Billy Napier’s introductory press conference did not go how many of them go. He spoke with humility, for one thing, which is a hard thing to find among coaches in any major sport.
Also in lieu of quoting a famous coach or a major figure in Florida history, he instead dropped one of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: “We’re going to begin with the end in mind, and that is to be a champion.”
“Begin with the end in mind” is the second Habit, and it’s the only one I can ever consistently remember from having read that book in college roughly 15 years ago. I don’t know specifically if Napier is a true believer in the 7 Habits, but he did quote one of them word-for-word.
The late Steven Covey advised in this section to be intentional in every thing you do. It’s a measure twice, cut once ethos applied to all facets of a job. I don’t think the book name-checks path dependency, but that’s a core consideration here.
Path dependency basically says that the state of the present is the sum total of things that have happened in the past. An example of how path dependency plays out is how Florida had to bring in several graduate transfers on the defensive line this season because it signed too few of them years ago. The lack of defensive tackles didn’t just happen but was the result of past decisions. Those decisions put UF on a path to needing to scramble to shore up depth much later.
In the life of a football program, a new head coaching regime is a chance to wipe away some of the things of the past an improve the path that it’s on. There will be new leaders, new policies, new methods, and, through the signing days and the portal, new players.
When beginning with the end in mind, your goal is to arrange things now to allow you to build to the end state you want later. There is no easier time to alter the path you’re on than in a discontinuity event like this one. It’s far harder to make effective changes later once your process has been running for years, which is why so few emergency assistant coaching changes actually save a head coach’s job. You almost never get to a precarious position all of a sudden, and path dependency means more bad outcomes are probably inevitable even if you fix some of the immediate issues.
Napier got into this when setting his priorities in his opening statement. “Our first task will be hiring a quality coaching and support staff,” he said, before explaining, “[t]he second order of business is going to be working [on] and finalizing our recruiting class over the next 60 days.” Staff first, then recruiting, and recruiting is a deal that goes into February.
This should make sense: the people on the staff are the ones who do the recruiting. They will want input on who the program goes out and gets. Whoever the defensive line coach is going to be will probably want a say on which defensive linemen they sign, and so on.
Things have played out as described. Florida has lost a number of players to decommitments while each day brings an announcement or three of assistants or off-field staffers being hired. Wednesday was a roller coaster of a day, with mid 4-star receiver Jaydon Gibson leaving the class on the heels of QB Nick Evers leaving the day before. Yet in the afternoon, word broke that Corey Raymond was leaving LSU to become the new cornerbacks coach in Gainesville. Raymond was an ace recruiter for a decade in Baton Rouge, signing and coaching up many of the players that allowed the Tigers to compete with Florida for the DBU title.
When asked about the early signing day during his intro presser, Napier gave an answer too long to quote in its entirety. However he did say, “I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t sign many at all.” He explained that people are the most important element of the program, so he’s not going to go sign a bunch of players he doesn’t know.
He has extended offers to current P5 commits that he recruited while at Louisiana, so it’s not like he’s doing nothing but hiring staff before early signing day. However as promised, he’s going to focus on getting things ready for a big recruiting and portal push in January.
Right now, Florida has seven commits left from the group Dan Mullen had lined up before his firing (including Chris McClellan, who unconventionally committed after Mullen’s firing but before Napier’s hire). At this point, it seems hard to predict how many of the seven will actually sign next week.
Mullen’s transitional class included seven holdover commits from Jim McElwain, but he signed 13 in December. Among the six new commits were a flip from Mississippi State (Evan McPherson) and a guy who unofficially visited MSU (Chris Bleich). Emory Jones and Trey Dean had been offered by UF too, although the 247 Sports timelines don’t show them as having visited during the McElwain era. JUCO transfer Noah Banks and John Huggins don’t appear to have had much history with Mullen or UF before Mullen’s arrival.
The 13 December signees were a mixed bag. Kyle Pitts and McPherson were good enough to go pro early. Dameon Pierce excelled in a platoon situation. Jones, Dean, and Amari Burney started with varying levels of success. However, Huggins was dismissed, and Bleich and Iverson Clement transferred and Dante Zanders just went in the portal. David Reese remains a career backup, and Randy Russell immediately and Banks eventually were medical DQs.
So it goes with transitional classes, and everyone knows it. They’re usually smaller than future classes, and they often experience a lot of attrition.
The issue of first classes tending to be small doesn’t appear to be a tide Napier is willing to fight. It would appear he’s trying to head off attrition by being patient (a word he used a lot) and only bringing in players who fit what he and his staff want and who will be committed to the new team culture. It’s a good strategy, as attrition exacerbates the problem of transitional classes being small.
It’s a risk not to try to lock in players in December, as time has shown that the majority of recruits want to sign then. There aren’t as many options at the February signing day, though perhaps the new transfer exemption will make up for it to a degree. With the oversized coaching carousel this year, there might be more portal options than normal.
Still, players from the portal have fewer years of eligibility to work with than do high school signees. Loading up on transfers, like loading up on JUCOs in the time before the portal, is setting out on a path that leads to roster holes in the future. Signing a tiny class also puts you on a path to roster issues, so it’s a hard balance to strike.
The bottom line is that Napier is beginning with an end in mind. That end is not landing in the top ten of recruiting rankings this year, or taking shortcuts to win an extra game or two next fall at the expense of longterm success.
Only time will tell if he’s putting Florida on a path to sustained success, but so far he’s doing exactly what he promised.