Going into the 2026 season, it was clear the Florida Gators didn’t have a roster ready to compete for a national championship. The first four weeks still gave fans plenty to believe in, and even had me cautiously optimistic after the blowout win over the Ole Miss Rebels.

Since that win, the Gators are 1-4. Florida sits at 5-4 overall with a 3-4 record in the SEC after a rough loss to the Oklahoma Sooners. That’s not good enough, and the main reason the program hasn’t seen the success it needs comes down to the quarterback position. This offseason, the Gators have to make a massive investment at quarterback through the transfer portal.

The Florida Gators need to target a high-profile transfer portal quarterback

The Gators got steamrolled offensively against Oklahoma. Florida ran only 47 plays on offense and gained just 203 yards. Meanwhile, the Sooners pushed the defense around and held on to the ball for 37 minutes and 50 seconds.

It was a rough game overall, and neither quarterback has been the answer this season. Aaron Philo was good through the first four weeks, but he hasn’t been anywhere near consistent since. Tramell Jones Jr. looked good in the upset win over Texas and was relatively solid against the Georgia Bulldogs, but looked lost against 

It also doesn’t help when running back Jayden Baa gets only eight carries. He’s the best player on the roster, and an offense that can’t sustain drives can’t feed its best player. Offensive coordinator Buster Faulkner needs to make him more of a priority.

It’s one of the things that makes the 5-4 record so frustrating, but it’s more so because of  Over the last three games, the Florida defense has allowed only 67 points, which works out to roughly 22.3 points per game. That’s plenty good enough to win, especially in the SEC.

The performance against Georgia stands out the most. The defense played well enough that a capable offense would have beaten Georgia. Not a great offense, just one that could move the ball with any kind of consistency. With capable quarterback play, the Gators likely would have overcome most of their deficiencies on defense early on and sit at 7-2 when they figured it out.

To be fair, it’s hard to win a game when the defense gives up scoring drives of 10 plays, 15 plays, and 20 plays like they did on Saturday night, along with being 10-18 on third down.. However, if the offense can’t hold on to the ball for more than four plays, what does it matter? The defense keeps getting sent back onto the field, and eventually, any unit will break.

All of this to say that the Gators need to make adding a quarterback in the transfer portal a priority. Now, the Gators do have young talent at the position. Davin Davidson is coming in as a four-star recruit, and true freshman Will Griffin was the Gatorade High School Football Player of the Year in the state of Florida last year.

Even with those two players on the roster, the Gators don’t have anybody they can trust as a projected starter for 2027. Davidson and Griffin could develop into that player down the road, but Jon Sumrall can’t afford to bank on a freshman or an incoming recruit to fix an offense that couldn’t function against Oklahoma.

That’s why the transfer portal has to be the priority. The defense has shown it can hang with the best teams in the SEC, and the offense hasn’t held up its end. Because of the quarterback position, the Gators need to make stark changes this offseason. The question now is whether Florida can land a quarterback in the portal who turns a capable defense into a winning team.