Jaden Rashada reportedly files for release from Florida
A truly wild saga in the recruitment of 5-star Pittsburg (Calif.) quarterback Jaden Rashada took another turn on Tuesday.
Six days after a report emerged stating that Rashada had requested a release from his National Letter of Intent from Florida — a report that was immediately denied by the Rashada family — 247Sports Brandon Huffman is reporting that Rashada filed paperwork with the NCAA on Tuesday asking out of his LOI.
Florida could take up to 30 days to respond.
Per a source close to his recruitment, on Tuesday afternoon, Pittsburg (Calif.) quarterback Jaden Rashada officially filed a request for a release from his national letter-of-intent with Florida https://t.co/k8lCSWUdMV pic.twitter.com/3QrrjNjBCr
— Brandon Huffman (@BrandonHuffman) January 18, 2023
The 6-foot-4 Rashada is the 59th-ranked recruit in the 2023 class, according to the industry-generated 247 Composite. He was a Miami commit for nearly five months before flipping his pledge and signing with the Gators during the Early Signing Period in December.
He was expected to be a mid-year enrollee and arrive on campus after the Under Armour All-America Game last week, but that didn’t happen, prompting questions and speculation about what was going on.
Though Huffman’s report makes no mention of it, The Athletic has reported that a $13 million NIL deal falling apart could be the culprit.
If Rashada is granted a release from his LOI, the Gators will likely turn to Wisconsin transfer Graham Mertz.
Dumpster. Fire.
Please just let the kid go. Let the nightmare end…
Last year, yes. This year, no. Most likely he wasn’t going to make as much impact this coming season, and if he had registered there’s a good chance he would have transferred by next season. The other recruits signed whether from high school or transfer portal are talented and excited to play for the team, we should see an improvement next season.
Only on message boards. Unfortunate that it couldn’t work out but I think we’ll survive
Items in the news the last time Tennessee won a football championship:
People learn of an elicit affair between President Clinton and a 21 year old intern named Monica Lewinsky
An internet search company named Google is founded
Apple introduces the iMac, their very first “I” device
The Spice Girls release their first album
Titanic is the number 1 movie at the Box Office and Celine Dion has the hit song of the year with it’s theme, My Heart Will Go On”
And of course, Tennessee ends a 50 year drought and wins their last football National Championship!
1998 ladies and gentleman
1980-2021. Don’t talk
31 years between Championships which I believe is actually shorter than UGA 41 years
Only in Knoxville do they count 1967. One random poll out of many names you number 1 and you hang a banner lol. Incidentally, who did that same poll (Liktenhous) pick in 1968? And yet no banner. LOL. I guess low standards are better than no standards, eh Vols?
This dude is speaking a whole bunch of nonsense.
Go look it up. It is easy to find utilizing a company that was founded in 1998…Google.
As Mick Hubert would say, “Oh My!!!”….
Buwahahahahahaaaa
Buwahahahahahaaaa
Hmmm
Well after winning 10 games for the first time in how many years and also the hire of Jeremy Pruitt you have the balls to call any other program a dumpster fire ? Esp a program that has beaten Tennessee what 15 of the last 17 years ?
Still the 2nd biggest dumpster fire in the cfp world as of right now.
Do we need to look at Tennessee over the last 16 years ? That is what a dumpster fire would look like. Don’t get me wrong Florida is not in a good spot at this point . Just think it Is hilarious the vols have one good season over the last 16 years and your our talking about a dumpster fire ….
Hey dont get mad at me… I’m just trying to tell the truth.
As was I vol fan .. not mad at all but one should not be throwing rocks in a glass house sir
Good riddance to the traveling circus. I wish him luck but Gainesville doesn’t seem to be the best place for him.
Agreed. At this point the Gators need players that are truly eager to play for them, like Lagway.
What The Athletic article said is that Rashada was sent a letter terminating the NIL offer.
Glad it’s over. Or hopefully over.
Fini-time, and I’m glad too that it’s not dragging on for eternity. What a soap opera this has been.
More importantly, have you noticed that SDS appears to be pushing Mertz as the ’23 starter?
So it seems. Don’t believe Miller will necessarily acquiesce.
Finally! I suppose it was necessary to try and work things out, but this kid was going to be trouble with a capital T. His focus appears to be on the money and his roots are definitely in the west coast.
