Brian Kelly to LSU, reportedly.
Never saw that one coming.
Oklahoma quarterback Spencer Rattler also ditching the Sooners, not surprising as he was benched for most of the season despite being talked up as a potential Heisman candidate early on.
Yeah, it definitely seems like a step down to me. I know, SEC blah blah blah. But he sure seemed secure as hell at ND.
At LSU they’ll dump him when he loses to Saban for the 3rd time in a row (and he will, most likely in year 3). Add to that the fact that LSU is likely going to lose to Fisher at A&M 2 of the 3 years (and maybe all 3) and could very well lose 2 of 3 to Kiffin and Kelly is on a VERY short leash. The money must be astonishing.
Man, he is one win away this year from competing for a national championship. And ND still might get into the CFP. He’s not gonna do that at LSU anytime soon.
Maybe that’s the secret to his thinking. He can sign a 10 mil, 7 year contract, and be bought out of it in year three, then sign a 12 mil a year contract somewhere else overlapping.
I think you’re a little tongue-in-cheek with this, but that’s not how it works. Any money he earns from coaching somewhere else reduces LSU’s buyout by an equal amount. As I understand it, that’s how all of those contracts are written to prevent exactly the situation you’re describing.
Normally, but he has a lot of power right now, he must getting something major. I obviously don’t know, but how quick, and panicky this came together after Riley yesterday, I wouldn’t be surprised if he flopped his sack on the table and said 100% guaranteed, no concessions on an LSU buyout. Something pried him out of South Bend.
I was shocked when I saw this last night and I still don’t get it. Kelly is the winningist coach in ND history. He has been sniffing around the playoffs each year and ND doesn’t have anything structurally preventing them from winning a national championship each year. He had a job for life unless he was caught with a boyfriend or bad mouthing the pope.
At LSU he’s not going to a better recruiting situation since he doesn’t have the history the fan base will turn on him the second he doesn’t turn them into the next 'Bama. LSU is also a much more tallent poor team than ND today and won’t be competitive for at least three years until his recruits make it through the system. If I was betting I’d say the losses in the next 3 years have him in the hot seat going into year 4 and it’ll be national championship or bust.
The only way this makes sense is if they paid him Sabin money but fully guaranteed. If guess 100 mil over 10 years to make the jump.
Re: ND and Kelly -
I have a good friend who was an executive at ND for a time. He was a good Catholic boy growing up and saw ND as his dream employer, and hoped to retire from there. According to him, the internal politics were(are?) way WAY toxic, and he was out of a job eventually due to being aligned with a loser in a power struggle.
Just speculating, but it could be there are things behind the scenes, that we will never hear about, that make it attractive to Kelly to move on.
And Kelly has shown that he’s not all that good in winning the big game. That will get him in a whole lot of trouble at LSU.
Good guess.
According to The Athletic’s Matt Fortuna and Brody Miller, LSU is giving Kelly a 10-year deal that will make him an enormous amount of money in Baton Rouge.
“LSU’s offer to Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly is a 10-year deal that will take him north of $100 million with incentives, sources tell Brody Miller and me,” Fortuna tweeted.
Week 14 Playoff Committee rankings:
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Georgia
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Michigan
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Alabama
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Cincinnati
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Oklahoma State
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Notre Dame
I think, based on this ranking, that Cincy controls their own destiny. Win and in. Notre Dame only has a shot if 2 of Michigan, Alabama, Cincy, and OkState lose.
Things get REALLY weird if Michigan, 'Bama, Cincy, and OkState ALL lose. Honestly, at that point, I think we just call Georgia the National Champs and have bowl games for fun, but no rankings. If Georgia and Cincy both win, but everybody else loses, have them play a 2 team, 1 game playoff for all the marbles.
Won’t happen, of course.
The teams that are likely in the playoff have mostly benefited from playing lesser teams. Look at who they’ve played who are currently in the top 25. Georgia has two, Arkansas and Clemson. Michigan has two, Michigan State (L) and Ohio State. Alabama has two, Texas A&M (L) and Arkansas. Cincinnati has one- Notre Dame. Oklahoma State has two, Oklahoma and Baylor. Notre Dame has one- Cincinnati (L).
I think the teams that rise to the top of the rankings at the end of the year do so largely because they’ve only played a couple good teams throughout the year.
Prediction -
Alabama beats Georgia for SEC title.
Everyone else wins their titles.
CFP Final four:
- Alabama
- Michigan
- Georgia
- Cincy
First round:
Alabama over Cincy
Georgia over Michigan
Championship
Georgia over Alabama
He’s “not good at winning the big game” because he just doesn’t have the athletic talent to compete with semi-pro SEC teams like Alabama, which are the kind of teams you have to beat in the college football playoffs. I believe that is why he never offered Notre Dame the opportunity to match the contract offer from LSU. It wasn’t a matter of money, it was a matter of hitting a ceiling he knew he could never get through.
My prediction is that he will have LSU back in the top ten within 3 years.
I think there’s still a realistic scenario where Cincinnati wins but still misses the playoffs. Let’s say Alabama and Michigan win their championships, Oklahoma State blows out Baylor in the Big XII championship, and Cincinnati wins a nail-biter against Houston. That scenario could end up with a top 4 of Alabama, Michigan, Georgia, and Oklahoma State.
I’d hope so. This is a team that won the National Championship 2 years ago.
That’s basically just the bare minimum they’d want for any hire.
Oh, yeah. The SEC is a snake pit, and they expect to be the biggest, meanest snake in it.
Another nightmarish scenario: If Georgia, Baylor and Iowa win (and Cincinnati struggles), then Ohio State supporters will demand that their two-loss team get into the playoffs. And there would be sympathetic committee members.
This is actually a common occurrence. A conference like the Big 12, where everybody plays everybody else, will very rarely have more than 3 teams in the Top 25. And in the mega-conferences like the Big 10 and SEC, division play limits the number of conference foes a team will face during the regular season. Right now, the SEC has five teams in the Top 25, but, as you note, both Georgia and Alabama have only played two of them. And, obviously, teams that consistently lose to superior teams won’t be ranked at season’s end.
Maybe college football should have a ‘conference challenge’ like we’re seeing right now in college basketball. The opening weekend of the season, featuring 14 games between the SEC and the Big 10, would be quite enjoyable,