had perhaps hundreds of players during that time span, and 23 guys are a small fraction of a largely law-abiding team!”

All those things are true. And it’s natural that we reach for them when faced with unwelcome news. We love the Gators and the University of Florida, and we don’t want their good names to be sullied by a handful of lowlifes. But that doesn’t mean we can declare “case closed,” dismiss the article and launch a few insults at Tennessee just for good measure. We should not ignore the issue as if it doesn’t exist.

We might not think so, or at least tell ourselves we don’t, but the media thinks otherwise. A few years ago, The Seattle Times ran an investigative series on the 2000 Washington Huskies – another team with a great defense and a bruising option quarterback. Husky fans were outraged and called the series unfair, and I can’t say I necessarily blame them. But whether the series was “fair” is irrelevant at this point. It happened and the school’s reputation suffered somewhat. It could happen again to Florida.

So with that in mind, it would help to understand what we’re really talking about here. I couldn’t find a comprehensive list of the 23 arrests, so working from memory and a number of message board leads, I set out to document as many of the arrests as I could. A few hours of Googling yielded 14.

I’m probably forgetting some obvious ones, and I couldn’t find links for some stuff that I seem to remember happening. I haven’t named any of those “unconfirmed” cases here, nor did I include anything that happened before or after a player was enrolled. This is a list only of the arrests and/or charges (post-Meyer) that I could substantiate with an actual media report. I’ve sorted them by level of severity as judged by, well, me. All suspects are presumed innocent until proven guilty, etc., etc., allegedly. Any instance in which I could confirm the charges were dropped is denoted by an asterisk.

C’mon, it’s college – generally harmless stuff

• John Curits – Probation violation stemming from an alcohol charge.
• Dorian Munroe – Illegally removing a boot from his car. Stupid, yes, but more funny than anything.
• Torrey Davis – Of his many alleged problems, driving with a suspended license wasn’t all that bad.
• Tony Joiner* – The underlying charge sounded serious, but considering the fairly humorous “misunderstanding” defense and subsequent dismissal, no reason to fret.
• Brandon James – Buying weed off an undercover cop. Yes, I’m including this here, because if you smoke weed (which many college kids do) you often have to buy it. James, well, he chose… poorly when it came to dealers.

Boys bein’ boys, not condoning it, not losing our shit over it

• Dustin Doe* – Fightin’. Moving on…
• Jermaine Cunningham – Sub-chuckin’. Abusing service industry employees is not funny if you’ve ever worked in the service industry. Except when it is. But seriously, tip your waiters.

He said, she said and a whole lotta nothing

• Carl Johnson* – Violating a restraining order. Frightening but completely unsubstantiated back-story.

Troubling crimes, but not depraved or wanton

• Marquis Hannah – Felony burglary and misdemeanor assault in what sounded more like a crime of passion than cold, calculated criminality.
• Cam Newton – Stealing a laptop. And not very well.

Really, really terrible things

• Jacques Rickerson – Beating up his girlfriend. Totally unacceptable.
• Jamar Hornsby – Credit card fraud. Of a deceased woman. Who was the girlfriend of a teammate. Later, brass knucles. Giggity.
• Ronnie Wilson – Shootin’ an AK-47 behind Gator City, detailed in terrifying audio.
• Avery Atkins – Beating up his girlfriend led to a sad, tragic spiral that led to his untimely demise.

Of those 14, half are merely things that college-aged males do. None of it is to be condoned, mind you, but it’s inside the realm of mistakes that good, decent people can make before their brain is fully formed. I’m also going to throw out the Johnson matter, because of it’s high bullshit quotient and the fact that there’s no way to ever really know what actually happened. But that still leaves a minimum of six serious crimes, four of which can be accurately described as “totally messed up” offenses. Or worse. That’s an average of one per year. And my tally is missing nine arrests.

For the record, all six players who were accused of serious misconduct are no longer on the team. Most were quickly kicked off and only Newton seemed to have left of his own volition. Yes, Ron “Don’t call me Ronnie” Wilson was back last year, briefly, but is thankfully off the team once more.

In that respect, this is not Switzer’s Oklahoma or Miami circa 1980-something, as Dave Hyde suggested. I certainly don’t think it’s fair to accuse Urban Meyer of “running a loose ship.” Minor transgressions are punished, though admittedly sometimes a bit too lightly. Major issues are met with much more serious consequences, but not necessarily automatic termination. Think of it as “shades of gray” rather than “black and white.” Page two of this Sports Illustrated article by Andy Staples does a fantastic job of explaining Meyer’s philosophy on the matter, particularly his differing approach in dealing with Atkins and Marty Johhnson when he was at Utah. (I agree with many of Staples’ points, by the way, particularly the one about the “one percent of one percent” canard.)

