It's the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Liberty Mutual customizes your car and home insurance to save you money. That's it, that's the ad. No bells and whistles. No guys, I said no bells and whistles. No. Trombones are fine. Visit libertymutual.com and make the switch today. Liberty, Liberty, Liberty, Liberty. Your life keeps moving. Choose an MBA that can keep up. The Flex MBA from Virginia Tech's Pamplin College of Business is designed to work how you work, now and in the future, so you can flex your schedule, not your momentum. Our expert faculty and network of Hokies prepare you for leadership roles and opportunities on your terms. This isn't just earning credits, it's earning recognition. Flex forward into your future in business. Discover the Flex MBA today. Lane Kiffin discouraged after Saturday's scrimmage but talks about the biggest position group of development so far. It's locked on LSU. Here we go. You are locked on LSU, your daily podcast on the LSU Tigers. You're part of the locked on podcast network. Your team every day. Okay, let's get it. It is locked on LSU. Your team every day. I'm your host, Matt Moscona. LSU held a scrimmage Saturday in Tiger Stadium and it did not go well for the offense. If you're in every day or you already heard my recap and if this is your first time ever finding this show, but you've listened to or read a lot of other LSU media who were at that scrimmage in Tiger Stadium. You all heard the same thing. As a matter of fact, I had several of you say, Hey, you said the same thing as media member X, Hunt Palmer, my colleague from Louisiana Sports.net. You and Hunt said the same thing. Yeah, because we both have eyes and we were at the same scrimmage. And if you didn't believe what we said about the scrimmage Saturday, well, Lane Kiffin met with reporters on Tuesday after practice, a much better day for the offense, by the way, if you missed our Tuesday practice report episode, please, please, please go, go catch that. But this was what Lane Kiffin said about Saturday. That was discouraging in the moment, Saturday offensively, you know, the way that we played the lack of explosive plays, the lack of plays made in competitive situations, you know, so that that's discouraging, not where I would expect to be, but, but I also have extremely high expectations. Nobody has higher expectations for us as a program than myself. So you know, Charlie reminds me that, you know, when we made a decision to sign Sam, that this was going to be part of it, you know, that you weren't going to feel as good in the spring because he wasn't going to be available, you know, so you don't have your quarterback, you don't have arguably your top receiver out there. So the top receiver he's talking about is trade as green, who is a tight end, but trade as has been limited so far. Now he's done a lot of the 11 on 11. He participated in the scrimmage. He was there at seven on seven today. One of the things that Lane Kiffin said with respect to trade as green is he, he puts forth so much effort in every rep that he's like, you put the, the, you know, the, the, the vest on them, the tracks, all the biometrics. So like he just moves so much throughout practice and runs so many miles. They just need to limit his output. So that, that's what he's referring to. But Sam, of course, is Sam lemon. And I think something is abundantly clear right now as we look at this LSU team through 10 practices. And it said, who saw Long street and Landon Clark are not yet ready to be players that lead this offense to a championship, which is the expectation this year, by the way, more on that in a second. Landon Clark coming over from Elon. It's a dramatic step up in competition. Not to say he can't get there, just not there now. And who saw Long street has spent one year in college and he played one meaningful game against Montana state when he was at Southern cow. So it won game with meaningful reps. So all that to say, there's a reason you went into the portal and you signed Sam Levin, who is the best quarterback in the portal. And he's the guy that you're expecting to lead this team to great heights in 2026 and possibly 2027 or two years of eligibility remaining. So keeping saying there, look, it all makes sense. Defense returns a lot of talent continuity on the staff. Defense should be ahead of the offense. You go into spring with a defense with a lot of talent, a lot of continuity and offense that's totally brand new. And without the starting quarterback, what did you expect? So you heard him say, look, it's discouraging what we saw on Saturday, five turnovers from the offense in that scrimmage, uh, five, excuse me, five interceptions, and a loss fumble, six turnovers. That was from the first two units on this field goal. It was just very bad. But I think Lane Kiven did a good job also of trying to keep everything in perspective after a very strong offensive gate a day Tuesday. There's a lot of work to do there. It doesn't happen overnight. You know, if I told him, you know, you can't think just because you signed the number one portal class and you come in here that, you know, you're going to national championship and didn't work that way and studied time. It didn't work that way. I mean, didn't work that way last year with the number one class. So when I say there's a lot of work to