Florida Gators Transfer Portal GEM DJ Coleman Should START in 2026

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1:02Hello and welcome back to another episode of Lockdown Gators, part of Lockdown Podcast, Network Your Team, every day. Thanks for being a Lockdown Gators. You're first listen of the day, every day if you're available daily and free, visit the podcast and on YouTube. As always, I am Brandon Olson. Find all my written work about the Florida Gators who is swamp singlet.sepsack.com. A reminder that tomorrow morning, three AM Eastern Time on audio, eight AM Eastern Time on YouTube, Florida Gators head coach John Summerall will be here on Lockdown Gators. We're going to talk about DJ Coleman today and what his role is going to be. First, the biggest stretch of college basketball is here, buzzer beaters, bracket busters, and those unforgettable moments that everyone's talking about the next day, the next month, the next year. It's bigger than BAM out of bios, fake 83 point game last night. The Game Time app gives fans the advantage with constant innovation. It's how you unlock amazing tickets and experiences and just a few taps in the playing counts, which is in game time. Take the guess we're going to buy in college basketball, take some game time, download

2:04the game time app, create an account, just go to lock on for $20 off your first purchase term supply, again, create an account, but he put locked on for $20 off down on the game time app to date. The Florida Gators went into the transfer portal this year to go get DJ Coleman from Baylor. You can go back to December, around the time that the portal was getting ready to open and we were talking about what exactly Florida could go get and safety was the thing we talked about a lot because safety's in 2025 were wildly underwhelming, right? Rice Thorn was the only quality safety out there for the Florida Gators in 2025 out of everybody, not just the ones that left, but everybody that came back and didn't. The Florida Gators went into the transfer portal to go get DJ Coleman who, again, we spoke about before there was even smoke about Florida pursuing him and I know that there were people part of the insider program that were like, well, did you know that Florida was

3:08going to pursue him and then started talking about him and the answer is no, he's just a hooper at safety. Important to remember that DJ Coleman comes from Baylor, which is obviously the head coach of Baylor is Dave Aranda, who is a Ron Roberts disciple, right? When you talk about that defensive scheme oftentimes, you will hear Aranda Roberts, so Robert's Aranda, because Ron Roberts kind of popularized it and really made it what it is, and then he's had the underlings who will say kind of evolve and change it, you know, the people, wings, the patch of ponies, the Austin Armstrongs, and Dave Aranda being the most notable one in that defense, and this is all, I promise, I'm not just talking to him to be a nerd, it's all relevant when you talk about playing deep safety in that defense or field safety in that defense, okay? When you're talking about playing field safety in that defense, you need to be really smart

4:12and you need to be not just knowing these things, but you need to be able to communicate them quickly, you need to be able to see them and communicate them quickly and not just see them and communicate, but see them kind of process what the adjustment is and then communicate that to the rest of the defense. That's what DJ Coleman did at Baylor, that's what every safety in that defense has to be able to do. And for Florida, you went and you got DJ Coleman after losing Jordan Castell who ended up going to Kentucky, it was a bit of a trade, it was Camduly, Brad White and Chris Collins to Florida in exchange for Jordan Castell and Aaron Gates, and personally, I think Florida won that trade big time, partially because of getting a guy like DJ Coleman, who I think is very talented, we saw him play safety at Baylor, we saw him play in the nickel at Baylor, and like I said, I would take him at both spots, and there's plenty of guys that have come

5:15to Florida over this time, and over the time that I've been doing lockdown gators, which is almost five years now, that I can not felt they can do both. DJ Coleman is one of those few guys who I've said, hey, I would prefer him at star, I'd still stand by them, by the way, I'd still prefer him at star, but I would gladly take him as safety as well. And the role that he's going to come here to play at safety is not going to be in the box, okay? He is going to be that field safety, because an important differentiator also is that this defense, and the Ron Roberts defense that we've known is, it's not really free and strong. It's 2026, free and strong safety, kind of dead now. You usually go field, boundary, some defenses will say they're weak and they're strong in the sense of the strength of the offense and strength of the defense, or where you're

6:16going there. But in this defense is going to be field and boundary, okay? That's where the Florida gators are going to have DJ Coleman as the field safety join me him, and probably competing with Cam Dooley at field safety in Cam Dooley, of course, who I just mentioned, coming from Kentucky, who I think is not going to be a starter this year, but I do think he's going to be able to compete for that spot with Cam Dooley. And with DJ Coleman, Bryce Thornton, wearing number one, really good film as a boundary safety in 2025 and 2024. Like I mentioned, the one guy in the safe room that worked last year. And that's not the knock anybody else. I've said this before, you hired a running backs coach to coach your safeties last year. It was going to be bad, right? And for Florida, now you've got an improved safety coach, you've got an improved defensive mind there. And you're about to get a lot better. We're going to talk more about DJ Coleman and how he fits into this defense when you get