It is fair, however, to point out that every one of those six players was either a Meyer recruit or, in Hannah’s case, a walk-on whose entire run with the team was during Meyer’s tenure. These are his guys. And Hyde is right when he says that the frequency of their heinous behavior runs the risk of damaging Meyer’s reputation and, worse, that of the team and university. A few bad apples, yes, but averaging one “totally messed up” incident a year is not good for business. Just. Not. Good.

So what’s the impact of all this? In the short term, probably not much. Our rivals will have some fun at our expense, newspaper columnists will moralize and, worst-case-scenario, Outside The Lines will launch an “OMG the horror!” investigative piece that reveals exactly zero new facts. (I don’t see anything in these arrests that the NCAA could latch onto.) But then, barring another gut-wrenching incident, silence. We’ll get back to talking about the things we like about football, entertainment, socializing and the ability to release all your pent up emotion by screaming “WOOOO” over and over again at high decibel levels.

The rest will fade into the background until the next backup lineman forgets how to hold his Natty Light. Pray it isn’t something worse.

Slive looking particularly good.

I can’t really fault college football bloggers or columnists for floating stupid ideas during the month of May. After all, we don’t really have anything to talk about – my last post was about summer workouts.

So on some level, I feel bad for poor Ray Melick of the Birmingham News, who has been taking some heat for his latest post titled, “Maybe it’s time Mike Slive put a muzzle on SEC coaches.”

Basically, Melick’s thesis is that petty infighting between coaches is bad for the conference and, with the stakes climbing ever higher, the strife threatens to tear the league asunder. My reaction to that is best summed up by Holly Anderson, Dr. Saturday contributor and noted Vol partisan:

Melick’s argument that the SEC is on the brink of dissolving into infighting and squabbling is both hysterical and completely contrary to the salient point: Infighting is an unqualified good for the sport.

Agreed. Though the Lane Kiffins of the world (or maybe just Lane Kiffin) occasionally cross the line, generally anythingthat keeps the conference visible during the long offseason – short of arrests or actual rules violations – is a good thing. Again, I don’t blame Melick for floating the idea – it’s yet another thing to talk about in May, and OHGODHOWISITSTILLMAY.

But I take issue with his attempt to draw a parallel between the SEC and the old Southwest Conference, which imploded in truly spectacular fashion in the mid-90s, due in part to infighting and general lawlessness. In truth, there really couldn’t be a worse analogy – not seven years ago when Slive took the reins and CERTAINLY not today.

In 1992, Sports Illustrated covered the imminent downfall of the SWC, and the result is a wildly entertaining look into college football’s past as a regional sport dominated by backroom political deals that were so shady, they almost don’t seem real when viewed in contemporary context. Except they were.

As outlined in the article, the SWC was a league historically dominated by two powerful, oil-rich schools: Texas and Texas A&M. The rest of the league was mostly comprised of lesser programs as Rice and TCU that were at a constant, significant disadvantage when it came to resources and support. This top-heavy arrangement may have been acceptable if the big boys were competitive on a national scale, but they were not. From Texas’ last national title in 1970 to the league’s dissolution in 1996, SWC teams finished first in a major poll exactly zero times. It wasn’t for a lack of trying. A full two-thirds of the conference served probation in the 1980s for various acts of cheatin’, with SMU receiving the only “death penalty” ever leveled against a major college football program.

Exactly none of that sounds like the present state of the SEC. Yes, there are “haves” and “have-nots” but the distribution is more equal. Five, maybe six programs in the SEC are truly “elite,” and even also-rans such as Kentucky make postseason appearances and rank in the top-25 nationally in attendance. The past three BCS Champions have hailed from the SEC, and four conference schools have combined for seven national titles in the past two decades. And for as worked up as we get about Limo-gate or Kiffin’s infantile outbursts, petty infighting is a far, far cry from the late-20^th century shenanigans of the SWC. Other than that, the comparison is spot-on.

But while we’re on the subject of Mike Slive and cautionary tales from defunct conferences, we should take a look at the real reason the SWC ultimately failed – money. Even before Arkansas’ defection to greener pastures in 1991, the league’s weaker programs had trouble staying relevant in a rapidly changing economic landscape. When the two Texas behemoths won the right to bogart an even larger share of gate receipts and television revenue already limited by the league’s limited geographic footprint, the gap only grew wider. As far back as 1992, many were wondering where this all was headed:

Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds says only that the long-range future of college football is the superconference—perhaps 40 of the biggest, wealthiest schools forming a handful of alliances, with the rest dropping down or dropping the sport. “The world is going to dictate where Texas goes,” he says. “The marketplace will dictate it.”

