bouje

November 23rd, 2009 at 10:32 AM ^

problems would be gone. He is the REAL miracle worker with the real snake oils! (I mean come on he did get William Campbell or at least that's what Dandy Don said!)

Sven_Da_M

November 23rd, 2009 at 10:42 AM ^

... it will become clearer that we dodged a major bullet when we didn't hire Les Miles. He got a pay raise, and coached his "damn fine team" to a title.

But the natives are getting restless, particularly after his epic screwup at the end of the Ole Miss game:

http://www.nola.com/lsu/index.ssf/2009/11/lsu_les_miles_tripping_down_f…

I even heard an analyst on Fox Sports Radio last night basically call Miles a liar with his post-game revisionist comments. This person even speculated that Miles was losing his team and assistant coaches.

bouje

November 23rd, 2009 at 11:21 AM ^

Or how RR has thrown his team under the bus or a coaching decision even remotely close to this one with the game on the line similar to what Miles did?

Seriously show me anyone saying that we can't hold RR to high standards because we do.

Seth9

November 23rd, 2009 at 12:53 PM ^

First of all, claiming that "we dodged a bullet" by not hiring a coach with two recent national championships is stupid. As in incredibly stupid.

Second of all, I have debated Rodriguez's playcalling with you before (particularly some questionable calls in the Illinois and Purdue games). While Rodriguez has yet to make such poor playcalling to end the game as witnessed in the LSU-Ole Miss game, I would argue that other decisions he made (hiring Scott Shafer, for instance) has cost us a lot more wins than Les Miles' playcalling.

Finally, saying we dodged a bullet by not hiring Les Miles after two consecutive losing seasons is idiotic in the extreme. We may not have done much better if Miles were our coach, but you are deluded if you think we would have been worse.

PurpleStuff

November 23rd, 2009 at 1:14 PM ^

Les has only won a single national title at LSU (not two as you claim), and did it in a season in which his team still lost two games. He also inherited a program coming off a great run of recent success (multiple BCS bowl wins and a national title). I think Miami fans are pretty upset that they hired Larry Coker, and he won his first 24 games there and went 35-3 his first three seasons. It is not idiotic at all to question a coach whose record gets worse and worse the further he gets from having Saban's players.

Seth9

November 23rd, 2009 at 3:29 PM ^

I wrote the last post quickly. I have no idea where I got the number 2 from. Stupid of me.

Anyways, Miles' record has gotten worse in the face of playing against Meyer's Tebow-led teams and Alabama's huge recruiting classes, coupled with Miles having to get rid of a top QB recruit due to character issues, leaving a mess at that position (and as we all know, that causes major issues). This set Miles back, but he still has his teams performing at rather high levels. At any rate, he still been producing good defenses and offenses, while recruiting at a high level. LSU should take a step forward on offense next year, and if Miles can produce a good defense, LSU will be a very good team next year.

PurpleStuff

November 23rd, 2009 at 4:47 PM ^

I think Miles is a pretty solid coach (I really liked what he did at Ok. State), but I just wanted to point out that coaches can have dramatic success/failure early in their tenure (Coker and Rodriguez would be my prime examples) that is unrelated to their own ability as coaches.

I think Miles is largely going to be punished for insane expectations from a fanbase that didn't see consistent winners for decades (much like with the criticism of Richt at Georgia). Aside from the debacle against Ole Miss, my only criticism of Miles would be employing Gary Crowton (a guy who has made every program he's left better).

Ponypie

November 23rd, 2009 at 11:43 AM ^

... do our best to ignore Steward Mandel, Lou Holtz, and the other Michigan haters and their lunatic ravings? Mandel's recent pieces have clearly been written to provoke return rants; they proceed from ignorance; are merely unfounded opinions (RR on the hot seat, only 1 or 2 percent of fans support RR, etc.); and reflect an inability to think beyond the reactive - what an idiot, unworthy of attention or response. I confess to having occasionally fallen into the trap of viewing and reading his train wreck of a column, but, as with the Freep and other crooked sources, no more.

k06em01

November 23rd, 2009 at 1:23 PM ^

that lsu/ole miss game reaffirmed every single reason that i did not want les miles as our head coach. lsu is a unique situation. its a talent hot-bed...and a talent hot-bed where seemingly no one wants to leave the state. the talent of his team is slipping a bit as it gets further and further away from the nick saban area, but because of the reasons i just listed, he's still able to recruit very very good players. i'm not sure that he would be able to land those kinds of classes in ann arbor.

the other thing, lsu's got a huge football budget and he's able to hire the very best coordinators, chait and crowton. he's not an expert on either side of the ball. he knows how to hire good coordinators, thats a skill. but its also a skill that requires resources he might not have here.

he's more or less an executive. he's a great motivator. he knows how to put together a great staff. and he's able to recruit his own region very well. his big coaching decisions are at best questionable.

MICHIGAN HAS ITS COACH!