DJ Lagway is a better fit for the Gator offense and a much better fit for Napier’s new team centric culture. In the meantime, as @mrtruth might say, “the Mertzinator era has begun!”
Good luck to Rashada out west. May he find the right place for himself out there.
The Gators haven’t played an out-of-conference, out-of-state “road game” since losing to Syracuse in the Carrier Dome on September 21, 1991.
That was over 30 years ago.
Absolutely pathetic.
Yeah that game against Michigan in Arlington. Didn’t happen or something
Buwahahahahahaaaa…. This ignoramus Gator fan thinks Michigan plays their home games in Arlington, Texas…. Buwahahahahahaaaa
Pathetic is someone who keeps using the same insult over and over ( as you keep saying with this out of conference game mess) as well as being an Anonymous fan ..
I personally don’t care about this, why is this a big deal, and you’ll have to come up with new material for September because they are playing at Utah the first game of the season.
So, Gator fans, how long before Coach Billy Bob gets fired and the Gators are looking for another new head coach? I mean, everyone knows the Bull Gators won’t tolerate a coach who doesn’t win a natty by the end of his second year…. Buwahahahahahaaaa, Gator fans have such incredibly unrealistic expectations for their dumpster fire football program…. Buwahahahahahaaaa
How long before you reach puberty and start to mature?
Good luck to Rashada. When he first committed to Miami and SDS and others were raving about what a huge blow it was to UF, my attitude was — we’ll see. Then, when he flipped to us and it was supposedly the greatest thing ever, my students was — we’ll see. I’ve seen plenty of guys come in with loads of hype and do nothing. I’m not saying he will or won’t have a great career. I’m just saying he hasn’t done anything on the college level yet.
Meanwhile, the last three national titles have been one by a former two star and a former three star, both of whom beat out 5 star hot shots to win the starting job.
Remember Bobby Sablehouse? He was can’t-miss too!
I’d feel bad about this loss if Lagway hadn’t committed in December. He let the air out of the tires of Rashada’s clown car.
Good riddance!
Now, Gator Nation can focus on “Mertzinating” the college football world!
Lol! Love Mertzinating. Also, Sablehouse was one of the players I was thinking of as I wrote!
Two three stars, to be fair, and Jones was still a fairly highly rated recruit.
Didn’t realize these NIL deals were so lucrative. That’s a ton of cash for someone that hasn’t planned a down at the D1 level. We hear so much about them but I wonder what is guaranteed, terms etc… Regardless if the guy doesn’t want to play at your school let them move on. The portal works both ways. Good luck to you guys getting the team back on track.
Don’t believe everything you read. There are limits. It’s just that Rashada’s agent is trying to push them.
When the #59 player in a class (247 composite) can allegedly command a NIL deal this large, there’s no telling where this game is going. Makes you really wonder what Texas and Tennessee have in place for much higher-rated QBs. This is NFL-level money – IF the reports are accurate.
NFL owners get a financial ROI for their money. Boosters and collectives don’t. It’s just gone, and then they have to pony up all over again when the calendar flips. Seems unsustainable. I’m sure the Cali legislature will lead the way in sorting this out for us, since they started it all. Can’t wait.
I’m not buying the tale that a college collective NIL is willing to pay a high school kid 13 mil. (or more than the head coach) to come play with us. If there is a school that’s willing to do that then let them have all the NC’s and self-centered players, they can own. That just cannot be sustained year after year, and Miami is going to find that out.
I’m with you Tailwhip. Common sense is in very short supply these days, especially out on “the left coast.”
Good riddance! This circus is the opposite of what Napier is trying to build in Hogtown.
You’re right Mountain Dog, but outrageous fiction always gets more attention than boring facts. “Return on investment” is a tediously boring subject.
Don’t forget, after this Jaden Rashada circus leaves Hogtown, that the Gators and Canes BOTH ended up inviting it into their towns. Just as they BOTH invited the Cormani McClain circus into their towns too.
There’s a common thread to BOTH of those stories, which is rooted in recruiting relationships. Both Napier and Cristobal were trailing other more established programs (UGA, Alabama, Ohio State) in relationships with coveted 5-star talent in the south. So, they became willing hostages to the top two mercenaries in the 2023 recruiting class. As things turned out, neither situation ended up well for either program.
