Paul Finebaum: Florida can not afford to keep Billy Napier

The pressure is mounting on Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier, with calls for his firing growing by the minute. That includes from Paul Finebaum of the SEC Network, who believes the Gators can’t afford to keep their embattled coach.

As Finebaum explained on The Matt Barrie Show, Napier’s tenure has been such a disaster that the school needs to eat the buyout and try to hit the restart button.

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“A lot of people are asking the question, ‘Can Florida afford to spend $26 million to fire Billy Napier,'” Paul Finebaum said. “I respond by saying, ‘Can they afford to keep him?’ My answer is no. They cannot afford to keep Billy Napier because he has been an abject disaster. What we saw Saturday was pretty similar to what we saw in the first game and what we saw is there is no reason to believe it’s going to get much better.”

Florida dropped its most recent game to Texas A&M 33-20. By halftime, the game was 20-0 in favor of the Aggies and seemingly out of reach as Billy Napier played both Graham Mertz and DJ Lagway at quarterback to mixed results. By the time the game ended, the Gators had their second frustrating home loss of the season.

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“The real problem for him is the calculus. He had to win that game yesterday because there are so many unwinnable games remaining,” Finebaum added. “The schedule, I’ll spare you the game-by-game, but there’s a stretch that includes Tennessee in about three weeks, and then on the backside, you have Georgia, Ole Miss, LSU, and Texas, as well as Florida State and Kentucky. So, you can do whatever you want with Florida State and Kentucky and UCF in two weeks, but right now there’s no way they’re going to do better than .500 and there’s probably no way they’re going to have a winning season.”

Billy Napier has been the Florida head coach since 2022. In that time, he’s led the program to a record of 12-16. That includes missing a bowl game in 2023, which was the first time the program missed a bowl since 2017. Still, there has been some hope about the future with DJ Lagway coming in at quarterback.

“Everybody tried to tell me yesterday in Gainesville when I was saying this was a must-win, ‘Well, what about Lagway?’ Well, what about Lagway? He decided to go with Graham Mertz. Had he gone with Lagway and lost by the same score, I don’t think his situation would be nearly as bad today. It would still be bad,” Finebaum said.

“But let me tell you forget what I saw and what you saw on TV, I talked to students all weekend. On our show Friday, they were chanting, ‘We want Lane [Kiffin.]‘ That was before the game and you know what it was like after the game.”

By the time Billy Napier left the field, Florida fans were loudly booing him and others chanted for him to be fired. In what had to be a difficult moment, Napier admitted, “I probably would’ve done the same thing,” if he was in their shoes.

Next week, Florida is on the road for another SEC game against the Mississippi State Bulldogs.