Napier: "We Need To Acquire More Talent"
“It’s not about X’s and O’s. It’s about Jimmies and Joes. It’s not about assignments or schemes. It’s about Terrences and Rakims” – Ron Zook
It was too easy to make fun of The Zooker who said that during his three years as Florida’s head football coach. Zooker took over a Florida football program that won a national championship, six SEC championships and never failed to win at least nine games during the 12-year reign of Steve Spurrier, one of the greatest X and O guys in the history of the college game. Zooker never sniffed a championship of any kind and never won nine games in a season, but oh, could the man ever recruit. Just ask Urban Meyer. When he won his first national championship at UF in 2006, 20 of the 22 starters were Zook recruits.
If you’re going to win in today’s college game, you better know how to X and O, but that will only take you so far. At some point, you better have the players. In the Southeastern Conference, nearly everybody has 22 very good football players. The problem isn’t the 11 starters on each side of the ball although it could be argued that there are light years difference between the top 22 guys at Alabama and the top 22 at Vanderbilt. The problem is the second 22 and the third 22. Nearly all of the second and third teamers at Alabama and Georgia were 4- or 5-star recruits coming out of high school. They would be stud muffins at Vandy.
Dan Mullen was an X and O guy. Too much of one, in fact. The same guy who could light up eventual national champ Alabama for 46 points – and lose – in the 2020 SEC Championship Game is the same guy who got fired a year later and left behind a roster that so filled with holes that you’d think it’s doing a rather nifty impersonation of a block of Swiss cheese.
You can only win so much as an X and O guy in today’s college game. Schemes are important, for sure, but your Jimmies and Joes still have to be better than the other guy’s Terrences and Rakims. To use a pizza analogy, better players make better teams.
Keep that in mind as Florida’s first spring practice under Billy Napier winds down, culminating with the annual Orange and Blue Game next Thursday night. From the moment the scoreboard clock strikes zero next Thursday until May 1, all hell is going to break loose because come May 1, everyone who intends to transfer and play football in the fall without going through the waiver process will have to declare his intentions and make a commitment. The roster you see next Thursday night isn’t going to be the roster you see on May 1 and even that probably won’t be the roster you see when preparations begin in August for the season opener against Utah.
In addition to new rules that allow an athlete to transfer without having to sit a year, we now have a transfer portal that makes it easy for coaches in need of new players and athletes needing a fresh start at St. Somewhere Else to connect. But it is a two-way street. You can go from pretender to contender which is what Mel Tucker did last year at Michigan State when he added 21 players to his roster or you can go from contender to pretender, which partially explains what happened to Clemson.
It is a minefield out there and it cannot be navigated without someone with a detailed plan, which is why Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin targeted Billy Napier as his guy to restore the football program to a consistent championship level. What impressed Stricklin was Napier’s plan to succeed by bringing in an “army” of support staff and analysts whose sole purpose in their working life is to anticipate things before they happen. Things like who’s likely to leave the Florida program and to scour rosters nationwide to bring in plug and play types who can step in to strengthen a position of need.
Now that he’s gone through two-thirds of his allotted spring practices, Napier already has a pretty good idea who on the current roster is going to be here in the fall and who isn’t. For some, practice under Napier and his new set of coaches has been a harsh reality. This new sheriff in town doesn’t tolerate slackers. That alone tells you there are those who have probably already figured out they need to go someplace where the head coach isn’t obsessed with this notion that if everybody works their fingers to the bone they’ll get championships and not just boney fingers. Others may require a come to Jesus conversation with a position coach who suggests that if you’re not happy getting your brains beaten to a pulp on the scout team a starting job could be had at Tennessee Tech.
