Billy Napier’s Florida Gators staff continued to evolve last week when assistant Darnell Stapleton left for the Washington Commanders. His exit has created the program’s most fascinating assistant coaching vacancy since Will Muschamp was cycling through offensive coordinators.
However Napier fills the spot left by one of his first hires will tell us a lot more than who will coach up the guards during spring ball. It will give us some insight into how Napier intends to salvage his 11-14 tenure.
Stapleton worked alongside offensive coordinator Rob Sale as one of Napier’s two offensive line coaches. The tag-team approach is rare, but Napier felt strongly about it when he got the job. SEC games and titles are decided at the line of scrimmage, so Napier said fielding a pair of coaches to teach five offensive linemen “gives us an advantage.”
“Nobody’s got one coach coaching five DBs,” Napier said in his introductory news conference. “I don’t know why you wouldn’t have two guys coaching the offensive line.”
But to gain a second offensive line coach on a 10-assistant staff, you have to give something up. Napier chose a quarterbacks coach/play caller; he’d do both jobs himself.
And that, finally, leads to the question that has been percolating in Gainesville for months: How long will Napier continue in those roles?
Napier said last offseason the question was fair. The transfer portal and name, image and likeness (NIL) have made a coach’s job more complex than ever. That’s why Missouri’s Eliah Drinkwitz and Ohio State’s Ryan Day have stopped calling plays to spend more time on big-picture issues like roster management and fundraising. Another veteran play caller, Auburn’s Hugh Freeze, focused on recruiting and flipped top-100 prospects Amaris Williams and Jamonta Waller from the…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/fascinating-choice-ahead-florida-gators-200900173.html
Author : Tampa Bay Times, St. Petersburg, Fla.
Publish date : 2024-02-20 20:09:00
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