Incoming freshman Blakely leaving Gators

[travisduncan]

Incoming freshman running back Mike Blakely (out of Bradenton’s Manatee High) will transfer from UF, Will Muschamp announced on Tuesday.

He enrolled at Florida in January, but missed spring practice with a shoulder injury and surgery.

Muschamp said in a press release: "Mike has come to the conclusion that the University of Florida is not where he wants to play football. We wish him the best of luck.''

Blakely said in a press release:

“Everyone at Florida has been very supportive of me in my time here and I'm thankful for the experience that I had, but I've made a decision to continue my college football career somewhere else.''

Blakely may not have seen much action this year behind Jeff Demps, Chris Rainey, Mike Gillislee and Mack Brown and by 2012, incoming running backs Mike Davis and Matt Jones, ranked as two of the best in the South, could compete for playing time right away.

 

[DRU2012]

What happened here? Was it just the competition level, already here and soon-to-come? Or was it academics-related (as I suspect was at least a part of it, based on the timing)? This kid looked like a major P.U. when he committed, even more so with a pro-style attack...I forget, did he commit BEFORE Muschamp replaced Meyer? Maybe that played a part as well.

 

[robdog]

I am pretty sure that it had to do with to much competition. Or the incoming freshman were just to good and his chances of playing were even worse. Not sure when he committed to the program.

 

[DRU2012]

Turns out he committed BEFORE Meyer stepped down...and his grades were OK--2.0 to 2.5, according to the word coming out of USF web sites, where it appears he may very well be headed.
Interestingly, reaction among USF bloggers on their sites is split between "This is great--we're getting better and better...a DESTINATION program...", and "UF isn't making this especially difficult for him...we play them during the next few years when he'll be here...we need to get to be good enough that they'll be afraid to let 4- and 5- star throw-aways go to us".