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October 27, 2025 13 mins
Recapping a sports-heavy weekend with games galore in CFB, the NBA, MLB, and the NFL, one story that has caused a bit of controversy following the conclusion of Week 9 in CFB happens to be none other than LSU parting ways with head coach Brian Kelly yesterday afternoon. Roughly completing a four-year tenure with the Tigers, Brian leaves LSU with a standing record of 34-14. Media personality and host of ESPN's After Further Review on 104.5 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Matt Moscona joins Dan and Chris, shedding a bit of light on LSU's release of Brian Kelly and what direction the university may take moving forward.      
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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Matt moscona host of After Further Review. He's also got
locked on LSU. He's got YouTube channel. I mean, you know, Matt,
you know joke with guests like you all the time
about this. I mean, the business card for you, is
it pretty much just a notepad now? Like do you
hand it to people and it's just like, hey, you
can fold it up? But I mean, you know, it's
just too much for a small little business card.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
I don't know. I mean, it's a busy day, guys.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
But we Yeah, if you were trying to rattle off
all the things that I do, we'd probably be here
for the entirety of this segment.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
All right, So let's get to it, because I know
that a week ago you had been saying there is
no appetite to move on from Brian Kelly, at least
to pay off all of that money. But then, I
mean it was embarrassing on Saturday night. I mean, was
it that much of an embarrassment and a personal affront
these people that they were like, hey, look, you know what,
I can't continue to have this anymore.

Speaker 3 (00:58):
Hey, guys. To clarify, I haven't said that for a week.
I've said that for four years, and that's not an
opinion that I held. That's the belief that was shared
with me by the people who would actually write checks
and make the decisions. One of the maybe big misconceptions
about LSU is, despite the fact that the program has
had a lot of success and is a premier program

(01:19):
in the country, this well, it's not a poverty program.
LSU is also not a wealthy university athletic department.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Louisiana is not a wealthy state.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
So the idea of spending fifty plus million dollars to
pay a coach not to work is not something that.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Has been considered feasible.

Speaker 3 (01:43):
And guys, look, I was in Nashville two saturdays ago
when LSU played Vanderbilt, and that was the LSU Board
of Supervisors trip. They do this once a year of
the board. You know, they're where they're gaudy purple blazers
and they go have a board dinner the Friday night
before the game and then the o they're all in
the field before the game or whatever. So I mean understand,
like all of the powerbroker's decision makers were there in Nashville,

(02:03):
and even after that lost to Vanderbilt. You know, some
conversations I had was still that there was no appetite
to fire Brian Kelly. That Lust were both close road
losses against top ten teams, and that's that's not a
fireable offense. So all that preamble to say, walking into

(02:26):
that game Saturday against Texas A and M it was
not in my or I think anyone's consciousness that Brian
Kelly would be fired.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
If they lost that game.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
The manner in which they lost, how it played out,
the fan revolt of sorts, I can only assume that
they reached a point where they felt like there was
no coming back from something like that in a season
where they were all in, and so during the game,

(02:56):
I'm told conversations started to be had casually about buy out.
There was enough support for it, and they were able
to move forward on Sunday.

Speaker 4 (03:05):
The crazy part is, Matt, you know, because I had somebody,
you know, you want to play Devil's advocate here. I
had somebody from the outside who doesn't really follow LSU
look at it and go, oh wait, all three of
his losses were to top ten ranked teams this year,
and I had to go back and look the last
three years or last two seasons plus this year Brian
Kelling and lost to one unraked team that was at
Florida last year. A those are the losses with two

(03:27):
ranked teams at the time. So it's you know, hindsight's
always twenty twenty. But I think the expectations coming into
this year were he assembled this seventeen to eighteen million
dollar nil class, a returning fifth year star, a quarterback,
like all the recipe for this season was supposed to
be LSU taking that next step. I think if they
had lost a ton of a ton to the draft

(03:47):
and all that kind of stuff and you you go
eight and four, I think most fan bases are reasonable
to go, oh okay, we get it. But it was
because of the expectations for this season that kind of
led to this, right.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yeah, I mean I think expectation is largely gauge all
of these decisions and conversations. Chris they that's within any program,
you know, Washington State be fired up to be five
and three round sure would at LSU, where you came

(04:20):
into this season preseason top ten year four under Brian Kelly.
Uh you mentioned your return Garrett nus Meyer, who was
the leading returning passer in college football in the offseason,
there was this big plea to LSU supporters to fund
the collective to be able to spend more in nil.