do, that's not talking about years. That's not buying times. None of that. It's just saying there's a lot of work to do when you come into a program and you've got to change a lot of things when you take over. And not just offensively, but the whole culture of a program takes some time and is get guys, it's the middle of spring. We don't play a game. Luckily today. It's funny to me how I mean, like it is, it's funny, like funny, ha ha. It's super interesting. How many people are listening to Lane Kiven's comments this spring and are perceiving what he's saying as planting seeds sort of doubt and to say, Hey, look, it's not going to be great for LSU this season. And so he's sort of planning those seeds to say whatever expectations you have this year, it's not going to live up to it. I don't get that at all from what Lane Kiven is saying there. Now, listen, I've also been out there to every spring practice when we've had availability. I was at a two hour scrimmage Saturday in Tiger stadium. I was at a two hour practice on Tuesday. I'm going to be out there Thursday at a two hour practice. I'm going to keep watching this team. And I do think it's been revealing watching a lot so far. And there's some things that I think are very obvious. I think you have a ton of talent defensively. I think you've clearly upgraded your talent on the offensive line. And I think the scheme that this coaching staff is putting in offensively is going to put LSU in a position to be really good offensively because we've seen Lane Kiven's offenses do that literally everywhere he's been every year from the first year at Ole Miss all the way through his six seasons, his, his time at, at FAU when he went immediately and it's all the hurry up, no huddle at, at Alabama. This is what he does. Offense follows. And so I think Tuesday was a great reminder of that, that even though Saturday was at Lane Kiven's word was, was discouraging the fact that it wasn't a very good offensive day. Tuesday was a very good offensive day when you saw all the things that are hallmarks of Lane Kiven offenses. They went very fast. You saw coverage bust defensively. You saw big gashing runs from a defense that wasn't prepared to make those tackles. You saw, you know, action to one side, a dump off to the other and a long catch and run. All the things that were maddening trying to defend Lane Kiven's offense, you saw work for LSU's offense on Tuesday, which reminds you it's still all there. So yes, he's right. There's a lot of work to do. And the semantics I think are what's getting a lot of people. I don't want to say confused, but the people who are rooting against LSU, namely Ole Miss fans. And I know there's a lot of Ole Miss fans who watch this show. A lot of, a lot of you found this show during the whole Kiffin saga with LSU. And I get it. I'm very glad that you're here genuinely. I'm, I welcome anybody to come watch the show. But I know there's a lot of people who are spiked watching or hate watching this show or are following LSU this year, because they want Lane Kiven to fail. And so you're going to read into a comment where he says it's going to take time or we, we have work to do as him sort of trying to mute expectations. And you'll ignore the second part of that, which is him saying, I'm not saying it's going to take years. It's just going to take time, which it is, because there is an awful lot of new offensively for this team and you don't have your starting quarterback. So I would submit actually that a day like Tuesday where offensively you're really good without your starting quarterback on the heels of a very disappointing day Monday is actually very encouraging for what this offense can be underscore can what it can be. So in any event, it was a really good day for LSU's offense and Lane Kiven also highlighted one position group in particular that he feels has improved the most so far from the time he arrived to now through 10 practices in spring. You'll hear that next. It's locked on LSU, your team every day. College football playoffs, well, those are past, but we love college football. We love the NHL playoffs as well. And they're here and every shift matters. Every moment is intense. The pressure's at its highest. So just like the performance matters on the ice, it matters off the ice too. That's where Rujiet comes in. Rujiet offers treatments designed to help you get ready and stay ready when it matters. 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So we've talked about LSU and Lane Kiffin feeling like they still have work to do offensively, but he did highlight one position group that he feels like has really taken a giant step in a short amount of time. I think that that offensively position has probably developed the best, you know, through a couple of weeks and, you know, has played well together. And in my opinion is dramatically improved from when we got here. And so that that's probably been the one bright spot, you know, as you re looked at the film. Now again, I got to be, you know, like I said, I have really high standards and expectations and we're not tackling. So that kind of, that obviously creates more yards because there's miss tackles within a game and you'd feel a little better. But I think the offensive line is coming along really well. That has got to be music to every LSU band's ears. Listen, the last