Impact Analysis: What Treon Harris' transfer means moving forward
In the wake of the news that Treon Harris will transfer from the Gators football program, Inside the Gators now takes a closer look at what this means with an Impact Analysis.
WHAT IT MEANS FOR FLORIDA AND HARRIS MOVING FORWARD: Honestly, this move has minimal impact toward what the Gators are looking to accomplish heading into the 2016 season. Harris had essentially fallen out of favor with the Gators following a disappointing 2015 campaign – and Jim McElwain has made it clear throughout the offseason that’s he happy with his quarterback room consisting of Luke Del Rio, Austin Appleby, Feleipe Franks and Kyle Trask. Harris wasn’t mentioned at all in that conversation.
It’s not surprising, considering that playing the 5-foot-11, 201-pound Harris in a pro-style system was like attempting to "fit a square into a triangle hole.” He wasn’t a good fit for what Florida wanted to do last season, but following Will Grier’s PEDs suspension, the Gators didn’t have any better available options on the roster who had received nearly as many valuable fall practice reps as Harris. It was the hand Florida was dealt – and it was a tough one to work with, as UF finished the year 4-4 after a 6-0 start and lost its final three games to FSU, Alabama and Michigan by a combined margin of 97-24.
Couple that with the talks of Harris potentially switching to wide receiver – and his latest suspension along with a past history of off-the-field missteps while at Florida – and it’s obvious that McElwain didn’t envision Harris as an appropriate leader for the offense moving forward.
McElwain basically hinted at that in an interview with ESPN’s Ivan Maisel last week, when he mentioned Harris not being the right fit and players around him not playing at a high level when he ran the offense.
“In playing effective quarterback, it's not necessarily being the guy with the strongest arm, whatever, the best feet,” McElwain said. “Obviously, those are the things that help you play the position, but the key to playing winning football at that position is making the other 10 guys around you play at a higher level because of who you are. A lot of times, we look at the tangibles. The intangibles, to me, are what the great quarterbacks have and always will have. That's the ability to get the ball to playmakers, but everybody out there plays better because they're on the field."
At this point, Harris’ departure from the program seemed more like an inevitable conclusion than a possibility. As he awaited the result of his suspension – and fell out of favor at the quarterback position – transferring was probably the most logical decision for Harris.
Now, it’ll be interesting to see where Harris will opt to transfer and find a fresh start with two remaining years of eligibility – and some of the south Florida schools will be worth watching considering his family’s deep ties in that region. Harris’ brother, Tim Harris Jr., serves as the running backs coach on FIU’s staff. His father, current Booker T. Washington High School head coach Tim “Ice” Harris, worked at Miami for two seasons as a running backs coach but was not retained by Mark Richt.
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HARRIS’ BRIGHTEST MOMENTS: Florida fans thought they had found their savior in Harris during the first month of the 2014 season, when he checked in for a benched Jeff Driskel and led the Gators to a fourth-quarter rally to knock off Tennessee 10-9 in Knoxville. While Harris completed just 2-of-4 passes for 17 yards and ran for 24 yards on four carries, the offense actually looked functional under his leadership and moved down the field successfully – something Driskel couldn’t get it to do in that contest.
Following his debut against Eastern Michigan where he threw long touchdown passes on his first two throws, the Florida faithful viewed Harris as the real deal and the answer to the team’s recent quarterback woes.
However, that rise to such acclaim lasted for a short period of time. Then a freshman, Harris found himself embroiled in controversy when he was accused of rape and soon suspended indefinitely by Florida while the process was ongoing. The accuser later withdrew her complaint a couple days later.
One positive you can draw from Harris’ time at UF: He was 2-0 as a starter against Georgia. Leading a UF offense that employed a run-heavy style in both contests, the Gators outscored the Bulldogs 65-23. Harris threw for a combined 182 yards and a touchdown on 11-of-25 passing in those contests.
A TUMULTUOUS RIDE: Not including the situation during LSU week in 2014, Harris often found himself in trouble during his time at Florida.
In December 2014, Harris was charged with a second-degree misdemeanor for driving without a license. With J.C. Jackson and Jalen Tabor as passengers in the car, Harris was stopped by UFPD for speeding. Officers smelled marijuana and found two small bags of it in the vehicle, but no charges were filed because none of the players was in possession of marijuana and the car did not belong to them.
Harris was suspended for the Tennessee game during the 2015 season for reportedly failing a drug test, but that suspension lasted just one game.
Then, Harris along with fellow Booker T. Washington grad Antonio Callaway were suspended indefinitely from the team starting in late January for undisclosed reasons. Both weren’t around during spring practices, and their suspensions were modified in June so each could attend classes at UF and use Florida’s facilities.
Still, Harris wasn’t a participant in a good number of Florida’s workouts during the Summer B session. Now, he’ll be taking his career elsewhere after an erratic two years in Gainesville.
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