Florida Football: Snapshot reaction to Billy Napier’s SEC Media Day

As SEC Media Days roll on, Florida football got its chance to dictate its narrative before the start of 2023. Billy Napier took the podium to give his State of the Union prior to taking questions from the media members present.

While, as predicted, there wasn’t anything groundbreaking said, here are some general thoughts about what we learned from Napier.

Florida Football: Looking forward

During his opening remarks, Napier kept to mostly safe and standard themes. A couple of things he noted was that new UF President Ben Sasse does, in fact, make appearances around campus and was in his office yesterday. Napier also took time to praise Florida being dubbed the “Everything School” and gave a shout-out to several other athletic programs on campus.

He closed his opening statements by noting the team did a comprehensive review of what worked and what didn’t in 2022 and emphasized the squad’s focus on discipline.

He also said he wouldn’t allow outside noise to dictate their approach. Guess that means he won’t be taking our advice if he sent him an email.

Questions from the media

His first question dealt with his name coming up as an option to be the Tennessee coach. In true Napier fashion, he mostly punted the question.

The Spurs Up Show asked Napier what led him to take Graham Mertz out of the transfer portal. Going back to his theme from his opening statement about the overall experience of the guys Florida grabbed out of the portal, Napier opted to highlight the amount of the previous experience Mertz has while giving a passing comment to Jack Miller and Max Brown.

When asked where Florida-Georgia should be played, he hinted at the economic implications of the game but mostly played the “both sides” card.

Napier did admit that his role as the offensive coordinator, as well as being the head coach, was part of their offseason evaluation process, but he feels that having a direct hand in the offense is most beneficial for the team at this time, but he also acknowledged its something that will always be looked at.

Sticking to his brand, he offered zero bulletin board material when asked about Utah, though he did mention they are trying to prep for the altitude. What does that mean? No idea.

When asked if it’s difficult to breed chemistry because of constant turnover due to the transfer portal, Napier went back to his number that 93% of the team has been on campus since January. Now how does that compare to other teams? Again, no idea. But ESPN made sure to flash the graphic as he gave that remark that Florida has the second least returning experience in the SEC with 48%.

Napier said Florida football does have young tight ends, and getting them up to speed is a work in progress. If he plans to keep running two tight-end sets, that might raise an eyebrow.

Overall reaction

As predicted, Napier didn’t say much on the podium that is going to raise alarms or ease fears.

He kept things close to the vest and maintain his calm demeanor.

Anyone trying to drive a narrative based solely on his SEC Media Days appearance is really going to have to work hard to do it.