Billy Napier: 'We're a Year One football outfit right now'

Florida Gators head football coach Billy Napier understands that the college game is constantly resetting every offseason. On Saturday, while addressing the media, Napier was asked about the team’s progress thus far. To which the Gators head coach explained that his team is in a good place as they are in year one right now.

“Yeah. I mean, reality is you’re always a work in progress. You know, I like to tell our coaches and people in the organization that every team in the country, right now, has a set of problems. Every football team, no matter if you’re the defending national champ, if you won your conference or division, or you just went to the Super Bowl. Whatever the case may be, there’s a set of problems that you have that you’ve got to solve,” said Napier.

The problems the Gators have had to solve this offseason seemed never-ending. Florida was one of the top schools negatively affected by transfers this offseason. The Gators saw several vital players elect to find new homes for the 2022 season, including last year’s starting quarterback Emory Jones. But this level of turnover is to be expected, according to Napier.

“If you did research, 30% of a football organization turns over each year. You have that much attrition. You start over, you got new roles, new people. So that’s where we’re at. We’re work in progress; we’re a year one football outfit right now. So there’s a lot of learning going on. We’re installing systems and we just need repetitions. We’ve gotten a lot so far, we need more, and I don’t think I could ever stand up here and say that that’s not the case. This is college football it’s a developmental game and you got a new team every year.”

Napier shares how players have responded to new culture

Meeting with reporters after practice on Tuesday, Napier was asked about his players buying into his new staff and their overall approach. The former Louisiana coach said it’s been a great transition so far.

“To be honest with you, we have had zero resistance,” Napier said. “I think that’s probably the biggest compliment I could give the players because they’ve completely embraced every change. I think it goes back to – I think the people within the organization have done a good job of establishing trust, there’s been good communication and I think we’ve explained why we do what we do and how we do it. And, overall we’ve hired really good people and people that are experts at what they do.

“I think immediately when the player senses that they care for them and that they can help them, I think that’s the reason we haven’t had much resistance at all. So, it’s probably the best thing about where we’re at right now.”