I hope everyone stayed safe and fared ok during the recent storms. I live on the west coast of Florida, and we need a break. That was brutal. Rumor has it there may be something else brewing out there in the tropics. Please say it aint so!
I posted (somewhere on here) before the first game this season about what Billy would need to do to keep his job. Of course it was all just my opinion. But I said that in order for Billy to remain UF's head football coach in 2025, the vast majority of Gator Nation would need to feel at the end of the 2024 season that the Gators were a significantly better, improving football team from the prior back-to-back losing seasons. In other words, Florida fans needed to feel that we were clearly headed in the right direction.
Billy needed that win last night, and it was right there for the taking. The defensive scheme and intensity were really good. That may have been the best defensive road game we have played in years. We got off the field on third down (Vols were 4-15 on 3rd); held them to 300 yds of offense; 8 tackles for loss; dominated the time of possession; etc. etc.
… and we still lost
Too many points left on the field and too many boneheaded moves as we all saw in crushing real time. We still cannot figure out how to get 11 guys on the field on Special Teams. Poor clock management, crappy play calling, and general unawareness.
The Mertz goal line fumble at the 1-yard line on first down was an absolute dagger. I know a lot of people will say you should have handed the ball to your running back. I was not in that camp. I was a “run 3 QB sneaks” guy. In my experience, you run the sneak to avoid exactly what happened – a fumble. It didn’t work. So, I don’t pin that on Napier, but there were tons of other boneheaded moves that fall on his ever growing hot seat. I am not going to go over all of them here as they have likely been covered in excruciating detail elsewhere. Suffice it to say that the timeout decision-making; offensive play calling; game management issues; and general vibe of uncertainty (why not challenge the spot when it looks like the refs gave you a bad mark?) do not make me feel like we are getting better.
On the bright side, we went on the road in front of 105k+ fans and competed. We played the last part of the game with a talented 19 year-old who made some mistakes but also threw an absolute dime in the 4th quarter to get us into OT. He is going to be special.
Those are the kinds of games that a Coach whose fans want a divorce must absolutely win.
IMO, the most important person to Gator football (SR) is not posting here much, if any, anymore because of comments that blame boosters for the performance of the Coach and Team and suggest that we have been lying to the fans about Napier. For real? Posters accuse "insiders" of telling untruthful rosy stories on purpose. Why would we do that? That is not how it works. If this thread turns into that, I will be disappointed. I get the frustration. Do you think it is fun to invest in something that does not succeed? People on here who know me understand how hard I take UF losses. I truly suffer. But, it's no fun to get popped by keyboard fans when something you posted previously does not turn out the way you thought it would. Why participate in that environment? I get on the message boards for fun.
moving on....
SR asked a good question a few weeks ago. “Who is the home run hire?” IMO, there is none, and if you are honest with yourself, your answer 4 weeks ago may be different today. There are flavors of the week but no home run hires. The key is that if we move on from Billy, we need to hire someone who turns out to be a home run hire.
Lane was the man, but now has put 2 losses on the board including a bad loss at home to a Kentucky team who got slapped around last night by Vandy in Lexington. Is Vandy’s Clark Lea today’s flavor of the day? No one has done more with less this year. I wonder where the "coaches on the list" will rank 7 weeks from now.
If Billy cannot demonstrate by the end of the year (and we have half the season left) that Florida Gators are substantially better than last year, then I believe he will be gone – and deservedly so. He has been given the keys to the Kingdom.
The question is are we the Magic Kingdom or Tire Kingdom?
UF is a different place than it once was. This is not necessarily the place where we can pick anyone we want (ie, when Urban chose us over the Fighting Irish because we were perched on top of the mountain). The light reflecting off our trophies has dimmed over the past 15 years.
I do not think SS is going to get fired this year. His hiring of Billy may, in retrospect, seem like a poor choice, but in Nov of 2021 it was widely praised throughout football. That is not a “mistake” that typically costs you your job – especially if Golden continues to improve. SS fired McElwain after being named our AD for less than a year. He also had a fairly quick hook with Mullen. He is not afraid to make changes. Do I agree with everything SS has done? Nope. Not at all. I would have demanded that Billy hire an established external O-coordinator last year. I just don’t think SS gets fired if Napier does not work out.
We have $28m reasons to want Napier to go on a winning tear in the 2nd half of the Season. I am still 100% pulling for him and this Team, but I am also a realist. I am not sure that Napier can fix the things that need to be fixed because most of the problems reside with him. I don’t know that he has the fix in him. That doesn't stop me from always wanting the Gators to win football games.
Hang in there. Just know we all suffer together.
KC
