re: Was Matt Canada an O coaching hire?

Recommended highly by none other than DP. Which is actually the case with several of the hires. Scary, huh?

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It was O. He wanted Kiffin but Saban got him the job at Florida Atlantic. Just to keep him off of O's staff.

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If that is true, then you see why he did! If Lane had half of the talent that LSU has had over the past 4 years the streak would have ended sooner. Bama needed two late defensive stops to keep Ole Miss from providing the upset.

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I genuinely think Canada was hired because of that big thread on here years ago dissecting Canada as an OC at Pitt. Maybe Ponamsky showed the thread to O.

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I don't think that was THE reason, but I'm sure Ponamsky was aware the fans seemed to favor that hire.

Remember, O wasn't the first choice for the job. He probably wasn't the second or third choice. He campaigned hard for the job. One of his biggest campaign promises was that he was going to bring Kiffin over from Bama to be the OC. He knew improving the LSU offense while simultaneously hurting Bama would be a BIG selling point for him. However, when Kiffin to LSU didn't work out O was in a jam. He promised the AD, fans, etc a big name OC and he had to deliver. Canada had just been a finalist the Broyles award and the fans (as evidenced by the TD thread) were going to be happy with the hire. So in essence, O hired the name and not the man. Four games into the season he realized he didn't like the man.

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Canada wouldve worked out fine if o didnt mettle in the offense.

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People love to use phrases like this and it never makes sense to me. A head coach has every right to meddle with any part of his football team as he so chooses because when things fail it falls on him. Name a CEO in any industry that doesn’t have a right to meddle in any part of that business.

My issue is more O ever saying that he wouldn’t interfere with his coaches because I knew that’s a promise he could never keep because no head coach can. Coordinators by design are only looking out for one side of the ball and the head coach is the one who has to make them understand why something may need to be done differently for the betterment of the team.

Yes

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Canada wouldve worked out fine if o didnt mettle in the offense.

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Yea he was an O hire. It was a bad hire because they didn’t see eye to eye on anything and O made promises to Canada he never intended to keep. Canada is a very good OC and was largely effective in what he was brought here to do, Improve QB play, but the constant feuding with O made it a bad hire.

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Yea bc Canada has had so much success since

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I mean, has he really had much opportunity? within months of arriving at Maryland he became interim HC which was not the job he was hire for. Tough spot to be in. Then he became QB coach with the Steelers.

I’m curious to see if he has future success as a college OC again.

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I genuinely think Canada was hired because of that big thread on here years ago dissecting Canada as an OC at Pitt. Maybe Ponamsky showed the thread to O.

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Orrrrr because he won the Broyles award

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it was a feedback loop

the internet wanted Canada...in large part b/c of just winning the Broyles award

O was fully giving the fans what they wanted at that time, if you can recall. this was just another way to do that

so it's both

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Here is Orgeron with SB Nation’s Steven Godfrey, explaining how close Kiffin was to winding up as LSU’s offensive coordinator. Kiffin was definitely coming to LSU from Alabama to be the Tigers’ offensive coordinator, per multiple, multiple sources. And per Orgeron, who’d included Kiffin’s name as OC on a projected coaching staff during his interview. "I know probably — and I can’t blame them — I know that Alabama probably didn’t want him to come here," Orgeron says. "I’m assuming they did everything they could to get him a head job. But he was honest with us. He said, ‘Coach, I’m coming to LSU unless I get a head job, and I want a head job.’ "We thought he had the Houston job. He woulda been dynamite there. Dynamite. Then we hear about Florida Atlantic, and we didn’t think he’d take that. But he calls and says, ‘Hey man, I’m coming. I’ve got one more meeting, and I’m just going to listen to them.’ Ended up, he took the job." Meaning: If FAU hadn’t moved in to hire Kiffin as head coach, he would’ve transitioned from one side of the Bama-LSU rivalry to another. Nick Saban is likely glad he didn’t.

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Here's how close Ed Orgeron came to hiring Lane Kiffin at LSU