On December 5, 2021, [autotag]Billy Napier[/autotag] was hired as the 29th head football coach in Florida football history. The soft-spoken coach took the podium and said everything right. He talked about how he wanted to build the best football program in the SEC, the importance of coming together as a program and fan base, and how he was going to revitalize Florida football recruiting.
If you want to read more about that opening press conference, legendary Florida Gators reporter and Gators Wire’s own Pat Dooley wrote up a great piece on the top 10 quotes from that day.
What stood out to me wasn’t anything that Napier said, per se. But rather the sense of calmness that Napier brings to the program. In the modern era of Florida football (from Spurrier onward), we haven’t seen a coach radiate a sense of tranquility as Napier does. Everything he says has been carefully calculated to prevent being a distraction. While other coaches might cosplay as Darth Vader after a brawl breaks out at halftime, Napier seems like the kind of guy that would consider his thoughts on the situation to be an internal matter.
That sense of groundedness, of stability, of organization, is what the Orange and Blue desperately needed when Napier was brought it. The team seemed to quit down the stretch of the 2021 season, fans were up in arms over the rapid decline from Mullen’s first three seasons, and recruiting was seen as an afterthought.
While not overly specific about all the issues, Napier put things into overdrive. He began by forming the largest staff in Florida football history, announcing hires like an industry-crafted album rollout.
Introducing your 2022 Gators Football Team#GoGators | #jOURney pic.twitter.com/nRPIRHmUrW
— Florida Gators Football (@GatorsFB) August 23, 2022
If your first thought was, “There are more polos than jerseys in that picture,” that’s the point. Napier understands that in order to win in the SEC and compete for national championships, you need to have the infrastructure to do so. I mean, “scared money don’t make money” seems to be an accurate assessment of the Georgias, Alabamas and Ohio States of the world.
It’s also important to remember that while Florida chose Napier, Napier also chose Florida. He was notoriously picky when his name was being thrown around for SEC jobs in years prior, being rumored to have turned down multiple SEC jobs before landing in Gainesville. That’s because he saw the potential the Gators could reach if given the resources.
In that December 5 introductory press conference, Napier expressed the importance of patience in rebuilding the Florida program. He even had to issue an open letter to the fan base in June after the Gators missed out on a couple of high-profile recruits. His response? He had one of the best recruiting stretches in recent Gators history, jumping into the top 10 on On3’s recruiting rankings just six weeks later.
A few days out from Napier’s debut under the lights of The Swamp, it’s important to remember how far the program has come in such a short time. The culture change is already taking shape. Napier’s presence can be felt all over the program, even in the state-of-the-art football facility that open just a couple of weeks ago, despite being in the works years before his arrival.
The players that Napier will bring in future recruiting classes won’t be on the field this season. The bumps in the road will be there. The Gators will lose football games and will be outplayed at times this season. All of those things are true. Regardless of what the win-loss record indicates at the end of the season, make sure to remember all that Napier has done off the field and how the mentality of this team is already completely different than in years prior.
So have some patience, enjoy the season, and take solace in the fact that the future of Florida football is in good hands under “Blue-Chip Billy”.
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