Brian Kelly has long been a controversial figure in the realm of college football. Abrasive, fearless, and at times antagonistic, the LSU Tigers' head coach has been put under a magnifying glass for some of his -- admittedly very shareable -- soundbites during postgame availability with the media.
Just this season, Kelly went viral for an outburst aimed at a reporter following his team's 20-10 victory over the Florida Gators, when questioned about the team's poor offensive production.
"Is that seriously the question?" he unleashed. "We won the game -- try another question. What do you want me to tell you? I just laid it out for you! We played the game to win the game. [...] It's one game! You're looking at this from the wrong perspective; we won the football game!"
As he raised his voice, Kelly would go on to call the reporter spoiled, and the internet spread the clip like wildfire.
But when the coach wins football games, their programs are happy to put up with a coach who's a bit rough around the edges for a chance at a national championship. And that was what his LSU team was looking at in the early stages of the season.
Unfortunately, with a larger sample to analyze, LSU's offensive struggles are undeniably bigger than one poor performance, and their inability to score the football came back to bite them as they lost to Ole Miss.
CBS analyst Will Backus had seen enough, and he was ready to pull the plug on Kelly's operation.
"It's not now. It's never for Kelly's Tigers. Their 24-19 loss to No. 13 Ole Miss in Week 5 proved that this is just the same ole Kelly-coached LSU team. Good, but not good enough to compete for anything that matters."
"LSU's defense put up another solid fight, but the Tigers were gassed by the offense's inability to stay on the field. Kelly seems incapable of fielding a complete football team. That means he's not the guy to take LSU where it wants to go."
Harsh words for the legendary head coach, but the season is far from over. Can LSU turn it around?
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