Les Miles Running Out of Sand?

Five years into Les Miles' tenure as the Louisiana State University football coach the numbers look pretty good. Miles has compiled a 51-15 record, has won four of five bowl games, and has a BCS National Championship ring on his finger. Numbers like that beg for praise from the passionate Tiger faithful.

Not so fast, my friend! While the numbers look great, a look at some of the individual games will reveal some downright terrible coaching decisions.

Tennessee 2005: The Tigers were playing in Tiger Stadium for the first time since Hurricane Katrina had rocked the state. Emotions were high and the Tigers jumped out to a 21 point lead in the first half. Miles, though, called off the dogs and ran the ball the entire second half until the Volunteers put nail in the cofffin with a late touchdown run and won the game 30-27.

Auburn 2006: This was the LSU's biggest rivalry pre-Saban/Alabama era. Going into a game where defenses were supposed to dominate Miles pulled out his Bo Schembechler playbook and ran the ball over 65 percent of the time until the game was on the line in the waning minutes.

Jamarcus Russel and the Tigers threw the ball with ease until two penalties and a bad no call on fourth down stalled the drive at the 30 yard line. LSU lost 7-3.

2007: Let me preface everything about the 2007 season with a few thoughts. First, that was the only team to play in a BCS National Championship game with two losses, and they backed into it when No. 1 and No. 2 both lost on the last Saturday. Second, that team was head and shoulders above every team in the country when it came to talent so losing even one game was a disappointment.

Kentucky 2007: LSU went to Lexington ranked number one. The Tigers stretched the the lead to 27-14 in the second half before letting the Wildcats real off 13 unanswered points on three consecutive posessions. The Tigers fell in three overtimes.

Auburn 2007: This Auburn team had no business playing with LSU. But in true Les Miles team fashion LSU allowed Auburn hang around until they took a one point lead with just over a minute to play. Needing only a field goal to win, LSU found itself inside the Auburn 20 yard line.

With a timeout in his pocket, Miles watched Matt Flynn let eight seconds run off the clock before snapping the ball with ten seconds left and lobbing it to Demetrius Byrd in the endzone for a touchdown with one second remaining. That play won the game, but had the ball been tipped into the air, the seconds that Miles let run off the clock would have cost LSU the game and likely the National Title.

Arkansas 2007: Miles and his defensive coordinators have never been able to figure out the wildcat offense and it showed on this night. Darren McFadden & Co. rushed for 385 yards as the Tigers fell 50-48 in three overtimes. There were two bonehead calls in the crunch time of this game.

First, with the Tigers down seven and the game on the line, Miles calls a fake quarterback sneak with a throw down the line of scrimmage on third down and one yard to go. The play was broken up, but Keiland Williams bailed Miles out on fourth down.

In the first overtime Arkansas faced a must have fourth and 10 at the 25 yard line. Miles and defensive coordinator, Bo Pelini pulled nine men into pass coverage and forfeited the Tigers' fierce pass rush.  Arkansas converted as Casey Dick waited over five seconds for an open receiver.

2008: The 2008 season was one to forget. Miles dismissed Ryan Perrilloux for continued discipline problems before the season. It was an admirable decision as Perrilloux had been afforded more than his fair share of chances. Freshman Jerrett Lee stepped in as the starter for LSU and was awful from the word go. Lee threw 16 interceptions in ten games and seven of those were returned for touchdowns.

The question was why was Lee still playing. When Lee got hurt late in the season, Freshman Jordan Jefferson, who Miles had insisted was not ready, came in to complete 36 of 73 passes for four touchdowns and only one interception and most importantly a win in the Peach Bowl.

2009 : The 2009 season was all about mediocrity. The defense held up for the most part allowing only 16 points per game. But the offense struggled throughout and finished the season ranked worse than 100th in NCAA FBS in total offense.

Mississippi 2009 (The Debacle): This is where Miles coaching abilities really started to show. Facing Houston Nutt's wildcat offense was difficult once again for Miles. But the Tigers found themselves with a chance to win in the final seconds. Trailing 23-25 the Tigers drove to the Mississippi 32 yard line with less than a minute left.

Jefferson was sacked on second down with 32 seconds left putting the Tigers out of field goal range. Miles called timeout and had one in his pocket. When Steven Ridley went down at the 48 yard line in bounds, it took Miles 15 seconds to call a timeout leaving LSU with only nine seconds to work with.

Jefferson completed a pass to the six yard line with one second left (had Miles called that timeout earlier there would have been time to spike it and get the field goal unit on to win the game). With one second left there was no time to spike the ball, but Miles ran down the sidelines giving the spike signal to Jefferson.

To make matters worse, when questions were asked about Jefferson spiking the ball to end the game, Miles threw his quarterback under the bus instead of taking responsibility for his mistake.

Penn State 2009: In an evenly matched game on the sloppiest field I have ever seen in a bowl game, the Tigers came back from a 16-3 deficit to take a 17-16 lead in the fourth quarter. Penn State, however, was able to kick a field goal to gain a two point advantage with 57 seconds left.

With under 40 seconds left in the game the Tigers gained a first and ten at the Penn State 49 yard line. With no timeouts remaining, Les Miles and his coaching staff sent in the call for a wide receiver screen with Brandon Lafell to the middle of the field.

The play was stopped at the 45 yard line and with a Penn State player laying on Lafell to keep LSU from being able to lineup, Lyle Hitt made an effort to pull the Penn State player off. Hitt was assessed with a personal foul penalty ending the Tigers' chances.

The Offense: The offense has been the point of frustration throughout Miles' tenure. The first two years of Miles' tenure were with Jimbo Fisher as the offensive coordinator. Fisher had a successful run at LSU from 2000-2006, but his least successful seasons were the seasons of 2005 and 2006.

After the 2006 season Fisher took the same position at Florida State University. In walks Gary Crowton from a very successful stint at the University of Oregon. The offense has never looked like his previous offenses, nor has it been as successful.

What am I led to believe? Well, that Crowton has not been given near the amount of freedom that he should be given and the same was true of Fisher. Miles has had his nose in the offense making it look more like a 1960s Bo Shembechler unit than a potent Gary Crowton or Jimbo Fisher offense.

So what have we learned from these instances? First, Miles is worse than my little brother on NCAA Football '09 at clock management. And what does that say about the rest of his football knowledge? And second, Miles refuses to give the reigns to his offensive coordinators which leaves LSU with a below average offense.

Is it time for Miles to go? I think it would be hard for any administrator to justify termination at this point in his tenure. However, one or two more seasons like the 2008 and 2009 seasons, and Miles may be packing his bags.