Sound familiar?

I’m not about to make an argument for NFL-style parity or draconian revenue sharing. For obvious reasons, I prefer my college football universe stratified. This is a Florida football blog, after all. But the microcosm of the SWC collapsed because a large number of weaker schools could not keep pace with a handful of behemoths. If that process were to happen again on a larger scale, then I agree with Dr. Saturday that it would kill the sport:

The more college football resembles a slightly less-wealthy NFL feeder league — i.e. something like minor league baseball — the less interesting and less marketable it will be, because even an “NCAA Elite League” can never compete with the actual pros.

As to how such a scenario is avoided without unjustly stripping larger programs of their hard-earned status, well, that’s a difficult discussion for another day. But as commissioner, one of Slive’s main jobs is to ensure that the SEC remains at the top of the heap. I would argue that he must do so without completely crushing those underneath.

So with that in mind, who’s excited for the Troy game this September?!?

Photo via Miami Herald

If you were to rank all the world’s social circles on factors such as propensity for irrational behavior and potential for swift, violent combustion, the blogosphere and SEC football would be near the top of the list. My guess is that they’d fall somewhere between illegal, underground cage fighting and the
Middle East.

When you combine the two in the form of blogs about SEC football… Well, sir, you’ve got yourself some madness of hyperbolic proportions. My goal for this blog is to keep things a bit more rational – not letting the highs get too high, the lows too low and so forth. I try my best to exude Gator fanboyism moderated by the firm, steady hand of reality. Laugh if you must, but that’s my dream.

Anyway, I bring this up because today I’ve let my guard down a bit. Normally, I’d be highly reticent to believe the hype, let alone embrace it. But after careful examination, I have come to the following highly logical conclusion about Florida’s prospects in 2009: WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Now under normal circumstances this would be considered by some to be, “calling down the thunder.” And, under normal circumstances, I would be the individual levying this charge. But these are no ordinary times for the Florida football program.

The Gators are reigning champions and a virtual shoo-in at number one in every preseason poll. “Astronomical” doesn’t even begin to define the expectations. Fairly or not, anything less than a 14-0 championship season will be considered a disappointment by most in the proverbial Gator Nation.

History tells us that living up to these expectations is going to be incredibly difficult. In the past seven seasons, only USC in 2004 went wire-to-wire from preseason #1 to national champions. It’s even more difficult to win back-to-back national titles. According to the BCS and the two major polls (whatever they happened to be called at the time) a repeat has happened just six times in the past 50 years. All but one of those involved a “split” championship in at least one of the two seasons — Nebraska in 1994-95 is the lone exception (and even then one could make a fairly strong argument that Penn State got screwed in ’94). More recently, no school has ever won consecutive BCS Championships.

So thus is the setup for the Gators in 2009: Impossibly high expectations to pull off what to this date has been an impossible feat.

As I see it, there’s two ways to go about this as a fan. On the one hand, we could spend the offseason living in constant fear, always expecting the next Google Alert to bring news of a late-night arrest or torn ACL. In the fall, we could dread every Saturday, wondering if today will bring this year’s “31-30.”

Or we could simply enjoy it. We can embrace these moments and go along with this thing for however long it lasts. Gator football has never been as strong as it is on April 20, 2009. Even if this is the high-water mark, it’s been one hell of a ride. But it’s not as if there are warnings of an impending end-point popping up at every turn. Rather, everywhere you look there are reasons for optimism.

The Orange and Blue game was a rousing success, with numerous backups shining in the place of resting starters. Though injuries were many this spring, as of press time, almost nobody from the two-deep suffered a setback that will keep him off the field for any length of time in 2009. The coaches, along with players such as Tim Tebow and Brandon Spikes, are determined to not let the Gators get too comfortable this summer. And just as a reminder, the Florida returns 18 true starters – all 11 on defense and seven on offense (I count the Pounceys, Carl Johnson, Riley Cooper, Aaron Hernandez, Tim Tebow and a running back, take your pick which one).

In short, all of the usual pratfalls that can turn a champion into an also-ran seem to not apply here. There has not been an unusual amount of attrition or injuries, no bouts of lawlessness, no sense of entitlement or complacency. There isn’t even an overly daunting schedule awaiting Florida on the other side of August. With the usual disclaimer that injuries can befell any football team at any time, it seems that Florida’s chief enemies are history and the law of averages.

Maybe that’s an overly optimistic assessment, but if there were ever a time for that kind of confidence, this is it.

