Shall we start with the obvious?

It hasn’t been the best year for Jimbo Fisher.

Texas A&M, which started the season ranked in the Top 10, is now 3-5 after Saturday’s 31-28 loss at Kyle Field to Ole Miss and a very chatty Lane Kiffin. When an opposing coach suggests you give them your “Joker Costume” for Halloween, you know things have gone from disappointing to borderline disastrous.

As bad as things are for Texas A&M right now, Fisher has 86 million dollars to hang his hat on. That’s the amount of money Texas A&M would have to pay Fisher if the program decided to part ways with the coach it hired away from Florida State to so much fanfare in December 2017.

Nearly 5 years later, the Texas-sized buyout is the biggest reason Fisher is still roaming the sidelines in College Station. Fisher’s 37-19 record gives him an identical win percentage (66%) to what his predecessor, Kevin Sumlin, was fired for accomplishing in a 6-year tenure in Aggieland. Sumlin also never had a losing season, which is a significant risk for Fisher and the Aggies this year, absent a 3-1 or better run down the stretch.

Fisher’s other last remaining claims to fame?

As long as he coaches, he’ll be on the short list of current head coaches to win a national championship, having captured glory with Jameis Winston, Kelvin Benjamin, Dalvin Cook and the mighty 2013 Florida State Seminoles. That season, for all its Jameis-inspired controversy, will live on forever.

Tied in with Fisher’s halcyon days at FSU, of course, is his dominance over Florida. Fisher was 7-1 against the rival Gators at FSU, and he’s 1-0 against Florida at Texas A&M, upsetting Kyle Trask and the Gators 41-38 in College Station in 2020.

Fisher’s 8-1 career mark is the best record of any head coach with 5 or more games coached against the Gators in his career since Bear Bryant, who compiled his incredible 12-2 record against UF at Kentucky (5-1) and Alabama (7-1). Any time you are sharing company with The Bear, who knew a thing or 2 about winning in College Station, you may recall, that’s good company.

To suggest Fisher has had Florida’s number undersells it. Fisher hasn’t just beaten the Gators — he’s humiliated them.

Fisher’s teams have won by double digits in 6 of his 8 wins over the Gators. Fisher has defeated 5 Florida head coaches, from Urban Meyer to interim coach Randy Shannon to Dan Mullen. His 1 loss? It was almost a decade ago, to Will Muschamp’s marvelous 2012 Florida team, which would finish the regular season 11-1 and ranked 3rd in the final BCS rankings, just missing the national championship game.

Fisher has even whipped the Gators with a bad football team. He took a 4-6 record into the Florida game in 2017, his final season at Florida State. In what would be the last game he coached for the Seminoles, he walloped Florida 38-22 in The Swamp, starting a true freshman, James Blackman, at quarterback.

In many ways, it’s fitting Fisher went out in Tallahassee with a win over Florida, as it was his ability to dominate the Gators, both on Saturdays in November and on the recruiting trail throughout the year, that defined his tenure in Tallahassee and helped send the Florida program into its 2010s tailspin.

In truth, the Gators have not yet recovered from the way Fisher tossed them around during the prior decade. FSU’s dominance of Florida in the rivalry and recruiting is part of why Billy Napier has such a long climb back to national relevance at Florida. The fact that Jimbo and the Aggies beat Florida’s best team since the 2012 squad that beat Fisher at FSU is just icing on the proverbial cake. It hasn’t mattered how good the Gators are or how bad Jimbo’s teams are — Florida hasn’t figured out how to beat Fisher.

That needs to change this Saturday at noon.

Napier desperately needs a win in College Station. Does he need one as bad as Fisher? That’s doubtful, but there are 2 desperate teams set to play football on Saturday, and for the Gators there might not be a better time than this weekend to end their futility against Fisher.

It’s also time for Florida to beat a team with equal or better talent under Napier. The Aggies rank 4th in the 247 Talent Composite, a testament both to how well Jimbo has recruited and how poorly he’s coached the talent he has this season. The Gators rank 12th, their lowest mark in half a decade. But Florida is playing better football, and all 4 of Florida’s losses are to quality opponents ranked in the AP or Coaches’ polls (Kentucky is ranked 24th in the Coaches’ poll but not ranked in the AP).

Florida also might not get another shot at Fisher for a while. If Fisher is dismissed from A&M this year or next, who knows what the future holds for him as a head coach. It’s hard to imagine he’d retire at 57 or 58, but then again, it’s hard to imagine having anywhere from 75 to 86 million dollars to play with and nowhere to go.

Even if Texas A&M sticks with Jimbo and lets him develop the elite 2021 (No. 8 class in the 247 composite) and 2022 (No. 1 class) recruiting hauls  he’s brought to College Station, Florida has played the Aggies 3 times in the past 6 seasons, thanks to a scheduling quirk where the league keeps matching A&M and Florida up in the “random” cross-divisional game that is intended to occur only once every 6 years.

With SEC expansion on the horizon as well, who knows when the Gators will get another opportunity to play and finally find a way to once again beat Fisher?

Put plainly, if Florida is going to end its misery against Fisher — and get the program a quality road win against a team with great talent in the process — it needs to happen Saturday. Napier needs to find a way to win this game. The Gators need to put their 4-4 record, their leaky defense, the crushing losses to rivals Tennessee and Georgia, and the dismissal of their best pass rusher, Brenton Cox Jr., behind them and win a football game on Saturday afternoon.

It won’t be easy.

The Aggies are desperate, and even in lean years it’s difficult to beat Texas A&M in College Station. Each of A&M’s home losses this season came by a field goal, and both games came against quality, bowl-bound opponents.

In fact, as bad as it has been for the Aggies this year, they still have a win over a then-Top 10 Arkansas team, and they still played Alabama to a 1-possession standstill in Tuscaloosa. A motivated, angry Aggies team is a dangerous team, and Fisher, who famously yelled obscenities in a hot mic after upsetting Florida in 2020, takes great personal pride in being a foil in Florida’s side.

Napier, who has preached patience and process, would do himself a great favor by solving the Jimbo riddle Saturday.

A win Saturday won’t define Florida’s season, but it would be a nice brick added to Napier’s solid foundation.