Speaker 2 (04:38):
They obliged by the way Brian Kelly did.

Speaker 3 (04:41):
Also remember he did a million dollar match where he
put up a million dollars of his own money to
be contributed toward this roster last off season, so he
I mean, he put his money where his mouth is.
But all of that bred enormous expectation, and then when
they beat Clemson in the open that only grew and

(05:02):
the frustration with the offense to this point, and obviously
to be at three losses before November and then to
have Saturday Night play out the way it did with
for all intents and purposes, you're seeing maybe they would
have had to win out to finish ten and two
and make the playoffs. So in theory, with your season
on the line, to lay down in the second half
and be so thoroughly dominated the way they were was just.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
Alarming to a lot of people. Guys. I still think
this is extremely.

Speaker 3 (05:29):
Reactionary to make this type of decision, because it's not
just the fifty four million they're going to have to pay.
Brian Kelly, they're gonna have to buy out a staff,
they're gonna have to hire a new head coach, a
new staff. And you're talking about, as it was estimated
to me yesterday by one Promenadelish and Booster, they're talking
the neighborhood of one hundred, one hundred and fifteen million

(05:51):
dollars all in to make this change. And that's that's
not couch cushion money for LSU. So that's why yesterday
the governor of the state was involved, the Board of
Supervisors was involved, high level boosters were involved in meetings.

Speaker 2 (06:07):
This was a very very.

Speaker 3 (06:12):
Odd situation how it all played out in the manners
it did.

Speaker 1 (06:16):
Again in ESPN one O four five's in Baton Rouge,
Matt moscona host of after further review, joining us here
on the seven ninety Morning Show. Another thing to scone
that I know you've been talking about and we've talked
about a little bit is Scott Woodward, the athletic director
there at LSU. And I mean it's hard to not

(06:36):
pay attention to his two massive misses when it's come
to hiring coaches. So is there part of this too
where yeah, you know you got somebody going around passing
the hat, collecting the money on Saturday night. But as
part of it too, those people who are putting the
money in the hat saying we're making the hire. He's not.

Speaker 3 (06:56):
I don't think it's necessarily that Dan, But I also
don't think Scott Woodward is going to make this higher.
Louisiana is weird, man. This is a weird political culture,
Like we still have the Napoleonic Code and it's politics
makes for strange bed fellows. And you know, right now

(07:19):
LSU is going through a weird transitional phase where they're
in the process of hiring a new university president. And
remember the athletic director can be hired or fired by
the president. Well there's an interim president right now. Well,
that new president is going to be effectively rubber stamped
by the board of supervisors appointed by the governor. So
really the governor is the one who's going to make

(07:42):
this hire, this decision for a new athletic director, which
I believe will you know, new president, which I believe will.

Speaker 2 (07:48):
Be new athletic director.

Speaker 3 (07:50):
So the question, though, guys, with this timeline, if you're following,
is you know, I don't know that LSU is going
to have a new university president in place before they
make a football higher, and at the university president's non
in place, I don't think they'll make an ad change.

Speaker 2 (08:03):
Before football higher as well.

Speaker 3 (08:05):
But if they don't want Scott Wooder to make the higher,
who's making the higher? So I think you could look
at a situation where Austin Thomas, who's the LSU.

Speaker 2 (08:12):
General manager, probably leading the search, and you.

Speaker 3 (08:17):
Know, whatever is done will probably have some influence from
the governor's office as well, which is just wild to
think that we're at a position where you hire an
athletic director and that person isn't given the autonomy to
do his or her job. But that's that's what it
is for Scott. Look, man, I think people highlight what

(08:38):
you did Dan the Jimbo and Brian Kelly contracts. What
it also point out about A and M is the
contract that he gave Jimbo wasn't the problem. The problem
was when the next athletic director gave Jimbo the extension
after the COVID year, and the Brian Kelly contract never
seemed outlandish until you have this reactionary firing after this loss.

(09:04):
So I look, he also hired j Johnson, who's won
two baseball national titles, which is a big deal. Here
he hired Kim Maulki, who obviously is one of women's
basketball title like some major major kid, he's been actually
an outstanding athletic director. But I understand, and I think
most do. You're judged by your your football hires, and
this one went belly up.

