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 When the news broke Tuesday night that Lane Kiffin was leaving Tennessee after just one season to coach at USC I was baffled. Like Jessica Simpson trying to read the Dictionary kind of baffled.
Right after the announcement, with the news blowing up all over the internet and ESPN, my phone blew up too, with calls, texts and e-mails from friends, wondering what in the hell was going on exactly.
To make things easier on everyone, I decided it was time to answer all your questions with just one broad stroke, in the "Idiot's Guide to the Lane Kiffin Hiring."
Q. Let's start with something simple: What exactly makes USC such a good job?
You mean other than the 11 National Championships, seven Heisman Trophy winners and a roster with more NFL talent than the Cleveland Browns and St. Louis Rams combined? You mean besides the unreal recruiting base, 100,000 seat stadium and boosters that provide the athletic department with a bigger budget than the last Batman movie? You mean besides the opportunity to coach in a league where you’ve got an inherent one up on everyone, every time you roll yourself out of bed? You mean besides the Song Girls?
Well other than that, not much really.
Q. Well if USC is such a good job, why did the last guy leave? And why did USC whiff on their first few candidates?
Those are good questions. And they’re kind of interwoven.
Some people believe that the real reason behind Pete Carroll (the last guy who had the job) leaving USC for the NFL, was because of the NCAA's continuous, never ending pursuit of the program, over alleged rules violations involving former Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush, and another now former running back, Joe McKnight. I was in that group until just a few days ago, and those potential problems undoubtedly scared some of the interested candidates away.
But after watching Carroll’s goodbye press conference, I’m convinced that he was simply looking for the next big challenge, rather than avoiding a possible hammer coming down from the NCAA. Maybe I’m just a sucker for a guy with a nice tan and a white smile, but I believe him.
Look, I’ve read a lot about Carroll over the years, and the guy is nothing, if not manically competitive. And like any manically competitive person, I think Carroll looked around the landscape at USC, probably looked in the mirror and said, “What else can I do?” He’s won National Championships, dominated the Pac-10, turned Los Angeles into a USC town, put guys in the pros and was pretty much hand-picking every big-time prospect West of the Rockies to come play for him. What else did he have to prove? He’d already climbed the mountain top, did he really need to do it again?
The NFL is the one place in every aspect of his life where Carroll hasn’t been successful. I think once and for all, he’s ready to take the challenge.
Q. Yeh, but come on Aaron, every year the NFL calls Carroll. Why was this year any different?
Well, as far as I can tell, the Seahawks are the only team that has ever offered Carroll such a big say in the player personnel department. They don’t currently have a General Manager, and when they do hire one, he will work in a “Collaborative,” role with Carroll (Wait doesn’t that sound like they’re making an album together? Weird. Anyways...).
Look, I’m not saying that the timing wasn’t a bit sketchy on this one, because it was.
But you’ve got to admit that if Carroll was going to leave USC, the deal wasn’t going to get much sweeter than this. Forget the money (honestly how much can you actually spend when you’re in the office 80 hours a week?), all an NFL coach can ask for are the resources needed to succeed, and the opportunity to go to war with his own 53 players every Sunday.
And that’s exactly what Carroll got from Seattle.
Q. For those of us who don’t know, give the quick Reader’s Digest version of we need to know about the new guy, Lane Kiffin:
Well, the USC ties are there. He was an assistant at the school from 2001-2006, and the offensive coordinator for part of that time.
He coached the Oakland Raiders for a year and change, before Al Davis emerged from hibernation, was convinced that the team should have been a contender (even though they didn't have enough talent to win an Arena League title, let alone a Super Bowl) and fired Kiffin just a few games into the 2008 season.
He then spent 14 months at Tennessee, finishing his only season on Rocky Top with a 7-6 record. And while he was there, he was all over the map, jawing with fellow coaches, bickering with Urban Meyer like two teenage girls fighting over a guy, and ending up with more secondary NCAA violations than I have speeding tickets, which is to say a lot.
Needless to say, it's been a bumpy couple of years for Lane.
Q. Wait, so he went 7-6 in his only year as a college head coach? If USC is such a great job, why would they want him?
Several reasons:
One he brings an All Star cast with him. His father Monte, is widely regarded as one of the best defensive coordinators in football, and will come to USC to coach that side of the ball.
Lane's buddy Ed Orgeron is considered to be one of the top recruiters in the country. For those of you who don’t follow college football, you may remember Orgeron playing himself, as the loud-mouthed, fast-talking coach who recruited Michael Oher to Ole' Miss in The Blind Side movie. That was really him.
