With Emory Jones’ transfer, let the Anthony Richardson era begin

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Emory Jones has been a part of my life for the better part of five years.

The third article I ever wrote for Read & Reaction was about Jones after he committed to new head coach Dan Mullen in 2017. That article did so well that it is probably the one that convinced me the site could survive long-term.

Jones’ commitment was supposed to be the signal that Mullen was going to win recruiting battles against Ohio State, Alabama and Georgia more consistently than his predecessor. And Jones was also supposed to be the dual-threat QB that we all assumed Mullen needed to make his offense hum.

But then Jones stayed on the bench. Sure, he got a cameo his true freshman season against Georgia and there always seemed to be a few plays for him to run (and a couple of weirdly timed series against LSU in 2019), but Jones couldn’t beat out Feleipe Franks and then Kyle Trask for the starting position.

I think we were all shocked that it was Trask – not Jones – who came into the game when Franks went down against Kentucky. We weren’t really sure what that meant, as Trask played so well once forced into the lineup that it was excusable that Jones couldn’t beat him out. But it certainly did mean that the 2021 season was going to be a referendum on Jones and whether he could further build on the foundation placed by Trask.

Well, the answer was that it became pretty apparent early in 2021 that Jones had significant limitations in his game that would hold the offense back. The Florida offense still scored 30.7 points per game this past season, a far cry from either the Will Muschamp or Jim McElwain eras (though, to be fair, that number drops to 27.4 if we exclude the 70 against Samford). McElwain’s offenses were particularly putrid, averaging 23.2, 23.9 and 22.1 points per game in his three seasons.

Still, Mullen’s first three seasons in Gainesville produced offenses that averaged 35.0, 33.2 and 39.8 points per game. And with a defense that was sometimes inconsistent and sometimes bad, even nearly 31 points per game wasn’t enough.

Combine that with the fact that Jones wasn’t always responsible for all of those points with Anthony Richardson breathing down his neck, and the situation was ripe for a change. The fact that Jones realized that after a few practices may be a surprise, but the reality was that Florida was never going to have six scholarship players at the QB position after the spring.

Just about everyone last season thought Anthony Richardson should have started well before the Georgia game. Well, Jones’ departure means we’re all going to get what we were asking for. It’s clearly his time to shine.

Jones the Player

Jones brought the hope of being a true dual-threat QB. He possesses a rocket for an arm and plenty of running ability.

His running ability showed up early and often in 2021. In all, he ran for 759 yards on 143 carries (5.3 yards per rush) and if you’d told me at the beginning of the year that he’d have that stat line on the ground, I would have told you that the Gators offense would have performed really well.

It’s actually not a terrible story in the passing game either. Because of his ability to run, Jones didn’t need to be Dan Marino. And when you look at his yards per attempt (7.9) or his QB rating (141.7), those compare quite favorably to Franks in 2018 (143.4, 7.6 yards per attempt). Now, no Gator fan is going to be bouncing their grandson on their knee 30 years from now talking about Feleipe Franks, but that team did go 10-3.

So what went so wrong for Jones then?

The answer is a confluence of factors: turnovers, explosive plays and especially redzone efficiency.

Jones threw 13 interceptions in 2021. He only had one fumble to go with that, but it was a backbreaker at the end of the first half against South Carolina. Compare that to Franks’ six in 2018 and you start to see where things started to go off the rails. Add in two interceptions in the red zone and the way drives seemed to stall down there under Jones a lot (the Alabama game, in particular) and the turnovers just killed the Gators.

Explosive plays are an interesting stat. In the running game, a lot of times those are categorized as 10-plus yard carries. If you measure by that metric, Jones actually grades out pretty well, with 21.1 percent of his designed runs going for explosive plays (Anthony Richardson was at 20 percent).

But there’s a reason that Richardson has a 7.9 yards per rush average compared to Jones’ 5.3 and why Richardson even edges out Jones in yards per pass attempt (8.3 vs. 7.9), and that’s because of the nature of their explosive plays.

Simply put, Richardson is the more explosive player. In 115 total touches in 2021, Richardson produced 14 explosives (defined here at 20-plus yard plays). Jones produced 43 explosives in 489 touches. That means that Jones produced explosives on one out of every 11.4 touches while Richardson produced one every 8.2 touches.

But there are also two additional things we need to factor in with that stat. The first is that Richardson was more explosive when he had an explosive, averaging 38.4 yards per explosive compared to 32.9 for Jones. But the other thing is that Jones had 13 explosives against Samford (8) and Vanderbilt (5).

And that’s the consistent story for Jones in 2021. As I mentioned, his QB rating (141.7) wasn’t all that bad. But if you subtract Samford from the ledger, his QB rating drops to 129.4 (and 13 TDs and 13 INTs). If you go further and subtract Vanderbilt as well, his QB rating drops to 122.6, and the TD:INT ratio (9:12) looks abysmal.

And that trend followed its way all the way down into the red zone, where Jones’ struggles were amplified.

