Might be a good time to revisit what resistance an AD ran into when he tried to fire a local Louisiana hero as LSU coach after he went winless in SEC play.

Considering Orgeron's 0-8 record in his last SEC campaign, the caterwauling by local Baton Rouge media and boosters with "access" is almost eerie following Stovall's 0-6 campaign.

Very interesting view of LSU/Louisiana politics from Brodhead's view, an outsider.

Fast-forward from 1982 to 2018 (?). Just change the names.

When the season ended on November 24, LSU's record was a miserable 4-7. For the first time in history, the Tigers had failed to win a single conference game, finishing 0-6 in the SEC.

I recommended to the Chancellor that Stovall be fired immediately and that the Athletic Department get on with its business. To my surprise, he didn't agree. Seems he'd changed his mind in the five weeks since our meeting after the Kentucky game, when he wanted Stovall's scalp.

The Chancellor's new strategy called for me to wait until December 2, the date of the next regularly scheduled meeting of the Board of Supervisors, where I would be required to make a formal recommendation to fire Stovall.

It was a beautiful maneuver that turned what should have been an open-and-shut matter into a public debate, complete with the shredding of Bob Brodhead by the media and the powerful Stovall backers who were set to lobby the Board on the Coach's behalf.

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As the date of the board meeting approached, there was a beehive of activity around town. Tiger Rag, the self-appointed Bible of LSU sports, published a special Pro/Con edition which, rather than presenting both sides of the issue, presented what amounted to a pro-Stovall/anti-Brodhead dissertation. I was later told that Tiger Rag publisher Steve Meyers had attended and participated in sessions held by Stovall backers to mount a "Save Jerry's Job" campaign. So much for journalistic objectivity.

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The Good Old Boy Club, no doubt, had heard of Arnsparger, but its members weren't happy that he was about to become LSU's next football coach. For the first time in 30 years, the Athletic Director would have his man as coach, and that meant the perks would dry up.

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Big John McKeithen, former governor of Louisiana and prominent member of the Board of Supervisors, had already stated his intention to battle my recommendation to fire Stovall. He thought the Coach had the right to finish out the "one little old year left" on his contract. That was, he reasoned, the honorable way all things in this state were done.

I found my seat in this foreign land and could almost see where the lines had been drawn. I suddenly realized that I was scared to death. I felt like little Dorothy who had dared to come in before the Wizard to ask for a new brain for the strawman football program.

I had barely uttered my final syllable when McKeithen,the Wizard, began to bellow, and I stood at the podium in respectful silence, for the duration of his forty-eight-minute rampage. Huey Long would have been proud of Big John's filibuster. He certainly didn't disappoint any of the room's 200-plus occupants who had come looking for fireworks.

He admonished me that firing Stovall could easily cost LSU tax dollars in the Louisiana Legislature at appropriation time. I wondered if he also feared that firing Stovall would cause a drop in the price of oil?

He warned me that firing Stovall could drive a wedge between the university and its alumni, resulting in the cessation of donations and support to the school.

He cautioned me that Warren Rabb, an ex-LSU quarterback standing wild-eyed at the back of the room, wanted to beat me up.

Then out of the clear blue sky, John McKeithen asked me, "Are you wearing a bulletproof vest?" Obviously, he wasn't aware of the police protection my family and I had been under for the past week and a half. Otherwise, he surely wouldn't have uttered perhsaps the most stupid statement ever uttered in a public forum.

from Sacked by Bob Brodhead, pp. 57-63.

All this resistance to firing a coach who went 0-6 in the SEC, because he was a local hero.

Beware. It's going to be that much harder to dislodge Orgeron if and when he fails. Joe Alleva, an outsider, has wildly succeeded in letting the good ole boy network back in the door to run things, after Emmert and Saban showed them the door.

This post was edited on 11/27/16 at 6:00 am