Cam Ward is a Cane

[gatordoll]

Mario must be a great recruiter to convince this guy to change his mind about going to NFL draft. I don’t think this was about NIL $

[soflaisgatorcountry]

I see it more as Cam Ward was advised he'd be a very late or undrafted QB in the NFL Draft so he stayed in school and will get good NIL money to do so. His collegiate experience is a few years at Incarnate World & one year in the PAC 12. He's a good college QB but outside of playing Oregon last year (a game where he threw for a bunch of yards but only 1 TD and 30 yards rushing) he's completely untested.

Smart move for him to stay in College (make money and improve his NFL stock), Good pickup for scUM (they have nothing else of quality), but Mario will bring him down as he does with all his QBs and i still feel Fla should/will be favored vs Miami and has the better QB room.

I'll take Mertz coming off his best year in a system that though needs improvement is better than Big Dumb Mario's offenses with DJ Lagway as an additional weapon over Cam Ward and the Stuper Mario offense.

[tapsgator]

Every other major university in Florida now has a far more talented starting QB than Graham Mertz. It's truly remarkable that Cajun Willie was gifted the best physical prospect in the nation (probably ever) when he came in and somehow has the most talented QB from the 24 class on campus and somehow we will be running out a game manager who can't push the ball downfield or run for 2 of the 3 years he is the Gators head coach (he shouldn't make it through 24 but he will unless the administration wakes up to the embarrassment that is our current AD). Ward would have been a nice mentor for Lagway. Jefferson would have been perfect. DJU would be a damn sight better than a guy who plays a game that does not vaguely resemble the game Lagway plays. Now we've also signed another slow footed check down Charlie to fill out the QB room. Then you have the fact that your head coach who insists on calling plays and being the OC and QB coach (but don't worry, insiders say he's going to make those changes any day now) runs a scheme and calls plays in such a way that you can certainly make the argument (even if I don't agree it's a discussion) that Graham Mertz is a better fit than Anthony Richardson. And that's how we're going to develop Lagway, we're gonna surround him with physically limited game managers and put him in a run first offense. Seems like a good plan. And hilarity will likely ensue.

Cristobal sucks but he's a better coach than Billy Napier just because he can recruit and doesn't insist on being his own OC and QB coach. Miami was better than us last year and I am guessing will be better than us this year. Only saving grace is it's at home and Mario is capable of doing insanely stupid shit.

[soflaisgatorcountry]

I don't think Cam Ward is more talented than Mertz. He definitely hasn't played anywhere as good of competition as Mertz either. Cam Ward played 3 years at Incarnate Word (whatever the heck that is) in the Southland Conference. Then he played one season in the PAC 12 (only true quality defense this year was Oregon) and he didn't exactly dominate in the biggest games on the schedule.

He is a dink and dunker which many here bash Mertz for with a 7 yards per attempt average last season and 10 yards per reception average. He's also not all that mobile which for whatever reason people love to fawn over for the QB position so i'd give in to someone who said he might be equal to Mertz, but i wouldn't say that hes better based off the poor competition he played.

There's a reason he pulled out the NFL draft and it was a smart one. Make more $ in college and continue to work on his draft stock. Sadly for him Mario Cristobal will hinder his development.

Im not sure Cristobal is this great recruiter either. Miami loves to break rules and waste money and in an era where there is no regulations Mia can thrive as opposed to the BCS-Pre NIL era where they are a programs had to rely more on actual conference revenue and school produced money. I highly doubt if Napier and Cristobal switched programs that Fla would be pulling Top 5 classes and Mia wouldnt.

Thats the real issue at Fla, no commitment to Football like other programs. Go Gators!!!!! Beat scUM

[tapsgator]

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, Mertz averaged the 2nd lowest amount of air yards per attempt in the SEC, and the vast majority of his numbers were put up against god awful Defenses and/or decent defenses playing prevent. Sadly, he did as good a job as he's capable of at executing the plays that were called. His Splits in games where we were behind by more than 15 versus the alternative are pretty telling, but that's not the main problem. The biggest problem being that combination led to 5-7 last year with one quality one win over an SEC team with a winning record. And that was with Pearsall and Etienne. This year we have had zero movement on the offensive staff and Mertz is coming back to finish some business evidently. Definition of insanity is repeating the same action and expecting different results.

As far as coaching and recruiting, I don't know how to draw the conclusion that Cristobal isn't better than Napier at both, as an assistant and as a head coach. I don't think Mario is a great coach by any means but he does have recruiter of the year awards, a winning record at the Power 5 level, and a Rose Bowl win and top 5 finish.

Similarly Ward had enough believers that the NFL draft is/was a viable option. He was 2-2 against ranked teams last year, threw for 331 per game against those teams and almost beat Washington. That's more upside than Graham Mertz has shown in his 5 seasons. I'd rather have Ward either way but definitely with Lagway waiting in the wings because you don't develop a guy by playing a 6th year senior who plays nothing like him in an ill-fitting system that you refuse to tweak, and you can't compensate for that by "having a package of plays" for him.

I agree on the lack of commitment, the overall administration is complacent which has allowed Stricklin free reign to run things into the ground at a time when you need to be ahead of the curve with NIL, realignment, and the portal. Meanwhile we're coming off 3 straight losing seasons for the first time in 75 years and looking to avoid a program first 4 straight losing seasons while losing our 2 best players to the portal and bringing in the #16-20 recruiting class and the #34 portal class. The only changes that appear to be progressive are in the S&C department which I don't want to gloss over, but doesn't address the most glaring issues as far as coaching. Meanwhile the AD and Head Coach offer platitudes about belief and no such thing as a hot seat as we continue on a downward spiral.

That said, I've accepted that Gator football is not really taken seriously anymore and won't be until we have a new coach and AD, I'll root for Gutsy Graham and Cajun Willie and hope we beat Miami and UCF, I think we have a shot with the games in Gainesville, but realistically we're not close to contention, we're getting farther away, and we're not really doing anything different to change that, so I'll just enjoy the show and hope for the best.