Ed Orgeron
Now
Career arc
Bowls and playoffs: 4-1 · won 1 of 1 national title game
2016Citrus BowlW 29-9
2017Citrus BowlL 17-21
2018Fiesta BowlW 40-32
2019 semiPeach BowlW 63-28
2019 ★CFP title gameW 42-25
Report card
Defense carries it: 75th percentile defense, above the median offense at 73rd.
LSU, every completed season graded against the whole field, then averaged.
Offense
Defense
Each season is his team’s percentile among every team with that stat (the share it beat), averaged over his completed seasons here; a mid-season takeover year and the season in progress aren’t graded. Letters: A+ 90th percentile and up, A 80, B+ 70, B 60, B− 50, C+ 45, C 40, C− 30, D 15, F below.
Fans
No fan talk about him on our list yet. His record is on Career.
Stats
Big games
Pick a job to see its years on their own.
The big-game ledger
How he does in the games that matter most — rivalry record, performance broken out by real opponent tier, one-score games, and his toughest historical matchup.
4-5 against his rivals at Ole Miss. Winless in 3 tries against Houston Nutt.
Signature games
Tags describe each game; they aren’t scores. The weighting that picks these games is still being tested.
The big-game ledger
How he does in the games that matter most — rivalry record, performance broken out by real opponent tier, one-score games, and his toughest historical matchup.
14-6 against his rivals at LSU. Just 1-4 against Nick Saban.
Signature games
Tags describe each game; they aren’t scores. The weighting that picks these games is still being tested.
The big-game ledger
How he does in the games that matter most — rivalry record, performance broken out by real opponent tier, one-score games, and his toughest historical matchup.
18-11 against his rivals. Winless in 3 tries against Houston Nutt.
Signature games
These losses tie at the model's current max -- an editorial pick among a real tie, not a clean ranking.
Tags describe each game; they aren’t scores. The weighting that picks these games is still being tested.
ATS is his record against the spread: did his team beat the closing betting line, winning by more than it or losing by less? Lines start in 2013; a dash means fewer than 6 of those games had one. One-score games carry no spread record: a big favorite that wins a close game has almost always failed to cover, so that number would say nothing about the coach.
Defining games during this era
From our list of the 50 most defining games of the Playoff era, ranked by how much each game mattered, not by date.
How he plays
Run/pass mix, by field position
Ran more than the situation called for under Canada; passed more under Ensminger.
4,157 run and pass snaps at LSU, 2016–2020, his own games, one row per offensive coordinator. Each cell is how much more often he passed than the rest of FBS did in the same situation (field zone, down, distance, score, quarter, same season), in percentage points.
Pass rate, stint by stint
Where each stint’s offense sat between run-first and pass-first, and how far it moved from one season to the next, against the FBS-wide average of 41% pass. The band is that stint’s real season-to-season range, not a fixed-width box.
Season-to-season pass-rate range for all 449 FBS coaching stints with at least three covered seasons, 2004–2025.
Building the roster
Five numbers on how he actually stocks a roster, from signing day to draft day.
His recruiting, really
His 4 ranked LSU classes of his own have averaged #7 nationally — best #4, worst #15.
His class — he had the full signing cycle
Rank is each signing class’s national recruiting rank (#1 is best). Only a class he had a full signing cycle to build counts as his.
Roster ownership
Roster ownership
of his 2021 roster arrived on his watch — 109 of 109 players. Nobody is left from before he was hired.
Of his own players on this roster, 3% came through the transfer portal; the rest are non-portal arrivals (high-school signees, JUCO transfers, walk-ons).
Everyone he has brought in, 2016–2021Counting players who have since left: 3% of the 32 arrivals we can classify came through the portal.
This tenure spans the 2021 transfer-portal tracking floor: seasons before 2021 structurally cannot be classified portal-vs-not (they land in 'unknown' below), so the portal-share figure understates how many pre-2021 arrivals might have been transfers under the pre-portal-tracking transfer rules.
“His own” means the player arrived while he was head coach; “inherited” means a predecessor brought him in.
Size up front
Size up front
Offensive linemen on his LSU rosters have averaged 11 lb heavier than the FBS average (2016–2021) — heavier than 96% of FBS coaching runs since 2010. In the three seasons before he arrived, LSU’s line averaged 9 lb heavier than the FBS average.
Average listed weight of every offensive lineman on each season’s roster, holdovers included, against every FBS roster that season (2010 on; a program needs 3+ seasons under him to appear). Weights are the ones programs publish, and programs list differently. This describes size only — not scheme, and not quality.
