LSU's Packed Football Schedule and College Politics

Talk a little about LSU, they're gonna be opening with Clemson. That's gonna be a little tiger battle. This year, I believe, last year was in Clemson, their Death Valley. This one will be down in the boot. They fired Ed Orgeron a handful of years ago, huge buyout. Buyout Brian Kelly to 250 some million dollars, spending a lot in NAL. They had to pay Lane's buyout to come from Ole Miss, then pay him a bunch. And it's been reported that they've got some cuts that are going on now in the university. They were having a big meeting with the governor, the Board of Regents, AD, everybody that's involved, all the stakeholders in the state of Louisiana. LSU's always wanted to win, they didn't care, they're unapologetic about it. Do you think we're gonna start seeing, is this unique to LSU, just the uniqueness of the state? Or that there might be more upper level officials start getting involved with this and maybe some of the governance of college athletics, Bill, just with how kind of wild the situation is running right now, lift it or leave it? Well, I think lift it as well. You and I are both 80s and 90s movies buffs, I know. So covering their football program is like watching one of those Grisham movies. It really is, it's great storytelling, it's colorful, it's fun. It's not always fun, probably for LSU fans, but it's a special culture in college football. But they wanna win, and you said it best, your phrasing was perfect. It's unapologetic the way that they want to win there. Otherwise, they don't bring in Lane Kiffin in the middle of the season to undercut another school in the conference's playoff run. They definitely have a lot of pressure on Lane, and I have a little bit of pressure on Sam Levitt, the Arizona State quarterback. And this is, again, a program where the state, the government, might get involved. It's not just about the fans there. So there will be a lot of pressure on them this year, especially in that opener against Clemson. Especially a couple weeks later, when they go to Ole Miss and play at Bohemian Way Stadium in a game where Lane, definitely gonna wanna win that one. They also play at Tennessee and Alabama this year. So it is a loaded schedule for the Tigers. It's kinda how I feel about Michigan. I think they could go nine and three, or eight and four even. But as long as it looks better than it looked when Brian Kelly and LSU got beat by, remember that Texas A&M game last year? That didn't look like LSU football. Our friend Jacob Hester, I mean, he told me a couple days later, that just didn't look like LSU football. And it's gotta look like LSU football this year. You talk about looking like that, and just there's certain identities that programs have always had. And one of the things, LSU has always been known for defense. I mean, there were times there with Les Miles where there were rock fights with Alabama in the 6-9 game, and it's your first team to 14, you feel like might win. LSU always had a good defense. That's the one thing in the last couple of years, they had a great portal class, but their defense was bad last year, Bill. And that identity of what they were, that to me, is what maybe stings people the most with everything. And it's something that might even be going on a little bit at Alabama where, hey, you know what, the Saban, maybe our offense wasn't always the most explosive, but we were always great and tough on defense and well coached. And both of those, the Kaelin DeBoer, who I think is a good coach. That guy thought Brian Kelly was a good coach. But it seemed like both of those programs, maybe now a little bit Alabama, but LSU already had, had lost their identity as tough, physical football programs. Well, and I think the identity stems more from, because offensively, schemes change, right? Like Ohio State football right now versus even when you played, the offensive scheme changes, but the defense is where the identity comes from. Are they hitting? Are they playing good assignment football? Are they flying to the ball? Are they not allowed? I always think with defensive identity, and you obviously played it, so you can tell me more, I think it starts with, can you shut down the run? Is somebody just running all over you? That's the worst when you watch a team just run all over you. And that's what was happening in that LSU-Texas A&M game. Texas A&M was doing whatever they want. And so that identity defensively, Ohio State's hasn't changed much. It's always just tough defense. It's gotten better under Matt Patricia the last couple years. And when you have that, I think the fans are happy. So that's what we'll be watching with LSU as well, as much as I've talked about Sam Levitt. How does their defense play this year? Because they've produced their fair share of NFL talent. I mean, I'm looking at a project we're doing at Sporting News. You could form a 2010 secondary out of just LSU guys. So where are those guys at? The Patrick Peterson, the Morris Claiborne, Honey Badger, those type guys. Where have they been the last couple years? They still have them. Ed Delane was a first round pick.