Why Lane Kiffin thinks LSU football signed best transfer portal class

BATON ROUGE — A couple of weeks ago, Lane Kiffin stood in front of the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report Leadership and told the crowd that under his watch, LSU football could be on its way to signing the best transfer portal class in the portal era.

Now that the dust has settled, does Kiffin believe he and staff pulled that off? To the new Tigers coach, the answer a little convoluted.

“I think talent-wise, it probably is,” Kiffin said Wednesday, Feb. 4. “Now, a lot of that too is also the numbers. The volume helps when I made that statement.”

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As of Wednesday, which was National Signing Day, LSU had officially signed 16 high school prospects and two junior college transfers, and Kiffin and company had compiled a group of 41 total incoming players.

The top-rated transfer portal quarterback in Sam Leavitt from Arizona State, the top-ranked offensive lineman in Jordan Seaton from Colorado, the highest-rated edge rusher in Ole Miss‘ Princewell Umanmielen and the second-highest ranked safety in Ty Benefield from Boise State headline LSU’s portal class. No other college team was able to land as many No. 1-ranked transfers at their respective positions than Kiffin and LSU.

Per the 247Sports Composite, LSU ended up with the No. 1 overall transfer portal class and, through it all, Kiffin and his assistants were able to address all of the needs they had to fill for their first roster in Baton Rouge.

“I think over time in general, volume’s gone up because the system has evolved. It’s really created a system that makes players go into the portal. No matter how you played, no matter what your contract structure is, imagine in professional sports, let’s just take the NFL, there’s two windows a year that you can opt into free agency to either come back and get paid more or to go somewhere else and create a more competitive market for you.

“That has created a lot of these numbers being higher to where when I say, ‘OK, this probably would be the best ever on paper.’ Part of that is the numbers and the volume of if. We had a lot to replace. I know at first there was a lot of skepticism about so many players going into the portal, but I just looked at it like, ‘OK what’s my answer to you as the fans and media too if we just kept the same players?’ We are good coaches but we don’t have magic dust. We changed a lot because there needed to be changes.”

Cory Diaz covers the LSU Tigers for The Daily Advertiser as part of the USA TODAY Network. Follow his Tigers coverage on Twitter: @ByCoryDiaz. Got questions regarding LSU athletics? Send them to Cory Diaz at bdiaz@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: Lane Kiffin on if LSU football signed best transfer portal class ever