I have to agree with you here. I was shocked early on how much Napier was having DJ running the ball. Imho given that Lagway IS our remaining QB personnel….only have him run when he has NO other options and can slide! But anyways good post
I know this isn’t for everyone here, but I put more weight on what’s happening in the here and now, and 2 years ago is damn near irrelevant to the future. It should literally be water under the bridge at this point - what is best for our future right now? I totally agree that Billy is a full year late on showing significant results. This shoulda happened last year. Well it didn’t — but it’s happening now. Too slowly for many, but every significant indicator is pointing toward improvement. In all phases of the game - his play calling and the performance of every individual unit on O and D. So…….do you throw it all away because he’s late delivering results? I say only if you’ve got a potential rock star ready to quit his job and coach here. I’d be thrilled to read tomorrow that Cignetti is our next coach. But there are no guarantees on anybody coming in and doing better than Billy Napier is right now. And really, that’s all that matters right now. The past is a distraction
Well, their quarterback drives a Lamborghini. Does ours? I bet Georgia pays their players in the aggregate 10x what we pay ours. And they have for years.
We should be tremendously proud of the effort the players and coaches put into this game. This is the first time that a Napier team has shown progress thru the season. And we are facing our third losing season with only vandy behind us in recruiting. One game of keeping it close in three years does not dig out of the hole to me. But, again, gotta celebrate the team effort today.
And we are staring at an all time historical awful recruiting class. If Napier wins 3 of 4 he may be able to sneak into top 20 classes. Without that the class will be terrible. We fired Mullen for far better classes (still not good enough)
It’s easy to forget the recent past, but UCF was supposed to “boat race” us with their record-setting ground game. Stoops and Kentucky were going to kick our butts. Tennessee was going to blow us out. None of that happened. It’s not just “one game”. If you can’t see that this ship is turning over the past month, you’re not looking in the right direction. One trick I use is to walk aft and then look at the wake. What does that tell you?
IMO there is no way of salvaging a recruiting class. That shipped has sailed with BN on the very hot seat. If he is retained the only hope is if he makes hay in the portal. If he is let go the same is true for the new coach, must make hay in the portal. We may not win another game this year. It is what it is.
Unfortunately now with a walk-on as QB1, this is the beginning of a 5-game losing streak to end the season, just like last year. It's disheartening. As bad as FSU has been this year, it's a big rivalry game on the road and I don't see this bunch winning it.
I'm not blaming this loss on Napier. But if you asked me if this is where I'd think The Program would be 8 games into Year 3, I would have skipped football season since we hired Napier. We aren't really that much different than the first 2 years. Sure, ugly schedule, not sure what idiot decided to saddle us with 3 years of a Top 5 schedule, but we'll have a 4th year and a 5th year of difficult schedules. If we keep Napier, I expect another 4-8 season in 2025. Our recruiting is the worst I've seen for our program since the 1980s. We are currently ranked 51st and we still have 4 games left. Will we lose any of the remaining recruits we have left and there's the ?? of who is going to leave at the end of the season. Napier might have to pull a Norvell.
The problem is that Billy has lost all the momentum that he could have had by being slow to adapt and is falling further behind. Don’t believe me? Move on down to Awesome Recruiting for a little while. Form should be renamed The Morgue.
I'd be interested to see film breakdown on Indiana and better understand what's leading to their success. Too lazy to do it myself, but I'd be interested to see it...
Side note, glad we knocked out their trader rb with a rib injury. Who will be rb #2 next year, as that freshman they have is pretty damn good.
The defense looks better but I think you are experiencing some hopium 1. we are likely to finish with a worse record this year than the last two. 2. The last two years we had a ranked win and had periods where we looked like things might be turning around MOST IMPORTANTLY We are staring in the face of a terrible recruiting class.
