All Aboard

 No one says no to Lane Kiffin.

    I know that’s a pretty broad claim because there is history that many people have said no to Kiffin. The football power brokers at USC, Tennessee, Alabama, Ole Miss and Oakland Raiders have all stopped him dead in his tracks with high profile firings or, in the case of the Vols and Rebels, labeled him a traitor or worse for his decision to leave once upon a time.

     But ever since Kiffin was named head coach at LSU a few months ago, I don’t think he has heard anyone utter the word no his way.

Let’s start with his rampage through the transfer portal. Kiffin’s haul of 42 portal players was ranked no. 1 by several of those rating services that LSU fans were watching by the minute. It’s safe to say Kiffin secured, signed and delivered pretty much every potential prospect he wanted. If one or two got away, who’s to say LK didn’t decide to back off and go in another direction? (I’m looking your way, Brendan Sorsby.)

He wined and dined Sam Leavitt, the portal’s no. 1 QB, at a Tigers basketball game at the P-MAC with the fans giving them both a lot of bayou love. Even though LSU hoops had another downer game, it didn’t derail the process. Not one to leave anything to chance, Kiffin got another swipe in at his former team in Knoxville by following Leavitt to Tennessee to close the deal.

There was no way Leavitt was saying no once he saw LSU’s private jet in Rocky Top and LK bearing a reported $5 million deal.

With Leavitt in place, LSU needed a protector, so Kiffin set his sights on the portal’s top offensive lineman in left tackle Jordan Seaton. The Colorado Buffalo just spent a spectacular season with Deion Sanders, where he barely gave up a sack or QB hurry. Kiffin jumped into the fire matching wits and charm with the ultimate showman in Prime Time.

It helped that Seaton entered the portal with the intent to leave Boulder, but he held all the cards when it came to going or staying. Kiffin pulled out all the stops. A visit to the mansion for a sit down with Gov. Jeff Landry for Seaton and his uncle. When he didn’t get a full-fledged yes Kiffin had them fire up that LSU jet again and followed Seaton to Atlanta. It took a few days, but Seaton eventually became a Tiger.

Leavitt was mission 1, with Seaton a close 1-A. The next signing was the trifecta on Kiffin’s wish list.

The pursuit of the no. 1 rated edge rusher/defensive end Princewill Umanmielen from Ole Miss went to another level of drama and intrigue. Was Umanmielen actually entering the portal? Was he ready to leave his defensive coordinator and new Ole Miss head coach Pete Golding? Did the young New York native and son of Nigerian parents already tell Ole Miss he was staying in Oxford?

Kiffin saw first-hand Umanmielen’s talent last season and had to have him in Baton Rouge. He’d already poached Shreveport native and four-star offensive lineman Devin Harper from the Rebels, but this was different. From the outside looking in, I think Kiffin played it cool and more laid back, but he went hard once Princewill was in the portal mix. 

In football lingo “the edge was set” once Kiffin got another yes. 

Once you get the quarterback, left tackle and edge rusher right, the rest is gravy when it comes to roster building. Kiffin now has the top-ranked portal player in each of those most important positions. The man knew what he wanted and needed. He went out and got it. But it didn’t stop with those three mega stars.

Early on, Kiffin added Boise State’s Ty Benefield, the no. 1 or no. 2 rated safety in the portal, depending on what ranking you like. Plus, a rising star at safety in Ohio State’s Faheem Delane, the younger brother of LSU’s outgoing top cornerback Mansoor Delane. Top five quarterback Husan Longstreet from USC was a surprising add who has four years to play. 

Kiffin and offensive coordinator Charlie Weiss saw a depleted and unproductive receivers room, so they signed top tier talent in Florida’s Eugene Wilson, Jayce Brown from Kansas State and Ole Miss wideout Winston Watkins. Kiffin’s heist from the Rebels roster hit the jackpot with linebacker TJ Dottery, who led Ole Miss in total tackles last season.

Bar none and without question, this was the craziest and most volatile two weeks in the seven-year history of the transfer portal. There were over a dozen major college Power Four coaching changes that would end up affecting massive roster changes across a slew of FBS and Group of Five programs.

Two points to consider in this just-completed portal chaos. Over 6,000 players were in the system at any one time between Jan. 2 and its closing date of Jan. 16.  Add in the fact that unlike the previous six years, there is no second portal period this time around, so coaches, players, general managers, agents, moms and dads were in a madcap scramble and race to the finish line.

Kiffin — and let’s not forget about new GM Billy Glasscock, who also followed LK to LSU — started their tenure right before the first high school national signing period in early December. Thanks to the ridiculous and ill-timed college football schedule for prep and portal signings, Kiffin had no time for Christmas shopping or holiday parties. It was recruiting 24/7. 

From the get-go, he had to resell, re-recruit and reunite with two of the no. 1 ranked high school players in the country sitting right in Kiffin’s backyard of Baton Rouge and New Orleans. On his first official night at LSU, he had five-star defensive lineman Lamar Brown in his office. Days later, five-star DL Richard Anderson was on campus.

