Joe Burrow took a short pause when asked about Lane Kiffin taking over at his alma mater, and the Cincinnati Bengals quarterback offered an interesting response.
“I think he’s a good coach,” Burrow said after he took a breath, on Wednesday. “I guess we’ll see how it goes. Those are my thoughts.”
A reporter asked if Lane Kiffin ever recruited him.
“No,” Burrow answered.
Another asked “could you imagine preparing for the College Football Playoff?” (while his coach accepted another job)
“Yeah, certainly not an ideal situation for a playoff run,” Burrow said. “That’s for sure.”
Short. Direct. Unbothered.
And honestly — completely on brand.
2019 Still Casts the Longest Shadow at LSU
Burrow already did his part at LSU — and he did it at a level that still shadows the program. In 2019, he collected the Heisman Trophy and a national championship. He dragged LSU into one of the most incredible offensive runs college football has ever seen.
He threw for 5,671 yards and 60 touchdowns with just six interceptions, completed over 76 percent of his passes, and led LSU to a 15–0 finish.
Since then, the program has lived in motion. Staff changes and roster turnover. Seasons that never quite stabilized. Momentum that never stuck long enough to carve out those consistent wins on the national stage.
Ed Orgeron was out two seasons after Burrow’s memorable campaign. Brian Kelly came in from Notre Dame and stacked double-digit win seasons and three straight bowl victories, but still left Baton Rouge without matching anything close to the Burrow run. The program stayed relevant; it never felt like 2019 again.
Now it’s Kiffin’s turn after the program moved on from Kelly on November 26. He arrives with a massive contract ($91 million) — a national profile and the kind of personality that guarantees attention whether things go right or wrong.
He left an 11-win Ole Miss team in the middle of postseason turbulence to take the job, immediately labeling LSU “the best job in football” and selling a fast reboot.
Burrow Remains Focused On Bengals
Burrow doesn’t live in Baton Rouge anymore. He lives in Cincinnati. And he of all people knows that his job isn’t finished this year for the Bengals.
In his Thankgiving Day return, he threw for 261 yards and two touchdowns in a 32–14 win that snapped Baltimore’s five-game winning streak and briefly slipped the Bengals back into the national window.
Cincinnati still sits under .500 and fights uphill for any kind of postseason life, but with Burrow back, every week becomes about keeping that window cracked open as long as possible.
As for Kiffin, he brings the right kind of chaos for a place like LSU: tempo, fireworks, QB appeal and a willingness to live on the edge offensively. He also walks in knowing the math. Anything short of playing deep into January won’t suffice.
That’s the era Burrow built. That’s the shadow Kiffin just signed up to coach under.
And whether the 14-year head coach eventually matches that standard or falls short won’t change where Burrow stands now: one of the NFL’s most dangerous gunslingers, chasing wins in the AFC instead of nostalgia in Death Valley.
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