two years, the most disappointing position group on the team has been the offensive line. It two seasons ago in 2024, when you had Will Campbell and Emery Jones and this very talented offensive line of, of your four draft picks on that offensive line, they were outstanding pass blockers. They were not very good run blockers. And then last year, they weren't very good in either capacity, protecting the quarterback or run blocking on the offensive line. And so when this coaching staff came in, they had two options. They could have either retained those guys that had played a lot of football, right? DJ Chester was a two year starter, guys like Koa Neckles and Tyree Adams and Ordie Williams, guys who had played a lot of football during their time at LSU in the SEC. And they could have, the staff could have looked at those guys and said, look, they haven't played very well, but they got a lot of experience. So let's teach them our system and build upon the experience they already have. Instead they came in and said, clean slate, wipe it all clean, send them all out of here. The only guys that are back are Braylon Moore and Weston Davis. Now, Braylon Moore was one of the three guys offensively that this staff prioritized. I told you it was Harlan Berry, Trayda's green, Braylon Moore. So they retained Braylon Moore, their starting center, and they also retained Weston Davis, who still has a lot of work to do, to maintain his spot, but he has been starting at right tackle, running with the ones at right tackle. And for now is maintaining that position. We've seen Bo Bordelon play right tackle right now. It's Darren Stray, the Kentucky transfer who's with the twos at right tackle. But all that to say, they started over. They started over with a new coach, and Eric Wolford, James Craig also, and they said, let's go get guys that we evaluate and think fit the mold of what we want to do, even if they haven't played. And not only do they get frontline starters, a true legit left tackle like Jordan Seton, Alubab, who's been a multi year starter in the big 10 at Maryland. They also went and got depth. William Satterwhite from Tennessee, Darren Stray, who we just mentioned from Kentucky. Satterwhite's your center next year. Darren Stray is going to be a starter, probably at right tackle. They went and got, you know, Tompkins, Sean Tompkins out of Baylor, who has been there starting left tackle, probably a backup this year, but could very well be your starting left tackle next year in 20, 27. So they got guys immediately and depth pieces on the offensive line. It's coming together clearly very well. As Kiffin said, the best, most, most improved position groups so far. And we saw some of that on Tuesday's practice. If you heard our practice report, they ran a short yardage goal line situation and they ran situations like third and one and you had to get two yards, boom, hand the ball to Dylan Jones, two yards. I remember last year, look, I was in Nashville for that Vanderbilt game. You remember the play where, where Kate and Durham busted off the long run and gets tackled at the one yard line and we're all sitting there holding our breath going, they're not going to score because they were just that incompetent in those situations. You get stuff, you have a penalty, they move backwards and they don't score. It was nice to see that development, that progress. And another player individually that Lane Kiffin was asked about was Bo Bordelon. Now Bo Bordelon has been in this program for four years. He's a legacy. Of course his dad, Ben Bordelon played at LSU in the nineties and Bo had been running as the second team right tackle. Well, over the last week, he's been running with the first team at left guard, replacing Devin Harper and Lane Kiffin explained why. He's just done a really good job. You know, we moved him into guard and had a competition going there and as of Saturday, you know, won it even though obviously we're not playing a game, but we don't just make a depth chart and you stay there. I think a lot of people do that. You know, like, if you get outplayed, we move the depth chart, you know, daily and he's been doing a great job and deserved a right to go in there and start and did a good job and play tackle and guard and I mean, I think coaching has nothing to do with whoever the coaches were before. Nothing to do with that. Coaching always sometimes fresh starts are good for players and guys come in and see different things or a different system and our line coaches have been really excited about him from day one working. James Craig had a background with him back when he was in high school and so starting a job. Bo Bordelon is a fifth year senior. He's going into his fifth year. He's been in LSU for four seasons. He's played in 42 games. He's just seen a ton, done a ton. It's mostly been as a backup or a tackle eligible. He's never been a starter and I don't know that I love the idea of Bo Bordelon having to be a starter when over the course of four years, he's been a backup or rotational guy, tackle eligible. If you're relying on him, that means one of the highly touted guys in this case, Devin Harper, who was a highly regarded guy from Calvary Baptist, who was an LSU commit, flipped the Ole Miss was last year, a red shirt at Ole Miss, now transferred to LSU. I don't like the fact that he's not winning