Here it comes:
The 2021 Gator Football season just over a week away now.
Though confident in the outcome of this first game (against a presumably out-classed in-state opponent—where only the DEGREE of difficulty is likely to tell us much about what is likely ahead beyond that), like y’all I am pretty unsure of what kind of season it will turn out to be.
I am encouraged at signs that there APPEARS to be an opportunity for this team to surprise everyone (especially the so-called “experts in the media”) and make this a breakout year for Mullens, Grantham and The Program...
But as things stand here and now today, we just don’t KNOW enough.
We may well have the ingredients. We won’t know either way for at least a month or so—by the Alabama game and beyond, well into our SEC schedule. Play the Tide at least close, beat the rest...see growth, maturity and excellence on BOTH sides of the ball and we just might have a special year after all.
Fall short in all those areas and it could all get ugly, trying and disappointing in a hurry.
We are on the cusp:
Whether of failure or glory, even perhaps just mediocrity, nothing is certain or clear at this point.
I can’t blow happy smoke up your butts; the way things slid at the end last season, then losing so much of what looked so good up til then in its aftermath, well, it doesn’t exactly fill me with upbeat joy or optimism.
BUT...We DO have a fine head Coach, at least SOME of the necessary pieces, PLUS signs of more-of-the-same coming on elsewhere. There seems reason for some hope, at least.
The scary part is how little we know or are sure of.
It is time for this Gator program’s “RErise”!
We ALL hoped to be clearly “on the verge” by now; as things stand, we are instead “on the BRINK” of learning if that is indeed warranted, or if (for example, among other things) Mullens kept Grantham around a year too long after all.
The next coupla months will go a long way in determining whether “happy days are here again”, or an avalanche of heartbreak, handwringing and second-guessing will rule our lives this season.
Ye gods, I’m hoping the former.
After everything else the last year-plus has brought us, I sure wish us that.
Sure, we ALL deserve it, really—but that can’t BE: So naturally I can and will only wish it for me and mine: Let this turn out to be a shockingly successful, joyfully breakout year for our Fightin’ Gators after all.
It isn’t impossible. The talent, will, and brain trust are all HERE, gathered and seemingly ready.
Far as I can tell, it’s now or NEVER, after all.
So. Here we go.
The 2021 Gator Football season just over a week away now.
Though confident in the outcome of this first game (against a presumably out-classed in-state opponent—where only the DEGREE of difficulty is likely to tell us much about what is likely ahead beyond that), like y’all I am pretty unsure of what kind of season it will turn out to be.
I am encouraged at signs that there APPEARS to be an opportunity for this team to surprise everyone (especially the so-called “experts in the media”) and make this a breakout year for Mullens, Grantham and The Program...
But as things stand here and now today, we just don’t KNOW enough.
We may well have the ingredients. We won’t know either way for at least a month or so—by the Alabama game and beyond, well into our SEC schedule. Play the Tide at least close, beat the rest...see growth, maturity and excellence on BOTH sides of the ball and we just might have a special year after all.
Fall short in all those areas and it could all get ugly, trying and disappointing in a hurry.
We are on the cusp:
Whether of failure or glory, even perhaps just mediocrity, nothing is certain or clear at this point.
I can’t blow happy smoke up your butts; the way things slid at the end last season, then losing so much of what looked so good up til then in its aftermath, well, it doesn’t exactly fill me with upbeat joy or optimism.
BUT...We DO have a fine head Coach, at least SOME of the necessary pieces, PLUS signs of more-of-the-same coming on elsewhere. There seems reason for some hope, at least.
The scary part is how little we know or are sure of.
It is time for this Gator program’s “RErise”!
We ALL hoped to be clearly “on the verge” by now; as things stand, we are instead “on the BRINK” of learning if that is indeed warranted, or if (for example, among other things) Mullens kept Grantham around a year too long after all.
The next coupla months will go a long way in determining whether “happy days are here again”, or an avalanche of heartbreak, handwringing and second-guessing will rule our lives this season.
Ye gods, I’m hoping the former.
After everything else the last year-plus has brought us, I sure wish us that.
Sure, we ALL deserve it, really—but that can’t BE: So naturally I can and will only wish it for me and mine: Let this turn out to be a shockingly successful, joyfully breakout year for our Fightin’ Gators after all.
It isn’t impossible. The talent, will, and brain trust are all HERE, gathered and seemingly ready.
Far as I can tell, it’s now or NEVER, after all.
So. Here we go.