But bad movie appearances aside, this is important. Recruiting is the lifeblood of college football, and Orgeron was in charge of exactly that during Carroll’s glorious run in the middle of the last decade. Guys like Bush, Mark Sanchez, LenDale White, you name it, came to USC in large part because of Carroll, but in larger part because of the groundwork laid by Orgeron.
Also, remember too that Kiffin worked at USC until 2006. Some of the oldest players on the current roster played for him. Many others were at least partly recruited by him. He knows Southern California, he knows this school, and he knows this program.
Q. What about Kiffin’s wife Layla? She’s coming to Southern California too, right?
As far as I know. And quite frankly I’m not so sure that she isn’t a bigger loss to the state of Tennessee than her husband is. 
Q. What’s the reaction around Tennessee right now?
Not good. Chris Low of ESPN.com did an excellent job of documenting what was essentially a riot that broke out in Knoxville last night. Couches were burned, cars were nearly flipped. Basically it turned into everything I hope my bachelor party will be, you know, if I ever get married.
Q. During his hastily thrown together press conference, Kiffin claimed that this was the only job he’d have left Tennessee for. Do you believe him? More importantly can you blame him?
Believe it or not, I actually do believe him.
Again, he coached at USC for five years, and knows the area. It’s an easy place to recruit, and it’s a lot easier to go undefeated in Troy than that it is at Tennessee.
But to answer your question more directly, if he were to leave Tennessee, where exactly would he have gone, unless it was for another crack at the NFL?
After he burned so many bridges in the SEC no other school would be willing to touch him. I doubt he'd have left for “big name,” programs in the Big 10 or Big XII either. He has no ties to any of those schools, and quite frankly, even if there were an opening at Ohio State, Oklahoma or any similar place, I don't think those Athletic Director's would even think to call him.
Now onto the second question, can I blame Kiffin for leaving Tennessee? Kinda, sorta.
Look, there’s no doubt that he sold all the kids who committed to him this year and last a bad bag of goods. But this is why we say that kids should be committing to a program and a school, not a coach. You never know what can happen.
Also, this is America, people lie, cheat and steal their way to the top all the time. Yet college basketball and football coaches are the only ones who ever seem to get called out about it. And as good a job as Tennessee is, USC is in fact a step up from it, in salary and also in prestige.
More importantly, isn’t that what every warm blooded, competitive American person in any industry wants? The chance to succeed at the highest level of their profession?
I bet a lot of you are nodding your heads right now. Not all of you, but I’m not talking to all of you. Look, if you’re content being a ski resort bartender, a bouncer at some club, or even someone with a good, but not great job, that’s cool, enjoy life. But not all of us are wired that way. It’s like the old commercial used to say, “In life there are passengers and there are drivers. Drivers wanted.” And right now Kiffin is in the driver's seat.
Now, did he have unfinished business at Tennessee? Absolutely. But dream jobs don’t come along every day.
So with that said, do I blame Kiffin for bailing after just one year on Rocky Top? Again, kinda, sorta.
I just don’t know that if my dream job called tomorrow, that I’d have made a different choice. And I bet you're probably thinking the same.
Q. Out of everything you’ve seen and read, what’s the most surprising aspect of this whole situation to you?
Look, I understand why people are trashing Kiffin on the way out. If it was my team I’d be as furious as Tennessee fans are, and reporters and columnists have every right to bash him for bailing on the program as well.
But what I’m most surprised about, is how on his way out, nobody is giving credit to Kiffin for what he was able to accomplish while he was in Knoxville.
Everyone keeps bringing up the 7-6 record, I get it. But honestly, am I the only one who actually watched games this season?
Because I did watch Tennessee's games, and here's what I saw from them: A team that very easily could have, and maybe, probably, should have beaten Alabama in Tuscaloosa. A team which laid the ground groundwork on how to slow down and nearly stop Tim Tebow and Florida’s offense. A team that crushed Georgia, when a lot of people (including me) thought Georgia was actually pretty good. A team that held on for victories over Kentucky and Vanderbilt late in the season, even though they were more battered and bloodied than Forrest Gump’s platoon in Vietnam.
Watching every week, I can’t think of a single team that got better from the beginning of the season to the end. Kiffin helped Jonathan Crompton go from one of the biggest recruiting busts in recent history to a guy with potential be taken late in the NFL Draft. There’s no doubt in my mind that despite the record, the guy can coach.
