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Florida Gators facing rare Day 1 NFL Draft silence

Florida has five year streak at risk tonight in the draft
ByBenjamin Henderson|
Apr 12, 2025; Gainesville, FL, USA; Florida Gators athletic director Scott Stricklin and Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier talk before the game at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Matt Pendleton-Imagn Images
Apr 12, 2025; Gainesville, FL, USA; Florida Gators athletic director Scott Stricklin and Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier talk before the game at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Matt Pendleton-Imagn Images | Matt Pendleton-Imagn Images

The NFL Draft is set to get underway today in Green Bay, and the Florida Gators will have a handful of players selected throughout the three-day event. After having just one player selected last year (Ricky Pearsall), Florida should see somewhere between five and seven players hear their names called.

But the Gators are at risk of having a couple of notable draft streaks end unless someone does something that isn't expected.

All Good Things Must Come To An End For Florida Football

For the past five year, Florida has had at least one player selected in the first round of the draft:

  • 2020 - CJ Henderson
  • 2021 - Kyle Pitts and Kadarius Toney
  • 2022 - Kaiir Elam
  • 2023 - Anthony Richardson
  • 2024 - Ricky Pearsall

Unless something unexpected happens tonight, that streak is going to come to an end as the Gators do not have anyone projected anywhere near the 1st round.

But Florida has an even longer streak that is also in jeopardy this weekend. Since 2013, the Gators have had at least one player selected in either the first or second round of the draft. In fact, since 1994, there have only been three years in which Florida didn't have someone selected in the first two rounds (1996, 2005, 2012).

Unless someone jumps up to take Jason Marshall or Cam Jackson, who are both mock-drafted in the third round at best, Florida isn't projected to have anyone drafted in the first two rounds.

Talent Drain

There are a couple of ways to look at the prospect of not having anyone drafted in the first round:

  1. One of the defenses of Billy Napier is that Dan Mullen didn't leave behind enough talent to be competitive out of the gate. And if we are being fair, the reality is that in the latest mock draft by ESPN, only eight of the 32 players projected to be selected in the first round were acquired through the transfer portal, while the other 24 were with the original team they signed with. And since most of those players are from the class of 2022, which Mullen neglected and Napier had to patch together, it's not necessarily fair to judge Napier on the lack of 1st round talent this year.
  2. Even without 1st round talent, Florida still had the 9th most players invited to the NFL Combine, should still have five to seven players drafted, and had a roster good enough not to start 4-5 in 2024.

The NFL Draft gets underway at 8 PM.

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