![Saban]()
Superstar clients are a dime a dozen for CAA super agent Jimmy Sexton,
negotiator of over $3.3 billion in active contracts, per a
Sports Business Journal bio that might actually date back to 2018.
Like any elite agent, if Sexton can pool any of his guys together as a means to leverage the upside of one of their career arcs, why not give it a shot? Or at least that had to be the rationale when Sexton convinced
GOATed Alabama football coach Nick Saban to take a flier on Lane Kiffin as his offensive coordinator back when Kiffin was considered damaged goods.
Kiffin was on the path to being blacklisted in the coaching ranks. He'd failed as a super-young head coach of the Raiders in the NFL before an ill-fated one-year stint at Tennessee. That was followed by an underwhelming three-plus seasons at USC. Burning through three golden opportunities like that before turning 39 years old is, I would wager, a turbulent odyssey the likes of which we'll never see again.
But the football gods smiled upon Kiffin one last time, blessing him with the power of Jimmy Sexton and the generosity of Nick Saban to be employed in Tuscaloosa for a magical three-year stint. Unfortunately, it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows despite the Crimson Tide going to the College Football Playoff in each of Kiffin's three seasons, with a national championship win in the second year.
In a new book by Sexton, it's revealed how incensed Saban was by Kiffin's antics:
https://twitter.com/ByCasagrande/status/1826414897938207069
I have a hot take here: Maybe Saban was jelly of Kiffin's extraordinary football acumen. After all, Saban had gotten by for years on barely game manager-caliber quarterback play, and essentially tasked Kiffin to make lemonade out of lemons at the most important position on the field. Remember Blake Sims? That was the QB Kiffin worked with in 2014, when the Tide lost 42-35 to Ohio State in the CFP semifinals. Sounds like a defense problem, which is Nick's area of expertise!
Then came the natty in the 2015 campaign, with Jake Coker under center. The fact that my first instinct was to Google "jake coker linkedin" as opposed to anything to do with his football career tells you all you need to know. No offense to Coker. He won a freaking national championship. But no, I'm not making this up, he literally sells insurance for a living. That Alabama offense hung five touchdowns on Clemson in a 45-40 triumph (a kickoff TD accounted for the other score).
Jalen Hurts was the QB in Kiffin's last year at Bama. Hurts was such a poor thrower of the ball
at the time that he was benched
the next year in the national title game in favor of Tua Tagovailoa. In the playoffs under Kiffin, Hurts threw the ball only 14 times and completed seven passes in a 24-7 drubbing of Washington. As Kiffin prepared to take the head coaching gig at Florida Atlantic, Saban was so over him by then that they "
parted ways" before the national championship. That game saw Hurts complete just 13 of 31 throws, as Clemson's Deshaun Watson carved up Saban's defense for 420 passing yards in a 35-31 win.
It's easy to see how Kiffin could rub some old curmudgeon like Saban the wrong way. If you ask me, Lane is a little too online. Like I have room to talk, but he's a ball coach after all. Point being, it's hilarious to me that this explosive anecdote about Saban hating Kiffin's guts comes out just as Lane is indirectly praising Saban.
In a series of recent social media posts, Kiffin invokes
a Saban-ism about how positive media chatter about his team is "rat poison." That is, if the players buy too much into the outside praise, it can breed complacency and prove fatal to their national title hopes.
https://twitter.com/Lane_Kiffin/status/1826272564597178849
https://twitter.com/Lane_Kiffin/status/1826435451613552751
https://twitter.com/Lane_Kiffin/status/1826437939729174576
https://twitter.com/Lane_Kiffin/status/1826438263621779634
Upon further reflection, it might be a good thing that Kiffin is so online. While I'll be interested to see if he replies to Saban's low opinion of him, I don't think he really cares. He's so out there with his brash personality that, in a way, it takes some pressure off his players. Some dated dig from Saban isn't going to derail the task at hand.
Ole Miss has a real shot at the national championship this year. They obviously have loads of talent on the roster (see: Senior Bowl watch list tweet above). Nevertheless, I don't see as much hype about them as any other viable contender.
The weirdo mystique of Lane Kiffin gives his teams a perpetual "nothing to lose, let it rip" vibe. He openly
pitches recruits with puppies and sorority girls as selling points. Such a fittingly stark contrast to the suffocating, uptight, championship-or-bust expectations Saban dealt with on an annual basis.
