Following his exit from the Florida Gators, James Madison coach Billy Napier reveals how the crushing demands of NIL, the portal, and micromanaged play-calling derailed his tenure in the SEC.
A four-game winning streak (including wins over ranked teams LSU and Ole Miss) gave Florida the confidence that Billy Napier should return for the 2025 season.
After a 3-4 start, the Gators decided to part ways with Napier after he went 22-23 overall and 12-16 in the SEC during his time in Gainesville.
Florida went on to hire Jon Sumrall, who led Tulane to the College Football Playoff in December. Napier took over at James Madison, who made the CFP last season, prompting Bob Chesney to take the vacancy at UCLA.
During an interview with On3, Napier admitted where he went wrong at Florida. He suggested that he struggled to adapt to the heavy workload that NIL required at the program.
“I think that we really struggled to manage the workload that came with NIL, that came with the portal,” Napier said. “I think in general there, the work continued to be loaded up in terms of my responsibility to our team and to our entire organization.
"So, for me, in general, if I can sum it up, I would say the ability to delegate and hire exceptional people in certain areas and hand over more responsibility to those guys and empower them to do their job at a high level. I think that you have to continue to adapt and evolve... We didn’t do that as well as I would like us to do it. And ultimately, that was my responsibility.”
Napier also took responsibility for the offense, saying he should have given up play-calling duties, though he struggled with the idea of turning that responsibility over once he knew he was on the hot seat.
While Napier's tenure will be remembered more for the losses than the wins, he is proud of the way he built the program up, noting that Sumrall kept a lot of the people in place his regime hired.
“I do think that we, just in general, built an organization from top to bottom that was impressive,” Napier said. “And I think that the fact that they retained the majority of those people within that organization, I think, speaks to that.
"I’m thankful for Jon for doing that. I do think that a lot of those people are incredible at what they do, and I think that they deserve to stay, and I’m glad that he saw that. That was able to create some stability for them."
The Florida gig was the first job for Napier in the Power 4. He struggled with the responsibility that came with coaching in the SEC. He can now apply what he learned and help continue the success that former JMU head coaches have had in recent years.
Like Napier, Sumrall is coming to Florida after having success in the Group of 6. He can learn from what Napier did wrong to help turn around the Gators.
