Cleveland showing growth after early setbacks in Florida career
As a Rivals100 signee and one of Florida’s most heralded offensive recruits of the past several years, wide receiver Tyrie Cleveland arrived at UF’s campus with high expectations.
However, not even a month into his time with the Gators, his Florida career got off to a rocky start.
On July 18, Cleveland – along with fellow freshman wideout and roommate Rick Wells – were arrested for property damage and criminal mischief involving an on-campus incident with BB guns and subsequently suspended for Florida’s season-opener against UMass. About two months later, Cleveland pleaded guilty after his charge was reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, receiving six months' probation and paying $979.80 in restitution and $200 in court costs.
During fall camp, Cleveland missed a considerable amount of time with a hamstring injury. Instead of spending most of his time on the practice field learning by experience, Cleveland was subjected to the training room while the receiver rotation began the take shape at the start of the season.
Eventually, Cleveland returned to the mix against Kentucky and played in garbage time during that contest, as Florida had already made the game out of reach by the third quarter, but he suffered another hamstring injury against the Wildcats that ended up sidelining him for the North Texas contest.
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“Anytime you go through that it’s a little mentally draining,” Gators wide receivers coach Kerry Dixon said. “He was down a little bit but he stayed engaged. One of the things about him, he always asks questions in meetings. If he didn’t know something he would always feel free to ask. He stayed engaged that way. When he came back out it wasn’t too hard for him to pick up on certain things.”
Since returning to the fold in practice last week, Dixon has been pleased with what he’s seen out of Cleveland during drills.
"He's doing a really good job,” Dixon said. “You know, we don't ask him to do too much right now, especially when guys miss that amount of time and they're just getting here. So what we try to do is bring him in and talk to him about certain situations where he would go in the game and put him in the proper position to be successful. That's our job as coaches is to get them in the right spot and make sure they can have success on the field."
That culminated in Cleveland’s first collegiate catch in the second quarter last Saturday during Florida’s 38-28 road loss to Tennessee. Seeing his first reps of the season in meaningful action, Cleveland came up big on a 36-yard catch where Austin Appleby faked a handoff and tossed it deep down the right sideline for the freshman receiver to catch over freshman defensive back Baylen Buchanan. The play helped set up Florida’s third touchdown drive of the afternoon.
After the catch, Cleveland celebrated emphatically, Gator chomping in the end zone.
“I was excited for him,” Dixon said. “I was a little nervous because he ran through the end zone Gator chomping, but I was excited for the kid. he's been through a lot and for him to go out there and get a taste of what it feels like was really good for him."
Moving forward, Cleveland could end up carving out a regular role in the rotation for the Gators – that is, if he continues to show growth and that he’s picking up the playbook, according to Dixon.
“Well, you really try to push the learning curve, so I try to put him in as many difficult positions in practice as possible,” explained Dixon. “So I’ll put him in for every concept, but then I can watch film and tell what he’s comfortable in. You know, when you’re thinking a lot on the field, you don’t play as fast. So I can see that on film and I evaluate it based off of what I feel comfortable with, and that’s when he goes in.”
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