The Josh Innes Show - Louisiana Governor Is A Sh*t Show Part 1

Episode Date: October 30, 2025

Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry was the biggest story in the country yesterday. He spoked about the LSU coaching search and said some stuff that really got people going. Let's break this down in two parts. Part one, lets listen to his comments on coaches buyouts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All right. Let's see here. So my university, LSU, the place that I went to for two years or so and got kicked out of, the place I root for in football, the place that I love, and the city that I love in Baton Rouge is all over the news today because yesterday the governor said some things that have people's attention. I think people are overreacting to it a little bit, and I think that's how the way of the world is. I think the Internet works that way, and that's the way the Internet's supposed to work, where people. overreact and think that everything's the worst thing that ever happened. Now, I'm going to play you some of the audio of Governor Jeff Landry in Louisiana, and then we'll get into this here. But I don't think this is as bad as people think it is. I think people are overreacting to it because people don't fully understand everything,

and people just want to be outraged and people want to be angry, and that's the way people work. But I don't think that this is some sort of death knell or something that's going to kill LSU because of this. But I can understand where people look at it and go, holy shit, this looks preposterous. So let's play a couple of commercials and get into it. All right. So one of the big things people are taking from this is that the governor of Louisiana said that the athletic director of LSU is not going to be hiring the next head coach. Let's play a little bit of this.

I'm not going to be picking the next coach. But I can promise you, we're going to pick a coach, and we're going to make sure that that coach is successful. And we're going to make sure that he's compensated properly. And we're going to put metrics on it. because I'm tired of rewarding failure in this country and then leaving the taxpayers on the foot, you know, to foot the bill. So let's start there.

First of all, the taxpayers aren't going to have to foot the bill for this at LSU because the money's being paid by donors and rich people and that's their cash. They can do what they want with it. So the taxpayers are not paying for the LSU football coach. That is false and that is dumb. That's number one. But number two, we'll start with this audio. Then there's some other audio, Jeff Landry,

who, by the way, I had no idea sounded like that. Because I don't follow Louisiana politics that much. I had no clue that Jeff Landry sounded like that. But that's how he sounds. And there he is. He's like a little mini Huey Long here. Except, obviously, different political leanings than Huey Long was, obviously. But that is, it's like a little mini kind of Huey Long.

It's very Louisiana sound of God, I'm tired of rewarding failure in this country, like that kind of stuff. But anyway, so let's start. Actually, let me go back to the beginning. a little bit and play from the beginning, just a little bit. I'm not going to be picking the next coach, but I can promise you, we're going to pick a coach, and we're going to make sure that that coach is successful, and we're going to make sure that he's compensated properly, and we're going to put metrics on it. See, when you say we're going to put metrics on it, by that he's indicating that LSU,

they want to create a world where coaches have contracts, I would assume this is what he means, that coaches' contracts should have more incentives and not just be, hey, here's a billion dollars and when you fail and we fire you are going to pay you to go away but to me and let me play a little bit more again because I'm tired of rewarding failure in this country here's the thing though

the coaches that you're going to want to hire are quite content with having their failure rewarded so like I don't know what the buyout is for Lane Kivitt let me see what Lane's buyout is let's see what is Lane Kiffin's buyout if he's fired let's see

let's see if Ole Miss fires Lane Kiffin without cause as of December 1st, 2025, his buyout is $36 million. $36 million for Lane Kiffin if he gets fired then. And it could be up to $44 million, according to this story. Okay. So in the mind of the governor of Louisiana, and he wants to strong arm, and maybe you're noble in that. Like, I don't think that is a not so noble idea. I would actually agree with that.

Like, when I get fired from my job here, I don't even know. I don't have an agent anymore, so I didn't really do a ton of great. negotiating. My old agent, one thing she did well is she at least got me, you know, six months of salary at my last job when I got fired. I think if I get fired here, they might give me two weeks. So, I don't know. But here's the problem you're going to run into. And I agree with him because we do reward failure. You know, James Franklin ultimately failed at Penn State and the agent's got him such an amazing deal that you're going to have to pay him $50 million to go win a championship or anything. And there's some more audio that you're going to hear

from Jeff Landry where he says some things that kind of makes sense. And then, of course, he says some things that don't knows the things that make the most news. But here's the problem you're going to run into. If you want to be the guy that's strong-arming people and you want to be the guy challenging the agents, the agents have all of these coaches. And these agents get these deals done. And these agents are paid to get these deals done. So if you think you're going to hire Lang Kiffin away from Ole Miss, let's go, because

he's like the most popular name. And I don't know what the latest favorite is for the job. I think the two-lane coach was at one point, the favorite. Let's see, LSU coach betting odds. Let's see what we have here. One of the latest odds here. Odds really, and this was a couple of days ago, but the favorite early on was, actually, hold on, let me. Let's see, who is the LSU next head coach?

