Clemson HC Dabo Swinney Appears to Throw Athletic Department Under the Bus

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Ballboys were the subject of conversation between Kirk Herbstreit and Chris Fowler in the ABC broadcast booth in the final minutes of No. 11 LSU's 51-10 blowout of the Clemson Tigers in Baton Rouge early on Sunday morning on the East Coast.

That's how uncompetitive Dabo Swinney's Tigers were in the season opener after an offseason of hearing about the head coach's previous accomplishments.

The lopsided affair wasn't too much of a surprise. Anyone with football instincts understood how bad of a calculation Swinney had made deciding to go with the winner of a quarterback battle between Christopher Vizzina and Tait Reynolds, two inexperienced players going into the "Death Valley" of the swamps.

Vizzina finished 10 of 16 for 83 yards and one interception before on Saturday night. He was benched for Reynolds, who finished 4 of 6 passing for 22 yards.

Swinney wouldn't tip his hat as to whether Vizzina or Reynolds would get the start in Week 2 at home against Georgia Southern. He appeared to throw some administrators under the bus, suggesting the decision to put LSU on the schedule in Week 1 hurt his ability to "work the kinks out" before playing tougher competition.

“That’s what I said coming into it. That’s why I said, we didn’t want to guarantee (Reynolds) would play, but it was pretty likely he was going to play,” Swinney said, via On3. “So we needed to play games. Again, I wish we had a game or two where you can work the kinks out, but that’s not the stick we drew. 

"We’ve got some stuff on tape now, we’ve got some things in real live games that we can evaluate, and then we’ll go from there. So, I would say we’ll continue to keep moving forward. I think there will be more to come on that as we play another game or two.”

Of course, Clemson athletic director Graham Neff said this offseason he was more than willing to give Swinney the money to pursue an accomplished quarterback in the transfer portal, to which the head coach declined.

Frankly, it doesn't appear like scheduling LSU in Week 3 would have helped Clemson's cause. The roster appears poorly constructed to play against ranked opponents, and it could be another long season for Swinney.

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