SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
And now it's time for sports.
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SIMON: College football coaching chaos, but, boy, it's lucrative. And make room for the tallest man in basketball. Sports reporter Michele Steele joins us now. Michele, thanks so much for being with us.
MICHELE STEELE: Good morning, Scott.
SIMON: Good to be with you. Alabama hosts LSU tonight. But a lot of attention is on the person who isn't there - fired coach, Brian Kelly. To let him go, they're going to pay him $54 million. And LSU is just the latest university to let go of their coach at enormous cost. The AP reports that buyouts for assistant head coaches have reached almost $185 million. Now, Michele, this is going to sound naive. But these are educational institutions - right? - in the business of higher learning. And couldn't at least some of all those millions be spent on education or maybe scholarships for students from low-income families?
STEELE: Yeah. I wish I wasn't laughing at your question, but that's kind of the state of college sports right now. And that's what critics of the game, of the sport have been talking about for years. It's a professional league masquerading as part of an educational institution. You're right. Fifty-four million dollars to one guy not to coach is wild. You just don't see that in the pros. You could argue that college is more pro than the pros. There's no salary cap. Players can kind of come and go. But as far as LSU is concerned, you know, this new coaching search is going to be watched very closely, not just 'cause the governor is getting involved. But it is considered the best job in college football, at least this cycle. Before Brian Kelly, every coach in the 21st century LSU won a national championship. He did not win, and that was unacceptable for them.
SIMON: Interesting in baseball this week. Colorado Rockies, which were the worst team in the major leagues this past season, are turning to Paul DePodesta to help turn things around. Now, he is the same person who pioneered the use of analytics with the Oakland A's. He was partly portrayed - it was an amalgam of the characters - by Jonah Hill in the film "Moneyball." Boy, I sense a sequel. But he has to help turn the...
STEELE: (Laughter).
SIMON: ...Rockies around.
STEELE: Yeah, "Moneyball 2: Electric Boogaloo." How do you go from the worst team in football to the worst team in baseball and expect to turn everything around? But that's what they want Paul DePodesta to do.
SIMON: Right. He's been with the Cleveland Browns. Yeah.
STEELE: Yeah. That's what they want. He was their chief strategy office, lives in California but, you know, works in Cleveland, technically. He was made famous by that Michael Lewis book, and, of course, that movie. He was that baseball stats nerd - found value in places where other people weren't looking. He hasn't been in baseball for 10 years, and the Rockies, from what I'm hearing, are about 10 years behind in the analytics department.
SIMON: (Laughter).
STEELE: So this is the ultimate analytics test. Because you're a baseball fan, Scott. You know Coors Field. The air is so thin there, sometimes routine fly balls can turn into home runs real quick. But if he can make the Rockies successful, maybe he should get an Oscar and a Nobel Prize for physics, if he figures that out.
SIMON: Oh. What a nice thought. And finally, college basketball this week - a record - Olivier Rioux from Quebec took the floor for the Florida Gators to become the tallest college basketball player of all time. He is 7-foot-9. I mean, the only play the Gators need is just to, you know, say stand under the hoop, Olivier. We'll get you the ball, stuff it in, and we'll do it all over again.
STEELE: Sure - slam dunk each time. The hoop is only 10 feet. He's almost 8 feet tall. He's 7-foot-9. He is 8 inches taller, Scott, than Shaq. His primary defensive move is just to look down.
SIMON: Yeah.
STEELE: You know, forget boxing out. He just needs to stand next to guys. I've actually procured every opposing team's pregame scouting report, and it says avoid the guy who is almost 8 feet tall.
SIMON: Ha.
STEELE: He's (laughter) - he's developmental but fun to watch for Florida fans.
SIMON: All right. Sports reporter Michele Steele, talk to you soon. Thanks so much.
STEELE: See you next time. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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