Let's see. I don't even see it on there. This is a bad sight for that. Let's see here, making sense of the betting odds for LSU's next coach. Let's look at that, and that was a day ago. point being in this is that if you're going to hire any of these big-name guys you want, so let's say the sexiest name on there is Lane Kiffin, right? Like that's the job or the guy that you want the most for the job.

And currently, now this was a couple days ago, but if you look at the betting odds, and this story is from the 27th, so whatever, if you want Lane Kiffin who had four-to-one odds or Joe Brady 2-1, by the way, Joe Brady is currently making a pretty good sum of money is the offensive coordinator in Buffalo. John Summerall, who's the coach at Tulane, I want to say, makes like $3 million a year or something at Tulane, some number like that. James Franklin, who's six to one, and they will not hire James Franklin. That's not going to happen.

But James Franklin was making like 10 mil a year. Eli Drinkwitz is making solid cash. I'm going to say like $7, $8, $9 million at Missouri. So if you're going to hire any of these people to be your head coach, Marcus Freeman, who's at 25 to 1, and that's not going to happen. But if you're going to hire guys like that, if that's the guys you're going to get, those are guys who all have buyouts in their contracts that are gigantic. I want to see a list.

SEC Coaches Buyout list. Let's see here. I want to see every SEC coach's buyout for the 2025 college football season. Let's just look at the buyouts these guys having their deal. Let's see, Brian Kelly's was $53 million. Kirby Smart's buyout is $105 million. Kaelin DeBore's buyout is $61. Steve Sarkeesian, 60.

Brian Kelly, 53. Mark Stoops, who hasn't won dick, really even by Kentucky standards, his buyouts 37 million. Josh Heiple's 37 million. Lanes is 36 million. Eli Drinkwitz's buyout is $28 million. So if you're going to hire Eli Drinkwitz, which I don't think they will, for whatever reason, I have a hard time believing that somebody named Eli Drinkwitz is going to be the head coach at LSU.

For whatever reason, it just doesn't, like, when you say that's LSU head coach, Eli Drinkwitz, it just doesn't roll off the tongue. It doesn't make sense, but hey, whatever. Billy Napier already saw his $20 million buyout. So point being in all of this, if you're going to flex your muscle and swing your dick a little bit here, and your idea for this is that we're not going to bow down and we need to start putting contracts out there that aren't going to reward failure. Well, if your idea is to not reward failure, then you're not going to get any big name coaches. And maybe that's not who you're going to go after.

But the reason why Kalin DeBoer can leave a Washington and go to Alabama, A is because it's Alabama, but B, because you're leaving one good job for another good job, you have to incentivize it. And the incentivizing aspect of this is, okay, if I get fired, I better get paid. And there's $61 million for Kalin DeBore. Or Steve Sarkeesians is 60. Or you saw it with Brian Kelly, it's 53. And who knows how that's going to play out, but they're still fighting over that. And then there's some reports, rumors out there that LSU is trying to find him on a morals clause. And I don't know what the morals clause would be.

Generally speaking, if I hear about a morals clause, it means a dude's banging somebody. And there's conjecture out there that the guy you might have been banging somebody. But to me, you shouldn't lose out on, there's two ways to look at it. One, you could say, God, you risked a morals clause in your contract to bang somebody. Like, was the Poon worth it? But I don't think you're thinking about that when you're banging some rando. Like, I don't think you're like, boy, I'm going to get fired. And when I do, they're going to use.