the job. That's the super high ceiling talented player that clearly has a lot of work to do. The flip side of it is I love the fact that they have competition and that you have a new coaching staff that knows talent wise, what they're looking for in their scheme. That's a big part of it. Remember, Eric Wolford wasn't at Ole Miss a year ago. He was at Kentucky. Now, James Craig was at Ole Miss, but I love the fact that there is real competition. If one guy's playing better, give them an opportunity and what better time to try to taste a sample than in the spring. I'll remind you last spring, they had brought Braylon Moore in from Virginia Tech to be the starting center. Braylon Moore ran with the twos at center all spring. DJ Chester running with the ones at center all last spring. It's a time where you can try a lot of different combinations. You can sample a lot of different things to sort of get a pole position for fall camp whenever that starts, late July, early August. But for right now, Bo Bordel on running with the ones at left guard. I would say left guard, right tackle with Weston Davis or spots still up for grabs. Center with Braylon Moore, right guard, Aluba, left tackle, Jordan Seton. Those jobs are locked down. The question is left, guard, right tackle and depth. That's going to be interesting to watch. Now, it's one other thing that I thought was fascinating hearing Lane Kiffin talk Tuesday after practice. It's about how he evaluates the roster. And he was asked specifically about his relationship with Nick Saban. You're going to enjoy this. That's next. It's locked on LSU, your team every day. If you've ever opened a bank account and thought, where'd all my money go? You're not alone. Keeping track of subscriptions, spending and bills. That can be overwhelming and get overwhelming fast. Well, that's where rocket money comes in, helping you take control of your finances all in one place. How does rocket money help you keep track of your finances? Well, it tracks all your subscriptions in one spot. 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Potential savings vary, subject to terms, conditions and availability, all state North American insurance company and affiliates in North Brick, Illinois. One of the most interesting comments that Lane Kippen made during his media available availability Tuesday was when he was asked specifically if he learned about moving guys in positions and cross training from Nick Saban. Saban has famously had a lot of those. Certainly at his time at LSU, Marcus Spears was a freshman all America tight end and moved to defensive end. Josh Reed was a running back who became a bulletnikov award winner at receiver. Corey Webster was a receiver who moved the cornerback and became an all American and, um, and a high draft pick and a long time NFL players. Saban had a real eye for that. And so we talk about borderline moving positions and we've seen some of that as well. And Lane was asked specifically if he learned that from Saban and he didn't attribute that to Nick Saban, but he did attribute something else. I find myself now like the obsession of winning the obsession of every day of like, there's got to be something that we can do better. And I find myself like that. And I think maybe now our coaches get a little annoyed with me, maybe like I did him. And it's like where you're kind of never pleased. I find myself like that. So that really what I feel taking from him is more than that really the different, but in that you look at everything, could this guy play somewhere else? Could he do something else? Like there's got to be a way to play better than we did yesterday and to practice better than we did yesterday each day. And I mean, that's why I'm here all the time, trying to figure out some way of something we can do better. That should be terrifying to LSU's opponents because Lane Kiven doesn't need to give an explanation. Like one of the first things he said when he did his press conference before spring, he talked about like, you may see me riding in parades and you're being out on stage with Busey and all that. But he's working and we all see it. And like we see the Instagram photos, the coffee pot at 4am. And we see the Instagram stories of Lane Kiven leaving football ops at 930 or 10pm. We saw the social media posts of him jet setting everywhere during the transfer portal period going to see guys like Sam Levitt and Jordan Seaton. And by the way, it paid off. Like nobody's doubting that Lane Kiven's working, but you heard him say it's the obsession of being great. It's finding the thing that gives LSU an advantage, whatever that may be to win. And sort of the impetus of that, you know, when he was asked about some of the jumbo packages and putting guys like Zach Weeks and Deuce Gerald's in a jumbo package offensively, it's just he's constantly innovating and looking for a way to make his team give his team a little advantage. And, you know, he's still in that position by contrast to the thought that many around LSU had with Brian Kelly, that Lane Kiven in his early fifties is still in that position where he is hungry and motivated and driven. I'm not, I'm not one that's ever argued that Brian Kelly wasn't. I, nobody was making the argument Kelly played too much golf when they, when they beat Clemson and were top five in the country that came