Perhaps more than any other profession, the job of “head football coach” is frequently likened to a wide variety of other jobs. One coach is “a teacher.” Another is a “CEO-style manager.” The guy who yells a lot? “General.”

But to me, the best modern college football coaches closely resemble PR guys.

It's Orwellian, bitch.

Every coach interacts with the media to a certain extent, but the best coaches are able to use the media with ninja-like precision to achieve a desired end. Spurrier used publicity to needle opponents. Pete Carroll leverages both traditional and social media to promote the dreamy SoCal lifestyle, brah. Lane Kiffin… well, he’s just a self-indulgent prick, actually.

But with Spurrier in decline in Columbia, Urban Meyer is now perhaps the greatest of the media Jedi masters. He plays mind tricks both with opponents and players on his own team and he does it without being incendiary or throwing out any “red meat” bulletin-board material. If anything, misinformation is his primary weapon. I like to call it the “Urban Meyer Ministry of Truth.” Case-in-point: Omar Hunter.

Around this time last year, Meyer was hyping Hunter as the “Tim Tebow” of the 2008 recruiting class. High praise indeed. Meyer made it publicly known that he expected Hunter to immediately help shore up the Gators’ glaring weakness at defensive tackle. Maybe he made those proclamations in earnest. Maybe he would have dominated from day one had injuries not limited his season to a few meaningless snaps against Hawaii. Gator fans can certainly hope that a healthy Hunter is some kind of super-human beast on the interior line. But one thing that is clear: By the time Hunter arrived, defensive tackle was no longer a weakness.

Between 2007 and 2008, Lawrence Marsh and Terron Sanders transformed from obscure backups to solid, occasionally spectacular starters. Their consistency and (for the most part) durability were a huge reason that the Gator defense made the leap from “certifiably terrible” to “AWESOME DEATH MACHINE” in just one calendar year.

This spring, I’ve read several quotes that indicate to me that Meyer is at it again. I’ll address a few of these in a moment, but first, two disclaimers:

#1 — I used to work in an athletic department and I fully understand the gap between outside perception and internal reality. These are my opinions and inferences based on published reports and prior knowledge.

#2 — I’m not mocking or questioning Meyer in any way. The man gets results and I’m not about to quarrel with his methods.

Now, on to four Urbanisms from this spring and the relative veracity of each:

The offensive line is so suspect, redshirt freshman Sam Robey may start at center

Quote: “Meyer said Robey has “really come on.” … “I’m not saying that’s happening (for sure),” Meyer said after Wednesday’s workout. “But we had a meeting about that (Tuesday). That’s a possibility.” — Florida Today, 4/9

Veracity: Completely unknown, but mildly dubious on the surface

Translation: It’s not inconceivable that a former three-star recruit such as Robey could turn out to be a surprise stalwart on the offensive line. The Gators have seen a number of three-star-or-lower guys made good recently, including Phil Trautwein, Jason Watkins, Jim Tartt, Steve Risler and Carlton Medder, to name five. But if Matt Patchan nails down a tackle spot, Carl Johnson seems likely to stay put at left guard, meaning that Robey would need to be awfully good to supplant CJ or one of the Pounceys inside. If Robey is that talented, this is a good problem to have. Even if he’s halfway decent it’s nice to have depth. But without any further proof, this one could be a motivational tactic.

Every tight end and fullback other than Aaron Hernandez sucks

Quote: “Des Parks right now has no idea which way right or left is and our fullbacks are struggling as well,” he said. “It’s not looking very good.” — Gainesville Sun, 3/31

Veracity: Dubious, at best

Translation: Aaron Hernandez is entrenched as a starter and potential All-America candidate at tight end, but behind him there is literally no lead-blocker/pass-catcher with significant experience. Though they may not be game-ready yet, I imagine that at least one productive player will emerge from the logjam of T.J. Pridemore, Rick Burgess, Steve Wilks and Desmond Parks emerges as a reliable “H-back” or whatever you want to call it. This seems like a textbook kick-in-the-pants tactic to me.

The I-formation is completely and totally dead

Quote: “I’m not sure how that I-package is going to be sticking around in here … We can run ‘I’ all you want, but if your players aren’t very good or they’re struggling or they’re young and inexperienced then we’re not going to run that ragged. We’ll go to five-wide and you’ve seen us do that before.” — Gainesville Sun, 3/31

Veracity: Highly likely

Translation: This one rings true. A young’un or two may step up to be a luxury at fullback/tight end, but that doesn’t mean that the Gators should devote precious hours of practice time to a package that requires such players. And I’m sure Tim Tebow can play under center, but for the purposes of winning games in 2009, uh, why make him? I’d take this one at face value.