Speaker 4 (09:25):
So talking about Sconna, where does LSU go from here?
I think obviously candidates already being thrown out there. It's
so funny when these happened, Like CBS Sports already prints
the article of the top five names, LSU will target.
Lane Kiffin's name pops up. Obviously, some people have joked
you called Nick Saban and make him tell you no.

Speaker 2 (09:44):
He just said in.

Speaker 4 (09:45):
January his greatest professional regret was leaving LSU. But I
look at the Mike Elcho thing at A and m
you fired Jimbo Fisher as one of the highest paid coaches.
You hire Mike Elcho. I believe coming into the season
he was number thirty two highest paid coach at seven million.
So do you go kind of bargain hunting and go
with maybe an up and comer because you're paying this

(10:05):
massive biot to Brian Kelly and his staff, or do
you continue the big game hunting and going after the
biggest name you can get.

Speaker 3 (10:13):
Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking I'm just making the higher. Right,
if it was Scott Woodward making the higher, we know
Scott's m oh, he's going to go look for the
biggest name possible. You're not knowing who's making the higher.
It's really hard to accurately answer that. What I could
tell you is the Lane Kiffen thing is interesting. There's
some sentiment that you know that he would you know,

(10:35):
he would crawl to Baton rouge.

Speaker 2 (10:37):
I don't know if that's true.

Speaker 3 (10:38):
I can't tell you that I know anything about what
Lane Kiffin's thinking. He's having success at Elemiss, seems very happy.
And in this era, if you have financial buy in,
you can win anywhere. I mean, Indiana's the number Look
at Indiana, Georgia, Tech, Vanderbilt are all in the top
ten right now.

Speaker 2 (10:55):
I mean you you.

Speaker 3 (10:56):
Can win if you have financial buy in. So I
don't know that he necessarily needs to leave all this
to win a championship, which I wouldn't have said even
you know, three four years ago, you're going to hear
the other names, Dan Lanning, Eli drink Whitz is a
Judge Washington, but as a Florida guy, and a couple

(11:19):
of often the radar names that you may want to consider,
just with with LSU or Louisiana Taize. I've heard Joe
Brady mentioned as maybe a person of interest. He's the
OC for the Bills now. Of course, he was on
staff for LSU in twenty nineteen. And maybe a wildcard,
I tell you it's Kelvin Sheppard played linebacker at LSU.
He's currently the defensive coordinator for the Detroit Lions, And

(11:39):
I think there might be an appetite to have someone
with NFL experience, just considering how things are structured now,
where you have a general manager that is going to
manage money in the roster by and large, and the
head coach is going to assemble a staff that's going
to coach the roster. So player friendly coaches that have
that sort of model of experience might be more of

(12:01):
a lean as opposed to the older school coaches who
have always had a lean on high school recruiting. As
we see Man saban Abo, Brian Kelly, Mike Gundy, just.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
Look at the lists a struggled.

Speaker 3 (12:15):
Transition in this era, and I think that's probably a
good indicator of the type of coach you might want
to avoid in this hire.

Speaker 2 (12:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
You can hear him every weekday afternoon on ESPN one
o four to five in Baton Rouge on ESPN one
oh four five as part of After Further Review, and
he also is on locked on LSU. He's got his
own YouTube channel too. The man is never not working.
He's Matt Moscona. You can find him on Twitter at
Matt Moscona. Do you finally get to sleep tonight? Or

(12:43):
you know, is that tomorrow? Is that next month? Any
of those days?

Speaker 3 (12:47):
I sleep well, fellas, I just when when I am awake,
I am sprinting, but I make sure I get my sleep.

Speaker 2 (12:55):
Man, I slept. I got six hours last night. I'm
good man.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
I mean, you know the term irons in the fire.
There's a picture of Matt Moscona's that's it. You got
a lot of them, my buddy.

Speaker 3 (13:07):
It's never boring when you cover LSU. And if we're
being perfectly honest, I tell people all the time, it'd
be having a real job. So as long as they
keep paying me. It's about sports. I'll keep doing that
for sure.

Speaker 1 (13:17):
Scone, you're the best man.

Speaker 2 (13:18):
We'll catch up with you soon, all right, Phillis, talk soon,
all right.

Speaker 1 (13:21):
See Matt Moscona again ESPN one oh four to five.
They're in Baton Rouge.
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