The Josh Innes Show - JIS Classic: Les Miles

Episode Date: July 7, 2025

Here's a 790 era interview with former LSU Coach Les Miles. If I recall, we talked to him somewhat frequently. This is from June of 2018. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

One of our favorites, the national championship winning coach of the Fighting Tigers of LSU, Coach Les Miles. Coach, how are you, sir? Josh, I'm doing great, though. Enjoying the Sunday morning in Baton Rouge and everything is good. Oh, that's great. Now, I was thinking about this before we brought you on. Your favorite moment when you were at LSU, like I'm trying to think

of some of the great moments and I was there to see the majority of them. The one that stands out to me, my favorite is against South Carolina in Tiger Stadium, the flip to the kicker. And I remember the Jim Hawthorne call, he says, how do you like that old ball coach? To me, that is like the almost the quintessential less miles era moment for LSU. Yeah I enjoyed that one myself. We were up by 10 going up by 13 in the field goal just you know still still two scores and the opportunity to make it go up by 17 made them have to score more than twice and so it it was certainly a way to go into half time I promise you.

Yeah, there have been so many of those moments, you know you got the name the mad hatter and all these but when you're in there like that like that there was the cult that did call David once get called for a taunting. Prime day is here with With great kitchen deals, greatness is a deal away. So if you love baking, you can get a deal on a new mixer, transforming you into the Lord of the Loaves. Hear ye, hear ye!

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No, no, no, that was Brad Wing. Wing! Brad Wing runs a fake punt and what they did is they came up to us the last time they punted and they said, listen, nobody's ensuring the punt. In other words, we're a team that certainly has its share of fakes on fourth down, whether it's a punt, whether it's a hand on the ground, run or play. So when they told us that, we said, okay, next time, give it a look, see what you think, Brad. And sure enough, they were basically 100% to the return. Everybody

ran off with their guy. And Brad Wing went down the sideline and scored. Now, somewhere around the five yard line, he takes his hands out in a gesture and says like, well, where is everybody? Right? Okay. And they had just put in a taunting rule and that was really the only taunting that we got on the year. And, but it was by our punter, our punter. I mean, what they said is your team has swag if your punter gets called for taunting. It was beautiful. And you know, you're talking about swag, though. I mean, the defenses, you guys were DBU for many years there, and there was the Badger, and there was Patrick Peterson.

And just go down the, I mean, Laron Landry, I think, was there when you got there. I mean, there were so many good players. And we got the Badger here now in Houston. Have you had a chance to talk with him at all? I mean, I know he dealt with the injury and didn't get the money he wanted in Arizona, but got a one-year deal here. Have you talked with the Badger at all? Well, see, here's the, you know, everybody has representation and that's to me, you know, I would hate to be an opinion that led him in a path that in some way didn't work out in his career. I think one, that he has a natural feel for what he should do.

And like as an example, when you take a one-year deal and you're really saying to the team that you're going to watch my year, this coming year, and then you're going to really have to pay me again, and that's the honey badger. The honey badger, he was never going to be a guy that didn't accept the challenge or really you know could intellectually put himself in the position how to motivate himself for the rest of his career and so I I think that was a great call I think a one-year ticket there with you guys, I think will be just exactly what he needs. And when he was at LSU, there are obviously issues there and he had to miss some games for you guys.

You know, it was the saddest thing I ever had to do. And because, one, he was, he never missed a class, he never missed a practice, he never was late to a practice. He was a consummate teammate. I mean, basically what he was saying was, watch me, play like me, I am yours, you are mine, we're in this together. And I always, my favorite Tyrone Matthew story is when he looks in the mirror, the rest of us see a 5'8", fast and talented, but when he looks in the mirror he sees a guy that's 6'6", 300

pounds, runs 4'3", and has got ball skills that are ridiculous. And there's never a play he can't make. And that's just the way Ty looks at himself. And I, he would be a great coach, he would be a tremendous teammate and the most difficult thing that I had to do while I was at LSU was to, you know, have to say goodbye to a guy that philosophically he fit team he fit to do he he turned teammates and let him I mean I'm just saying he was you guys will so enjoy watching him play on Sunday. That's a coach Les Miles. So gambling is legal now sports betting is legal. Did you did do coaches or when you were coaching, did you ever use a point spread

as a motivation? Did you ever say these, they think you're 20 points worse than Bama or, now you were never 20 point underdog to Bama of course. But you know, did you ever use that as like these people think you can't beat them? Yeah, I like, I don't mind being the underdog, but the point is something I never worked with. You got me? I don't want our guys fixating on numbers, okay? The outcome is all going to be based on the play that you're about to play.

Not about at the end of the game we won. It's all about the very next play and the opportunity to play a team that really doesn't have respect for a great LSU Tigers team that plays extremely well and has swagger and carries themselves. I mean, physicality, you want to play physical football, whoo honey, just come on, line up with these Tigers. And I would always think that there were things better than saying 20 point, 15 point, you know, hey, man, somebody doesn't respect us.

