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Never prolong the inevitable.
It’s inevitable that LSU will fire head coach Les Miles this season — we learned that after Saturday night’s loss to Auburn.
There’s no imaginable scenario where Miles keeps his job at the end of the season — it seems like he could even beat Alabama and still be on his way out — and LSU president F. King Alexander and athletic director Joe Alleva have to know that.
They should fire him as soon as possible.
Yes, it can be debated if LSU, in fact, won Saturday’s game, but when you’re coaching for your job, it shouldn’t come down to a debate when you played a team that didn’t score a touchdown.
What’s not debatable is that LSU’s season, which started with national championship aspirations, is effectively over. The Tigers are now playing to go to a nice bowl game and perhaps to land an upset to two down the stretch.
That’s not good enough, especially when Miles was a half away from being fired at the end of last year.
It’s clear: LSU needs a fresh start under new leadership.
Why should LSU act immediately? For a few reasons:
All season, the college football world has been waiting for the other shoe to drop at LSU. You can’t convince me that tension didn’t permeate the Tiger team. Everyone around LSU has been wondering if or how Miles would keep his job. Every play seemed to be a referendum on the head coach. That’s not a proper way to function. That's not a winning environment.
Firing Miles now would remove that tension. Yes, there would still be the “what’s next?” cloud, but the gloom would be broken up a bit. The Tigers might be able to play a little looser knowing that the worst was over.
No one knows who would be the acting head coach should Miles be fired — we can hope it would be interim head coach extraordinaire Ed Orgeron — but no matter who it is, being promoted to LSU head coach would be a tremendous opportunity. Also, the other LSU assistant coaches and staff members would be able to get a head start on looking for their next job, giving them the best possible chance to find an excellent opportunity for 2017 and beyond. Everyone at LSU has lived in purgatory for the past 10 months, give them a break and get it over with.
LSU might already be making calls, but getting out into the marketplace early is a tremendous advantage in the hyper-competitive college coaching carousel. Alleva can start working on Jimbo Fisher, Tom Herman or -- gasp -- Lane Kiffin now and be at the vanguard of any market changes that will surely develop in the weeks to come. There's no downside to that, and there's no reason to deliberately handicap yourself in making such a critical and expensive decision.
