Florida State fans have no shame once a blue chip recruit canceled his official visit

The Florida State football coaching staff took a gut punch on Tuesday when prized wide receiver recruit Jabari Watkins announced he would no longer take his official visit in a couple of weeks.

Watkins, the No. 253 player nationally and No. 34 wide receiver, is from nearby Thomasville, Georgia, which is only about 40 miles from Tallahassee. The latter is probably the more damning aspect of the situation because Watkins isn’t in the elite prospect category.

Florida State got him on campus twice in the spring, once in January and again in March, so he’s had the opportunity to see all of the new facilities, etc. He had recently named Florida State one of his top schools, so it’s not clear what shifted in his recruitment. Nevertheless, Florida State fans took to social media to voice their displeasure with the coaching staff.

The problem was that many of them wrote directly to the recruit, congratulating him on the decision.

Florida State fans are rightfully jaded after the last two years, but this behavior isn't a good look.

It’s one thing to voice opinions on social media, but directly replying to recruits probably isn’t the best idea. For one, nobody knows why he changed his mind. It could have been a conversation with the staff(again, it’s not like he’s elite, and they took a ton of receivers in the last recruiting cycle).

Other schools could be negatively recruiting Florida State with the future of Mike Norvell in doubt. That’s a by-product of not firing him when they should have last year. It’s one of the biggest things I said they would have to combat if they didn’t get a new coach, and here we are.

I get it. Our program has been so far below the Florida State standard, but stooping to these levels of celebrating a recruit not entertaining Florida State is crazy behavior. I don’t anticipate Florida State recruiting improving much until they show they can produce a better product on the field or until there’s a new coach in place.

As I wrote about the offense here, there’s potential for the Florida State offense to be better in 2026, but there’s also questions about the defense with so many new faces they’ll be counting on.

The bad part is that the beginning of the season will make or break things in recruiting. If FSU can beat SMU and Alabama in back-to-back weeks, that would provide a spark that could move the needle again. However, if they lose those to games? It’s probably a wrap for the rest of the season. Let’s be better about writing to recruits, regardless of what’s happening with the program.  

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