After each Kentucky football game Cats Illustrated publisher Justin Rowland opens the Twittersphere for hot takes on the Wildcats.

This week's edition follows Saturday's 34-10 loss to the Florida Gators in Gainesville.

I'm not sure whether I'd say he's regressed or hasn't improved but the latter is at least undeniable and the former may well be true. If you think back to how Wilson played against Florida in 2018, that was the peak of his collegiate performance. That he showed he was capable of that yet hasn't duplicated it or built on it has to be considered very frustrating for fans of the program.

I understand the coaches not wanting to throw young guys to the wolves against Alabama or Florida, to a lesser extent, but no question, one of the tough things about this season is the coaches have not spent a lot of time developing younger players on the roster. In a season with a conventional schedule that would be different. As for the South Carolina game, I'm on board with what you're saying at least on offense. It's not working with the older guys now. They should play a fair amount because it's their last regular season game and they have done a lot for the program but they should get more experience for the future.

It's hard to believe. It's also hard to believe he's won as many games as he has given that. We can say that Stoops' staff has "salvaged" seasons with weird quarterback circumstances, but we can't really say that quarterbacks have improved a lot over their time at Kentucky.

They really hurt themselves on those points. Kentucky would have needed to play a pretty much flawless game and hope for some UF mistakes to have a chance at an upset but after 28 solid minutes things started to unravel. There were a whole lot of self-inflicted issues out there.

Buy. For a couple of years there Kentucky was regarded as a different program than it had been in the past, much more competitive. You don't want that identity to shift to one of being bad at offense. They definitely can't afford another year of this and keeping the momentum moving forward.

Buy. I know they'll tell you that Louie Matsakis has basically been the coordinator before this season, even without the title, but from the outside looking in, if the special teams unit is struggling this much and you have the rather novel idea that you can go without a special teams coordinator, that will obviously be something that people question.

I think against South Carolina you will see those guys play but at quarterback you'll also see more of Gatewood and Allen, kind of like a couple of recent games. I'm not sure how much you really help next year's team by letting them play a lot against South Carolina.

It's going to be a toss-up, or at least it should be that on paper. Kentucky's defense at its best is probably the best unit in that game but when your offense and special teams units are struggling this much no game is safe. Vanderbilt made it a three-point game.

Sell. If there is any change at coordinator I can't imagine there would be more than one. And I'm not sure there will be any change at all right now. I think Stoops will want to make changes but I don't think he's going to scrap everything he has done before entirely.

I will agree that they have not done a lot to develop some of the younger players on the roster. As far as not making personnel changes to win now, the only thing I would say is that it seems obvious that Chris Rodriguez should have gotten a lot more of the workload at running back.

It is interesting that Wilson's numbers tend to be pretty good at the start of the game but as the game goes on the numbers get worse and worse. I'm not exactly sure why that is, but I've definitely noticed that myself.

I'm not sure how things are going to be changed in the offseason but I do agree with your point. I'd like to see what his ideal vision of the offense would be. Heck, I'd just like to know how much of it is his preference versus Stoops'.

All of these takes about the quarterback are things I just don't feel strongly about one way or the other. I wish I had an opinion on who Kentucky's best chance to win is with right now. Wilson doesn't build for the future but the coaches keep putting him out there and that probably means something. We've seen that putting in a backup doesn't fix the issues at least that week. But if you're saying they need to in order to build for the future that seems like a fair take.

I know Kentucky football people bristle at that and it really makes some of them mad, so I try to always avoid those jokes myself. Unfortunately, there is more than a nugget of truth in the suggestion and that's why it angers those people so much. It's a collective mindset that includes a large number of the fans, but not all. It will probably always be that way.

Coaches will tell you special teams is one-third of the game but I'm not sure how many really invest that much time in it compared to the others. I can't pretend to know exactly what's happening behind the scenes but you can judge the product and there has been a definite regression here. The place-kicking game is a mess, there are no big plays in the return game, and the coverage has been bad.

I think you have to say that's in the realm of possibility. Last year they did get a lot of their yards before Bowden took over but if you told me it would not get better this season, at all, I wouldn't have believed you.

It's odd that he has been totally out of the mix in terms of the depth chart after the coaches said his arm was looking good again in the spring. I'll admit to being interested in what he could have done. But he had Ahmad Wagner, Lynn Bowden, etc., around him which was a little better than what they have this year. That was a pretty small sample, too, so I have never known how much to put in it. He definitely was not the same quarterback when he was injured so I don't judge him harshly for that reason.

