Martin Blank

Assuming your litmus test is .500 or better vs top 25, 10 and 5, who are the coaches who pass your test?

The buyout Kelly would have to pay to LSU in order for him to leave on his own goes away if Woodward gets fired as athletic director.

The buyout that LSU owes Kelly for LSU firing him is completely unaffected by whether Woodward gets fired or not.

No athletic director would agree to a coach buyout clause that effectively guarantees that he’d be fired first before the head coach.

If anything, the quicker you fire Kelly, the easier it is for him to find that 2016 job and reduce that buyout.

It’s $53 million minus whatever he makes at his next coaching job. And he has to use due diligence to find one.

So if he signed a 6 year contract ar $5 million a year at Va Tech or somewhere similar, the buyout goes down by $30 million.

It is paid monthly though. No lump sum at all.

There’s also not a ton to “scrape up.”

Even if you assume the total buyout is $54 million (it’ll be closer to $30 million with offsets), there is no lump sum payment to make, like Billy Napier is about to get.

The buyout is paid monthly, just like Kelly gets paid now. The only difference once Kelly is fired is that he’s being paid to not coach instead of to coach.

So the big money guys would need to get rounded up to make sure they can hire an expensive new coach after the season. But there’s time for that between now and a new hire (Kelly’s hiring was announced on November 30, 2021) - the actual buyout of Kelly doesn’t really require a ton of financial work on the front end.

By the time you factor in offsets and such, you can probably replace the entire offensive staff for under $3 million in terms of buyouts, which again are paid monthly.

I am curious why Scott “is not the decision maker.”

Is that for money reasons?

That is a tough one.

In a perfect world, guys like Scott would know which way the wind is blowing, and know who’s going to get the job. Then go get at least tacit approval of whatever Scott wants to do.

Also agree that there’s good reasons for both sides to agree to a much smaller amount, paid in a lump so Kelly can just go get one more job and not have to worry about LSU suing him for not making enough at his new school.

Almost every coach has the same buyout language. Full guarantee, paid monthly with no lump sum, full offset language and best efforts clauses.

So let’s say you fire Sloan, who makes right at $1 million a year and has 1 year left.

He can definitely go get a QB coach job somewhere, or even a mid major OC job, making $400k to $600k a year. At the very least LSU can argue that he can, and pay the buyout accordingly.

So now you’re only talking about paying Sloan (in this example) around $500k in equal monthly installments for a year, which is chicken feed.

And some of the position coaches will probably find jobs that pay enough to almost cancel out the buyout.

So the staff buyouts are basically meaningless. It’s paying Kelly a net $30 million or so to go away that matters.

If that’s what you took from “(i)f Kelly does him a solid and allows him to find an NFL LB job,” and “(House) has to use “best efforts” to find a new job if fired. If he doesn’t go find an NFL LB job on his own, LSU has the right to deduxxt (sic) from the buyout”?

Then I wish you well in your future endeavors.