A portal ‘mistake’ Billy Napier made that he doesn't want to repeat
When it comes to recruiting in the transfer portal, which Billy Napier describes as speed dating, time is of the essence. The last thing coaches can afford to do is waste it.
However, skipping steps in order to streamline the evaluation process can also backfire. According to Napier, you must “flip over every rock” in a short amount of time.
“There’s a ton of research done before the portal opens and obviously when the portal does open, we have checks and balances to make sure that we’re not rushing into a relationship,” he told On3’s Keith Niebhur prior to his speech Wednesday in Sarasota, Florida.
Unfortunately for Napier, he and his staff had to learn that the hard way during a previous portal window. Part of the evaluation process with transfers is determining whether they have the grades to get into UF.
That has prevented the Gators from taking at least one player they targeted.
“Admissions, that’s a mistake we’ve made here,” Napier said. “We’ve pursued players for weeks — in the very beginning — and then all of a sudden we get the transcript and then, ‘Oh, can’t take him.’
“A player that has one or two years left, OK, that’s been in college for eight semesters, I mean, there’s a high likelihood that guy can’t get into school at the University of Florida. So, there’s admissions issues.”
In fact, new Gators safety RJ Moten is sacrificing some college credits in order to transfer from Michigan to Florida, but that didn’t deter him from his decision.
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Napier said another potential pitfall when pursuing players from the portal is the medical examination. His staff must dig deep into their injury history, reviewing medical records not only from college but high school as well.
“I mean, there’s a ton of research to do,” Napier said. “Sometimes you’re out in front of that. Sometimes you anticipate it, you’ve been made aware of potential scenarios. We all understand how this happens. And then sometimes it just happens unannounced, and sometimes that requires a ton of research to be done before you’re ready to go. So, academics is important, the admissions process is important, the character process is important.
“You’ve got to do a medical (exam). You’ve got to call every single person that you know in that circle. I mean, I think you can make a lot of mistakes, is what I would tell you. And, essentially, the NFL has years of research and they get to pick, right? They don’t recruit. … So, is what it is. We’re not going to speed through that process. We’re going to be, you know, as detailed as we can be.”
