Why didn’t Kelly put this effort into the defensive staff from day 1?

I feel the same way, thus I don’t have an answer. As highly regarded as Kelly is coaching-wise, it’s hard for me to understand how he got caught with his pants down this season the way he did. I mean this was a national championship and beyond - on offense - yet we fielded that joke of a defense. I’m still scratching my head.

I mean you're gonna get downvoted to hell but you're definitley not that far off.

Kelly made some questionable hires and I think everyone felt that way right off the bat. I don't remember Denbrock or House getting anyone around here excited.

Kelly is a great coach. He might not be the best at picking the staff around him. He's had some good ones but seems like throughout his career he's had some bad ones as well. And is big on recycling guys he's already worked with.

My guess is others stepped in this time around and had more of a say for who we go after. I'm sure Kelly had the final say but I believe SW may have nudged him in the direction of guys with LA roots.

Whatever the case may be, we've got the right coaches in the right places now.

It's gonna get fun.

Coaches evolve. He realized he screwed up this year with the defensive staff, the best thing I’m seeing from this is willing to admit mistakes and correct them

Pretty obvious the Louisiana-centric makeup of this staff now. Only Bo played at LSU but with 2 positions open, the entire rest of the staff are either from and/or coached at Louisiana colleges.
Had he gone that route the first go round and hired not the guys he got this time, but “lesser” names and it not worked it would’ve made sense. OK, he was going to focus on in-state, that make absolute sense, he just hired the wrong ones. Or say he hired Parker from Iowa as his DC and surrounded him with name guys with big reputations and that didn’t work, you could say it made sense what he was trying to do. But not that motley crew of a collection of past failures and never succeeded that he put together instead. It’s confusing.

BK knows that if these hires don't work out, he is gone in 3 years.

It's no secret that I absolutely hate BK. Having said that, dumping the bucket on defense was definitely the right move & these hires are "Damn Strong"! I'm not saying he has won me over, but I'm certainly impressed with the moves he has made this off season so far.

He made a mistake. He has seen what he needs and has evolved . He realized that creating a defense will be huge and will be a very reachable goal here at LSU. We are in the hands of a great coach. People can bitch all they want. They are fools.

Agree on cooks.

Steeples was DB coach at Mizzou and was decent on paper with a good recruiting track record

House was a good hire on paper. Great last season at Kentucky. Top 10 defense...AT KENTUCKY. Coached LBs at the very highest level...Superbowl.

It didn't work in hindsight. But It wasn't bad at the time

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Steeples was DB coach at Mizzou and was decent on paper with a good recruiting track record

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Naw dog

High school coach Kelly projected as an ace recruiter

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My question is if he thought it was just a talent issue, why did he fire the whole defensive staff?

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They were supposed to be recruiters + House

Clearly their talent acquisition was not high enough to overcome their coaching deficiencies

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If he keeps winning ten games a season, he’ll never be fired.

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I have to disagree. If he continues to have 9-3 regular seasons, he will be gone in 3 or 4 years.

Case in point:

Les Miles won 10+ games in 7 of his 11 full seasons @ LSU. In the 4 seasons in which he did not win at least 10 games, he went 8-4 (2 years) & 9-3 (2 years). Les was fired for the way he lost the games that he lost & honestly for winning games the way he won them.

Furthermore, in most years going 9-3 in the regular season is not gonna get you into the 12 team playoff. BK will need to go 10-2 or better in the regular season & if he doesn't do that consistently, he won't be here very long.