For the first time in more than four years of doing this, I’m staring at a blank page and struggling with where to begin.
I’ve been fairly critical of Dan Mullen in his time at Florida. The recruiting has been substandard compared to previous recent coaches not named McElwain. He has shown that he doesn’t understand the basic economics of supply and demand. And he’s recently spent an awful lot of time focusing on Georgia.
The problem is that based on recent events, he needs to spend that energy focused on Florida.
There’s no doubt that Mullen is a brilliant on-field coach. He took a team that looked broken and defeated under Jim McElwain and transformed them into a top-10 team that whipped Michigan in the Peach Bowl. He turned Mississippi State from a laughing stock into a team that could compete every once in a while with the big boys in the SEC West.
He said many of the right things when he came to Gainesville.
Relentless effort and bringing back the Gator Standard are marketing genius. They have galvanized a fan base licking its wounds from death threat accusations from its previous coach.
The offense began to score points consistently, and not just because of a running game. The development of QB Feleipe Franks in 2018 was a welcome sight for those who’d spent much of the previous three years at times wishing that Clarabelle would actually get a shot behind center.
But the entry into the transfer portal of Chris Steele is different.
It’s different because it doesn’t really have anything to do with football. Instead, it speaks to the character and integrity of the program. It speaks to being able to trust Mullen and his staff.
According to multiple reports, Steele was uncomfortable rooming with QB Jalon Jones and expressed a desire to change living situations. How forcefully that was done and whether his reasons were fully explained to Florida staff is currently unclear.
But what does appear to be clear from Gator Sports’ report is that Steele and his family were unhappy about having to wait until the summer for the move to take place in January, his first month on campus.
That means that Steele was forced to live in an uncomfortable situation until April, when allegations of sexual assault (no charges) led Jones and the program to mutually part ways.
Now Steele is gone, apparently because he and his family didn’t feel that the staff – the one that likely promises all parents that they will take care of their sons – took good care of him. Quite honestly, that’s a reasonable response with the request and subsequent assault allegations.
It’s also a big problem for Florida.
From a football perspective, it’s a problem because Mullen just lost the best prospect he’s ever brought to Florida as head coach. Steele was going to contribute early and often, and was insurance in case Marco Wilson struggled coming back from his ACL injury.
But from a program perspective, it’s a much larger problem.
All we have right now is the initial reason for the transfer as Mullen has not addressed it. Maybe there were good reasons a dorm change couldn’t be made.
Maybe this is a situation where the dorm change should have been made for Steele and it fell through the cracks because of an oversight by the staff. Maybe the staff didn’t ask enough questions when Steele made his request and didn’t think it was a big deal. Maybe Steele wasn’t clear enough about what he wanted or why he wanted it. Or maybe they decided they wanted to show their highly ranked guy that he wouldn’t receive special treatment now that he’d signed his letter of intent.
Regardless of the reasons though, it’s clear that Steele no longer trusted the staff to act in his best interests.
It seems foreboding that 5-star 2021 recruit Bryce Langston decommitted from the Gators shortly after the Steele news broke. Every single recruit’s parents are going to hear the exact same refrain from opposing coaches: you can’t trust Mullen to take care of your son.
It’s good to remind ourselves that everything is a matter of degrees. This does not appear to be a Penn State, Baylor or FSU situation where there are questions about cover ups of awful behavior.
But that also doesn’t mean it’s ideal. Hopefully it’s an isolated incident of a miscommunication between a player and the staff.
But until Mullen addresses this, all we have is the story as it is being currently told. And that story is not a good look for Florida.
Ken Clarke
It’s easy to understand now why Steele felt uncomfortable rooming with Jones. I hate to lose him, but I can’t fault his decision to leave. Very unfortunate.
Bryan K Hutto
This could be the head of a bigger problem in this age of social media. Tweets or Instagram posts from Mr. Steele about how the staff did not address his needs could change the minds of of any one of the top recruits that Mullen is trying to get.
Darrick Taylor
I don’t want to make judgments about this until we know what Mullen did and didn’t know and when he did or didn’t know it. I understand where Steele is coming from, though again, it depends on exactly what he told Mullen. Did he tell him this was a bad guy who might get me in trouble? Or was it more “I just don’t like the guy?” It makes a difference in my opinion when evaluating the moral aspect of this debacle. As for the football part, this is the first time I’ve felt Mullen and his staff have been completely in over their heads or just plain incompetent, that the job was too big for them. I hate to say it but that is probably the most disturbing thing to me as of right now. It may be we are all overreacting a bit, but it is definitely not a great look for the program.
