Lane Kiffin left Tennessee high and dry.
He rumbled into town 14 months ago looking like the man for the job of returning the Vols to national prominence.
He was young and brash, a total change of pace from former UT coach Phil Fulmer.
He put together an all-star staff and hit the recruiting trail hard, and most Southeastern Conference fans expected to see Tennessee back in the title race in the coming seasons.
Then, almost out of nowhere, he skipped town for USC, leaving an angry mob of students behind.
He bailed on all those players he brought in and made promises to, he bailed on the season ticket holders and he bailed on the program at a very vulnerable time.
Good for him.
Kiffin didn’t do anything especially slimy, sleazy or scuzzy. He did what plenty of other coaches have done and will continue to do in the future.
His dream job came open, he wanted to take it, and he did. Don’t like it?
Change the rules.
Coaches are being paid outrageous sums of money to bring in talented teenagers, who do the majority of the work for no pay and less glory than the coach ultimately receives.
Then, the coach can up sticks and hit the road without warning, and the environment those players signed up for is gone.
Don’t get me wrong. Coaches are important, and a great one will bring a lot of wins and money to his program, but something has to change.
Maybe a portion of a coach’s buyout clause could go to the players he leaves behind.
Or force coaches to make an announcement that they’re open to taking another job at least one calendar year before they sign with another program. Any coach who breaks this rule gets hit with a multi-million-dollar fine.
It’s a tough situation to fix, but it’s not fair to the players.
In this case though, I think the move is good for the Tennessee program in the long run.
In his FanHouse column on Tuesday night, Clay Travis — who wrote a book about the Vols’ 2008 season — detailed how Kiffin had ruffled some players’ feathers by abandoning Tennessee’s traditions.
Citing senior center Josh McNeil, Travis wrote about how Kiffin frequently showed the team highlights of USC players rather than Vols legends, didn’t want to take part in the custom of reciting General Neyland’s maxims before games, brought in the Trojans’ chants and at one point said, “Well, whatever Tennessee’s been doing isn’t working anymore, so we’re coming up with something new. Get used to it.”
After a lifetime of living in the South, I feel it’s safe to say Tennesseans wouldn’t take too kindly to a fast-talking city-slicker from California doing that sort of thing.
The UT program is a proud one, which makes Kiffin’s jump to a bigger pond all the more maddening, but the Vols deserve and need a coach who will embrace them and their traditions.
In the short term, of course, this is terrible for Tennessee. A hire has to be made fast to avoid a signing day disaster, and there aren’t a ton of good candidates out there. Depending on who’s hired, this sets the program back a few years.
Kiffin robbed the cupboard of bigtime assistant Ed Orgeron and his father, defensive mastermind Monte Kiffin, leaving the Vols in shambles and giving USC a quick rebound after Pete Carroll’s departure.
There’s not much of a downside for the Trojans, unless Alligator photographer Harrison Diamond’s prediction that Monte will “die of dysentery on the wagon ride to California” comes true.
