OK, if your first love in life is LSU football, and you remain a diehard LSU fanatic, then you better find a way to support LSU football in as many ways as you can. Many in the LSU fan base have had a hard time doing this in one specific area in the last 6 years—the Head Coach, Les Miles.
On this Valentine’s Day, it is time to put that behind you and to realize that you will be better off learning to love and appreciate Coach Les Miles for who HE is; you should love The Hat, strengths, quirks and all. But first, one last purge is needed by putting the oft-cited comparison to his predecessor in the rear view mirror.
Step 1: Six Years of comparison to Saban is enough—one last compare, and then move on
For the last 6 years, many LSU fans have lamented the departure of Nick Saban’s highly-disciplined, process-driven style. Throw in the fact that Nick Saban is the coach that finally woke the modern day sleeping giant and led the Tigers to the national championship in 2003, and despite winning a national championship of his own in Baton Rouge, Coach Les Miles has had an uphill battle winning and keeping the approval and love of the LSU nation.
This is the case despite his LSU coaching resume, which is similar in accomplishments over their respective FBS coaching careers. Save the fact that Mr. Saban has two Crystal Trophies to his resume versus one for Mr. Miles, the national media, many LSU fans, and plenty in the overall college football world have felt that “The Hat” has been 1) the beneficiary of Nick Saban’s foundation building at LSU, 2) was more lucky than good, and 3) was not that good of a coach, specifically when it came to that real-time, situational clock management at the end of nationally televised games.
There are many ways to compare Miles and Saban, so let’s just boil it down to Saban, recording a 75% (48-16) winning percentage and a national championship in Baton Rouge over 5 years, and Miles recording a 78% (62-17) winning percentage and a national championship over 6 years at LSU. Also consider the head-to-head battle between the two coaches, with each of them garnering 2 wins each. Yes, Saban has a 2nd crystal trophy, but Miles can boast 4 out of 6 seasons with 11+ wins and he has never lost to UAB or ULM while coaching an SEC power, unlike Saban.
Let’s just agree to conclude that Saban and Miles (and Meyer) are damn good coaches who deploy drastically different coaching formulas.
On this Valentine’s Day, let’s just love Les Miles for who he is, and move past the era of comparing Les to Nick.
Let’s focus in on why Coach Les Miles is one of the best coaches in all of FBS football. Let’s make this all about Coach Les Miles, why he is worthy of high praise, and why he will have LSU in the national title hunt more times than not in the next 7 years of his new contract at LSU.
God knows Les has shown he loves LSU, opting for LSU twice when lured to his alma mater up in Ann Arbor.
The man deserves for the LSU Nation to return the favor, en masse. Let’s begin that on this Valentine’s Day starting RIGHT NOW.
Loving Les—What makes him so special?
So, why is Coach so special, and why should this Valentine’s Day be a time to love Les? Ok, this is about football, so the Valentine’s Day reference is a bit much I’ll agree, but you get the point. Let’s lay out the case piece by piece.
Player Recruitment
No one knows the exact contribution of recruiting in the formula for winning, but let’s say that it is somewhere north of 70% of the battle in winning SEC and National Championships. Getting top-notch players to sign on National Signing Day (NSD) each February is no easy task, but Coach Les Miles has living room charisma, as do the coaches he sends out to gain and build relationships with kids and their families. He is one of the best, and this recruiting record is proof that he is elite in this all important area of college football coaching. Take your pick of the various recruiting services over Coach Les’s time in Baton Rouge, whether Scout.com, Rivals.com, ESPN or whatever, and you will see that Les Miles is one of the strongest recruiters in the FBS level of football.
Recruiting Coaches
Save the co-Defensive Coordinator debacle in 2008, and coach Miles has been highly successful in luring and retaining strong assistant and position coaches. When they haven’t worked out, or when they receive better opportunities for advancement, Les has handled their departure with class, and helped them to gain positions that are better fits for them, whether that meant a promotion or a lesser position than what they had at LSU. This goodwill has required a lot of patience from Coach Miles and the LSU nation, but it has been, and will be, worth the principled approach in the long run.
Coach Les Miles possesses such assistants as Frank Wilson, recently touted as the top 2011 recruiter in the country, as well as ace defensive backs coach Ron Cooper to name a few, but the luring of long term Defensive Coordinator Chief Chavis and newly-hired Offensive Coordinator Steve Kragthorpe to the top assistance positions shows the prowess of Coach Miles’s ability to recruit great coaches.