after the losses started the pile up. But nonetheless, no one can argue against Lane Kiven and the amount of work he has put in to try to make LSU great. Now, well, that sustained for 10 or 15 years or five years, I have no idea, but it's an undeniable truth right now for Lane Kiven. So when you go back to the very start of the show where you talked about, you know, being discouraged by the offense and having high expectations and having work to do and it taking time. Well, the also the, the other part of that, that's the undeniable truth is nobody's working more to figure those things out than Lane Kiven. And judging by his track record, probably get it figured out by the time LSU teased it up and kicks it off against Clemson come Labor Day weekend. There's one more thing that Kiven talked about. I thought was fascinating that I'm probably at some point going to do a, another full episode just on this. But if you remember back to the whole portal era, that, that portal month, one of the things we talked about at Nazium was the evaluation. If you're an everyday or you know that we talked about all the, the amount of evaluation that Lane Kiven and Billy glass cocktail that painstakingly, not just height and weight and athleticism and things like that, but things like personality, the good team guys, how they, how they put a valuation on position groups, all of it. Well, he was asked specifically about the tight end spot. And, and if he felt like he had good numbers there, and it's sort of big got this conversation. I challenge our guys to make sure we evaluate who they are really, really well. Who is the player as they're coming out of high school? Because how, what is their mindset? How competitive are they? You know, because what's going to happen is most likely it's not going to go like they want in the first year and then get into your analytics of, okay, well, if they're going to, you're going to pay them and then they're going to leave after year one, then what did you really get out of them from a business sense first of the money going somewhere else? So I really tried to find that in tight ends, but in all of our players, who really are they in nowadays set up that it is so that they are competitive enough that this is the place they want to be at and not come and do a place for a check because then all of a sudden doesn't go well, they'll get another check somewhere else. And are they going to stay through some university, which is what they need to play through too as a good player. So that obviously character is always part of the evaluation, but I've moved it a lot higher now because of the ability to leave where before you got the 17 year old, well, he was really stuck with you for four years. So he had to eventually buy Henry, which was never going to play. Now they really don't have to just go somewhere else. I think it's a pretty brilliant way to approach it, understanding that you can't just go sign the top tier high school guys every year if there's not a place for them to play immediately, because ultimately you're going to pay them for a year and then they're going to be gone. So how you build a roster, how you build a roster in this era has never been different and it's never been more important to have all those ducks in a row. Well, Lane Kiffin and Billy Glasscock, we'll see what the immediacy means with 40 transfer players, right? How might that evolve over time? It'll be fascinating to see, but we've got a plan. Nobody's working harder from discourage to maybe encourage. We'll see how it develops over the final five practices in spring and throughout fall camp leading up to the 2026 season. Okay, that'll do it for us here on today's episode of Locked on LSU. Please subscribe on podcast or YouTube and let a friend know if they love the Tigers. We got you every single day. It's locked on LSU. Your team every day. The winner games are officially here. And if you're anything like us, you're locking in for events you only get to see on the biggest stage every four years. And that's why following the winner games on Fandall just makes sense, from mental counts to individual events to finding your angle on the sports you care about most. Fandall gives you more ways to stay connected to the action. The drama of curling matches that start slow and somehow get intense fast hockey games that feel different right from opening face off. The winner games are on and there's no better way to follow them than with Fandall. Fandall, play your game. And Doug, there's nowhere I wouldn't go to help someone customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual even if it means sitting front row at a comedy show. Hey everyone, check out this guy and his bird. What is this? Your first date? Oh no, we help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Need a human, him to a bird. Yeah, the bird looks out of your leg anyways. Only pay for what you need at libertymutual.com. Liberty, Liberty, Liberty, Liberty. Hey everyone, this is Ross Jackson, one of the hosts of the Locked on Podcast Network. If your group chat's been a little quiet lately, I want to invite you to come and join ours. If you sign up for the Everyday Air Club, you get access to the members only group chats for your favorite teams, plus national chats for every sport. 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