FLORIDA QUARTERBACK WUERFFEL WOBBLES BUT HE WON'T FALL DOWN.

Byline: Doug Ferguson Associated Press 

You can bench him or berate him. You can hit him in the back or under the chin or drive his face mask into the turf. You can burn him with an interception or bury him with a blitz.

What Danny Wuerffel has proved over and over again is this: You can't keep him down for long.

He's the inflatable punching bag with the smiling face, always bouncing back from any blow, the expression never changing.

This is not just Wuerffel's approach to football, it is his outlook on life. And through his eyes, life is a bowl full of cranberries.

``The way you tell if cranberries are fresh is with a bounce test,'' he once said. ``They roll the berries down a slope and the ones that bounce over a little wall are the ones that make it. The more they bounce, the better they are.''

One of the finalists for the Heisman Trophy, Wuerffel ought to be a lock for a Purple Heart with the amount of punishment he has taken in four years under Florida's wide-open Fun 'N' Gun offense.

He weathered a two-year quarterback controversy with Terry Dean and emerged as the most productive passer in school history.

Chastised by coach Steve Spurrier for a subpar game at the start of this season, he responded by completing his first 11 passes and finishing 15 of 16 against Georgia Southern.

Wracked by Florida State in a 24-21 loss behind an offensive line depleted by injuries, Wuerffel threw for 401 yards and six touchdowns a week later against an Alabama defense that had given up only five TD passes all season.

``He's as tough mentally and physically as any guy I've ever seen,'' said Bobby Stoops, in his first year as Florida's defensive coordinator. ``You may get to him here or there, but just when you think you have him rattled, he hits a beautiful pass.''

No one at Florida has hit more of those beautiful passes than Wuerffel, the son of an Air Force chaplain whose serene disposition belies the pressure he endures from playing for a perfectionist coach.

Wuerffel has set more than two dozen records at Florida, including 10,975 yards passing and 114 touchdown passes. He is 32-5-1 as a starter and is the only quarterback in SEC history to win four league championships.

Spurrier says the reason Wuerffel is the best quarterback in the history of Florida football is simple: He has the most records and the most rings.

But numbers are usually the product of the system, whether it's Florida's Fun 'N' Gun offense or the passing game at BYU or ``Student Body Right'' during the glory years at Southern Cal.

``How can you single out a team sport such as football and give any individual award?'' Wuerffel said. ``You're only as good as your teammates. The statistics are a reflection of everybody around you and what they're doing.''

Not surprisingly, a phenomenal senior season began to lose its shine when senior center Jeff Mitchell suffered a season-ending ankle injury Nov. 2 and left tackle Zach Piller tore knee ligaments a week later against Vanderbilt.

Wuerffel never offered that as an excuse for why the Gators' offense no longer looked invincible.

Instead, he called guard Donnie Young on the eve of the South Carolina game on Nov. 16 to thank him for all the extra time he was spending with the freshmen on the offensive line.

In the loss to Florida State, Wuerffel was sacked six times and knocked on his back on nearly 20 other occasions. Senior linebacker James Bates winced on the sideline every time Wuerffel went down.

``I don't think I've ever seen anybody with more toughness and grit than Danny,'' Bates said. ``He took more shots than I think I've ever seen a guy take, and after the game I asked him about it. He said, `Isn't that what you guys go through every day in practice?'

``Ever since I've been here, he has always found a way to amaze me with how he handles himself. He makes you look at life as a great opportunity through a positive perspective.''

The Heisman is nowhere to be found in that perspective. Neither is a career in the NFL. Those fall under Wuerffel's category of elements he can't control, so he figures, why waste the energy?

``My life doesn't get better because I throw six touchdowns or worse if it's six interceptions,'' he said. ``That can't be the focus.''

Wuerffel's focus is on his religious faith, and it goes far beyond the way he clasps his hands together in prayer after each touchdown.

Rarely a weekend went by this summer that he wasn't speaking to a church group, usually on his favorite topic - adversity as a test of character.

His response to Ryan Hale of Arkansas after a crushing sack was, ``My goodness, are you guys ever going to quit coming?''

Even after taking several late hits against Florida State, he refused to retaliate.

``Sometimes I wish he'd get a little madder,'' Spurrier said. ``Guys are hitting him late and he doesn't get mad at them.''

Wuerffel doesn't get overly excited, either. He is known to have lost his composure once - his freshman season, when he threw a touchdown pass to Chris Doering in the final seconds against Kentucky for a 24-20 victory and ran to the end zone to congratulate him.

His backup, Brian Schottenheimer, felt another rare display of emotion against South Carolina last month.

``We always give each other five after a touchdown,'' Schottenheimer said. ``He smacked my hand and it stung for about five minutes. He's on an even keel so much, it's interesting to see him excited.''

Wuerffel may have saved his best regular-season game for his last one. Having thrown the three interceptions a week earlier against Florida State, he was intercepted on the third play of the game against Alabama.

By the time the half was over, he had thrown for 239 yards and three touchdowns for a lead that the Gators would not surrender.

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Photo

Photo: Danny Wuerffel, the most prolific quarterback in Florida's history,

has compiled 10,975 yards passing and 114 touchdown passes.

Associated Press