Les Miles out at Kansas amid sexual harassment claims from time at LSU | Yahoo Sports College Podcast
Yahoo Sports’ Dan Wetzel and Pete Thamel, and Sports Illustrated’s Pat Forde discuss Les Miles being fired as the head coach at Kansas after claims of sexual harassment arose from his time at LSU.
Video Transcript
DAN WETZEL: All right, speaking of stupid, Les.
PAT FORDE: Oh, boy.
DAN WETZEL: I did not see the plot twist where Les Miles would become creepy old man. I thought you were just this harmless, eccentric weirdo who ate grass and told bad jokes and wore your hat weird. Les Miles turns out to be a creep and now is fired at Kansas.
You probably know most of the story. Back in 2013, allegations of-- I don't know what you want to call them, sexual harassment, sexual-- appear. I mean, he's propositioning kids, young ladies. He's trying to get them to go to his condo. He's telling them that he's gonna help their career.
He's telling only have certain women that look a certain way can work in the office. The whole thing's just pathetic. It's honestly just pathetic. Doesn't seem like Les got very far with most of his propositions, but we don't know the whole extent. There's probably more. Terrible.
Of course, it's LSU. Pete, Les done. Fin.
PETE THAMEL: Yeah, Les has earned every bit of the infamy he's brought on himself. And Les is not gonna be a TV commentator, Les is not gonna be in commercials, Les is not gonna be in football. Les is just going to disappear from the football space, and he earned it and every bit of it.
I'll be very curious to see what Kansas has to end up paying him. It was a pretty interesting dynamic with the university and coach. Kansas doesn't want to go to court because they got just totally blasted in the David Beaty thing. The AD got depositioned, and then they got mocked. We had some fun with that on the podcast. So Kansas is gun-shy from that.
Les is owed about $8 million. They said they're gonna release it sometime soon what they ended up paying him. It'll be pretty interesting. Because Les has like no leverage other than Kansas doesn't want to go to court. You know, Les wouldn't really want to go to court either. He's just probably gonna go to the beach and live the rest of his life.
So, yeah, just a-- not the ending I expected for Les Miles. I mean, Pat, you know Les miles. I know Les Miles. Been around him for 15 years. And, again, we don't really know these people. Ross Dellenger wrote a good column about it on "SI."
You've covered him. I've sat in Les's kitchen. But we don't know him. We cover him. We write what they allow us to see, but we don't really know who they are.
And I really think with Les Miles-- sometimes, guys, coaches have reputations. I can't say I had heard a ton about Les Miles. A few people said to me, oh yeah, this was kind of known. I don't know if you'd caught any of that, Pat. I really hadn't just in terms of how he acted and treated people. But, yeah, I mean, with the Les conversation, it's almost short. Like, yeah, this happened, he's gone, and he's not coming back.
PAT FORDE: Yeah, no, I hadn't heard any of that about Les. And the thing that I guess stuck out is that basically Les tried to institutionalize creepiness as a way of operating the football building. I want the blondes with the big boobs on the staff and the football staff. And it's like, what? Really? I mean, that's gonna be the modus operandi that you're going to state that you want? I mean, that's pretty astounding.
And, yeah, I mean, LSU just basically swallowed it. You look at that university and the way they've handled things, now we know going back to 2013 and all the way through the sexual violence from a student body standpoint and from a football and athletic standpoint involving football players and then involving Will Wade and the scandal there. I mean, they've put up with a lot. Pretty high tolerance level at LSU.
And so, yeah, all this comes out. And now, yeah, Kansas has absolutely no choice but to do what they did. And the next question is how long Jeff Long can keep going as athletic director. Because somebody would have to explain to me what Jeff Long has done right as AD at Kansas. Because I don't see anything.
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