Lane Kiffin calls out Paul Finebaum on live TV and things get awkward quickly
I guess it wouldn't be SEC Media Days without some interpersonal drama to serve as chum for fans around the conference. Lane Kiffin, the outspoken head coach of Ole Miss, has been drawing praise for his more reserved demeanor this week, including a moving statement about the passing of his father, legendary coach Monte Kiffin. On the football side of things, too, he has seemed relaxed and confident in what his program brings—as well he should, of course, as the Rebels will likely compete for a playoff spot this year.
Paul Finebaum, of course, has been Paul Finebaum. He's not a shock jock, by any means, but he doesn't shy away from speaking his mind when he feels like he has something incendiary to say. The problem with that, of course, is that it can come back to bite you... even years and years on.
This culminated today in an extremely awkward exchange between these two men on the SEC Network.
“Really I don’t know what you’re good at” is wild😭😭 pic.twitter.com/eiGLvD0C8C
— Daniel Giddens🐘 (@DGiddensBurner) July 18, 2024
What a malign cocktail of bad vibes.
Look, Kiffin clearly has some stuff to get off his chest about Paul. There's a way to do that—there's a way to be confrontational. I'm no Paul Finebaum fan, either. I can't help but feel, though, that this callout really fell kind of flat.
Like, why does he spend so much time talking about Miley Cyrus? I get that Finebaum made that point, but it just became way too much of a thing in this interchange. It really weakened the effect that it seemed like Kiff wanted to have here.
This feels much more like the old Lane Kiffin than the one we saw most of the week. He's looking to make headlines and just kind of stumbles his way through whatever juicy thing he thought of to say until it sort of peters out. Weird! This was just all very weird.