AP Photo - Steve Addazio

After a drama filled weekend that saw Coach Meyer retire then have a change of heart the next day, Gator fans were glad to see Monday roll around and the back to business mentality re-established. Good thing Jeremy Foley is the best AD in college sports and has had practice handling this situation with Billy Donovan. Jeff Greer of US New & World Report says, “It wouldn’t be Florida without drama.”

While Coach Meyer is away from the program, Steve Addazio will take over as the interim coach. The current players are very satisfied with the promotion of Coach Addazio.

As Coach Addazio tried to get ready for his new role as interim coach, former Gators defensive coordinator Charlie Strong is trying to juggle both the Florida and Louisville jobs. When asked if he would have been given a shot to coach the Gators when Meyer left Strong replied, “You never know if I stayed here what would have happened,” he said. “So I just don’t look at it like that.”

Ted Lewis of  The Times-Picayune has put looks for Tebow to pull off one more miracle to end Coach Meyer’s job related stress. Maybe that won’t happen,  but he does look at how Tebow has moved mountains during his distinguished career. During his interview he does procure this great quote from Tebow: “Good for them,” Tebow said in a rare public moment of spite. “If they enjoy seeing me cry, then I have bigger things to worry about.”

Fox 8 out of New Orleans is reporting business is down for the Sugar Bowl this year. There are still a 1000 general admission tickets left for the game.

For a little humor,  the fake Lane Kiffin Show discusses the Urban Meyer resignation with new Florida head football coach, Phillip Fulmer.

Stick Around Coach Strong

Yes, Charlie Strong deserves to have a head coaching job. Yes, he should’ve had a head coaching job two to three years ago, but this Gator fan doesn’t want to see him go. Ever since Pat Forde reported Strong was the top candidate for the Louisville head coaching job, I’ve been racking my brain as to who can and will fill Charlie’s shoes when he does get his first head coaching gig. Of course the Gators would be losing a great defensive coach, but also they would be losing one of the best recruiters on the staff. Strong has built the current Gators’ defense full of four and five-star recruits.

Coach Meyer was quoted today saying, “Charlie is not only a great coach, he is one of my great friends. The one thing about him is he’s very professional. There’s been zero discussion about (the Louisville job). At the appropriate time, there will. That’s just part of the business. There’s two kinds of coaches: ones you want and ones you don’t want. Unfortunately, I have a few people want.”

Louisville sites are also reporting that Strong might try to get Billy Gonzales to come with him to Louisville as offensive coordinator. Rumors were flying that he also might leave to go with Dan Mullen to Mississippi State too, and also Lane Kiffin made a huge push last year to try and get him on his League of Super Coaches staff. Billy has said in the past that he is 100% happy in Gainesville, and he has a long relationship with Coach Meyer back to his days at Colorado St.

I, being a greedy fan,  hope Urban can talk Charlie into saying and is able to offer a nice bump in pay for him. Coach Strong clearly deserves to run his own program, but like Dan Mullen he will be missed and very hard to replace.

Coach Urban Meyer has made SEC history again. This time he is the first coach to have the strong arm of Mike Slive hand out a fine for the SEC referee gag order. Meyer got a $30,ooo fine for these words:

“I don’t want to step out of line, [but] there should have been a penalty, in my opinion. Obviously it should have been. You have to protect quarterbacks. That’s the whole purpose. It’s right in front of the referee.” 

You can find more from around the web here on the fine.

• AP Story on SI
• Andy Staples - SEC’s Slive left himself no choice but to fine Meyer
• Gville Sun - SEC fines Meyer
• Urban Meyer fined $30,000 for comment on late Tebow hit

The SEC has made it clear that they can’t handle the truth, and has made a rule that they are going to be forced to enforce without any leniency. Maybe next time Coach Meyer could be a little more blunt and go for the suspension over the fine. This way Charlie Strong could get that head coaching gig.

With only 23 days till the home opener the Gators have now put on the pads and are ready to get down to business. It should be a great fall practice as guys try to crack the starting line-up. On defense there is going to be competition at every position. Defensive Coordinator Charlie Strong summed it up like this at the Gators Media Day:

“What is great is that the players understand that if they don’t prepare well, they don’t practice well, then they aren’t going to play. We have recruited well over the last few years and have managed to get some really good football players. Our staff has done a really good job at developing these players as well. If you look at our team a year ago, we got ridiculed for our game against Michigan. Then, at the start of last year we had Terron Sanders show up, Lawrence Marsh show up and Ahmad Black show up. All of those guys were developed and they became really good football players and key members of our improved defense last season. What we can’t allow happen is to look back to last season and not fully coach up our players just because they have made plays in games in the past. It is our duty as coaches to make sure that each day our players are getting better.”

Debose Working On Ball Security

ESPN.com’s BSC Guru Brad Edwards believes the Gators have schedule advantage in 2009. The Gators have a good looking schedule on paper, but any time you have LSU, UGA, Tennessee, and FSU on your schedule you don’t have any easy road to the BCS game.

University of Florida coach Urban Meyer begins his fifth season in Gainesville with a team constructed entirely of players he recruited. You can tell in recent interviews that Coach Meyer is happy with the state of his team, and proud of the talented staff and players he has around him. If you missed it, here is the must read from Pat Dooley on the comfort level Urban Meyer now has in Gainesville.

As we reported last night Kadron Boone picked Texas Tech over Flordia. “I’ll tell you what,” Trinity head coach John Brantley III said, “I’d be excited if I was a receiver and you’ve got the potential to catch 70 to 100 balls a year. I think that’s what Kadron was looking at.” Yes that is Gators QB John Brantley’s Dad quoted there. Not even having a Gator for a coach in high school was able to swing him to the Gators. Andy Marks gets more in-depth with his interview with Kedron.

Still none of the Freshman players have lost their stripe yet, but Jelani Jenkins, Xavier Nixon,  Mike Gillislee, and Jon Bostic have impressed so far. Also Jordan Reed and Andre Debose are improving over each practice.  The first one to lose their black stripe will join Jeff Demps from last year and Major Wright from the 2007 class as the first to be welcomed to the team.

And just a little something to get you fired up…

Janoris Jenkins Shined in 2009

39 tackles, three interceptions, and 12 pass deflections…these statistics don’t begin to tell the story of what Janoris brought to the Gators in the 2008 season. After giving up a ton of yards to Michigan in the Capital One Bowl, it was clear the Gators’ defense needed a couple of stoppers.

Charlie Strong loves to have an aggressive defense that he can use to bring pressure and shut-down corner backs that he can trust in man to man coverage. Joe Haden had shown that he could be a shut down corner, but who was going to be that other guy?

Wondy Pierre-Louis had the talent to be that guy, but his late start in football showed. After the first game of the season , however, a bold freshman was ready to be that guy, and he was letting his teammates know.

Safety Ahmad Black heard it as soon as he step on campus, “He told us he was going to be real good. We were like, ‘Whatever,’ and then he went out there and showed us.”

Jenkins was able to lock up man for man in major SEC contests with freshmen A.J. Green and Julio Jones, which allowed the Gators to use an extra man to keep pressure on Matthew Stafford and John Parker Wilson the whole game. In the second half of the conference championship game ,you could see the Julio Jones’ frustration at the tight coverage Janoris maintained (Bama fans– he did give up a big play early in the game).

“Not too many freshmen come in and play on the Florida defense,” Gators defensive leader Brandon Spikes stated. “But he’s done all the right things, made a lot of big plays, never let guys catch the ball on him. “

So I’d like to just take the time to say thanks Janoris Jenkins, you are a big reason the Gators were able to claim their third National Championship.