The Heritage Hall-billies

Come listen to a story about a man named Lane,
A rich Volunteer, treated Urban with disdain,
One day as he's off doing the recruitin' battle,
His godfather up and leaves 'SC to coach Seattle,

Seahawks, that is. NFL. Suzy Kolber.

Well, the next thing you know Lane's a millionaire again,
Dumps Rocky Top for the surf of the Pac-Ten
Says, "Bringin' daddy and I'm gonna bring my gal,
Then they fueled up the booster plane and flew to Southern Cal-

-ifornia, that is. Earthquakes. Smog alerts. Governators.


When the first tweets announcing Lane Kiffin's exodus from Tennessee to USC began pouring in Tuesday night, two thoughts immediately came to mind:

1) How does he do it?
2) When did Jeff Zucker become the athletic director at USC?

The announcement that Lane Kiffin was leaving Tennessee after "14 months" to succeed Pete Carroll as coach at USC coincided with the season premiere of American Idol. The juxtaposition was fascinating. How delicious to hear Simon Cowell appraise various hopefuls as having "good energy" or "bad energy." Because if there is one aspect of Kiffin's personality that has stood out in every public appearance I've seen since he took the Tennessee job in 2008 it is this: he exudes bad energy.

The Volunteers had yet to conduct a single spring practice in '09 and Kiffin had already (wrongfully) accused Urban Meyer, the Gator coach who had won two of the previous three national championships, of committing a recruiting violation.

Do you recall Nov. 13, when three Vol football players (Janzen Jackson, Nu'Keese Richardson and Mike Richardson) were arrested for attempted armed robbery? When Kiffin spoke with the media after practice later that day, he emphasized that "we made it 11 months and 11 days without any incidents."

Never mind a variation on the old Chris Rock riff ("You're SUPPOSED to have zero arrests for armed robbery in a football program!"), Kiffin's statement was false, or at best, misleading. One week earlier, although the media had yet to uncover it, freshman safety Nyshier Oliver had been cited for shoplifting at a Knoxville Dillard's. Oliver's arrest took place just five hours before the Vols were to host Memphis at Neyland Stadium and he was taken off the dress roster for that night's game.

Again, all of this preceded the arrests of his three teammates. Was Kiffin lying or does he simply differentiate between felonies and misdemeanors? And how foolish of USC, a program that has leveraged its benefit-of-the-doubt reserves with NCAA investigators beyond sub-prime mortgage levels, to hand the keys to its gridiron future to someone who has yet to grasp that in life there are consequences?

How, though, would Kiffin have learned that lesson? After coordinating a USC offense that boasted not one but two Heisman Trophy winners (and a bevy of future NFL Draft picks besides them), Kiffin was hired as the head coach of the Oakland Raiders at age 31. Hey, John Madden was roughly the same age when Al Davis hired him in 1967 and that worked out swell. But Lane Kiffin is not John Madden. After a one season-plus and a 5-15 record, Kiffin was forced out.

That was perhaps Kiffin's first and last moment as a sympathetic figure. Al Davis bum-rushed the likes of Mike Shanahan and Jon Gruden, too, after all.

For an out-of-work 33-year-old, though, there's landing on your feet and then there's being hired as the head coach at Tennessee.

I'll admit it: we sportswriters are flummoxed by, and not just a little bit envious of, Lane Kiffin. What did Al Davis, what did Tennessee, what does Mike Garrett -- what did his wife, Layla -- see in him that we don't?

I look at Lane Kiffin and I see two figures. I see a little bit of Dubya in the sense that we all wonder where he'd be without his daddy and also in the way he struts around as if his elevated stature is completely deserved. And then I see Ringo Starr. Sure, USC is happy to give Kiffin the gig as long as he brings the rest of the band (his father Monte, the defensive genius; and Ed Orgeron, the recruiting dynamo; and maybe even Norm Chow, the passing game's version of Professor Whoopee) along with him.

What are we missing here? Definitely, Tennessee's defense played well in Kiffin's only season on Rocky Top. It's easy to point out that the Vols lost to UCLA, but they also gave Florida and Alabama one of their toughest games of the regular season and did so on the road. The Vols recruited well last season and were in the midst of compiling another outstanding recruiting class. Kiffin was by no means a failure in his 14 months in Knoxville.

Still, we all wonder, how much of that game success and recruiting success was due not to Lane Kiffin but to the staff with which he had surrounded himself? And why are these men, two and three decades his senior, so eager to allow him to front the band? Is it that they know that Kiffin (and his wife) are simply more presentable to the media?

Honestly, I don't see charisma. I don't see charm. I don't see an ounce of positive energy in Lane Kiffin. And if USC fans are honest with themselves, would they be happy with the Kiffin hire if he weren't bringing his daddy, Orgeron (who, like Kiffin, previously served under Pete Carroll at USC) and potentially Norm Chow along with him?

I don't get it. My question to USC and to Kiffin is, to quote another Pac-10 coach who is also arrogant but has at least earned the right to be, "What's your deal?"