{"id":49113,"date":"2023-07-22T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-22T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=49113"},"modified":"2023-07-21T17:24:32","modified_gmt":"2023-07-21T21:24:32","slug":"lsus-brian-kelly-at-sec-media-days-the-perfect-fit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2023\/07\/22\/lsus-brian-kelly-at-sec-media-days-the-perfect-fit\/","title":{"rendered":"Brian Kelly at SEC Media Days"},"content":{"rendered":"

LSU’s\u00a0<\/span>Brian Kelly<\/strong>\u00a0was the first coach to take the stage at 2023\u2019s SEC media days. Much was made of Kelly\u2019s fit at LSU this time last year. Shortly thereafter, the 2022 season answered those questions emphatically with an unexpected SEC West title. Kelly’s polish at the podium was evident. His years of experience and thoughtful nature combined to present an impressive display of speaking to his team through the media while artfully responding to some questions without truly answering them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kelly answered questions on controversial topics, like hazing at Northwestern and\u00a0<\/span>NCAA sanctions<\/span>\u00a0at Tennessee, with savvy. His answers gave the impression that he took those issues seriously while managing to avoid throwing fellow coaches under the bus. No knock on the previous regime, but he is a far cry from a coach who would physically challenge a random UCLA fan in a zesty blue shirt.<\/span><\/p>\n

Several of Kelly\u2019s comments said a lot about the potential of the 2023 team, as well as the standing of the program in relation to conference powers. Here\u2019s a look at a few of the more meaningful quotes and how fans should interpret them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Can the Transfer Portal Replenish the Secondary?<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n

\u201cAgain, I think when we talk about areas within your program that you\u2019re coming, but you\u2019re not there yet when you have to dip into the transfer portal – and this is just my perspective – but when you have to dip into the transfer portal and bring in that many guys on defense, that\u2019s an area of concern, because you really don\u2019t know what you have until you play against Florida State\u2026We\u2019re a team that needs to get off the field on third down. We did not do a very good job of that last year.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Kudos to Kelly for taking advantage of an opportunity to recruit early in the session. It\u2019s apparent that he would rather not take that many players from the portal. The statement is true, but it\u2019s also a recruiting pitch to high school prospects to come to LSU to build a secondary that doesn\u2019t need transfers.<\/span><\/p>\n

This statement is also a challenge to current players to be better than the 2022 version of the Tiger secondary, which quietly had four players that were drafted or signed as undrafted free agents to NFL teams.<\/span><\/p>\n

What are the Expectations for Jayden Daniels?<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n

\u201cFrom what we saw in the first week, where a step up in the pocket meant to step up and run, or not making those tight-window throws – I think that\u2019s what we saw during the year, was his natural progression of understanding the offense and being more confident.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Kelly saw growth from his starting quarterback,\u00a0<\/span>Jayden Daniels<\/span><\/a>, last year. He understands that it took time for Daniels to get comfortable with running the offense. It took time for the offensive line to mature and gel, and it also took time for Daniels to become confident enough in himself and his receivers to\u00a0<\/span>make throws<\/span><\/a>\u00a0that involved risk.<\/span><\/p>\n

If Kelly’s hope is for that evolution to continue the odds are in his favor. With Daniels year of experience with mostly the same weapons, he\u2019ll have in 2023.<\/span><\/p>\n

Is LSU Closing the Gap with Georgia?<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n

\u201cI know that based upon how we\u2019ve recruited and how we\u2019ll continue to recruit that we\u2019ll have a football roster that will be able to compete against Georgia. Is that right now? No, it\u2019s not. But if we continue to do what we\u2019re doing, we\u2019re going to have a roster that can compete against Georgia, and then it\u2019s just a matter of getting it done on the playing field so everybody then can assess they\u2019ve closed the gap.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Relax, Tiger fans. Coach Kelly is not saying that LSU can\u2019t beat Georgia in a one-game scenario. He\u2019s saying that his program isn\u2019t where Georgia is right now, and he\u2019s right.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kelly is\u00a0<\/span>recruiting well<\/span><\/a>\u00a0at LSU, but not at the level of UGA and not for the same length of time as Kirby Smart. The acknowledgment that he expects to get there should be encouraging for the purple and gold faithful.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Return of Maason Smith and His Impact on the Defense<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n

\u201cYeah, so getting a guy like that back changes a lot of things because last year was a double-fan situation. You could slide the center-guard tackle to one side and really be three-on-two on one side to him. You could add a back to the other side because we really didn\u2019t have an inside guy that could win every single one-on-one matchup. Maason will one those one-on-one matchups.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Defensive tackle\u00a0<\/span>Maason Smith<\/span><\/a>\u00a0was projected to be an All-SEC caliber player last year but tore his ACL in the first series of the season. Kelly spoke on Smith\u2019s abilities while offering a quick lesson in Football 101. Long story short, Smith will command double teams. This creates one-on-one matchups on the edge. Tragically, it also leads to some poor, opposing interior lineman trying to block Harold Perkins<\/strong> when Matt House<\/strong> inevitably sends Perkins on a blitz from an inside linebacker position.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s important to note Kelly’s restrained demeanor when describing Smith’s impact. His statement was not one of hype or promotion it was simply a matter of fact. Smith has the potential to make every other defensive position better.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Photo Credit: Steve Roberts-USA TODAY Sports<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LSU’s\u00a0Brian Kelly\u00a0was the first coach to take the stage at 2023\u2019s SEC media days. Much was made of Kelly\u2019s fit at LSU this time last year. Shortly thereafter, the 2022 season answered those questions emphatically with an unexpected SEC West title. Kelly’s polish at the podium was evident. His years of experience and thoughtful nature […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4690,"featured_media":49119,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2,2056],"tags":[729,9549,86,4580,20,3303],"class_list":["post-49113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sec","category-featured","category-top-25","tag-brian-kelly","tag-harold-perkins","tag-lsu-tigers","tag-matt-house","tag-sec","tag-sec-media-days"],"modified_by":"Kate Pearson Halyburton, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4690"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}