Lane Kiffin gives his take on possible Senate run for Paul Finebaum

Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin is all aboard the Paul Finebaum for Senate train, based on his comments Wednesday. Finebaum revealed he is considering leaving ESPN to run for the open Senate seat in the state of Alabama in the wake of the assassination of political activist Charlie Kirk.

Finebaum said after the incident last month, he started to rethink his priorities. He even struggled to do his radio show immediately after Kirk’s murder, he told OutKick.

It’s hard to tell if Kiffin thinks Finebaum is serious about this move, but seems to be on board at the minimum. Maybe he won’t have to deal with their friendly verbal sparring on the air anymore!

“That means I don’t have to deal with him anymore,” Kiffin asked on Pardon My Take. “I think Paul would be great for that.”

How Kiffin and Finebaum would communicate or continue their professional relationship if the host became a politician remains to be seen.F inebaum joined McElroy & Cubelic in the Morning this summer to discuss his odd relationship with Kiffin. He used an interesting analogy to highlight their on-air chemistry. In general, Kiffin gives off a different vibe that your typical big-time college football coach. His use of social media is a prime example.

“I’ve had a lot of interesting conversations with him, and I’m too old to have gone through speed dating, but that’s kind of like, you sit down with him and you don’t know you have,” Finebaum said. “You have five minutes. You have no earthly idea what he’s going to say, how he’s going to say it. That’s his personality. I mean, he’s mercurial, but incredibly smart, and I think he looks at (SEC Media Days) as an inconvenience.”

Kiffin’s main gripe with Finebaum is his claim that the SEC Network host was the reason he lost his job as head coach for the USC Trojans, the job he took after spending one season in Knoxville. It’s a passing joke at this point, and was the cherry on top of their awkward interview during Monday on the opening day of SEC Media Days.

How Finebaum would perform in the Senate, should he run and be elected, is anyone’s guess, even if Kiffin said he would be good at it. Finebaum actually changed his perspective on the Senate seat once Tommy Tuberville, the former Auburn football coach, said he would run for Alabama governor. Not only that, recently retired Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl said he would not run for a Senate seat, despite rumors linking him to the job.

“I was … hesitant at first because I was very aware of Bruce’s interest and [I’m a] huge fan of Bruce … I didn’t take it too seriously,” Finebaum said. “I ended up talking to someone … who made it clear that there was a desire for me to be involved. And this person … was compelling and compassionate in the approach to me, and I started thinking about this.”