LSU Tigers head coach Lane Kiffin is taking advantage of some recent confusion on college football rules to add former professional football players to his roster, but one former Tiger isn't thrilled about it. Kiffin recently added to his team Zxavian Harris, a defensive lineman who played for Kiffin at Ole Miss last year but who signed a deal with the New Orleans Saints after he went undrafted. Now released by the Saints, Harris is returning to the college ranks, something former Tiger Breiden Fehoko wasn't a fan of.
"I’m so cool off this [expletive]," he wrote on social media. "I want LSU to win but this ain’t the way. I’m really all the way cool off this [expletive].
I got not respect for Lane and this staff doing it this way. I don’t care if the 'rules' allow it. Integrity/amateurism all gotta count for something bro." He followed that post up the next morning with a condemnation of the school's athletic department in general.
"LSU as a whole university in athletics is moving so disgusting right now," he wrote. "I genuinely can’t believe this is the product I’m seeing. It’s become Money over morals and I’m absolutely disgusted.
"I love my university but this is just [expletive] disgusting how we’re moving." Kiffin has defended adding former professionals to his collegiate team, noting that it's been allowed by recent court rulings, and he's already got another former Rebel, tight end Dae-Quan Wright, lined up to join the Tigers once he clears NFL waivers. ""At the end of the day, because of these rulings, they're either going to play for you or they're going to play for someone else around the country," Kiffin said, as reported by Max Olson of ESPN. "So we've made the decision to recruit them like probably most people are." Where Kiffin may be incorrect is his belief that "probably most people are" recruiting former NFL players.
The Big Ten as a conference banned such players from competing, and the ACC and Big 12 are considering doing the same, reports Craig Meyer of USA Today. The SEC may not have a rule in place, but Ross Dellenger of Yahoo Sports reports that athletic directors in the conference are likely to be prohibited from adding pro players "under threat of penalty." Until the courts provide some sort of finality to the question of eligibility, it's likely that these debates will continue. Until then, expect more moves that would have once seemed unthinkable — and for more criticism of those decisions.
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