The college football season is right around the corner, and ESPN’s Paul Finebaum has been particularly vocal lately. The college football analyst has specifically been targeting USC football head coach Lincoln Riley. Although Riley has only been with the Trojans for two years and led USC to an impressive 11-win season in his first year, Finebaum doesn’t believe that Riley is the right fit for the job in Los Angeles.
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“I think he has an enormous amount to prove because, quite frankly, I think he’s been a disaster,” Paul Finebaum said on ESPN. “Let’s go back three years: Oklahoma and Texas joining the SEC. What did Lincoln Riley do? He ran away. … I thought last year was one of the worst coaching jobs I’ve ever seen. Quite frankly, had I been the athletic director at USC, I would’ve fired Lincoln Riley because he has yet to show, after many years as a head coach, he knows anything about defense. He’s gone through defensive coordinators, he just simply couldn’t handle it. And now things are going to be five times worse in the Big Ten. … This is a guy who owned LA for about half a minute, and next year at this time, I think he’ll more than likely be an assistant in the NFL, if he’s that lucky.”
There you have it. Finebaum thinks that USC football is going to move on from Lincoln Riley after this season. He made those comments last week, and on Monday, he shared who he thinks should replace Riley should a head coaching change happen.
Deion Sanders to USC?
Another coach who struggled last season is Deion Sanders. Despite his Colorado football team receiving a lot of national attention, they ended up with a 4-8 record, finishing last in the Pac-12. However, Paul Finebaum believes Sanders would be a good replacement for USC if they decide to move on from Lincoln Riley.
“You have to win in L.A., otherwise, you lose badly, and I think [Riley’s] losing badly,” Finebaum said on ESPN’s *First Take*. “…I believe the answer after this season is Deion Sanders. He’s going to be tired of Colorado because, quite frankly, it’s not prime time. He’s done well, as well as he can, with his son and Travis Hunter and all the Stephen A. and Shannon Sharpe appearances. But that’s gonna dry up this year because they’re not going to be that great. When you put ‘Prime’ in Tinseltown, I think you have one of the great combinations in history. …Deion Sanders as the coach at Southern Cal is the answer to the problems. Lincoln Riley is a good coach. He’s got a great resume. Deion Sanders just exudes exactly what that community is all about. He takes the recruiting there which Lincoln had and then lost, but I think he sustains it, especially now.”
Finebaum doesn’t have a lot of confidence in Deion Sanders when it comes to Colorado, but he thinks that he could do a good job with USC. There are some huge what-ifs here, but it would certainly be entertaining to see Sanders leave Boulder for the bright lights of LA.