For a program perennially at the top of the ACC, No. 14 Florida State’s off-season was anything but steady.
Coming off only the second season the Seminoles did not claim at least a share of the ACC championship since joining the conference in 1992, Bobby Bowden’s squad has made far too much noise for its off the field antics this summer.
On June 14, quarterback Wyatt Sexton, already suspended for what was later identified as failure to submit to a drug test, was hospitalized after police found the junior lying face-down in the middle of a Tallahassee street. Sexton identified himself as “God” and later as the “son of God” to the officers. On July 9, the self-proclaimed deity was diagnosed with an advanced case of Lyme’s Disease, which will cause him to miss the entire season.
Redshirt freshmen Xavier Lee and Drew Weatherford will seek to fill the quarterback void left by Sexton’s illness. Though talented, both applicants lack experience. Lee has not played a collegiate down, and Weatherford sprained his ankle on his first collegiate snap and was forced to use a medical redshirt last season. Bowden announced Wednesday that Weatherford will be the starter, but both would likely get playing time. Neither verdant signal caller will have much of a learning curve, as Florida State opens Sept. 5 against No. 9 Miami.
The offense was not the only unit to receive bad news this summer. Vaunted linebackers Ernie Sims and A.J. Nicholson each had run-ins with the law—Sims for an early-morning fight with his girlfriend outside their apartment and Nicholson for a misdemeanor DUI. Because neither were felonies, Bowden said both would play in the season opener.
The defense will be missing two players for the year, however. Antonio Cromartie, a first team All-ACC cornerback, went down for the season with a torn ACL in July, and defensive tackle Clifton Dickson was dismissed from the team for academic reasons. Still, Bowden does not see a large discrepancy between this off-season and those previous.
“People ask me about how awful things have been,” Bowden said. “We’ve always had somebody in trouble. We’ve always had somebody who’s had [bad] grades. We’ve always had somebody sick. I just don’t remember that much difference. It’s just the way it is nowadays, folks.”
Despite these off-field distractions, the Seminoles will be loaded with their usual stable of athletes and skilled position players. Running backs will be the backbone of Florida State’s offense, as senior Leon Washington and junior Lorenzo Booker return after combining for more than 1,800 rushing yards last year. The two workhorses hope to have plenty of room to run behind a new zone-blocking scheme installed to help a young offensive line.
No one, however, is about to take the program that has dominated the ACC for more than a decade lightly. Florida State was picked to finish first in the Atlantic Division, something that perplexed even Bowden.
“It looks like you all hadn’t been reading the paper,” Bowden joked. “You all don’t know we’ve lost some guys. I’m surprised you had us up there.”
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