I think there's an opportunity here this afternoon or this evening to earn some respect. Oh this painful painful looks thrown by the Tigers after days like that if you line up against the Tigers and you talk trash in the media or beforehand on twitter or you have made a serious mistake. I want to say I forgot what year was it might have been Mississippi state and somebody from maybe Mississippi state

said something in the media about lsu and this is back when lsu was just you guys were regularly beating up on Mississippi state now states could program and lsu's kind of back and forth with them. But did you ever do that did you look at a quote from a player and say you see what they're saying about you in Mississippi State this guy number 7 thinks this about you guys. Yeah, we we looked at we looked at Florida Florida and beat

this. Last time we're in the swamp and they said basically this this this film said, they quit. They're not any good. We got them. I mean, it was overboard. And from that time forward, I don't think six in a row and certainly three at the swamp. Yeah, again, I just didn't think it would benefit anybody to talk about the Tigers.

You know, who represents... Let me tell you what happened in the game that we lost in that game. We had a great middle linebacker we had that basically could not, he was cramped, couldn't play for a series and Pat Peterson was cramped, couldn't play for a series. And during that those series they scored two touchdowns. Okay, when those two guys were on the field they weren't scoring Okay, so and this guy and this guy said in Basically summed up the game was this the coach? Yeah. No heck. No the coach wouldn't be near stupid as that The the

The the player said, you know, they quit. They've been over. They've been over for us. And I'm going, oh. Well again, it was a nice run. We saw several different Florida coaches, but none of them beat us. And that was a fun run. I mean, that was a fun run.

The sad part is, and we're talking with Les Miles, you know, LSU, and I know we were talking about Vegas a fun run. I mean, that was a fun run. And the sad part is, and we're talking with Les Miles, you know, LSU, and I know we were talking about Vegas a second ago, I mean, the over-under win total is seven, according to Vegas, and they're knowledgeable people. You know, LSU, when you were there for the most part, you opened up most years, top five, top 10, nine and a half, 10 win over-under, sometimes even higher.

Does it upset you to see LSU as down as it is or do you consider it down. Well here here's the truth the they have some really good players and I mean some offensive defensive lineman some linebackers that can flat run hit. Their secondary is to a hit to graduation, but there's some really good players there. And the guys that I know that were recruited by the staff

before, this staff recruits really good players. I mean, you watch that middle linebacker play. You watch those defensive linemen play. There was some recruiting that was done. So I guess what I'm saying is, I never accepted the feeling of, hey, you need to have patience. When you say that you need to have patience, aren't you really just saying to your team,

you're not good enough? Because I want you to know something I never took the field to get myself in position where I said yeah okay we got it we got the plan we the plan is in we're we're ready to play yeah that took some time but I never asked for, hey, give me a break here. Hey, listen, the Tigers are good. Tigers get good players. Tigers can play. Hey, you know what?

We didn't make any mistakes. You guys are going to play your butts off this Saturday and you're going to kick the living hell out of the opponent. And that's just the way it is. This is our day. This is not their day. Are you kidding me? You are the Tigers.

So I always felt differently than, you know, certain people need to have a safety net. If you need a safety net, you need not coach for the Tigers because the Tigers are your safety net. They are the winningest, toughest, most committed group of men that I have been around. And so I, if you lined up with New Orleans, you were second ranked in the nation, we were playing you at Dallas you need. And you beat the hell out of them in the second half of that you're playing Tigers you beat the hell out of Oregon in the second half I was there I mean you guys put it on like

forced like 4 turnovers you crushed him in the second half took their will. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, the their will. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the, um, it was Chip Kelly and, and Scott Faust, Scott Faust was a deep offensive coordinator. He's now the head coach in Nebraska. And of course, coach Kelly's, um, piece of UCLA now, I believe. So, uh, I, uh, physicality, the ability to control a game, be able to make big plays in a passing game, win every special team snap. I promise you I can script it and write it and call it. And when you do that, you just really have a difficult time losing you just I mean you know and you recruit your ass off you you really evaluate effectively yeah I think I think the Tigers are ready to play in that in that Oregon game.

Oh I mean there was that there was Virginia Tech in 07 which is one of the great beat downs to happen in Tiger Stadium there was. Yeah, they played the time to say the LSU and I believe it was to the Blacksboro I was in Washington DC what was actually in Blacksburg was in Washington, I don't remember. I do not either but I because we didn't play when I wasn't there. We just they they came back on the schedule as we owed them a game

and so we did and I think it was 41 to 7 or something like that. I think you guys won 49 to 7. Yeah, okay. I knew it was give or take a 7-pointer. So yeah, the game was a, I remember Keith Zinger, a tight end that was just a tough, hard-nosed guy. And he'd gone through some sickness during the tour days and kind of got his handle back on it. And we put him in motion. We took advantage of a personnel matchup in a running game. Oh, my goodness, that was fun. Hester went and got some yards. Everybody seemed to go get some yards, and we threw the ball well.

And our defense was spectacular. So again, that's how the Tigers are meant to play. And if you want, all you got to do is get some old film out and say, hey, you know what, this deep here, they played with Swagger, they played with, it was, I'll never forget, Moe Claiborne at West Virginia and he really misplayed a ball and he basically said he owed the team. I can remember him going out for a kick return and he says I got you coach knows basically he was paying us back and Sure enough he it was either kick or a punt They kicked the ball to him. He took it to the house and he came right back to me. I told you I told you

Then I want you to know I never had more fun than coach, I mean never. That is, coach we love talking with you coach. You're the best. We're up against it here but we got to have you on again soon. I could talk about your era of LSU football forever. I mean those were some of the most memorable games ever. But we love you coach and hope to talk with you soon. I love the front game, getting up that way and the me and the Tigers. Yes sir, all right, be good coach.

See ya. See ya.