By GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
The $54 million dollar question may be answered today, or at least that or a lower settlement will be discussed.
The LSU Board of Supervisors on Thursday called a special meeting for 9:15 a.m. today on campus for “discussion of Brian Kelly” concerning the $54 million buyout his contract says he is owed.
Either that, or LSU wants to introduce a new football coach. But there is no mention of that in the Board’s alert to media. Meanwhile in Oxford, Mississippi, LSU’s and Florida’s target for a new head coach to replace Kelly – rising Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin – is expected to meet with Ole Miss athletic director Keith Carter about Kiffin possibly coming up with a decision to stay at Ole Miss or go to LSU or Florida.
The next best thing to Nick Saban available – Lane Kiffin – is coming to LSU, if Nick Saban has his way.https://t.co/TaBuardbYF
— Glenn Guilbeau (@SportBeatTweet) November 17, 2025
But Kiffin has all the leverage.
Former LSU coach Nick Saban and Kiffin’s and Saban’s agent Jimmy Sexton have been trying to convince Kiffin to go to LSU, should he not want to stay at Ole Miss.
So, was Brian Kelly fired for cause, fired without cause, or just be-CAUSE, which would be without cause, which IS what happened, regardless of LSU’s Causeway of Crap. Which LSU needs to Cut, if it wants Lane Kiffin, who sounded interested on Monday. https://t.co/7l3JHlIe02
— Glenn Guilbeau (@SportBeatTweet) November 12, 2025
Kelly and his lead attorney Bennett Speyer of Toledo, Ohio, filed a lawsuit on Monday, Nov. 10, against LSU seeking Kelly’s full, $54 million buyout after his firing by then-LSU athletic director Scott Woodward on Oct. 26 in the fourth year of a 10-year, $100 million contract. LSU then fired Woodward four days later in a move that could damage LSU’s legal efforts to decrease Kelly’s buyout.
The suit filed in the 19th Judicial District of East Baton Rouge Parish came after LSU attorneys let pass a 5 p.m. deadline on Nov. 10 submitted by Kelly and team requesting LSU confirm it will “fulfill its contractual obligation” to pay the entire buyout to Kelly.
Kelly previously turned down settlement offers of $25 million, then $30 million.
LSU not answering that request on Nov. 10 meant LSU doesn’t wish to pay the full buyout, and it then changed its story midstream and said it wanted to fire Kelly with cause, which means it would not owe him the buyout. The original firing by Woodward had all the traits of one without cause, which meant Kelly would get the full buyout, or close to it. LSU also said Woodward wasn’t authorized to fire Kelly, although he had virtually unilaterally fired and hired other coaches at LSU in the past.
There had been media speculation via LSU’s side that LSU expected to get Kelly’s buyout down to $27 million via negotiations because of a clause in Kelly’s contract under the “Termination and Suspension” title.
The agreement may be terminated by LSU at any time, the contract states, for cause, which includes:
“Engaging in serious misconduct, which either displays a continual, serious disrespect or continual, serious disregard for the mission of LSU, brings employee into substantial public disrepute sufficient – at the discretion of LSU – in a manner sufficient to materially impair employee’s ability to perform his obligations, or constitutes moral turpitude and breaches his high moral and ethical standards applicable to him as a visible representative of LSU.”
National college football coach contract expert lawyer Tom Mars does not give LSU much of a chance to pay Kelly anything less than the $54 million buyout.
“Approximately, zero,” Mars told Tiger Rag. ““If LSU is running this narrative with sportswriters that Brian Kelly breached the moral turpitude part of his contract, it sounds as though they are just grasping at straws and using a strategy that could blow up in their face. The ‘at the discretion of LSU’ language in the contract does not mean that LSU has unfettered discretion to determine that some conduct by Kelly violated this section of his contract.”
The courts may have to decide a settlement or if Kelly gets the full buyout, if the parties do not, which could be addressed today at the board meeting.
Be the first to comment