After five interceptions against No. 3 LSU, uncharacteristic lateness on throws and simple misfires against South Florida that have contributed to a 1-2 start — leading to renewed skepticism about Billy Napier’s long-term future as Florida coach — many are asking: What’s wrong with DJ Lagway?
Even Florida’s famed former Heisman Trophy-winning QB and national championship-winning coach Steve Spurrier has noticed that Lagway looks “off.”
“I’ve never had a performance like that in my life, so it’s kind of hard to process it,” Lagway said after the 20-10 loss to LSU. “But, at the end of the day, it’s all about, how do you bounce back and how do you respond? And I’m planning on doing so.”
Progress is not linear, but it was assumed after a promising end to the 2024 season that Lagway would take a leap in 2025. But that hasn’t been the case due to multiple, overlapping injuries and the knock-on effect recovery has had on his development. In some ways, it seems like Lagway has regressed.
Lagway spent most of the offseason rehabbing a shoulder issue that stems from a high school baseball injury, which was rehabbed at the time. The shoulder pain returned at the end of last season however. The sophomore sought two medical opinions in January from Dr. Neal ElAttrache — who has worked with Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, and Shohei Ohtani among others — and Dr. Keith Meister (head physician for the Texas Rangers), according to his agent Deiric Jackson. In consultation with doctors at UF, a rehab program was developed.
“It was as abnormal as abnormal can get,” Jackson said of Lagway’s offseason.
Throughout the course of the 2024 campaign, Lagway also developed and played through a core muscle injury, which He addressed with surgery in early 2025. A hamstring and groin injury also impacted Lagway in 2024. There is a thought by some in his camp that the compounding injuries led to compensation in his throwing motion to make it more arm-focused, which could have aggravated the shoulder.
Effectively, from January through April, Lagway was unable to throw a football. He participated in spring practice but did not throw; he only handed off to running backs in Florida’s spring game. He is now essentially trying to play himself into shape as he tries to make up for significant time and reps loss.
“I don’t want to make that excuse about him missing so much time, because we all tried to at least feel like it wasn’t going to be too much of a drop off,” Lagway’s personal quarterback coach JP Tillman said.
Tillman has seen Lagway develop year over year thanks to a regimented offseason routine. But that was severely disrupted by the rehab process, preventing Lagway from repping a few of the tweaks he made looking toward 2025 in terms of sequencing.
“Being able to step a little further into his throws with his lead foot, and that helps with his weight management and control,” Tillman said. “And then the other thing was making sure that he didn’t get too low when he pulled the ball back. So when he got into his first stage of his wind up where we would kind of stretch and pull the ball back, making sure that he didn’t get the ball too far below his elbow.”
The latter tweak originated via a plan from CORTEX Sports Performance — a sports science-based training facility — to protect his shoulder over the long term and strengthen his smaller muscles. Lagway’s injuries had piled up over time. His camp wanted to get his body right.
“He’s got big muscles,” Tilman said. “The best thing they did is just work on the small muscles, things that stabilize. … That’s where most of the focus was this offseason.”
But Lagway was unable to truly rep the changes because of the truncated offseason.
Napier said at the end of May that Lagway was throwing 210 passes a week, plus warm ups, and put him “on schedule.” But a calf strain he suffered at the end of July again altered the timeline. It is not uncommon for a quarterback in an offseason training session or training camp practice to throw 100+ balls per day across different drills and play installs, Lagway simply was not getting that amount of reps, and Tillman describes Lagway as a player who learns best from repetition and feeling the changes from throw to throw.
“It wasn’t like, OK, you’re ready, go and throw 100 balls in practice today,” Jackson said. “No, it was, like, 20, 25, 30, and this wasn’t every day. This is like every other day. We didn’t start throwing back to back [days] until well into August.”
Florida also dealt with multiple injuries to its wide receiver corps through training camp. Eugene Wilson III — who missed half of last season with a hip injury — missed part of fall camp, including team scrimmages, with a different lower body injury. Aidan Mizell missed some time during camp with a soft tissue leg injury, and freshman Dallas Wilson, whom Florida expected to count on as a significant receiving threat, has still not seen the field due to a camp injury.
Combine Lagway’s unavailability for much of the spring and summer with Florida’s rash of injuries in fall camp, and Lagway never got the critical offseason reps with his receivers. The timing between the two parties is suffering because of it.
“It’s like Steph Curry going the whole offseason without shooting 3s, then his first game back, you want him to shoot 50%,” Jackson said. “You have to have the reps.”
The poor play early in the season has caused some Florida fans to question if Lagway is indeed the answer behind center. Napier, however, affirmed after the LSU game that, “DJ’s our quarterback.”
Moving forward, those in Lagway’s camp expect him to improve as the season goes along.
He’s not injured, but he’s working his way back into rhythm, which is a tough proposition given Florida’s next three games are against ranked opponents. Some of the interceptions were throws Lagway knows he can usually make. His body is still just catching up to what his mind knows he can do.
“It’s something he’s going to figure out,” Tillman said. “He’s just trying to figure it out as we all watch. He didn’t have much time to acclimate himself when we thought he’d be able to. So, we’re watching him (adjust) in real time.”
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