Dan Mullen’s recruiting produces Florida’s worst draft class since 1980

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Following his first scrimmage as Florida’s coach in the spring of 2022, Billy Napier met with the media and basically sent out a casting call.

After watching what UF had to work with, Napier made it clear that he needed to update the roster due to attrition, depth issues and, most importantly, lack of talent.

“We need players,” Napier said bluntly. “You can anticipate us being very aggressive in the portal this spring. … We’re thin and we need help in a lot of different spots.”

The Gators landed Ricky Pearsall from Arizona State that spring. Two years later, Pearsall’s first-round selection underscores how much the roster Napier inherited was devoid of talent.

The only player drafted from Florida’s 2023 team was a portal addition in Pearsall. This year marked the first time since 1980 that the Gators had just one player selected in the NFL Draft.

That draft class was on the heels of Florida’s worst record in school history — an 0-10-1 season in 1979.

If Napier did not sign Pearsall during the spring portal window in 2022, UF’s streak of having at least one player drafted every year of the common draft era would have been snapped.

The 2024 draft results are an indictment against former Florida coach Dan Mullen. His recruiting shortcomings have been well documented and ultimately contributed to his firing.

“He didn’t like to recruit,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said when he took a shot at Mullen last season.

Still, it’s staggering to see none of his former signees get drafted with the Gators this year. Just one Mullen recruit — Missouri linebacker Ty’Ron Hopper — was selected in the draft.

That’s it. Hopper is the only “one that away” among the Mullen recruits that left Florida after the coaching change, and there were a lot of them. A total of over 50 outgoing transfers.

Mullen signed top-10 classes in 2019 (No. 9) and 2020 (No. 8), according to the 247Sports rankings. However, both years turned out to be busts due to attrition, poor evals and bad takes.

So far, 60 percent of Mullen’s 2019 class has transferred out (15 of 25 HS signees) and 70 percent of Mullen’s 2020 class has transferred (17 of 24 HS signees). Additionally, four more signees in those classes never made it to campus (three from 2019).

Of the 49 signees, only five are still with the team and just eight finished their college career at UF, with three being reserve players. Mullen also signed Brenton Cox Jr. (later dismissed) and four more transfers in 2020, including Lorenzo Lingard (left for Akron).

The 2019 and 2020 classes did include a couple first-rounders in Kaiir Elam and Anthony Richardson and second-round pick Gervon Dexter. But Mullen’s recruiting, by and large, did not produce enough NFL-caliber players and that was evident in this year’s draft.

The lack of talent has contributed to Florida’s losing record the past three seasons, and Napier will need to continue upgrading the roster through high school recruiting and the transfer portal to field a team that can compete in the SEC. Based on blue-chip ratio and average player rating, the Gators have added some quality signees in their last two classes.

Napier signed an 80 percent blue-chip ratio in 2023, Florida’s best mark since Urban Meyer’s No. 1-ranked recruiting class at UF in 2010 (85 percent). The Gators then landed two five-star recruits in the 2024 class for the first time since 2015 and finished with the nation’s No. 6 average player rating (91.16), their highest rating since 2010 (91.83).

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