The Gators are going hurry-up, Oklahoma-style

Quote: ”We’re working on our cadence and our tempo and no-huddle,” Meyer said. “We thought Oklahoma did a nice job of it so we messed around with some stuff.” — Miami Herald, 3/26

Veracity: Half-truth

Translation: The other half of the “grizzly bear/chainsaw” combo, the no-huddle is actually already part of Florida’s bag of tricks, so this isn’t a total ruse. However, a wholesale conversion to the breakneck philosophy employed by Oklahoma and (soon) Auburn seems unlikely. Even without Percy Harvin, the Gator offense should still score at a strong clip, and with the aforementioned deathsquad of a defense, the Gators might not want to extend games. But the mere threat that, at any moment, the Gators could shift into a no-huddle for more than a series or two is enough to give opposing defensive coordinators cold sweats at night. Ministry of Truth at its finest.

MS Paint... holla

I obviously haven’t been blogging these past few weeks, which sort of stinks given that there’s been a daily pipeline of Gator news emanating from spring practices.

Don’t let me fool you into thinking that this in any way justifies the absence, but I have been making one of those dreaded “this is going to affect the rest of your life” decisions over the past few weeks. After a handful of plane rides, lots of boring meetings and a fairly diverse sampling of regional beer offerings, I have arrived at a decision and will be attending grad school at Georgia Tech this fall. (Yay for rooting against Florida State and Georgia twice a year!)

Over the long-term, this means I should have a bit more free-time for research and posting. Not that I haven’t had that up until this point, but I digress. In the short-term, however, I should be back as scheduled, beginning with a spring roundup, forthcoming this afternoon.

I’ve been posting a lot about “Hated Rivals” lately, which is a pretty good indication that spring practice really, really needs to start. Mercifully, it begins tomorrow and will be accompanied by the requisite spring preview column.

But until that time, let’s just continue to sip on H (formerly known as Haterade). Today’s target: Da U, who is feeling spurned by Florida’s refusal to extend the series on a biennial basis after 2013. Try to act surprised.

But really, no, this is not a surprise. That’s not to say that it won’t illicit cries that the Gators are “ducking” the Hurricanes. The comments from Miami fans on the Herald story follow along in that vein, particularly commenter “Bkchero” who referred to the UF braintrust as, “Clown Prince Foley and his erotic lover Machen.” Most, if not all, are accepting this bit of news as incontrovertible proof that the ‘Canes are on the verge of something big. Recruiting aplomb aside, that is very much open for debate, but bonus points for enthusiasm.

Herr Swindle tackled the issue with the type of wit about which I can only dream, but (sadly) this isn’t even about Cock Sandwiches or badassmofo NED. To me, this is about two very obvious facts:

1) Florida doesn’t want to play Miami

2) Florida doesn’t need to play Miami

The reason behind the “want” part is easy to figure out — money. The Gators already have one permanent in-state rival, Florida State. Florida plays the ‘Noles in Gainesville in odd numbered years, when the Gators’ “home” conference game against Georgia is played in Jacksonville (assuming nobody screws that up). So in any given year, the Gators play only four out of nine permanent opponents at Ben Hill Griffin.

That leaves three remaining open slots on the schedule, and Florida doesn’t want to give up even one of them on a regular basis. The loss of revenue would be too great. So it may not be entertaining to watch the Gators thrash a I-AA school, but when the announced attendance is 90,374, it makes financial sense. And when something makes financial sense, it almost always happens.

And that leads us to the second point. Florida doesn’t need to play Miami. Arrogant though the point may be, Florida already plays annual games against FSU, Georgia, Tennessee and LSU, for starters. Even in fallow years, those names, along with those of rotating SEC opponents, carry enough cachet to give the appearance of playing a “strong” schedule. In good years, such a slate is a gauntlet of pain. Cyclical ups and downs aside, none of that is likely to change.

It’s not so much that Florida is “scared” to play Da U, though a loss to one of the ‘Canes more badassed outfits would be undeniably damaging. Rather, Florida doesn’t have much to gain from playing Miami in most years. The rest of the schedule is typically strong enough to withstand a regular-season loss (as evidenced by 1996, 2006 and 2008), and the losses both real (revenue) and potential (on-field) just don’t seem to justify it.

Football populists like The Wiz of Odds rail against the lack of quality non-conference matchups, and on some levels I agree with him. As a college football fan, I wish there were better games on every week. But as a Gator fan, I understand why there aren’t.

(And if none of that was very convincing, would you want to run the risk of bumping into this guy at a tailgate every four years? No? Thank you.)