A History Of USC Coach Lane Kiffin's Golden Touch (UPDATE: Make That *Former* USC Coach)

Or: A Proud Football Program Shoots Itself In The Groin.

Twitter: @LAIreland

Lane Kiffin has had what some might call an eventful coaching career.

Another way of putting it is that his personal connections and self-promotion skills have allowed him to remain prominently employed despite increasingly extensive evidence that he is about as good at coaching as Cleveland is at being a city.

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Seriously, Lane Kiffin is the Somalia of coaches.

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Here's a brief timeline of the carnage.

In 1975, Lane Kiffin was born. His father was/is legendary NFL defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin. This was/is the high point in Lane Kiffin's career.

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In 2001, at age 26, he began working for USC, eventually rising to become offensive coordinator.

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(This period was probably the ACTUAL highlight of his career. Those offenses were pretty good.)

In 2007, Al Davis hired him to become the head coach of the Oakland Raiders when he was only 31. He went 5-15 before being fired midseason as Davis accused him of being a liar.

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To be fair, everyone who coaches the Raiders does poorly, gets fired quickly, and is accused of a horrible crime. The Raiders' first coach was actually Roman Polanski.

Kiffin immediately landed on his feet as coach of Tennessee. In his first year, 2009, the team went 7-6. At one point in the year Kiffin committed an NCAA recruiting violation by publicly accusing Florida coach Urban Meyer of a recruiting violation.

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He also wrecked a Lexus that the school was leasing for him in a late-night single-car crash.

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"Ladiezzzzzzzzz!!!"

And allegedly asked an undergraduate "hostess" to fly to Kansas to help recruit a running back.

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And then in 2010 Kiffin quit — to become head coach at USC.

Joe Murphy

A single 7-6 season in which he'd consistently been a public embarrassment was all USC's athletic department needed to see! "We gotta get this guy, he's solid gold!" said USC's athletic department.

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His shirt looks like a lab coat. For a lab that studies the science of losing.

You'll never f---ing guess how it's gone for Kiffin at USC.

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"Throw the ball to the other team." "What?" "I SAID DO IT."

Yes, it has gone badly.

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Despite elite recruiting classes (sales = Kiffin's strength), the team's performance has ranged from OK to bad. Kiffin's USC teams are currently 3-10 against ranked opponents.

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Kiffin's public relations game remains as shrewd as ever. In 2012 he told reporters he'd never vote USC #1 in the USA Today coaches' poll. USA Today immediately revealed that he had in fact JUST voted USC #1 in their coaches' poll.

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The worst has come this year. Kiffin's 2010 recruiting class was the best in the country, and those players have now had four years in Kiffin's system...and a few weeks ago they lost 10-7 to Washington State. At home.

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"No one cared who I was...until I put on the visor." —Bane Kiffin

Instead of facing questions from actual reporters in the week after the loss, Kiffin staged a FAKE PRESS CONFERENCE, taking questions from an athletic department staffer, and released it on YouTube.

Lane Kiffin is as good at public relations as New Jersey is at being a state.

Last week, playing Utah State at home, Kiffin and his Fightin' Sense Of Entitlements needed a fourth-quarter field goal to win 17-14.

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With games against Stanford, Notre Dame, and suddenly-actually-good UCLA still to come, Lane Kiffin is on the hot seat. His seat is on friggin' fire.

Flickr: macwagen

Really, there's only one way this can end...

...

...

... And that's with USC going 5-7 and Kiffin somehow getting hired to replace Mack Brown at Texas.

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Sorry, Austin.

Update - Sept. 29, 1 p.m. EDT: USC gave up a billion points last night in a loss to Arizona State, and Kiffin has been fired. Onward and upward!