One day after Brian Kelly’s messy exit from Baton Rouge, LSU kept the housecleaning going. The Tigers’ offensive struggles have been painful to watch all season. And somebody had to answer for it. Joe Sloan, the offensive coordinator who’d been getting publicly ripped by Kelly on the sidelines during games, became the next casualty of LSU’s disastrous 5-3 start. But firing Sloan was just the beginning. The Tigers immediately reshuffled their entire offensive coaching staff, making three significant moves that will define how this team finishes the season under interim head coach Frank Wilson.​

LSU didn’t waste time figuring out the new structure. Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger broke down the assignments. Alex Atkins, currently the tight ends coach and run game coordinator, will take over as the primary play-caller for the rest of the season. Tim Rattay, who’s been working as an offensive analyst since joining the staff in February, will step up to coach the quarterbacks. This was the role Sloan held before his promotion to coordinator. Cortez Hankton, the co-offensive coordinator and pass game coordinator, will keep his current responsibilities with the receivers.

Frank Wilson, the associate head coach and running backs coach, is shifting more into his interim head coach duties, while analyst Cordae Hankton (Cortez’s brother) will assume a greater role with the running backs. These aren’t minor tweaks. LSU just completely restructured its offensive leadership in the middle of a season that’s already gone sideways.​

Sloan’s firing was the worst-kept secret in college football after Saturday night’s 49-25 beatdown by Texas A&M. Kelly was caught on camera absolutely laying into Sloan late in the first half. And the viral moment basically sealed his fate. The OC had been with LSU since 2022, initially as the quarterbacks coach who helped develop Heisman winner Jayden Daniels in 2023. Kelly’s own firing on Sunday was even messier than most people realize.

After the Texas A&M loss, the HC showed up at the football facility Sunday morning expecting to make staff changes, presumably firing Sloan and maybe others. Instead, he walked into a tense meeting with athletic director Scott Woodward that quickly spiraled out of control.

What happened next is almost unprecedented. Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry got directly involved in the decision. Landry, a first-term Republican who’d already tweeted criticism after Saturday’s loss, wields serious power over LSU’s Board of Supervisors. He’s appointed six of the members and has four more appointments coming when current terms expire. With no permanent university president in place, Landry essentially had final say on any decision involving major financial implications. And Kelly’s buyout is as major as it gets.

LSU owes him roughly $53 million, representing 90% of his remaining contract salary, though it can be paid out monthly (about $800,000 per month) over several years instead of a lump sum. One LSU source told reporters it was “the most abnormal thing ever” to have the governor directly involved in a football coaching decision, but that’s where things stood.​

Why Finebaum says Kelly never had a chance

Paul Finebaum didn’t mince words when he broke down Brian Kelly’s firing on ESPN’s “Get Up” Monday morning. The timing might have caught people off guard, but Finebaum made it clear this was inevitable. “Not only did they lose on the field, he lost in the locker room. I don’t think he had anybody who believed in him anymore,” Finebaum said. And that was just the start of Kelly’s problems. The stands were basically empty by the end of Saturday’s 49-25 disaster against Texas A&M. Fans had been chanting “Fire Kelly!” throughout the second half. Somehow, the most important person who lost faith in Kelly wasn’t even his boss.

It was Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry, who managed to insert himself into the decision because LSU is operating under an interim president right now. When you’ve got the governor of the state calling emergency meetings with the Board of Supervisors to discuss your job performance, you’re probably not making it to next week.​ The buyout situation is absolutely wild when you break it down the way Finebaum did.

Finebaum added that Scott Woodward, LSU’s athletic director, who’s supposed to be the guy making smart financial decisions, is responsible for not one but two of the biggest buyouts in college football history. Woodward gave Kelly that enormous $54 million parachute, and before that, he handed Jimbo Fisher a $76 million buyout at Texas A&M. So the same AD who’s now pushing Kelly out the door is the one who made it cost a fortune to do so.