Lane Kiffin’s on-field staff now has an opening.
Friday evening multiple outlets reported that LSU safeties coach Jake Olsen is leaving the program for a position on the Washington Commanders defensive staff.
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Olsen has been tied at the hip to LSU defensive coordinator Blake Baker for quite some time. Olsen was a defensive analyst in 2021 while Baker was the linebackers coach, and then Olsen followed Baker to Missouri after neither were retained when Brian Kelly took over.
At Missouri, Olsen was Baker’s linebackers coach and then he followed Baker back to Baton Rouge and has spent the past two seasons as the Tigers’ safeties coach. Olsen will now reunite with former LSU defensive coordinator Daronte Jones in Washington. Olsen’s 2021 season as an analyst overlapped with Daronte Jones’ lone season as the Tigers’ defensive coordinator; Jones was hired by Dan Quinn to be Washington’s new defensive coordinator three weeks ago.
Whoever Lane Kiffin and Baker decide to fill the role of safeties coach, they’ll have plenty of talent in the cupboard to work with. LSU’s returning TaMarcus Cooley and DaShawn Spears, and added Boise State’s Ty Benefield out of the transfer portal.
Perhaps Corey Raymond could pull double duty and coach all the Tiger defensive backs, instead of just the corners; Baker himself has coached safeties before back when he was coaching at Arkansas State and Louisiana Tech and is reportedly going to coach the STAR position this season, so that’s another possibility. Or maybe now that Kiffin has an open on-field coaching position, he elects to elevate an analyst to the job or goes outside the football ops building to fill that role.
