Never change, Lane. Never change... With Lane Kiffin coming over to Baton Rouge from Magnolia Bowl rival Ole Miss, expect for these things to be a vibrant part of LSU Tigers football moving forward. He will speak his mind at the podium, and over on social media. Kiffin will run a high-octane passing offense. More importantly, his LSU teams should win a ton of games, based on how they are built up.
That is right. Kiffin is a lot of things, but he is The Portal King. Curt Cignetti may be trying to take his crown over in Indiana, but Kiffin has been proficient at building great teams out of the portal for a little big longer. While he did recruit well out of high school over at Ole Miss, his incredibly high hit rate out of the portal in Oxford is why the Rebels ascended to a College Football Playoff team in his final year.
Of course, Brian Kelly tried to win in the transfer portal last year at LSU, and got burnt to a crisp... Outside of Mansoor Delane coming over from Virginia Tech, there were far more misses than hits from LSU out of the portal in what was Kelly's final year. Well, guess what? Kiffin is back on his stuff alright, as he once again brought with him a plethora of players to LSU from out of the transfer portal.
ESPN's Mark Schlabach explained why this could be an issue perfectly in his write-up about LSU here.
Lane Kiffin plans to be the transfer portal king yet again in first LSU spring
Schlabach touched on LSU having the No. 1-rated portal class in this offseason cycle. Some of the biggest names coming to Baton Rouge for spring semester include quarterback Sam Leavitt (Arizona State), defensive lineman Princewill Umanmielen (Ole Miss), book-end tackle Jordan Seaton (Colorado), and defensive back Ty Benefield (Boise State). Umanmielen just played for Kiffin last year.
The upside with these players could get LSU into the College Football Playoff. Kiffin is taking over a program that has won it all before, but only made the playoff once before in its history. Although future playoff expansion could help LSU out a ton, Kiffin has the pulse of what makes a player great coming out of the portal. Yes, Umanmielen followed him, but everyone wanted the three other guys.
Most importantly, Kiffin needs to continue to win in the portal because he simultaneously has to repair some of the fractured recruting relationships that were butchered by an out-of-place Kelly during his middling four-year run in Baton Rouge. Kiffin is a lot of things, but he is not trying to fake it as an SEC head coach. He is one and a darn good one at that. The question is how bad did it get here.
Kiffin should have quick buy-in from his players and coaches because a change needed to come to Baton Rouge in the worst way possible. Kelly seemed to coach in spite of his players, whereas Kiffin has a unique way of connecting with younger people. He does love to burn bridges, but it never felt like at Ole Miss he operated from a level above any of his players. His guys always played hard for him.
Kiffin does not have to live or die by the transfer portal because he was long ago crowned its king.