FSU Midseason Stock Report: Who Has Disappointed, Who Has Impressed

Many Florida State fans are looking for explanations about the poor start from the Seminoles. Most conclusions reach some mix of coaching, effort, and plain weaknesses in certain positions. Suffice to say, there have been major winners and losers across the roster. Some are obvious, others less so.

To qualify for this list, there must be some sort of expectation that the player exceeded or failed to meet. Guys like James Blackman had basically no expectations in preseason, so they can’t be properly judged. Others like Derwin James and Derrick Nnadi have played right around where they were projected, give or take some slight variation. The ones in this piece have substantially improved or declined.

Stock Up

Auden Tate, WR – There was a slight debate before 2017 about whether Auden Tate or Nyqwan Murray would have the better season. Through five games, the answer seems to be resoundingly in favor of Tate. He’s scored a touchdown in every game so far and has improved in basically all aspects of being a receiver. He’s reliable, tough, and dominant in the end zone. Despite a nagging shoulder injury, Tate is still the No. 1 option for the foreseeable future. It’s impressive enough that his draft grade might be high enough to convince him to leave after this season.

Levonta Taylor, CB – Fans haven’t heard Taylor’s name much this year. That’s a good thing. He’s been very impressive at field cornerback and has shut down every receiver that he’s been put up against. The secondary in general has been a massive disappointment, but Taylor is showing that there is at least one player coming back who fans can trust in 2018. He’s everything he was billed to be with his quickness and speed, as well as underrated strength.

Cam Akers/Jacques Patrick, RB – Both of the running backs have been impressive in different ways. Patrick looked like he was about to get usurped by Akers full stop after the N.C. State contest. Instead, he’s reeled off three straight games of 90-plus yards on the ground and 5-plus yards per carry. It took him a couple of seasons, but Patrick is finally understanding how to use his physical gifts properly.

Akers had been on the verge of “hitting a home run” in his first few appearances, and he finally did it against Duke on a 42-yard go-ahead score. There had been too much free-styling on his part against N.C. State and Wake Forest. Now that he’s learned to stay within the play, he’s beginning to shine with his lateral quickness. The numbers bare that out too: In his first three games, he combined for 143 rushing yards on 3.9 yards per carry. His last two? 136 on 6.9 yards per carry.

Josh Sweat, DE – The raw numbers for Sweat are good, if not overly eye-popping. But like many positions, his true impact can’t be accurately captured with stats. Sweat has done a great job this year of not taking plays off and not letting runners break contain. He provides constant pressure and is overall a more consistent player than he was in 2015 and 2016. While he’s not perfect, Sweat is finally starting to realize the potential that he had coming in to Florida State.

Derrick Kelly, OL – Unfortunately this selection might be moot depending on the updated status after Saturday’s game. Kelly went out with an injury in the third quarter and was replaced by Brock Ruble. Either way, Kelly is still very deserving of a mention. Who would’ve guessed that the redshirt junior would come all the way back from being benched in 2016 to being the best lineman in 2017? Kelly was succeeding at left tackle before an injury to Landon Dickerson forced him to move inside to guard. He was doing a fantastic job of protecting Blackman’s blind side and looks to have finally turned the corner on his development. Hopefully, the recent injury scare is just that.

Stock Down

Tarvarus McFadden, CB – Back during the preseason, we wrote that “…[McFadden] is certainly a promising prospect…that being said, perhaps some should wait until 2017 plays out before crowning him as the best cornerback in the nation.” He’s now showing why that was a good qualifier to have.

To clarify, McFadden hasn’t been terrible — and some criticism of him can be attributed more to coaching and great offensive plays. But there is still a noticeable decline in his play. He often gets caught giving a ridiculous amount of cushion to opposing receivers and has consistently lost plays near the sideline. In addition, he is still struggling on passes near the end zone. That was something many had assumed was fixed after a bad start to 2016. It turns out it wasn’t. Most already know the situation with the Miami touchdown, but even the final play against Wake Forest showcased this weakness as the Wake receiver had the ball in his hands before safety Derwin James came over and punched it out to preserve the win. McFadden simply has not improved.

In addition, there’s something that’s a bit harder to quantify: Pursuit. Other than the Alabama game, McFadden doesn’t seem all that interested in following where a play goes. That’s fine if it’s on the other side of the field and a player is getting wrapped up. It’s not fine when it’s relatively close to his position and the runner is still on two feet. It’s hard to see this as anything other than an effort problem. At this rate, it’s probably safe to assume that McFadden will head to the NFL after this year.

Nyqwan Murray, WR – Murray still has a chance to turn things around. After all, he didn’t start making a major impact in 2016 until halfway through the season. The problem is different however — in 2016, he had starter Jesus Wilson in front of him. In 2017, it’s completely on him. He checked out sometime after the Alabama game and only recently revived himself with a 5-reception, 81-yard outing against Duke. Some of it was frustration with the unexpected quarterback change. Yet watching plays like this where he misses his block and doesn’t even notice the fumble is incredibly frustrating. Many had criticized head coach Jimbo Fisher last year for playing Wilson ahead of Murray. They’re figuring out now why he did.

Trey Marshall, S – It’s not all that clear why Marshall has struggled so much in 2017. But as each game goes by where Marshall whiffs on a pursuit or misdiagnoses a play, it’s obvious that the coaches aren’t doing something right. Perhaps this is more drastic of a drop-off because Marshall really had a positive effect on the defense last season. They didn’t look the same when he was out. Now? The opposite appears to be true.

A.J. Westbrook, S – We’re not intentionally picking on the safeties (that would be opposing quarterbacks). It just so happens that as a unit, they’ve been very disappointing. Even Derwin James has experienced a dip in performance, though not nearly to the extent that the other two safeties have. Westbrook has regressed to his early 2016 form, where he ran away from tackles and was a general weak spot in the secondary. Duke had two passes on its final drive Saturday where Westbrook was caught too far back from his responsibility and allowed huge gains. Again, there’s definitely a coaching aspect with this.