There are no short cuts in recruiting players that are both talented and team focused. You must establish a winning program, start intensely recruiting them early in their HS careers (before they acquire their stars) and lower your emphasis on the egotistical, selfish players as you discover who they are. Notice that Rashada received no serious attention from UGA, OSU, or Alabama and McClain did not reveal his mercenary bent until he surprised everyone by committing late to little visited Miami… then failing to sign with them on signing day. Like Rashada, he’s still shopping for a “better NIL deal.”
Excellent analysis. You’ve gotta be there early in a blue-chip kid’s HS career, and you HAVE to be alert to too much “I” and not enough TEAM in his character.
Thank you Mountain Dog.
Very true, StL. We need quality players like Young and Anderson who are talented and want to play for their teams.
Just stop by for a second to say a couple things. First the alleged $13M was probably for multiple years. So, not more than the HBC. And, if he did sign the NIL deal and it was retracted, I imagine there are lawsuits to follow. You just don’t cancel contracts willy nilly. UF will survive without him.
For sure but if the deal was signed for the amount then he should have been paid . Is he worth it .. prob not but if the collective agree to pay him
The 13 million it should follow through
Gatorfan, IF the Gator collectives reneged on paying out any part of any signed agreement, there will be lawsuits. Count on it!
On the other hand, if there are no lawsuits, you can comfortably assume that the $13 million story was just a fairy tale.
Well it’s official mee palley, Rashada for Heisman sign is available on eBay, 90% off
Just wait till he signs with his new team and you can make a profit :)
Sounds to me like the Gators dodged a bullet on this one….
Enrolling at Colorado in 3…..2…..1…..
Right along with Cormani McClain. Those two young men belong together wherever they land.
Colorado doesn’t have enough money to pay their coaching staff yet. They don’t have the money for this kid either.
NIL money is not supposed to come from the school so that wouldn’t matter about the coaching budget. My reasoning for CO not courting him is different. Deon’s son is the current starting qb.
The majority of the HC’s salary doesn’t come from the school either. It’s media deals and boosters.
This kid and his Lavar Ball wannabe father will be a perfect fit with Prime Slime in Boulder.
Exactly!
NIL will and is ruining college football. Until there are some parameters put into place, college football will never be the same.
I disagree most emphatically!
Just take a look at the just completed college football season. It was a rousing success, built around great stories about great players and great coaches making great things happen on the field all around the country.
UGA repeated as NC’s for the first time in the CFP era. TCU almost completed a true Cinderella story. And, Tennessee came out of the woodwork to put on a great show, with Hooker leading their charge.
Not one of those stories was tainted by anything that happened on the “business side” of college football. There will always be Rashada / McClain type “business stories” that will be breathlessly reported and end up having little to no effect on what happens on the field in the fall.
Sounds like he wasn’t going to be a team player in the first place. Let him go and move on. NIL is going to ruin (if not already) the NCAA.
So Florida tricked the kid into signing by promising a lot of money and then backed out after he signed. The kid kept his side of the deal and the gators did not. And dont say the school had nothing to do with it, the coach knew all about it.
You really need to read the rules on the nil and the school’s role 493.
You really need to get some common sense.
Common sense would mean reading the rules before you go out and criticize .. form your comments you have no clue what role the coaching staff , university, or collective have on an nil deal. That shows as you clearly keep saying Napier and uf owe this guy money . Please go do some research sir ..
8115 you have your head in the sand if you think the coaching staff knew nothing of this deal. i never said napier or the school owed the kid money. i said he was tricked and now florida did not want to pay, meaning the collective with florida’s knowledge of same.
If the Gators “tricked” one kid, they’ve “tricked” others. Why is it that Rashada’s the only one asking the NCAA for a do over?
Gators dodged a bullet and provided some real learnings for other programs trying to figure out NIL, collectives, etc… Players like this are never going to be the backbone of a program. Mercenaries is more like it. Sure, pay a high performing kid $100K or whatever that may be. I can’t imagine a high school QB coming into Florida, or any other self respecting program, with a multi million dollar NIL contract and have that do anything short of blowing up the locker room. Good riddance I say!
You nailed it Cats Fan. It really doesn’t matter what the market rate for a 5-star HS QB is.
When the player and his family are more focused on how much money they can get than what he can accomplish in your program, it’s best to let that player go elsewhere. Nothing good for your team will come out of adding a player like that to your roster.
$13MNIL? Is this real or fake news?