this against me, so I don't know if that's the case. And B, on the other hand, it's the fact that any school would keep you from your money because you bang somebody that wasn't your wife is some pretty low shit. Like, that's one of those kind of things where I'm like, eh, I don't like that. Like, that would turn me off. If I were a potential, you know, a potential prospect for this job, I'd be like, wow, LSU's over here haggling over this guy's money that they owe him. And they're trying to fight for some morals clause because the guy fucked around. on his wife with somebody, if that's the case. I'm just trying to think of examples of what morals clauses would be in a contract,

and usually it has to do with the punanae, right? So that would turn me off for that job, too, if I were someone that was, you know, look, these guys. Dude, if I were the coach at LSU, I'd fuck everybody, like, Coach O was. Like, I'd be the dude who's like, you see a picture of me laying in bed with the random blonde chick chick smiling like, hey, fuck the chick, go tagles. Do you think when Coach O ejaculates, he says, go tigers? Coach O still wants to coach and wants to coach LSU. Now, of course he wants to be the head coach at LSU, and that's not going to happen.

But, like, Coach O wants to be even like he'd take a role as a coordinator or a line coach. In a second, I would make Coach O the defensive line coach at LSU. 100% if they're really trying to recreate this world of people who love LSU. My fear is that we're going back to the dark days of LSU, where LSU's biggest concern was like fit versus who's a good coach. And I agree that you have to be a fit. Like, I don't think Brian Kelly ever fit. None of us liked him. The team wasn't winning enough.

See you later. But I forgot the guy's name, but there was an old school AD at LSU that just couldn't get past the good old boy network at LSU. And he was a very smart athletic director, but never could get past these people. And it ultimately was his undoing. I don't know if we're at that point of LSU football. But, I mean, you got the governor up on a podium saying that the athletic director isn't going to be making the hire and that he's going to be in charge of the hiring and all that. I don't know.

Again, we're just focused on this one part of this, and then in the next episode, I'll do the other part of this press conference. But if I'm a guy who's Lane Kiffin, and I know that I currently have a job where if they fire me, I get $36 million. And if I'm Josh Hype, well, they're not going to hire Josh Hypo, but I'm trying to find names that are thrown out there, like Lane Kiffin is thrown out there. For what it's worth, if I'm Lane Kiffin, I wouldn't consider leaving Ole Miss for LSU. I wouldn't consider leaving Ole Miss for Florida. I'd stay right the fuck where I am. It's

my legacy now. It's my place. They fucking love me. And I'd have to fall off a cliff for them to fire me. I'm currently on an upward trajectory. And they love me here. And I love it here. And I'm making tons of cash. It's not like I'm going to make any more cash to go to LSU. Might I have some more resources at LSU? Sure. But you want to tell me that he can't get players at Ole Miss? Sure he can. Just like Alabama can get players. Just like everybody can get players now. It's the portal era. It's the NIL era. Everybody can get players. Like, to a degree, like, I was arguing, I wasn't arguing, but some dumbass Tulane fan, which I'm, the fact that I'm even saying this is ridiculous. But something popped up on my algorithm about Tulane, and this guy is like, I don't know

why our coach would ever leave to go to LSU. And I'm like, because you're fucking Tulane. You're a stepping stone. Oh, we're a stepping stone. So I guess Notre Dame was a stepping like, bro, you're Tulane. Shut the fuck up. Like, shut up. Your coach would leave to go to LSU in a nanosecond. There are some places that while they've improved are still always going to be what they're going to be. Tulane is always going to be Tulane, even with more money in the college football playoff era and schools like that getting into the playoff, a guy is not going to stay at Tulane for six, seven million dollars less to go play conference USA games or

American conference games against people. It is not going to happen. But people will stay at jobs like Ole Miss because you have every resource available to you. So why not? Is it that much better to be at LSU than it is to be at Ole Miss? Not really. It's a new era. 15 years ago, sure, 20 years ago, sure. Not anymore.

Look at Indiana. Let Indiana be the example. Now, Kirk Signetti's in his mid-60s and who knows how much longer he's going to coach and he got a ton of money to stay at Indiana. But look at what Indiana is doing. You know, if Indiana can do it, the fact, Old Miss can do it. Now, the schedule will be tough. offer, but Ole Miss can do it. There's no reason to leave that school for LSU. I'd like it because

it'd be fun of laying with a coach and it'd be like it'd bring excitement and all that. But there's nothing LSU can offer Lane Kiffin that Ole Miss can't. Then throw on the fact you got a meddling governor here and the governor's like, well, we're going to make sure that, you know, we got to keep these coaches from getting rewarded for failure. Well, you know what those coaches all want? They all want to be rewarded for failure because that's what they're used to. You can't take that away from them at this point. Do you think you're going to be able to lure Lane Kiffin to LSU and say, hey, come coach to LSU, but just know if we fire you, your buyout's not going to be the $53 million that Brian Kelly got or even the $36 million

that you're getting an Ole Miss. We're going to make sure to make it lower because we want you to be successful and not be rewarded for failure. Well, good luck. You're not going to get any of those people if that is your mindset on that. I wouldn't leave Vanderbilt if I were Clark Lee unless it's the perfect job. Like I see that Clark Lee is on that list for LSU. I would not leave that job.

