Kyle Trask, the Heisman Trophy, and becoming a Gator legend

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One thing I’ll be able to tell my kids is that I was in the building when Kyle Trask threw his first touchdown as a Gators QB.

This is cool. Good reminder that every player is someone’s son. Congrats Mr. Trask. https://t.co/5bTBUCAZkP

— Will Miles (@WillMilesSEC) November 4, 2018

It was at the end of a miserable loss for Missouri, but did provide some hope that maybe Florida had something at the position given the struggles of Feleipe Franks.

Instead, Trask broke his foot during practice the next week, Franks led an improbable comeback against South Carolina that started a 4-0 finish that included blowout wins against FSU and Michigan, and Trask was again relegated to backup QB.

It’s a really interesting “what if” that I’m not sure people think about much because we didn’t know what we had in Trask at the time. What if Trask had stayed healthy and led the Gators to that 4-0 finish? What if he had been able to tune up against cupcakes early in 2019 so that he made one more play or one less mistake against LSU in Baton Rouge that year?

What if he had been able to garner the national attention last year needed for this year’s Heisman campaign that apparently starts when the recruiting process begins?

Devonta Smith is an incredible player and I think is a deserving winner of the Heisman Trophy. I would have been okay had the voters selected Mac Jones for the award too. He certainly had a lot of built-in advantages with Smith and running back Najee Harris, but there’s no disputing that his numbers – and particularly his efficiency – were better than Tua Tagovailoa the year before and that he had an incredible season.

Trevor Lawrence was a good player too in 2020. But the fact that anyone could rank him above either Jones or Trask – players who had 1) better stats, 2) played the entire season, 3) won more and 4) didn’t play the Citadel – isn’t a reflection on Trask or Jones. It’s a reflection on the hubris of voters who have mailed in their responsibility to select the “outstanding college football player whose performance exhibits the pursuit of excellence with integrity” and instead select the guy who has the best pedigree.

But none of that should change the way we feel about Trask.

Whether the media selected him as the second or fourth best player in the country is really irrelevant. What is relevant is that when I was sitting in the stands in 2018 after that Missouri game, I left completely dejected in a way that was an all-too familiar feeling in the midst of the Will Muschamp and Jim McElwain regimes.

And the lump in my throat in 2019 when Franks went down with that injury, not even expecting Trask to get the call over Emory Jones, was that of someone who was wondering if the Gators would even make a bowl game if they dropped their second straight game to the Wildcats.

Instead, Trask came in and immediately put a charge into the offense. He’s been nothing short of incredible ever since. In fact, if you compare his career to Lawrence’s, he actually has been more efficient (9.1 yards per attempt vs. 8.9 for Lawrence) and has a higher QB rating (168.5 vs. 164.3) so if we’re going to give career achievement awards, that should probably go to Trask too.

Selfishly, I would have loved to have seen him come back for one more year. I get why he’s moving on to the NFL and he deserves to take that next step when he wants to take it. But man, the ability to have one more shot at the Heisman and a championship still has me salivating.

When you sit in my seat, you’re required to put on your analytics glasses and look at stats and recruiting rankings to predict what’s going to happen. I love those angles and trying to figure things out, but it would get old if nobody ever defied the stats, numbers and rankings.

There were signs at Manvel that Trask could be a serviceable QB. There were indications last year that he could be a very good player for the Gators in 2020. But I don’t think anybody could have expected a Heisman run that would have the Gators within 12 points of a playoff berth. I certainly didn’t.

Trevor Lawrence was the number one recruit in the country in 2018. Smith was ranked 62nd in 2017. Mac Jones was a 3-star, but he was ranked 399th, hardly someone who can’t turn into an elite signal caller. They were supposed to be on that (Zoom) stage this year.

Trask was not.

And that’s part of why he’s going to go down in Gator lore. He’s not Tebow, Wuerffel or Spurrier but he doesn’t have to be to be remembered. And if Dan Mullen eventually leads the Gators to a SEC Championship or a National Championship, we all need to look back and thank Trask for that accomplishment.

Because in the third year of the Will Muschamp experience, we got QB performances from Tyler Murphy, Skyler Morhinweg and Jeff Driskel. In the third year of the Jim McElwain experience, we got QB performances from a very young Franks, Luke Del rio and Malik Zaire. Those teams combined to go 8-15.

But when Franks went down in 2019, Florida had Kyle Trask waiting in the wings. He waited his turn. He was ready. He was prepared. And he was the bulwark standing between Florida having a potential catastrophe of a season (imagine someone like Zaire with this defense) and instead competing for the SEC title.

He didn’t get the job done completely, but that wasn’t his fault. In the Gators four losses this year, Florida gave up 46 points per game. If Marco Wilson hadn’t throw that shoe, his performance in the SEC Championship might have put him over the top in the Heisman voting even in a losing effort.

Instead, we’re left to ponder “what if” in a lot of different ways.

But here’s the thing. You don’t need a statue to be remembered. You don’t need a brick to prove that you belong.

Trask did that in the SEC Championship, when he came within an eyelash of bringing his team back from an 18-point halftime deficit against the team I think we all believe is going to capture the national championship next week.

After he announced his decision to go to the NFL, I simply retweeted his announcement with the caption “thank you.” Because that’s really all there is left to say to Kyle Trask.

He may not have won the Heisman Trophy or the Davey O’Brien Award. But he gave his all to this program, and he’s accomplished the one thing this season that no voter can ever take away.

He became a Gator legend.

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