Relationship Les
Coach Miles is a very likable and genuinely friendly man. I personally got the change to meet him three times, including a one-on-one discussion at Walk On’s restaurant, and it was very clear how easily it is for his players to like him. Les is a charismatic man in person. His unique brand of communication does not carry that charisma across a microphone or camera, but in person, it is very real and genuine.
Les Miles is a man who builds his life around relationships. His family is first in his life, and unlike many of his coaching fraternity, when he uses the phrase “Family First”, it is as genuine as could be.
His players want to win for him. His coaches respect him. It all adds up to a significantly positive effect on his coaching style.
The Good Man Les—Running a Clean Program
Coach Miles is a very good man who walks the talk of his faith as good as any. The fruits of this carry across the spectrum of the LSU football program. For starters, it keeps the Tigers out of trouble with the NCAA. Sure, there have been a few mild issues, but compared to most of the other SEC powerhouses, the issues have been extremely mild, and when they have occurred, he has been out in front with self reporting and self penalization.
The Ability to Learn and Correct Mistakes (Finally)
Ok, this has not been his strength all along, most would admit, but he is showing that he can adapt and learn from his mistakes, and he and LSU football are about to reap the harvest from his changes.
He was a bit slow to act on the few, but notable, coaching issues he encountered, but that was due more to his philosophy of treating people respectfully than it was due to a failure to understand that changes needed to be made. It was also due to behind-the-scenes political and monetary issues that the media and public were not privy to.
He was also too slow to fix the clock management issues, but steps have now been taken to clean area up also. This one will need more time to bear out, but before getting too excited about the once-per-season late game issues, one should notice many of the other genius coaches also have their fair share of clock management issues. He is learning, so look for improvement.
He made mistakes in the recruiting retention in the Offensive Line and QB areas, but he has now learned from these mistakes, and has theses two areas on track to be the strengths of the team, instead of the weakness as they were in the last 2-3 seasons.
Make no “mistake” about it (pardon the pun) but Miles has indeed learned from his mistakes, and is poised to reverse these issues and even turn them into strengths, or at least he is leveling the playing field in these areas.
Miles the Motivator
Miles believes in his players, and they feed of his belief in them. Organizational behavior’s “Pygmalion Principle” in part states that a player will perform at a higher level if he truly believes that his coach truly believes in him. Miles is very talented at doing this in a genuine manner. His players buy into this belief and they want to win for him. Most coaches have this at a decent level, but when LSU is in a big-time game, he seems to have an edge over most other coaches in utilizing this motivating tactic, and a big part of that is that he applies it in a genuine manner.
Miles’s “Want” to be at LSU—A True Love Affair
Anyone familiar with the fact that Les played at Michigan for Bo, and knowledgeable of the fact that Bo gave Les his first coaching job at his Alma Mater, and knows that Les was lured to Michigan 2 times, knows that Les love LSU.
Yes, Miles has a quirky vocabulary, but he truly “wants” to be in Baton Rouge. He has no other dream job, he is at it. This is very admirable and is very powerful to use in the above-mentioned areas of player and coaching recruitment. No other SEC coach can probably look you dead in the eye and say the same, but Les can look the recruits dead in the eye and they know he means it when he tells them that LSU is the best college football has to offer. That “want” is very powerful.
Bottom Line
LSU is blessed with a fertile recruiting ground in Louisiana and the surrounding states. LSU has tremendous fan support. LSU has tremendous tradition. LSU has tremendous facilities and arguably the best home field advantage in all of sports in Tiger Stadium.
These are things that give LSU a leg up on many in college football.
But the icing on the proverbial cake may just be The Hat, a man who is on his way to legendary status, and who has as good of talent in his cadre of coaches and players as any coach in the FBS.
LSU is postured as well, and arguably better, than any other college in the country to contend for Crystal Trophies in the next 7 years of The Hat’ contract.
The “Want” is there. The Hat is there. Don’t be the one betting that more Crystal Trophies will not be there at LSU also in these next 7 Years.
Happy Valentine’s Day, Coach!
Kelly Ripa Yvonne Strzechowski Rhona Mitra Kelly Rowland Danica Patrick
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