Haskins hired as Florida’s director of personnel

By Adam Silverstein
January 24, 2012

Former Stanford Cardinal and NFL linebacker Jon Haskins has been hired as the new director of player personnel for the Florida Gators football team, CBSSports.com‘s Bruce Feldman reported Tuesday evening.

Haskins, who served as director of player personnel for the Nevada Wolfpack in 2011, spent four years at Stanford prior to that as assistant director (2007) and director of player development (2008-10). He worked as assistant head coach and defensive coordinator for Pace (2010) and the managing editor of Rivals.com affiliate Cardinal Report (2010-11) in the 19 months between those positions.

A four-year Cardinal starter from 1994-97, Haskins went on to spend three years in the NFL with San Diego and Philadelphia (1998-2000) before playing in the first and only season of the XFL for the San Francisco franchise (2000-01). After hanging up his cleats, he took a graduate assistant role at Duke, helping coach the offensive line, special teams and tight ends from 2002-04.

He also served as the assistant general manager and director of football operations for the Sarasota (his hometown) Arena2 football franchise (2005-06) and spent nearly two-and-a-half years away from the game before being hired by Stanford in 2007.

In his role with Florida, Haskins will primarily be counted on to coordinate the Gators’ recruiting efforts and help run football operations (among other responsibilities). The classes he helped recruit at Stanford finished 50th (2008), 20th (2009) and 26th (2010) nationally according to Rivals‘ final rankings.

Three of Haskins’s four years with the Cardinal were spent with current UF linebackers/special teams coach D.J. Durkin, who was a defensive ends/special teams coach at Stanford from 2007-09.

He replaces Mark Pantoni, who left the Gators’ following the 2011 season to join former head coach Urban Meyer‘s new staff at Ohio State.

12 Comments

  1. Daniel M. says:

    ALRIGHT! …. I guess.

  2. CeeThree says:

    Adam do we know if this is a good hire? seems a bit random, he was an editor of a Rivals site recently and coaching at Pace?

  3. Tom Feldstein says:

    You Gators are very lucky. Awesome hire for you. Jon will work tireless to help find and develop players for the Gators.

    • DP Brewster says:

      Tom is correct. Great hire by Florida. You guys will love Haskins — great energy and passion for football. Wish he was coming back to Stanford.

  4. Greg Howell says:

    His recruiting classes at Stanford played in back to back BCS Bowls and will likely produce 4 first round picks this draft, including Andrew Luck.

  5. Gatorgrad79 says:

    I know Adam must report all the facts (and he is the best at it) but I will certainly be glad when we never have to hear about the urban Liar again. One thing about a huge ego, if it manifests as a propensity to lie and scheme, it usually comes to a bad end. The osu folks can look forward to being kicked to the curb when the nfl comes calling, or he gets scared that his team won’t win/continue to win.

    • scooterp says:

      Get over it, man. I know you probably would have rather he stayed and had a heart attack or got a divorce or for his brain to explode on the sideline, but I’m glad he left when he didn’t think he could give it 100% anymore. I wouldn’t trade his 6 years with us with any other team. Just be happy you saw the Florida Gators rise to the top of the CFB universe even if it was for a short time. I’ve watched too many years of mediocrity to not be greatful ……….but I guess some people just have to hate.

  6. Fernzpat says:

    I agree, anyone who can recruit that well at Stanford can rock the house at UF! Welcome!

  7. npgator says:

    He looks like a good one to me.

  8. SC Gator says:

    20th and 26th ranked classes don’t exactly wow but that was at Stanford, not the easiest place to recruit. Even with all the mad success they have had these past two years they only ranked 22nd last year and are sitting at 16th this year.

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