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9:19Event contracts are offered by Robinhood derivatives LLC, a registered futures market commission merchant and swap firm. Thanks again for having a lot of dogators. We're first listened of the day every day. We are available daily and free reviews of the podcast and on YouTube and the Florida Gators went and got DJ Coleman after two mediocre at best years from Jordan Castell. And it's not to be a jerk. I do think coaching fail the safety room over the past couple of years is really. I think that the fact that I go, yeah, Bryce Thorne was the only safety that worked is actually more of a testament to him than a slight did anybody else because again, crappy safety coaching over the past couple of years in Gainesville. That's just is what it is. But we're floored in I got Chris Collins and now you're going to be talking about a field safety, boundary safety, field safety is going to be what you typically think of as you are deep safety. Okay, so that's going to be when people talk about free and strong, that's going to be

10:20your free safety, right? That's going to be the guy that needs to be overtop. If you're in a single high, he's going to be the overtop guy. If you're in a two high, he's also going to be overtop obviously since they're both going to be high, but he's going to be to the field side. Okay, and his job, he's got more ground to cover. He's got to be range here on the back end. And he's going to be the overtop defender. If you're playing cover one, your field safety is going to be ranging over everything, right? You got to be smart, you got to be instinctual, you got to be ranging. You have to be able to cover everybody too, because there's certain times where corner gets beat on the outside, bad off the press, and they're running deep, that's going to you. You got to come over and handle that, okay? So you go to the field side there, you're usually also going to be the guy that's communicating to the rest of the secondary and the front seven, or I guess, we'll say, we'll say front six, because now it's, you know, you're two linebackers instead of three usually.

11:25So we're going to say your front six, and then the rest of the secondary. Because you're the guy that can see everything. You're the one that's, you know, 10 yards back, and you're the one that's going to be able to say, hey, they're shifting here, do this. They're shifting there to that. That's one of the reasons that I was so high on DJ Coleman is that playing in that Ron Roberts' David Randa defense, safety is really not easy. You have to do a lot, playing in that Ron Roberts' David Randa defense, and star is really not easy. You have to do a lot, okay? You have to be able to one play, say, hey, I've got the overtop, I'm the deep middle defender on the last line of defense. And then the very next play, you got to be able to come down and run the alley against the Ron. And the very next play, you might be in man coverage on a tight end or a soft receiver. Frankly, it's, it's, it's hell to play field safety.

12:28It is. It is really difficult to play field safety. That's why you got to have a good one. I know that we're in an age where people are like, oh, you know, safety's aren't as of a value. They should be. I've seen bad safety play for the past few years at four. I know that bad safeties can really hamstring your defense. Now you have a guy like DJ Coleman. And again, I'm very optimistic and very positive about what he brings to the table, right? He's going to be the guy again. When you go single high, he's going to be your deep safety and you go too high, he's going to be one of the two. And DJ Coleman is going to have that responsibility to kind of just go, go, I don't want to say go Rover, but you're going to be roaming over top everybody and field safety, space, range, boundary safety, physicality coming down.

13:30And pop and I will also say this, like I said, DJ Coleman can play star in my opinion. I think he's a really good star, especially based on his 20, 25 film, a Baylor thing is a really good star. Also able to play that if you can play star and play boundary usually, right? Just because they're typically on the opposite side, right? Star is usually going to be your slot on the field side or strong side, whatever it is. And then your boundary is going to be on the weaker side. So you can play one, you can usually, I'm going to say, usually play the other, you got to be able to cover better for star. If you play star, you can play boundary. We'll say that DJ Coleman, I think the play star, I think with boundary, they play deep safety. I think he's going to play deep safety for the Florida Gators in 2026. Thing is going to be pretty damn good at it because well, I've seen him play it. I've seen him play well at looking forward to see what he could be for the Florida Gators

14:31in 2026. Thanks for being a lot on Gators, you're first listen up the day. Every day we are available daily and free Webster Podcasts and on YouTube as always, I am Brandon Olson for Lockdown Gators, follow me on Twitter at WNS underscore brand and find all my written work about the Florida Gators with SwampSingle.supstack.com. I'll see you all next time.