Breaking news:Florida Football Set to part ways with mega Five-Star with full commitment as the coach resign…see .
Breaking news:Florida Football Set to part ways with mega Five-Star with full commitment as the coach resign…see .
Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach Jon Gruden holds up the Vince Lombardi Trophy after winning Super Bowl XXXVIII against the Oakland Raiders at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, CA on Jan. 26, 2003. Xxx Axx Letfeat 29 S Fbn Ca / ROBERT HANASHIRO / USA TODAY NETWORK
It’s Wednesday, and Billy Napier is still the head coach of Florida Football. When will he get fired? Nobody knows, but it will require a minor miracle for Napier to still be the coach of Florida in 2025, despite his claiming he feels he has a pathway to a fourth season in Gainesville.
To fire a coach means you have to hire a coach and one high-profile name who is currently out of coaching claims he wants to hop back into the game.
Florida Football: Spider 2 Y Banana
Jon Gruden was one of the hottest names in coaching in the early 2000’s. After leading the Oakland Raiders to a 12-4 season in 2000 and a 10-6 season in 2001, where they were eliminated in the playoffs by the New England Patriots thanks to the infamous “Tuck Rule,” Gruden was literally traded to Tampa Bay in 2002.
Gruden would finish off what Tony Dungy couldn’t and won the Super Bowl for the 2002 season.
Gruden was fired by Tampa after the 2008 season, became a commentator for ESPN in 2009, returned to the NFL in 2018 to be the coach of the Raiders once again, and was fired in 2021 because of emails that surfaced that said things we won’t repeat here.
Let Me In
In an exclusive interview with CBS Sports, Gruden highlighted a desire to get back into coaching. Even though he hasn’t coached college football since he was a wide receiver coach at Pittsburgh in 1991, Gruden indicated he wants a job at the college level.
“Yeah, I’m interested in coaching. My dad was a college coach, I was a college coach at Pitt, my wife was a cheerleader at Tennessee when I met her. Hell yeah, I’m interested in coaching.”
If fans get their way, guess what college program is going to need a new head coach soon?
Advantages and Disadvantages
For the record, there is no formal reporting that Jon Gruden is going to become the head coach of the Florida Gators. However, given the timing of this CBS interview, his name is bound to be floated as an option.
Gruden would bring a big name to Gainesville and would bring an intensity that has taken a nosedive under Napier. Plus in the new age of college football of NIL, having someone who is used to working with paid athletes versus someone who has never done it (think Urban Meyer) would have its advantages.
Plus, Gruden would be available now and could start recruiting for you today. The risk of holding out for someone like Lane Kiffin is if Ole Miss makes a run into the playoffs, he may be tied to the Rebels deep into January.
But some major red flags make him far from a slam-dunk hire. Beyond the fact he has almost zero experience having to hit the recruiting trail, the email scandal that led to his firing from Las Vegas is going to come up in every household he enters.
Google is free, after all.
After winning the Super Bowl, Gruden was 68-82 for the remainder of his NFL career. Only once over the ten seasons he coached after winning the Super Bowl did he win ten or more games.
Tampa fans would tell you, “Yep, see what happened once he couldn’t lean on Tony Dungy’s players?”
If you don’t believe us to be skeptical, here is a quote from an anonymous Group of Five AD from the CBS story.
“If I was in the market right now, would I interview Jon Gruden? Yeah, probably. There’d be no reason not to. Now, if I was at Florida, no, I’m not doing that. It’s not the right fit, right time. A lot of that depends on the right job. One of the things with a Group of Five [school] is you can take a more calculated risk.”
The calculated risk part is the problem for Florida. Since Urban Meyer left, only one of the four coaches Florida has hired since had Power Five head coaching experience. Love Dan Mullen or hate him, and for the record we have written at length why Mullen deserved to be let go, he was the most successful coach the Gators have had since Meyer.
The moral is to strap in because a bunch of names are going to get floated in the coming weeks. The dilemma is just how much of a risk the Gators are willing to take.
