GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- With another subpar outing from Jeff Driskel in the books and another Florida loss on Will Muschamp's record GatorBait.net reporter Thomas Goldkamp takes a look at key questions surrounding Driskel, Muschamp and the Catch 22 Florida finds itself in offensively.

Jeff Driskel's ceiling just isn't that high...

With each passing game it becomes more clear that Driskel is simply an average quarterback. Florida won games in 2012 with great special teams and defense and Driskel playing smart, safe football.

Driskel certainly had his fair share of bright spots in that 2012 season, but strong outings at Texas A&M and Tennessee in the passing game and a terrific showing against Vanderbilt in the running game have proven to be more the outliers than the norm.

It's easy to understand why Florida's coaches have had such confidence in Driskel. His size, athleticism and arm strength make his seeming upside extremely high. The problem is that Driskel lacks some other things that make high-upside quarterbacks great. In his fourth year he still doesn't have a great feel for the pocket or how to attack a defense, he frequently misses what should be routine throws and his inability to connect on deep throws makes Florida's passing game one dimensional.

That combination has left Florida in an extremely precarious position. As 2012 proved, when Driskel is effective as a game manager and the defense and special teams are excellent, Florida can win games at a high rate. But even then, the margin for error is razor thin. Florida can reasonably compete with all of the good teams on its schedule but often needs one of those outlier performances from Driskel and a great game on defense and special teams to compete with the SEC champion and national title caliber type teams.

The downside is that when the defense and special teams are not playing up to that extremely high level Florida frequently struggles with teams it used to put away with ease. We saw that last week when Kentucky pushed Florida to triple overtime.

And when Driskel is just bad, coupled with a poor outing from the defense or special teams, Florida is in serious trouble. See: Louisville 2012, Miami 2013, Kentucky 2014 (first half) and Alabama 2014.

That really puts Muschamp and the Gators between a rock and a hard place. Do they stick with their junior quarterback and hope to just slide by or do they take their chances with a younger, perhaps more mistake

-prone freshman with higher upside?

Making the case for a move at quarterback…

Given that Florida's defense has proven through three games in 2014 that it is, at best, unreliable, it's fair to question whether any formula that relies on Driskel to be consistently successful is fatally flawed at this point.

What the question really boils down to, though, is what the big-picture goal is. Is it simply to try to win each game, one at a time? Or is it really to get to Atlanta at year's end? They might be very different questions, though the assumption from Florida's coaching staff has been that if you can do the former, the latter will fall into place.

Muschamp said last week that his team is in a series of one-game seasons. And looking at each game through that lens, it's perfectly reasonable to conclude that Driskel would give the Gators a better chance to win than an undeveloped freshman quarterback in that particular week's game. Driskel knows the offense better and the coaches know what they're getting out of him.

Of course, that conclusion also leaves the freshman undeveloped heading into the following week's game. Rinse, lather, repeat. With Driskel at the helm the Gators win their games against the cupcakes, perhaps win most of their games against the average to good teams on the schedule, but rarely beat any of the good to truly elite teams on the slate.

Not exactly a winning formula long-term. Certainly not a championship one.

And so Muschamp is left with a choice. Does he stick with what he knows and simply hope that the Gators don't trip up in any games they aren't supposed to and then hope the perfect combination of strong play from Driskel and solid outings from the defense and special teams happens at the same time in the games that truly matter?

Or does he take a chance on the unknown, potentially risking the game at hand with the hope that something clicks and becomes a better alternative for the tougher games ahead?

Now is the perfect time to answer that question with Florida getting a bye week before heading to face a Tennessee team that has real questions in the trenches. Florida should have a reasonable chance to win with whoever they put at quarterback in two weeks.

We'll see what Muschamp opts for, but there probably won't be a better time for a change. At least not while it can still make a difference.

Talent improving, but offense caught in vicious circle...

One reason that it's been easier to pin Florida's offensive struggles on Driskel so far is that the offensive line has played considerably better in 2014 than in the last few years. That's a huge credit to Mike Summers, who has quickly molded the Gators into a serviceable pass-blocking unit, despite losing two starters to injuries already.

But while there have been some improvements, there are still some obvious talent gaps on offense.

The stable at running back is loaded, so that's not the issue. The story at receiver and tight end is different. Sure, the Gators had Demarcus Robinson step up against Kentucky.

Unfortunately, no one else really has. And even normally sure-handed receivers like Quinton Dunbar are playing poorly now. There's no one in the slot that has proven to be a consistent threat. Tight end, from a pass-catching standpoint, is a disaster.

Obviously injuries have contributed to those woes, with top receiving option Jake McGee out for the season at tight end and a freshman C.J. Worton, who was looking like he'd contribute right away, out for a few weeks with a broken hand.

The problem is that Florida still has too many holes. With Driskel not making plays as it is, not getting more help is absolutely killing the Gators.

The more it happens, the more it harms the outlook for the future too. It's hard to recruit great talent on that side of the ball when you're fielding a hard-to-watch product.

There are only two things that can really help overcome the recruiting issue on offense:

1) An offensive coordinator that can be good enough to mask personnel problems and get something out of an offense that doesn't quite have the skill players it should.

2) Wholesale change in the program that would lead to a completely fresh start.

Obviously No. 1 would be the answer Muschamp hopes to get, but so far the jury is still out on offensive coordinator Kurt Roper. He definitely has certain aspects of the offense operating better, and there have been less self-inflicted problems this year.

But we haven't yet seen the spark of a true creative genius, either. The way Driskel -- and even more importantly, Florida's defense -- is playing right now may mean nothing short of that will suffice.

Regardless, either recruits are going to have to take a leap of faith or Roper's going to have to get his side of the ball playing well above what it seems to be capable of.

The former doesn't seem to be happening right now, so Florida's first-year coordinator has his work cut out for him.

He's got three games on tape now and a bye week to work on it. We'll learn a lot about him in two weeks.