At first glance, Florida’s red zone performance doesn’t look all that bad. If we go back to the Franks comparison, the 2021 Gators had 3.8 red zone attempts per game compared to 3.9 in 2018 and 3.2 red zone scores in both seasons. But that is a Dameon Pierce stat, as the Gators had 19 rushing TDs in the red zone and 17 pass TDs in the red zone.

And of those 17 pass TDs, three went to Anthony Richardson and another two went to Trent Whittemore. What that means is that Jones’ stat line deep in enemy territory was 30-47 for 191 yards with 12 TDs and 2 INTs. That equates to a QB rating of 173.7 and doesn’t look too bad. After all, 173.7 is an elite full-game QB rating.

But let’s subtract the performance against Samford again, and that drops the TD:INT ratio to 8:2 in the red zone and the QB rating to 140.7. If we subtract Vandy as well, we’re down to 6:2 and 126.8.

Compare that to Anthony Richardson who only threw 7 passes in the red zone, but completed 6 of them for 3 TD, 0 INT and a QB rating of 285.9. Combine that with Jones only having two red zone touchdowns rushing (compared to AR’s one) and what we saw with our eyes is exactly what played out on the field.

What that means is that exempting Samford and Vanderbilt, Jones accounted for a touchdown on eight plays with 62 touches (12.9 percent). Even if you include Samford and Vanderbilt, that only rises to 20.3 percent. Compared that to Richardson, who had four touchdowns on 12 red zone touches (33.3 percent) and again, the eye test is confirmed by the stats.

Takeaway

So now Jones has put his name into the transfer portal.

He’ll likely end up somewhere like Arizona State or some other program looking for a stopgap at the QB position. He probably has the chance to help a struggling program in much the way Feleipe Franks helped Arkansas after transferring from Florida in 2020. I hope he gets an opportunity to show that these stats are outliers now that he has a full year under his belt.

But this trip down misery lane – and these stats – are important for a different reason for Florida fans.

The Gators were 1-4 in one-score games in 2021, and Jones’ stats in those games were 89-134, 983 yards (7.3 yards per attempt), 3 TDs and 7 INTs for a QB rating of 125.0. Add that he only averaged 3.5 yards per rush in those five games and you see why the Gators struggled.

But I come into 2022 with lots of hope for the offense.

When mining some statistics recently, I came upon the disparity that Florida finished 21st against FBS opponents in yards per play, but only 61st in points per game. Yards per play is usually a much better indicator of the true ability of an offense than points per game, but the fact that Jones struggled so much in the red zone is why you would get that disconnect.

Richardson showed no such struggles in the red zone last year. Combine that with the fact that the offense is likely to regress back to the mean (and more towards its yards per play performance) and I’d look for a bounce back year from that side of the ball.

Put it this way. Florida scored 27.4 points per game against FBS opponents and went 5-7. Even with that sort of production, you’d expect to win 6.6 games with the exact same defensive performance (24.7 points per game allowed).

However, if you boost that production up to 33.8, which is what the 21st ranked scoring offense averaged last season (to match with the yards per play) and you would expect Florida to win 7.8 of its 12 games against FBS opponents.

What this says to me is three things. First, the Gators were worse than their underlying numbers on the offensive side of the ball, meaning that should get better this year. Second, Florida was more unlucky in one-score games than they should have been and that should move back towards a .500 record this season.

But the third thing it says to me is that this was nearly a top-20 offense in 2021 even with all of Jones’ struggles and the way the offense could stagnate for long stretches of time. And now we have Anthony Richardson taking the reins.

I’m not saying Richardson is going to win the Heisman (though the odds make that a tasty futures bet). But what I am saying is that with just a small improvement next year at the QB position, Florida has a chance to field a top-15 or even a top-10 offense.

But consider what that means if that happens. We’re talking about a defense that is bringing back a ton of experience at defensive back (and that finished 18th in yards per pass allowed in 2021). We’re also talking about a defense that should be coached on how to stop a counter and will no longer have Todd Grantham calling the blitz from Micanopy.

My wife accuses me of being a pessimist. I tend to think of it as being a realist. As such, I’m trying to limit my excitement, but with Utah coming to The Swamp to open things up on September 3, there’s a scenario in which Florida sends a message early that they’re players in the SEC much earlier than any of us thought.

I can’t imagine any scenario where the special teams isn’t significantly better than last year. There are multiple avenues for the defense to improve and be considerably better. But the biggest thing is exactly what I’ve been preaching ever since Anthony Richardson announced his presence by averaging more than 38 yards per touch against South Florida.

You win in the SEC two ways: better recruiting or a transcendent QB.

The reason to move on from Dan Mullen was he wasn’t capable of the first and didn’t seem interested in finding out whether he had the second, even when we all saw flashes. I don’t suspect Napier will have the same problem, especially now that Jones has decided to transfer out.

So we all wish Emory Jones well as he departs. He’s been nothing but classy throughout, and I hope he goes somewhere that can utilize his skill set and appreciate what he brings to the table. But while I’m bummed his tenure didn’t deliver what we all thought back in 2018, his departure does bring a level of excitement and hope I haven’t felt since Will Grier was slinging TD passes all over the place against Ole Miss in 2015.

Let the Anthony Richardson era begin.