Some truths find a way to reemerge every season in college football. One concerning Billy Napier is that nobody coaches harder than the Gators’ head coach when he is on the hot seat. We saw it last year. Coming into the 2025 season, there was a different vibe around Florida. They started hot, and then the old woes reappeared. Three straight losses. Back on the hot seat. And then the Gators went on a bye week to prepare for Texas in Week 6. The hot-seat Napier struck again.

“The overwhelming narrative around Billy Napier was it’s a foregone conclusion he’s going to lose his job,” Josh Pate said on the October 6 episode of his podcast. He was not talking about this year. For Gators faithful, they have lived this before. After a bad 2023 season, the 2024 campaign wasn’t a smooth run either. Kicking off with a 4-4 campaign, calls intensified for his firing. But AD Scott Stricklin stayed put, and Napier secured his job with an 8-5 record after defeating LSU, Ole Miss, and Florida State.

The team that fought for him last year is still kicking to keep him at Gainesville. “If he’s still there, then he’s still got an opportunity to win,” Pate added. “The crazy thing that can happen when a team does not quit on a coach and they’re really talented and take pride in their performance like Florida does is they can mess around and win games.” That’s what we saw against Texas last week.

The Longhorns lost against Ohio State, but since then, their defense has been cruising. Arch Manning looked good in flashes but had yet to have a complete game. A tough SEC matchup was the stage, and Arch failed to live up to it. The final score (29-21) doesn’t do justice to how the Gators dominated the game. Especially at the line of scrimmage. While Texas QB1 had little room to breathe throughout the game, Lagway had a much better outing, completing 21 of his 28 passes for 298 yards.

But bigger challenges await the Gators, and they could return to losing ways. “They still got A&M, they still got Georgia, they still got Miss, they still got Tennessee, they still got a lot of tough teams,” Pate continued.

So, what does this win do for the program? Are they delaying the inevitable? Pate didn’t like this line of thought. “This just prolonged the inevitable, right?” And that’s the general consensus. I even think amongst Florida fans, “Oh, this prolonged the inevitable.” I don’t know that. You don’t know that… How do you know it prolongs the inevitable? Or, in other words, are you telling me that if he doesn’t lose another game, he’s still gone? Because if you can’t tell me that, then it’s not inevitable because you don’t know what the results are going to be. Because I’m telling you, if you didn’t watch Florida yesterday and you just saw the final score, that team is still fighting for him just like they did last year.”

Billy Napier’s $19.3 million buyout

Back in 2021, he inked a $51.8 million deal with Florida, a contract that stretches on till 2029, according to the details obtained by USA Sports. The quote, “Scared money don’t make money,” accompanied the deal.

If the Gators were to release Billy Napier, they would need to pay him 85% of his current contract, which equals $19.3 million. Not to forget the annual increment of $100,000. If he is let go, then the program has to pay him 50% of his remaining contract within 30 days of his termination. The rest of the amount would be paid in installments by 2028.

Even Urban Meyer is not sold on the narrative that Florida will let him go. “Billy Napier is caught in a firestorm. How does it end? Again, I don’t see them making a change right now with a $21 million buyout,” Meyer said on the Triple Option podcast. “That’s been a pretty well-documented conversation with people throughout the country: where is that money coming from? Because the money is already distributed.”

Presently, Billy Napier has been fixated with a hawk’s eye on his future matchups, running towards the SEC championship race.