The Gators, Napier will tell you, are “a work in progress” which is to say what he’s seeing now isn’t anything close to what he knows he needs to be seeing in the fall. Not that any of this has caught him by surprise. He knew what he was getting into when he took the UF job. Mullen never embraced recruiting the way it takes to sustain a program at a championship level. From 1990-2009 the Florida football program won more games (202) than any school in the country. In the 12 years since, the Gators have won only 95 games, which is the 33rd best record in the country. The Gators are 6-10 in their last 16 games, 6-7 in 2021, which resulted in Mullen’s dismissal.
A few players have already departed the program. More are expected to go.
“We took over a program, we've had a number of things that have caused attrition on our team,” Napier said last week. “I mean, we're literally going to give five walk-ons scholarships this spring. So, we have spots available.”
A few spots? Walk-ons?
When spring football began it seemed the Gators were right at the NCAA-mandated 85 scholarship limit but obviously that’s not the case. If Napier can (a) give scholarships to five walk-ons and (b) still have roster spots available it’s a sure sign that either there has been far more attrition than we’ve been told about or else more is anticipated.
Two high school signing days have come and gone for Napier and it’s rare for a freshman to come in ready to play from day one. So, there is only one place to solve the problem of open spots on the roster and that is the portal.
“So, the University of Florida, you can anticipate us being very aggressive in the portal this spring,” Napier said. “We need players. Now, I think the approach is going to be, you know, acquire as many good players as we can at any position, right? So, you know, we're thin and we need help in a lot of different spots.”
It is indeed all about acquiring talent. Whether it’s through the time-tested method of recruiting as many as 25 high school or juco kids every year or taking the newfangled approach of plugging holes in the dike with transfers, it’s still all about acquiring talent. The Florida roster isn’t devoid of talent. It’s just that there aren’t enough good players to go around. When you’re in the Southeastern Conference, which has won the last three national championships and 12 since Florida won in 2006, you better have an abundance of talent brought in by a staff that is committed to relentless effort on the recruiting trail.
Even with its tradition of national championships – three since 1996 – the University of Florida has been passed on the recruiting trail by Alabama, Georgia and others. Napier arrived confident that Florida can win enough recruiting battles to restore championship tradition. The response so far has surpassed all expectations but now it’s time to make a wholesale move on the portal trail. Napier got a head start back in December when he brought in O’Cyrus Torrence, Kamryn Waites, Montrell Johnson, Jack Miller III and Jalen Kimber, all of whom transferred to Florida in time to participate in spring practice.
Now that he’s had a chance to evaluate his roster in both mat drills and spring practice, Napier has a very good idea just how many transfers he will need to transform the Florida roster.
“So, I think we have, we're approaching double digits if that makes sense,” Napier said. “So, you know, I think it's fortunate that we have that opportunity, right? It's something I'm very thankful for, you know? Can't imagine not having that opportunity at this point. So, that window of time is coming. We anticipate doing a lot of business and we're looking forward to it."
This is an opportunity. This is a chance to rebuild the Florida roster, but at the same time when the possibility looms that 20 percent or more of the fall roster could be made up of players who began their collegiate careers somewhere else, it tells you just how big a rebuilding job this is.
At a place like Florida a massive roster overhaul should never have to happen, but that is where the program is today. And why? If you add in the number of outstanding high school kids playing in this state and within four or five hours of Gainesville, there is simply no excuse for a roster that isn’t oozing with 4- and 5-star recruits, the kind of place that only requires a transfer or two when kids leave early for the NFL or suffer devastating, career-ending injuries.
As a former collegiate quarterback at Furman and as a play caller who has put together some productive, explosive offenses, Napier knows just how important it is to have the right scheme, the right X’s and O’s in place. But, he also understands fully that even the best scheme and better X’s and O’s can only take you so far.
At some point, you better have the right Jimmies, Joes, Terrences and Rakims and the only way you’re going to have them is to recruit relentlessly. For now, that means working the transfer portal to bring in players who have SEC talent and who are ready to play.
“I think we need to continue to acquire more talent,” Napier said. “I think that's the name of the game.”
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