LSU Tigers head coach Lane Kiffin is shamelessly still using the Ole Miss Rebels, the team he ditched in the middle of their first College Football Playoff run, to his advantage from his new home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
As ESPN's Pete Thamel reported, "Four current LSU offensive assistants are joining OC Charlie Weis Jr. at Ole Miss to prepare the team for the CFP run. TE coach Joe Cox, WR coach George McDonald, assistant QB coach Dane Stevens and slot WR coach Sawyer Jordan all returned to Oxford this morning."
Sounds like good news on the surface. And it sounds like a good guy move from Kiffin to let his position coaches finish the season with the Rebs. But then there was this response from Sports Illustrated's Albert Breer.
"This is actually pretty cool. Doing right by the players is the right thing to do, and that’s what Lane Kiffin’s doing," Breer wrote.
Even when Kiffin is doing right by his people, he and Jimmy Sexton are scheming something up to benefit themselves through back channels.
This was a designed PR win for Kiffin in a situation in which the University of Mississippi really had no other choice. Let's not forget Kiffin also gets CFP bonuses from LSU depending on how far Ole Miss goes in the playoff.
Auburn dodged Lane Kiffin bullet in 2022
It's not out of the realm of possibility that the Auburn Tigers would be in Ole Miss's shoes right now had they hired Lane Kiffin in 2022. To Hugh Freeze's credit, even if his X's and O's were dreadful woes, he left AU in a better place than he left it on the recruiting trail. He re-established in-state connections with coaches who never heard from Bryan Harsin and opened doors in Mississippi.
Kiffin could've brought the same number of CFP appearances and SEC championships during that time, but burned everything on the way out like he's doing in Oxford, Mississippi. He'll always be a Bammer at heart. Kiffin seems like someone who would've wanted to make the jump from the Tigers to the Crimson Tide.
Auburn dodged a bullet in a big way. Watching this offseason unfold in the Sip has been reason enough to be thankful the Magical Mystery Tour is unfolding hundreds of miles West of the Loveliest Village on the Plains.