You guessed it — Kiffin got the yes nod and signatures from Brown, Anderson and 16 other prep recruits that were targeted. All total, between high school and portal LK is bringing in 60 new players to combine with 35-plus holdovers. That’s a ton of long days, late night evaluations and jet miles. Kiffin promised he would sign the no. 1 portal class, and he delivered on his post-hire introductory press conference pledge.

On Feb. 4, in his first media sit down since he took over the LSU reins, he said he was thrilled with the job he and his staff accomplished on the roster but threw out a few red caution flags to keep things realistic.  Kiffin warned “this class may be the best on paper,” but there is still a ton of work to do to get everyone playing as a team. With spring practice still weeks away, Kiffin says he doesn’t have any “magic dust” to make that happen overnight.

All this coaching staff success, recruiting and roster work would not have come to pass without Kiffin getting a lot of yeses and nary a no from AD Verge Ausberry, university president Dr. Wade Rousse, the LSU Board of Supervisors and toss in Gov. Landry, for good measure.

None of them said no to any of Kiffin’s requests. It began with his annual $13 million salary; then LSU paid him those CFP incentives in his Ole Miss contract. Next came sizeable contract bumps for coordinators Blake Baker ($3.5 million a year), to keep him from leaving for Tulane, and Charlie Weiss ($2.5 million) to keep NFL teams at bay. There was no push-back for making Glasscock one of the highest paid GMs in college football with a $1 million-plus deal. 

Kiffin has been called many things, namely the Portal King. To me he is the Harvey Specter of college football. LK is the ultimate closer of deals and negotiations, much like the brash, cocky New York lawyer on the TV show “Suits.” Heck, Kiffin even looks like his TV alter ego.

No one will say it publicly (Kiffin won’t divulge any details on contracts, money and deals with any of his portal signees), but he had to get that much-talked-about roster money commitment this year increased from the reported $30 million to at least $40 million. I don’t see $30 million covering the holdover players plus this incoming portal class.

Surely every time Kiffin wanted or needed the jet to Knoxville, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, Shreveport or Lake Charles it only took a quick call followed by an agreeable nod from Ausberry or Rousse. I think it’s safe to say LSU’s pilots are on Kiffin’s speed dial.

Since his well-documented and controversial departure from Ole Miss to LSU, the highly vocal critics in the national media — and one former head coach Jimbo Fisher — lambasted Kiffin for abandoning his playoff bound team, jumping ship when his players needed him the most, stealing Ole Miss coaches and accusations of player tampering. 

Fisher went as far as calling Kiffin’s actions “stupid and selfish.” Well, if that’s the case, then any head coach who has left a successful team for a new job might be labeled stupid and selfish, starting with Fisher.

I have said from day one if Ole Miss didn’t want Kiffin to abandon the team during the playoffs, then let him and his staff coach them. With so many changes and never-seen-before nutso things happening in the game now, what’s the difference? Tulane let Jon Sumrall coach the Green Wave, ironically against Ole Miss, before he left for his new job at Florida. 

The sky didn’t fall in New Orleans or Gainesville.

You would be a fool if you didn’t think some level of player or coaching staff tampering is going on at any time in college sports. I am sure Clemson’s Dabo Swinney will send Ole Miss a handy mirror to hold up so they can see tampering first-hand. Kiffin wasn’t able to lure the Rebels’ two prize players to LSU in QB Trinidad Chambliss and running back Kewan Lacy, did he? 

Unless he wants to come clean, I don’t think Kiffin ever told his Ole Miss coaches to be on that LSU jet sitting in Oxford or they wouldn’t have jobs in Baton Rouge. I think he has too much respect for the coaching profession and the game to have the balls or gall to do that. 

At some point in this drama, the anti-Kiffin media needed a villain in the story, and who better than the sport’s lighting rod and most polarizing figure? Some pundits — not all, mind you — aimed their intense vitriol directly at him. It was the easy response but didn’t make it right. 

Kiffin is far from perfect. He has made some dandy-sized blunders and mistakes in his career. His ego has been front and center over the years, but the 50-year-old Kiffin has admitted the same. With time and a few pink slips, he says has learned and matured. 

No doubt he would probably do some things differently with his exit plan from Ole Miss. But if there is blame, it first should fall on college football’s calendar and the placement of the game’s free agency portal while the season is ongoing. Makes no sense. There has to be a better way for the game, players and coaches.

Just ask college football’s new commissioner Nick Saban (that’s my hope, anyway), because he will tell you the same thing.

In the meantime, Kiffin has been … Kiffin. True to himself and his personality. Surprisingly open, honest and transparent with the media and at recent large business and donor functions.

The Lane Train is loaded up with the country’s top portal pull, arguably the second-best high school recruiting class in the country, two of the best and highest paid coordinators, and a large legion of deliriously joyful LSU fans.

         Kiffin’s next ask should be getting a bigger train. Who’s going to tell him no?