“Left a good job in the ‘Sippi
Working for the man every day and night,
And I never lost one minute of sleepin’,
Worryin’ about the way things might have been,
Big wheel keep on turnin’,
Lane Train keep on burnin’,
Rollin’. . .Rollin. . .Rollin’ on the River. . .”
As you ride the rails in luxury for the college football adventure of your life, my purple-and-gold fanatics, your breath will be taken away by the picturesque views of record-setting offenses and the unhinged, pearl-clutching anger of fans from every corner of the Southeastern Conference.
As an exclusive rider on The Lane Train, you will be offered a slew of five-star amenities, including bottled water distilled from the tears of Ole Miss fans, a social media trolling exercise class with a free burner account, an all-you-can-eat buffet of pettiness to assist with feuding with Paul Finebaum, and, of course, your very own complimentary LSU visor.
This is, of course, an old-fashioned whistle-stop tour where we will make frequent stops at Lawsuit Injunction Junction, Hot Yogaville, and Haters Going To Hate Township. The Lane Train is an experience you won’t soon forget.
ALL ABOARD for The Lane Train!!!
“I hear a Lane Train a-comin’, it’s coming around the bend,
“The Tigers haven’t seen a coach like him, since I don’t know when. . .”
With the speed of a locomotive, Lane Kiffin has become college football’s biggest agent of chaos.
He led Ole Miss to its first College Football Playoff appearance, only to throw himself off that Rebel train to come to LSU, but still tried to coach both at the same time, which created a PR nightmare.
He followed that up with raiding the NCAA Transfer Portal, which helped him produce a reportedly $50 million roster for this season, but then followed that up with doing an unnecessary Vanity Fair interview that caused a firestorm.
After a period of odd quietness, he attempted to add former Ole Miss players who were on NFL training camp rosters to his team. This resulted in an injunction hearing in Baton Rouge, a federal lawsuit filed by the SEC and Commissioner Greg Sankey against LSU and Kiffin, and a threat of kicking out one of the founding members of the conference. This week, things have de-escalated as Kiffin opted to complete its roster without the two former NFL camp players, and the SEC opted not to vote to kick out LSU.
Despite the Louisiana court ruling that LSU could roster the players, Kiffin wisely did not for the season opener. And what did the most hated man in college football do on Saturday? His team ran over and through a program led by a two-time national championship coach, Dabo Swinney. A man who won those two titles against the G.O.A.T. Nick Saban and mighty Alabama.
The 51-10 pummeling for Dabo was the largest in more than 200 games (241 to be exact), and the orange-clad Tigers went 1-for-13 on third down, which was tied for the worst in a game under Dabo. It was a statement and a loud one to everyone inside Death Valley, and the millions watching at home.
“Don’t give us your aggravation,
We had it with your discipline,
Saturday night’s alright for fighting,
Get a little action in,
Get about as oiled as a ‘ol Lane Train,
Gonna set this game alight . . .”
The Lane Train does not care if you like his antics, or if you think he is a dirtbag. He is here in Baton Rouge to do one thing – win and win big. If that means you view him as a modern-day mercenary, then so be it.
The Lane Train, who is the first head coach at three different SEC schools, is not stopping for you.
To be fair, we have seen this all before, but it was packaged in different colors.
Legendary former Florida and South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier was the original unfiltered quote machine. He simultaneously ran up the score and his mouth.
Why? Because he could.
Kiffin is Spurrier 2.0, another QB whisperer and offensive savant, a visor-wearing, genius play caller who loves stirring the proverbial pot.
To the dismay of outsiders, LSU and its die-hard fan base have no reservations about being hated on, and they have a lengthy history of embracing guys who others hate or ridicule.
Les Miles spoke in incomplete sentences, ate grass, and failed to understand clock management. Yet. The Mad Hatter won them a national title in 2007 and played for another in 2011, so they loved him for a long while. That was until things grew stale and the program faded.
Ed Orgeron had the worst coaching tenure in SEC history at Ole Miss and was known more for his thick Cajun accent and ripping off his shirt and smashing Red Bulls. Yet, as a Tigers’ assistant and then interim coach before being hired full-time to replace the fired Miles during the 2016 Tigers’ season, he led the team to a historic 15-0 run for the 2019 national championship.
Everyone loved him “Coach O” until he cratered, and happily accepted a $17.1 million termination buyout to exit after the 2021 season. He headed to Florida beach bars to flex for the next four years before Kiffin hired him in mid-May as a special assistant to recruiting and defense.
Hell, LSU fans accepted Orgeron predecessor Brian Kelly for a little while, even after his fake accents and lame recruiting videos made him the butt of jokes. He was their guy as Jayden Daniels won the 2023 Heisman Trophy. But that changed when he, too, began to underperform and was fired last October 26 a day after Texas A&M obliterated LSU by 24 points before a packed Tiger Stadium and 6.76 million TV viewers.
It’s no surprise the same LSU fans who called Kiffin a choker, a smart-aleck punk, and claimed their previous head coach was better than Kiffin (you know who you are) are now fully on board The Lane Train. He is their guy now, and they will ride or die with him.
“People in the Bayou, join in,
Form a Lane Train. . .Lane Train. . .”
LSU is a legit national championship contender, and Kiffin will very likely win that elusive national championship as a head coach in Baton Rouge. That said, The Lane Train rarely ends pleasantly for the conductor or its passengers. The train always derails and does so in a manner so spectacularly that it becomes the lead story on the five o’clock news and ESPN.
There was famed Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis using a projector to explain why he fired Kiffin, while also calling him a “flat-out liar” and “professional liar.”
He then left Tennessee after one year to take the USC job, which resulted in an awkward departure presser and fans in later years throwing golf balls and mustard bottles at him on the field. There was also the dream job he took, which resulted in him being famously fired on the tarmac at the Los Angeles airport.
Kiffin accepted and attended the Nick Saban Rehab Program for Coaches at Alabama. He helped the Crimson Tide win the 2015 national championship but was fired just prior to the 2016 title game due to taking over as head coach at FAU, which was mostly a controversy-free experience until the internet myth of his alias of “Joey Freshwater” started spreading like wildfire. It has gotten another current dose of exposure due to published excerpts from a new book by John Talty, which describes some of Kiffin’s alleged risqué behavior. Read it but parental control is advised.
And now, of course, the messy and brutal divorce from Ole Miss, as he left one SEC wife for her prettier and possibly drunk neighbor down the block and wondered why she was upset about it.
The Lane Train has already put together a legendary 10-month run, and we’re just more than a week from witnessing his return to Oxford.
“Getting off that bus at Ole Miss. . .wooo, that’s gonna be funnn bay-bee,” Orgeron said with a huge laugh in July at the annual Louisiana High School Coaches’ Association annual clinic.
Full steam ahead.
Raymond Partsch III is the co-host of “RP3 & Meche” which is broadcast weekdays (11-1) on ESPN 103.7 Lafayette and 104.1 Lake Charles — Southwest Louisiana’s Sports Station.
