While admitting that I am not a fan of this decision, here's how it seems to have gone down.

Throughout the season, Alleva and others in the administration grew comfortable with Orgeron absent a "home run hire." When the list of potential candidates was produced, a lot of them failed the "would I rather have than Ed" test (e.g., Fedora).

It became a three man race with O in third place: Jimbo, Herman and O. Jimbo was the most proven commodity and was #1. LSU was willing to accede to most of Jimbo's demands and they were legion. Ultimately, Jimbo said no to LSU's best offer.

Herman was the wunderkind and had the most upside. He was viewed as potentially Saban-like. An offensive savant to pair nicely with Aranda. However, Herman had some red flags. He failed spectacularly this year, for example, at keeping his team motivated when things got bumpy. In contrast, O was able to get the Tigers off of the mat after Alabama and put a hurtin on Arkansas. Herman was great in the big games, but his team was not prepared against many lesser opponents (put aside the three losses, there were other games such as Tulsa where the Cougars looked ill prepared).

Despite all of this, Alleva was prepared to make Herman the head coach, in part due to the upside. However, there was an economic point at which Joe would not go above. Herman wanted Nick Saban's arrangement at Alabama. Full control, $7 million per year and a heft buyout. Guys like Saban get that because they are as close to a sure thing as you can get. Herman, as noted above, was not a sure thing. LSU was willing to pay him a hefty sum and give him control. But LSU was unwilling to tie themselves so financially to a coach that if he failed, it would have a profound impact to the program for years to come.

O, on the other hand, was willing to take all of that risk off of Alleva. O was willing to work for small potatoes and no buyout. This allowed Alleva to lock down Aranda with $2 million and chase a top OC with a top of the market salary (whether that is Kiffin remains to be seen). O basically told the administration that he would prove that with the talent he had assembled and better offensive coaches, he could get us to the promised land and if he didn't, they could fire him with no economic hit.

Ultimately, the gap between what Herman wanted and LSU was willing to give was larger than the risk-adjusted value of hiring Herman over O.

So while I would have still taken the chance on Herman, the decision being announced today is not as shocking to me as it is to many of you. It's not a simple question of would you rather have O or Herman as HC in 2017. It's also a function of costs and downside risk. Herman clearly wins if all things are equal. But O's willingness to work for cheap and protect LSU's downside ultimately won the day.