I don't think it necessarily needs to be an Air Raid style coach who passes 70% of the time or more. Whether they bring in an assistant to oversee the passing game or if there's a change, I have no clue. But I do think it's fair if someone thinks they need a more modern system.

They came out of the locker room with a lot less focus than they had for most of the first half. That's undeniable. Just a sequence of little mistakes that showed they weren't all there. The punt return really impacted their psyche, I think. As for the play calling, whatever they did was not working. I did think they were pretty vanilla especially in some third and shorts.

The tight ends have been a bright spot this season. Keaton Upshaw is the biggest reason to be hopeful for the offense in the near and longer term.

I get it. Earlier in the season the hot takes were just a little hotter. But by now in the season we know what the problems are. There's not much mystery to it. And you know how the season is pretty much going to go at that point. But after you get handled by Alabama and Florida it just feels worse and worse. The issues are the same now that they were weeks ago and there was probably nothing they could have done, so it's a really agonizing thing to watch it knowing how it will end.

Without question this is true. Buy. I've wondered all along whether the Wildcat with Bowden would be better than any other quarterback Kentucky has and I think it's clear it would have been. You can make the case he was Kentucky's best quarterback since at least Mike Hartline's senior season.

I don't think they're playing to get the season over with. I sensed some real defiance on the question of whether they would postpone. Don't think they thought too highly of Florida State cancelling on Clemson at the last minute. That's the clear sense I got. SEC rules stipulate that you have to have at least 53 scholarship players, including seven offensive linemen (one of which is a center), a quarterback, and four defensive linemen. Kentucky has come close to not meeting some of those numbers, but they haven't quite been at the cancellation point.

I don't think they'd be in the playoff hunt but I think they could have won six SEC games in a 10-game conference schedule, which would have been a heck of a year.

As frustrating as this year has been for fans, it's worse at Tennessee, Michigan, Nebraska, and Penn State.

There are several issues conspiring together to make that difficult. It would make a huge difference, you are definitely right. It's been a long time since you've seen a Kentucky receiver go up and make a great play over a defensive back on a contested catch opportunity. Wilson's deep balls have left a lot to be desired. The protection hasn't allowed for a lot of long ball chances. Defenses are keying in on the run game for sure.

Also agree that accuracy and decision making are the key attributes for a college quarterback. And speed is indeed the No. 1 thing they need at receiver.

It seems like there are some strong opinions on the Gatewood-Allen debate point. I just don't have a strong feeling either way because we haven't seen a lot of either of them. Something does tell me that Allen is the better passing prospect, but the light could go on for Gatewood at some point like it did for Woodson going into his junior year. Let them battle it out in the offseason. Nik Scalzo is going to be in the competition as well. The coaches have been careful with him but he's inching back.

It's definitely a different year, that's for sure. We should have always been prepared to judge this season a little differently, although the challenges programs are facing are similar in many respects. For Kentucky, there's been a lot of heartache on and off the field.

I think they have the talent to be 6-4. Say they beat Mississippi State, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Missouri, and Ole Miss. That's pretty much what I expected before the season, give or take a game.

That's the really disappointing thing. Kentucky had six straight possessions without a first down but Florida had the No. 65 defense in the nation according to total yards per game.

That's just not going to happen. They won 18 games over the last two years and have been in four straight bowls. They'll finish 3-7 or 4-6 in the SEC which is not out of line with other conference performances from most Stoops teams. I know it hasn't been pretty. It's been underwhelming. But the staff is not even going to be on the hot seat next year.

I'll push back a little on that. Don't you think we've learned enough to know the offense either needs to change or execute better? I don't think we can lay all that on the pandemic. It's a lot of the same issues the offense has had before.

I'll have to sell. They are very big up front on both sides of the ball even compared to several SEC teams. There are a couple of spots on the field where they are a little smaller than average but on the whole they look like an SEC team getting off the bus. I think the bigger thing is they need more speed at receiver.

Buy, at least on that point about the offense. The SEC was one of the last conferences to come around to 21st century offense, and within the SEC the 'Cats are at the tail end of the movement in holding out.

In macro-terms I can somewhat agree. The recruiting is still better than it ever was before Stoops at least in my lifetime. The defense isn't spectacular but it's competitive against most teams. They are fighting for postseason berths year in and year out. There's a definite case to be made for some continuity.

I don't think any of the true freshmen are going to leave for lack of playing time after one year. On some level they understand this is a senior-laden team in some key spots and it's an SEC schedule. They couldn't have expected to play too much even in a free year. In some spots the true freshmen have graded out far below the older players. But I do think some are in line to take a big step forward next year.