I came home from work yesterday to the depressing news that Gators backup QB Kyle Trask had suffered a season-ending injury.
Trask was most fans’ pick to start this week against South Carolina in lieu of the struggling Feleipe Franks. With Dan Mullen stating pretty clearly that he doesn’t want to burn true freshman Emory Jones’ redshirt, that means Franks is the guy for at least two of the final four games.
Florida’s offense has struggled in SEC play and much of that has been tied to Franks’ play. His yards above replacement (YAR) is currently -0.35, including negative values in four of his last five games. Just a reminder that a YAR of 0.0 is average, 1.0 is really good and 2.0 is a Heisman contender.
Moreover, his YAR in the last two games (-1.56 vs. Georgia and -2.85 vs. Missouri) has been absolutely abysmal. That’s why people are frustrated with Franks’ play. It’s not just that he’s played poorly. It’s that he seems to have regressed back to last year’s play.
How can Florida move the ball?
None of that matters on Saturday versus South Carolina. Franks will be the main QB and he’s going to have to figure out a way to move the ball.
But the path to moving the ball is right there in front of Florida. In fact, they used it this past Saturday against Missouri but never came back to it.
Florida struggled to run the ball against Missouri (28 rush, 4.0 yards per rush). This was especially true in short-yardage situations. The way to combat this is to throw deep (which Florida showed it was comically incapable of doing) or to add an extra blocker to the mix by having the QB run the ball.
On this touchdown drive where Florida brought the game to 21-10, Franks ran the ball three times for 17 yards (5.7 yards per rush). He finished the game with….3 rush for 17 yards.
In my season preview, I actually predicted that Mullen would need to rely on his running game to support Franks, who would struggle as a solo QB.
Feleipe Franks performance in 2017 along with projected 2018 performances with improvement similar to Tyson Lee and with running from other Florida QBs added. (Will Miles/Read and Reaction)
The above chart shows what I projected for Franks for 2018 based on last year’s results and the improvement that Dan Mullen saw for Tyson Lee from 2008 to 2009 when he took over at Mississippi State. His yards per attempt are currently at 7.1, right in line with what I predicted. His YAR (-0.35) is higher because he has run the ball more effectively than I expected.
The struggles on offense are tied to Mullen not implementing the plan that I expected. I anticipated that some combination of Emory Jones and Kadarius Toney would provide 79 carries at 6 yards per rush, which would raise the overall QB YAR to slightly above average.
Instead, Mullen has only put the ball in Toney’s or Jones’ hands as a runner 21 times at a 7.4 yards per rush clip. That raises the overall YAR for the team to 0.01, or almost exactly average.
Had Mullen committed 30 of Franks 66 rush attempts to Jones and Toney, and had their efficiency remained high (6.5 yards per rush), the Gators YAR would have increased to 0.31. That doesn’t sound like a huge deal, but it’s likely worth more than two points per game.
So what this means is that improving the Gators offense doesn’t have to do with Franks and likely wouldn’t have had to do with Trask either, had he been named the starter. Instead, the success of failure of the offense will rely on whether Mullen finally puts a running QB into the backfield to move the ball.
Because here’s what happens on third-and-short when the opposition isn’t afraid that your non-running QB will throw the ball.
Now, it would help if Nick Buchanon hadn’t been drive right back into Dameon Pierce. But Pierce doesn’t have the shiftiness to get away, and he also doesn’t have any threat of throwing that can keep the back-end of the defense honest.
Conversely, look at what Toney can do in short-yardage situations, even when there is initial penetration. First, he’s patient enough to give the pulling tight end (Lucas Krull, #14) enough time to set the edge. Then, he makes guys whiff in open space. Neither Franks nor the Florida running backs can do this, and the backs also don’t have at least the threat of a throw.
I’d love if Florida could throw its way out of this issue. But the 25.9 percent third-down conversion against Georgia and Missouri indicates that is unlikely to occur. Instead, it indicates that teams have abdicated worrying about the pass on third-and-short and that Florida can’t convert third-and-long on a consistent basis.
I’ve stumped for Kadarius Toney since last season to get a look at QB. You can argue whether my analysis is correct and you may be right. But there should be no doubt that he is the player who should be running the ball from the QB spot.
And if Florida’s offense is going to improve, the statistics indicate that is a change that Dan Mullen is going to have to make.