ENOUGH OF THE HYPE

Sorry Deonte, you're NOT the next Gator stud WR.  You can't excel at one position, Mario, much less three.  Garcia, it's a tough call, but the vote is in, and you need to worry about getting a college degree.

It happens every year.  A handful of players are given expectations they can't possibly meet, no matter where they were ranked by Scouvals (Scout/ Rivals/ other recruiting "masterminds").  There's always an excuse for them year after year.

For Deonte Thompson, a consensus top-3 WR coming out of high school, he's been at Florida for 2 years and has 18 catches to show for it.  He was redshirted his freshman year and played sparingly last season.  I don't care who else is on the team, elite players earn their touches early and often.  For a case study on Deonte, see Dallas Baker.

Mario Fannin struggled holding onto the ball his redshirt-freshman year, but the kool-aid drinkers thought, "If only he can grip the ball better, he'll be unstoppable."  Last season his lack of playmaking was blamed on the coaching staff and gameplan (which is a very strong argument).  But what did he do when he touched the ball?  Not enough.  Now everyone is making him the crownjewel of Malzahn '09 offense.  A virtual spitting-image of D-Mac running the Wildcat, right? No.

Making the call on Stephen Garcia is tough, but he has two things going against him.  One is his rollercoaster career at SC to-date.  His story is known, so I won't go over it, but he's been a headcase throughout his short college career.  The second thing going against him is Spurrier's lack of QB success since returning to the college game.  Most of the time, you can just point to Spurrier's laziness in recruiting to figure out why he hasn't done well at SC.  But Garcia was a legitimate elite QB coming out of high school.  So there's more to Spurrier's demise than his inability to consistently recruit top talent, and Garcia is living proof.

There are always exceptions.  See Jason Campbell, who spent three years with three OCs and mediocore numbers, only to legitimize his #2 QB prep ranking with a undefeated senior season.  Cases like his are rarities though...more often we're looking at guys whose game just can't cut it in college, or who can't handle the freedom and lifestyle college can bring.

So who else am I missing from the past or present?