Like you're from there. Your team is competitive now when you lose your quarterback. Who knows? I mean, you're still Vanderbilt. You're going to have to fight that stigma that you're Vanderbilt. And everybody knows your Vanderbilt. But still, it's not the end of the world. Like it's a good setup there. You make good cash.

They love you there. If you go six and six one year, no one's going to care. If you go six and six one year at Vanderbilt, the governor of Tennessee isn't going to be trying to fire you. I mean, there are things to be said about those. jobs. I would not leave those. I wouldn't leave Missou if I were Eli Drinkwitz. Why? You can get players there. I mean, is LSU a better situation? Sure. Is it a better university for football? Sure. But the money isn't

going to be that much different. Like, this is not 15 years ago. 15 years ago, I think all these guys would be beating down the door because none of them would be competitive. Missouri wouldn't be all that competitive. Old Miss wouldn't be all that competitive. Vanderbilt would be a doormat. Why would you leave these places? Unless, I mean, look, the money's going to be pretty close. The resources may be better at LSU, but that's where the meddling from the governor comes in and you go,

I don't want to fuck with this. Now, at the end of the day, I don't think that's going to be a deterrent for people who really want that gig. And it's a great gig. I just don't know that, like, I do know. If I were laying kiffin, and it's hard. When there's big jobs like that open, like that's how it was for me in St. Louis.

When you hear that that job is there, it's like, holy shit. It's hard to say no to those things. You know, it's hard to say, I got offered a job. job. I told you a couple weeks ago, I got offered a job that I couldn't take. Now, if I truly fought for it, and I went to these people and said, listen, this job is just a much better job than I have here financially and everything else, and it's closer to what I want to do, blah, blah, blah. If I went in them and told them all that, who knows what would happen, they might just tell me to fuck off or what. They might fire me. I don't know. But I didn't because I'm committed

to this job and I want to do well here and I want to succeed here, and I like the town. So, but this job that was offered, you could argue fits my personality, and it was in a city that makes sense for me and all that, and I couldn't do it. But, like, in their situation, if I'm laying Kiffin, like, there's, I don't know, I'm sticking where I am. I'm doing what I'm doing. Like, it has to be something that truly blows your skirt up. Like, if today, if I got a call, and let's just say WIP called, all right, if WIP call and they said, listen, we want to, we want to get back together and we think you'd be huge in Philly again and come do mornings, middays, whatever, in Philly. I'd probably go to my boss and I'd go like, listen, I can't turn that down.

Like, it's WIP, it's Philly, it's radio matters. They're like, I have to. And they'd probably tell me to go fuck myself. It's very possible they would. But I would still have, I'd go to them and fight for that and say, listen, this is a life-changing thing. But if someone came to me today and they're like, hey, do you want to go do mornings on a rock station in Houston? I'd be like, I'm not going to go fight for that. It's a lateral move, maybe a step down.

Like, you know, it would have to be truly something that blows your skirt up. And I get it. It's hard to turn down those kind of gigs if you're laying Kiffin, but you've got a good gig. And it's a gig that's made the gig. You've made it a sexy gig. Why would you leave that? I wouldn't. And I wouldn't leave.

And by the way, for places that are hostile and fire people pretty quickly like Florida and LSU at this point. I wouldn't do that at all. I'd stay where I am. Now, if I'm the coach at Tulane, like, sure, bring it on. Let's go to LSU. Or if I'm, you know, a coordinator somewhere. If I'm Kelvin Shepard, who's the defensive coordinator for the Lions who played at LSU, sure, why not? But I don't know how sexy it is because of the era we're in.

So anyway, I want to get to the other part of this. I went way long here. I want to get to the other part of the audio. And the audio that's probably more of the turnoff for a lot of people from the governor of Louisiana. We'll do that in the next episode.