And when you factor in all that, with all the recruits that he and his staff brought to Tennessee the last two years, Kiffin is right, even in just 14 months, he’s leaving Knoxville a lot better than he found it (Well not literally. You know, since there was a riot and all last night. But still, you get what I’m saying).
Q. Do you think any changes will come about because of everything that’s happened?
As a matter of fact, I think there will be two.
The first is, I believe that buyouts in the contracts of coaches at all these major colleges will increase exponentially.
For example, in Kiffin’s contract, his buyout was $800,000. $800,000! That's it!
Sure $800,000 might be a lot to you and me, but if you’re USC Athletic Director Mike Garrett, are you letting $800,000 stand in the way of getting the guy you want? Because I’m pretty sure Garrett can make one phone call to a big booster, and have $800,000 sitting in an unmarked briefcase underneath a park bench within an hour.
More importantly, do you know why the buyout was so low? Here's my thinking. When Tennessee hired Kiffin, they probably thought to themselves, “We’re Tennessee. We’re in the SEC. We’re giving Lane all the money he needs to bring in all the assistant coaches of his choice. Who cares what the buyout is, why would he ever leave here?” Only he did. And now they’re looking for a new coach. And you better believe when they find him, his buyout will be a little more than $800,000.
The other change which I think will happen, is that high school recruits become a little more skeptical about enrolling early in school.
Don't get me wrong, I understand the benefits of getting to campus early, going through spring practice, and giving yourself a better opportunity to getting on the field the following year. I do. But after seeing so many kids get burned by the practice at Tennessee, and to smaller extents at USC and Florida, does the risk outweigh the reward?
We all heard the story about Kyle Prater, the No. 1 ranked high school wide receiver in the country, who was literally only hours away from boarding a plan to go to USC when the Pete Carroll news broke. He was devastated, decided to go home and re-open his recruitment. He's just lucky the news didn't break a day later.
But what a lot of people probably don’t know, is that Tennessee actually starts their spring semester today, January 13. Would you want to be the kid who’d gotten to Knoxville on Sunday or Monday only to find out that your coach is skipping town 24 hours later? Because I wouldn’t want to be.
And that’s why I think high school coaches, advisors and parents will take notice, and warn their kids before they decide to enroll early.
Besides, if the coaches at these schools can leave their options open until the last possible second, why shouldn’t the players do the same?
Q. Finally, what does Tennessee do next?
Well like USC, they better find a coach quick, especially with Signing Day just three weeks away.
I’ve already heard a lot of names, and as far as I’m concerned most are bogus.
Tommy Bowden was the first. But wait didn’t he get run out of town at Clemson?
How about former Tennessee offensive coordinator David Cutcliffe? I thought when Kiffin was brought in, Tennessee was trying to rid themselves of all ties to the Phil Fulmer era?
Mike Leach? HA! Oh, you were serious? Randy Edsall? As a Connecticut native, I can comfortably say that he’d fit in on Rocky Top about as well as Kiffin would at the next Knoxville Elks Club meeting.
For my money, there’s only one answer: Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp.
He’s tireless in the film room, practice field and the recruiting trail. He’d likely be able to salvage this class on name recognition alone and also piece together a pretty nice coaching staff. And if there’s one thing he proved in the BCS National Championship game, it’s that he is a SUPERSTAR in the making.
Now I know he’s the head coach in waiting at Texas. But Mack Brown just signed an extension that’ll pay him $5 million a year. You honestly think he’s leaving any time soon?
And I know that Muschamp already said earlier Wednesday that he’s not interested in the job. But at one point wasn’t Nick Saban not interested in the Alabama job? Same with John Calipari and the Kentucky basketball gig?
If you're Tennessee go to Muschamp with an offer he can’t refuse and bring him to Knoxville. As a matter of fact, I'm thinking that a nice $800,000 down payment might be a good place to start.
Sure it won’t be easy to pry the guy away from Texas. But if we’ve learned one thing through this who mess the last 24 hours, it's that every coach is available for the right price.
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With all that being said, you have to feel for the recruits from both programs. This ridiculous rule in college sports where trasnfers have to sit out a year needs to go or atleast needs to be ammended so that if the head coach leaves for greener pastures, you get to do the same in a timely manner. It's crazy.
I had an idea for the Tennessee coaching position as well. Hire Peyton Manning. I'm pretty sure he is capable of qbing the colts, while essentially being their offensive coordinator and running an SEC football program simultaneously.
Another great article AT!!