Brian Rodgers
I would think that as a society we would understand that the early story is never the full story and that, often, the masses never truly get to understand the full story because the people involved (and the people behind the people involved) have motivations that don’t care about or taken into account the desire for the fans and the public to know more. And that’s fine. It’s only football after all. But this, like any other story of this ilk, has much more going on than is currently being reported or understood.
Chris Selbach
Let’s be honest, there’s no way Mullen or anyone on his staff could’ve predicted something like this was going to happen. However, since Steele and Jones are so young, technically they could have still been seniors finishing up high school, was it wise to have them rooming together..? Perhaps in the future, early enrollees should room with older players while adjusting to college during their initial spring semester.
Nevertheless, learning to deal with a lousy roommate is part of the learning experience of college. I had bad experiences while at UF and I became much wiser having dealt with them. If Steele was just a student and not a Blue Chipper, what do you think would’ve happened if he had a problem with his dorm roommate and wanted to switch?
That’s right, the Adminstration would say you can switch roommates at the end of the semester.
If they would’ve immediately accommodated Steele’s request, they would’ve received 2 dozen more requests the very next day. It’s college, not high school and you have to grow up and adjust quickly to dealing with adversity, even if you weren’t the one who caused the adversity thrusted upon you. This won’t be the last adversity Steele will have to face, I’ll be curious to see how well he deals with it next time. I wish Steele and Jones all the best with their future because after all, they’re just kids. But I really hope the girls involved are ok and get the professional help they may need. The best way for Mullen to handle this going forward is to lead head on with it, this could’ve happened at any college, so use it as a tool to get better and communicate what policy changes you’re implementing because of it.
Nate w
The real issue here is the thousands of points of views expressed about a situation with little to no information yet available about the situation. We don’t know the time line of events, because we don’t even know what happened or who was involved with what or who decided what when where and how… So how can we judge the actions of anyone so immediately? Give it some time… people tend to reveal who they are by what they do repeatedly… I happen to be optimistic about Mullen and his long term effects on the program. Maybe Mullen did all he could and Steele just wanted a way out.. Or… If Mullen did make a mistake hopefully he learns from it and it prevents an even bigger issue down the road. Go Gators.
Bob Padron
Let’s see if I get this straight, we have a broken program, by a previous head coach & his staff . So we bring in a coach that is a proven winner both as a offensive coordinator for the gators and a head coach forMississippi State. Now we are all quick to judge without further exclamation that has yet to be given. He gave us a 10 and 3 season, a well earned victory in the peach bowl, and yet we are questioning him on an incident of which no one to this point knows anything about. Not every recruit would fit the bill whether he’s a three star or five star, that’s just the facts of life. If he was going to give us an issue on his living conditions then he would give us an issue on the way the Coaches coach. This may be a blessing In disguise. You can get a five star athlete and a three star athlete, coaching up the three-star can be a proven winner more so than A five star athlete. So my point is be content with a great season and more great seasons to come, hopefully an SEC championship and a national championship. So the old saying goes one player doesn’t make a team, I will take 3 and 4 star players who plays as a team any day.
John Gibbons
Ditto to those who have said “slow down the rush to judgement” and let’s tap the brakes! As fans reacting to social media, which is at best inflammatory – accepted as “fact” by many when it is only opinion and singular perspective without one iota of clarification.
Mullen has done a great job, he deserves the benefit of the doubt until the facts say otherwise. All I can say is when he left UF the facts say all you need to know. When he retuned he turned around a program headed in the wrong direction (in 12 months by the way).
Having worked in the D-1 industry (and yes it’s an industry with slave labor), it is virtually impossible to control every detail. CDM has a solid staff, let’s let them sort this out and trust them to do so. The results will speak for themselves.
Remember Gators, the last thing you want to be doing in a huddle is pointing fingers! This goes for fans as well as staff and players.
Got Gators!
Don
I do not know why the focus is only on Mullen. If parents have concerns, they should have complete and absolute access to Scott Strictland himself. If there is policy that prevented this situation to impair this young man’s education then the administration is broken. Policy dictates behavior and this encumbering housing policy and the pairing of athletes is not at the University of Florida standard. This is unbecoming of a top 10 University and it starts with Scott Strictland.
Kendall
It may be a bit early to postulate theories regarding Steele’s move or the administration ‘s management of the situation. For all we know this may all be rooted in a teenager’s homesickness. Time will tell.
Sean A Nicholson
To be honest I thought everyone is too high on this kid. Even as a recruit I thought he was a waste of time. Spring he seemed a cut below how Dean, Henderson, Wilson and Guardner came in as freshmen. The team also seems to have moved on from him now on Twitter. I wish him the best but I dont know if this is a big loss, Elam I believe will be far better.