Gators LB Ventrell Miller, CB Jaydon Hill Up For CFB Comeback POTY Award

Two Florida Gators are up for College Football's 2022 Comeback Player of the Year Award.

Florida Gators linebacker Ventrell Miller and cornerback Jaydon Hill have been named to the 2022 Comeback Player of the Year Award Watch List for college football, the College Sports Communicators in association with The Associated Press and Fiesta Bowl Organization announced on Wednesday. 

Miller, a sixth-year redshirt senior, missed the majority of the 2021 season after tearing his bicep against the USF Bulls, the Lakeland, Fla. native has come back with a vengeance in his final season of eligibility. Miller ranks third on the team in tackles this year with 43, despite missing a game in Week 3, and has added 3.5 tackles for loss, one forced fumble and recovery, one pass breakup and five quarterback hurries.

"Ventrell is productive as a player, but it’s more impactful than just the production," head coach Billy Napier said of Miller after Florida defeated Missouri this past Saturday, a game in which he logged 11 tackles. 

"That’s the thing that’s significant. I mean, the guy’s inspirational relative to his example, his consistency as a person, his leadership, his presence. He makes other people around him better and certainly that showed up today.”

Hill, meanwhile, earned SEC Defensive Player of the Week honors freshly removed from his second appearance since the 2020 Cotton Bowl. Following an ACL and LCL tear in opposite knees dating back to August 2021, not to mention an ACL tear in high school to the same knee as his recent LCL injury, Hill tallied two monumental interceptions including a pick-six against the Tigers this past weekend. 

He now leads the Gators in picks this season after his most recent showing. 

"What a story, right?" Napier said about the fourth-year redshirt sophomore on Saturday. "If you really dig into what the young man has been through – the ACL in high school, the ACL here early in his career, then the LCL. The discipline to continue to rehab, the toughness to stay the course. 

"He’s got passion about the game. I always felt like watching him in spring ball that he was one of the best players we have. That showed up today. His character … the guy stayed the course. He was a difference-maker today.”

Miller and Hill are among 61 Division 1 college football players currently under consideration for the honor, as well as 14 candidates from the SEC. The award recognizes college football student-athletes from all divisions of college football for overcoming injury, illness, or other circumstances. 

In a vote by a panel of writers, editors, and sports information directors, three players will be selected for the award after the conclusion of the regular season and the winners will be revealed during the College Football Playoff Semifinal at the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl.

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