re: Why are we talking about anyone but Aranda? He is the Head Coach that LSU needs...

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I’m not holding 2020 against anyone.

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WE hold it against Orgeron so why not Aranda?

Thankfully, he’s not one of us. For that reason, he can analyze situations well and coach with clarity.

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You think there are fewer issues with Aranda than Fickell, Napier or Riley? Or coordinators like Elko, Freeman or Briles. Please explain

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Okay, but this is going to take a bit.

Riley is a fantastic coordinator, but he has yet to build anything like a championship defense in 5 years. I've heard it argued the he doesn't have access to recruit defensive talent, which I don't buy because there's all kinds of talent in Texas. I've heard it said that you can't build a good defense in the Big-12, but there's some good defenses right now. Oklahoma State is 3rd, Iowa State is 10th, Baylor is 38th, and Oklahoma is 74th (for comparison LSU is 70th). So with all the resources at his disposal at Oklahoma, he hasn't been able to build a great defense. Consequently, we can't say with certainty that he can build a defense at LSU. This is a deficiency at this point, not an unknown.

I don't think we can get Fickell. He seems like he wants to stay in the midwest. That's a huge negative.

I've tried to get people to convince me of Napier because it seems he could become our coach (and I'd like to feel good if it happens), but no one has made much of a stab at it. He's supposedly a good recruiter, but much of the evidence for this is from his time in Alabama where he had the Alabama recruiting machine helping and Saban closing. So, I don't really know that he can be an elite recruiter. I'm told he was a great coordinator, but I don't see much evidence of that. I see a couple years in Clemson that were good, but at that time he was assisting Dabo in making the calls. So I don't think we can say that offense was him. Plus, after he left Clemson he went back to being a position coach, which is not something you'd see if those results were his. The only other year he was an OC was at Arizona in 2017, where the offense finished 67th. That's not particularly good, and it looks worse when you discover that Arizona was ranked 16th the year before and 12th the year after. So, I don't see evidence that he was a good coordinator. Then I'm told of the fine work he's done in the Sun Belt, which is indeed nice, but doing well in the Sun Belt does not always correlate to success in the SEC. So I see a lot of questions there.

That brings us to Aranda. He was clearly a top coordinator (won awards for it), and won a championship as a coordinator. So that's a major factor in his favor. Aranda is to defense what Riley is to offense. While Riley hasn't been able to build a defense in 5 years, Aranda has already built a decent offense at Baylor (Baylor is 24th while OU is 31st) and he's done it with mostly 3-star recruits. The big question is recruiting with Dave. He has a nice list from LSU, but that was with LSU as a draw and Orgeron closing. However, when we look at Baylor there doesn't seem to be a drop off from their traditional rankings. So he can recruit well, but we don't know if he can recruit at an elite level. So he only has one unknown (not a deficiency). He might not have the experience one would want as a HC, but he has a few years as an assistant HC at LSU and we saw what happened once he left. As an added bonus, he's got a lot of familiarity with the players and staff. So his transition will be smooth and quick.

The coordinators you listed are good coordinators (just like Aranda), but they don't have any HC experience. That makes Aranda a better option.

So yes, I think Aranda is the least risky. At this point I would be happy with Riley as well, but I would rather Aranda.

There's on other thing that should be considered in choosing between Aranda and Riley. They've gone head to head 3 times and Dave has shut down Riley's offense. One time might be a fluke, but 3 times is significant. In addition, two of those times Dave was at Baylor with a significant talent disparity.

I've been on the Aranda bandwagon since Whisky.

I DO have a bit of trepidation. Past relationships seem to be a low probability endeavor. But Woodward didn't originally hire him and he'd select his own staff, so I'd be willing to take a chance on him.

Coaches need to know that the admin has faith in them. I'd hope that could be done with a 5-7 year or so initial contract. Limit any potential downside. Upside is obvious.

I'm just a low level booster but haven't signed a check in a couple of years. I have a check ready if Aranda, and his hire would also get my arse back in my seats. I can't say that for some of the other candidates being speculated upon.