Where he recruits
is his biggest recruiting state: 67 of 143 signees (47%) across his 2016–2021 tenure, drawn from 18 states in all. Next: TX (20).
67% of his signees come from LA and its 3 border states (TX 20, MS 9).
Off this map: 5 signees to the west (UT 2, AZ, others), 1 to the north (MI) and 1 to the east (MA).
- median hometown distance
- 210 mi
- within 100 mi
- 38%
- within 500 mi
- 76%
- beyond 1,000 mi
- 10%
The map counts signed recruits across his tenure; the distance figures cover his current roster, transfers and walk-ons included. Two different groups, kept separate on purpose.
The NFL pipeline
The NFL pipeline
players drafted into the NFL off his teams here. He brought in 32 of them himself; 17 arrived under Les Miles. 11 went in the first round.
| Year | Pick | Player | Pos | NFL team | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | R1.03 | Derek Stingley Jr. | Cornerback |  Houston Texans | |
| 2022 | R2.27 | Ed Ingram | Offensive Guard |  Minnesota Vikings | |
| 2022 | R3.17 | Cordale Flott | Cornerback |  New York Giants | |
| 2022 | R3.29 | Tyrion Davis-Price | Running Back |  San Francisco 49ers | |
| 2022 | R4.19 | Cade York | Place Kicker |  Cleveland Browns | |
| 2022 | R4.21 | Neil Farrell Jr. | Defensive Tackle |  Las Vegas Raiders | |
| 2022 | R5.33 | Damone Clark | Inside Linebacker |  Dallas Cowboys | |
| 2022 | R6.27 | Austin Deculus | Offensive Tackle | Houston Texans |
| Year | Pick | Player | Pos | NFL team | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | R6.32 | Chasen Hines | Offensive Guard |  New England Patriots | |
| 2022 | R7.27 | Andre Anthony | Defensive End |  Tampa Bay Buccaneers | |
| 2021 | R1.05 | Ja'Marr Chase | Wide Receiver |  Cincinnati Bengals | |
| 2021 | R2.27 | Terrace Marshall Jr. | Wide Receiver |  Carolina Panthers | |
| 2021 | R4.10 | Jabril Cox | Inside Linebacker | Dallas Cowboys | |
| 2021 | R4.17 | Tyler Shelvin | Defensive Tackle | Cincinnati Bengals | |
| 2021 | R6.21 | Racey McMath | Wide Receiver |  Tennessee Titans | |
| 2021 | R6.40 | JaCoby Stevens | Safety |  Philadelphia Eagles | |
| 2021 | R7.09 | Kary Vincent Jr. | Cornerback |  Denver Broncos | |
| 2020 | R1.01 | Joe Burrow | Quarterback |  Cincinnati Bengals | |
| 2020 | R1.20 | K'Lavon Chaisson | Outside Linebacker |  Jacksonville Jaguars | |
| 2020 | R1.22 | Justin Jefferson | Wide Receiver | Minnesota Vikings | |
| 2020 | R1.28 | Patrick Queen | Inside Linebacker |  Baltimore Ravens | |
| 2020 | R1.32 | Clyde Edwards-Helaire | Running Back |  Kansas City Chiefs | |
| 2020 | R2.12 | Grant Delpit | Safety | Cleveland Browns | |
| 2020 | R2.29 | Kristian Fulton | Cornerback | Tennessee Titans | |
| 2020 | R3.05 | Damien Lewis | Offensive Guard |  Seattle Seahawks | |
| 2020 | R3.19 | Lloyd Cushenberry III | Center | Denver Broncos | |
| 2020 | R3.33 | Jacob Phillips | Inside Linebacker | Cleveland Browns | |
| 2020 | R4.02 | Saahdiq Charles | Offensive Tackle |  Washington Football Team | |
| 2020 | R4.25 | Rashard Lawrence | Defensive Tackle |  Arizona Cardinals | |
| 2020 | R6.06 | Blake Ferguson | Long Snapper |  Miami Dolphins | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2020 | R7.37 | Stephen Sullivan | Tight End | Seattle Seahawks | |
| 2019 | R1.05 | Devin White | Inside Linebacker |  Tampa Bay Buccaneers | |
| 2019 | R2.14 | Greedy Williams | Cornerback | Cleveland Browns | |
| 2019 | R4.35 | Foster Moreau | Tight End |  Oakland Raiders | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R2.23 | Donte Jackson | Cornerback | Carolina Panthers | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R2.27 | Derrius Guice | Running Back |  Washington Redskins | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R2.29 | D.J. Chark | Wide Receiver | Jacksonville Jaguars | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R3.23 | Arden Key | Defensive End | Oakland Raiders | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R6.20 | Russell Gage | Wide Receiver |  Atlanta Falcons | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R7.01 | Danny Etling | Quarterback | New England Patriots | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2018 | R7.27 | Will Clapp | Offensive Guard |  New Orleans Saints | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R1.04 | Leonard Fournette | Running Back | Jacksonville Jaguars | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R1.06 | Jamal Adams | Safety |  New York Jets | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R1.27 | Tre'Davious White | Cornerback |  Buffalo Bills | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R2.26 | Ethan Pocic | Center | Seattle Seahawks | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R3.11 | Duke Riley | Inside Linebacker | Atlanta Falcons | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R3.43 | Kendell Beckwith | Inside Linebacker | Tampa Bay Buccaneers | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R5.35 | Davon Godchaux | Defensive Tackle |  Miami Dolphins | recruited under Les Miles |
| 2017 | R7.29 | Malachi Dupre | Wide Receiver |  Green Bay Packers | recruited under Les Miles |
A pick counts toward his tenure when the player’s final college season was one he coached, a checkable rule rather than a claim about who developed the player. A blank note means the player is on a verified roster and arrived on his watch. “Estimated” means no roster record, so the final season is assumed to be the year before the draft.
News
No outlet on our list has written about him by name yet. His record is on Career.
Career
Coaching career
The arc of his career is on Now.
Inheritor inherited a power and neither built it higher nor let it collapse · Sustainer inherited a power and held it for five-plus elite seasons · Steady no large move in either direction on our stature ladder
2nd-best LSU tenure of 16 by the numbers.
Followed Les Miles (2005–2016) · succeeded by Brian Kelly (2022–2025).
| Season | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | |||||||
| Record | 6-2 | 9-4 | 10-3 | 15-0 | 5-5 | 6-6 | |
| Postseason | W bowl | L bowl | W bowl | Champion | — | L bowl | |
| Coordinators | |||||||
| OC | Cam Cameron | Matt Canada | Steve Ensminger | Steve Ensminger | Steve Ensminger | Jake Peetz | |
| DC | Dave Aranda | Dave Aranda | Dave Aranda | Dave Aranda | Bo Pelini | Daronte Jones | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | |||||||
| Offense | 80 | 83 | 53 | 100 | 42 | 52 | |
| Defense | 93 | 61 | 89 | 83 | 19 | 40 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script | |||||||
| 1st-down pass% | 36.0 | 29.6 | 40.6 | 60.7 | 49.7 | 48.0 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 26.9 | 21.9 | 26.9 | 48.5 | 43.0 | 54.1 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 15.4 | 11.4 | 16.7 | 20.6 | 29.4 | 45.2 | |
Performs about as expected for his recruiting talent, on both sides of the ball.
Brings in smaller-than-position-typical players than most.
Recruits older, more experienced transfers than most.
4 player-seasons honored (All-America / national award): Joe Burrow (2019), Derek Stingley Jr. (2020), Cade York (2020), Zach Von Rosenberg (2020)
Followed Lane Kiffin (2010–2013) · succeeded by Steve Sarkisian (2014–2015).
3 NFL Draft picks: Marqise Lee (2014), Marcus Martin (2014), Devon Kennard (2014)
15th-best Ole Miss tenure of 17 by the numbers.
Followed David Cutcliffe (1998–2004) · succeeded by Houston Nutt (2008–2011).
| Season | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | ||||
| Record | 3-8 | 4-8 | 3-9 | |
| Postseason | — | — | — | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | ||||
| Offense | 36 | 17 | 42 | |
| Defense | 68 | 46 | 34 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script | ||||
| 1st-down pass% | 46.9 | 24.8 | 41.8 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 44.9 | 30.8 | 50.0 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 25.8 | 35.5 | 25.8 | |
3 NFL Draft picks: Tre' Stallings (2006), Patrick Willis (2007), Trumaine McBride (2007)
Was he good?
Every angle here comes back inconclusive — not enough separation from zero to call it either way.
+6.4 pts at LSU · #329 of 1290 · middle halfIn this company
Other coaches who reached Blue-Blood-or-better at multiple programs: Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, Lane Kiffin.