When FSU football fans look at the roster, they see players leaving in droves to enter the transfer portal for the second year in a row. There were players who needed to leave after the 2024 season, and it was easier to understand. Mike Norvell preached about getting and keeping players who “played with an edge.”
It was thought that the players who returned to FSU after 2024 wanted to be at FSU. They wanted to compete, play with an edge, and help turn the program around. That looked to be the case when FSU came out of the gates to upset Alabama in the season opener. That team played with a fire we hadn’t seen since the ACCCG in December 2023.
However, that fire wasn’t as hot after the first three weeks. I still can’t put my finger on what happened, but something changed in that program. Nevertheless, the team lost seven of its last nine games, and nearly 20 players have announced intentions to enter the transfer portal. Several players from the 2024 recruiting class which was the highest-rated recruiting class (No. 12 nationally) in the Mike Norvell era.
Why have so many high school signees not been developed in the Mike Norvell era? As a former college athlete, I put a thought on social media on Monday afternoon and wanted to expound on it:
Player development is largely on the player. Drills are all similar. Coaches can motivate some, but ultimately it’s on the player to put the time/work in. It’s on the coach to find those with talent AND drive to get improve…otherwise there would be better players everywhere
— Kelvin Hunt (@khchopchat) December 22, 2025
When I was in college playing baseball, we did it all. We had strength and conditioning, regular practice, hitting and fielding drills, situational drills, film analysis from intersquad scrimmages, etc.
However, it was up to me to come to practice early to get work in, stay late to do it, and come in on our off days. It was up to me to watch the film in my dorm room. Our coaches tried to motivate us. However, our coach had a saying. “The best motivator is yourself.”
So I say that to say this. FSU fans want to blame the coaches for the lack of player development. That’s fair; there’s plenty of blame to go around. However, the majority of the blame should go to the player. Every player has their own circumstances that impact things. Injuries, some get homesick, some are immature and don’t understand how things work yet. Some players don’t understand they have to do more than the bare minimum because they’ve always been the best wherever they grew up. All of those are factors that limit player development. It’s up to the coaches to help guide that young man through that process.
However, ultimately, if that player doesn’t want to do all of the extra work required to be great? He won’t be great. He’ll fold under pressure when his number is called. Jameis Winston said it best a few weeks ago. He said, “Pressure is for the unprepared.”
I don’t think FSU coaches have held these players to the fire, but as a dog, you gotta WANT to be held to the fire. FSU lost a ton of leadership from that 2023 team. That team was full of dogs who wanted to prove themselves. Jordan Travis, Jared Verse, Braden Fiske, Trey Benson, Johnny Wilson, and I could keep going. They all had obstacles to clear to become great. They all motivated one another to get better. They did it with a bunch of coaches who got fired, and we think they are terrible coaches. Those are all transfer players, but they developed because they came to FSU with little to no production and became NFL Draft selections.
The same could be said for all of the high school players from the 2024 recruiting class. Kam Davis, Landen Thomas, Edwin Joseph, Cai Bates, Elijah Moore, Camdon Frier, DD Holmes, etc. All four stars who made little to no impact at FSU.
Lawayne McCoy and Micahi Danzy have become contributors. They are from the same class and had the same coaching as Elijah Moore. Why did they develop, and he didn’t, when he’s arguably the most physically talented of the three?
However, when we look at some players from the 2025 recruiting class. The Desir twins, Shamar Arnoux, Ousmane Kromah, and Chavez Thompson. Some others would have been contributors if not for injuries. Those guys came in with the attitude that they had something to prove, and they got playing time.
FSU coaches must do a better job of identifying players who can motivate themselves. True, it’s more difficult than ever to do that when players get paid now. However, it must be done because everyone has to do it. However, it's also why you see players leaving programs all across the country. It's not just an FSU problem.
The biggest thing missing from FSU is the best players influencing everyone else to meet the standard. If players are laughing after losing to Stanford, and the best players on the team aren’t checking them? That’s a problem.
That means they aren’t checking them at practice when they mess up. They aren’t checking them if they are late to meetings, they aren’t checking them if they are playing around in the weight room, etc. Recruiting self-motivated players with talent is the best way to get the team to police itself. That policing ensures that guys are prepared to practice the right way, and practicing the right way encourages competition and development.
Once that happens, the habits formed at practice transfer over to actual games, and guys want to play for one another because they’ve been in the fire together. FSU has had more than enough talent to go 7-17 over the past two years. The 2024 recruiting class had a 70 percent blue-chip ratio, yet over half of that class has already exited without contributing. If guys are just freelancing, doing the bare minimum or less, and it doesn’t hurt to lose? You get what we’ve gotten the past two years.