Now-LSU football head coach Brian Kelly once had New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh shovel snow and park cars for him.
Shockwaves were sent throughout the college football world on Monday afternoon when it was first reported by Yahoo Sports’ Pete Thamel that Brian Kelly would be leaving Notre Dame to become the next head coach of LSU.
The news was subsequently confirmed by the school on Tuesday morning.
Sources: LSU is expecting to hire Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly as the school’s next head coach. An announcement could come as early as tomorrow.
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) November 30, 2021
Interestingly enough, New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh once worked under Kelly during the latter’s head coaching days at Central Michigan University. Saleh worked as a graduate assistant alongside current Green Bay Packers head coach Matt LaFleur.
Unfortunately, Saleh and LaFleur don’t look back on that experience too fondly from at least one particular perspective.
Saleh recalls one winter night when he and LaFleur thought they were invited to a party at Kelly’s home, per ESPN’s Rob Demovsky via a January 2019 piece featuring the Packers head coach.
Upon arriving, it turned out they weren’t on the guest list. So, instead, Kelly put them to work.
“We shoveled the snow and parked all the cars,” Saleh, the then-San Francisco 49ers defensive coordinator, said in early 2019, just as the Packers hired his buddy, LaFleur. “Then, at the end of the night, we had to go get the cars again.”
At the end of the night, the two made an important decision.
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“We decided that when we’re in that position, we’re never going to treat people the way we got treated,” said Saleh, who has since become a head coach himself.
Saleh says LaFleur has lived up to that decision, and it’s safe to assume that he has as well.
While this small story from Saleh has little effect on … well, anything, it’s still interesting to gain a little insight on the new LSU coach from the perspective of a current NFL coach.
H/T SB Nation’s Trevor Woods
Matt Lafleur and Robert Saleh (Graduate Assistants at the time) thought they were invited to a party at then Central Michigan head coach Brian Kelly's house.
Kelly made them shovel snow all night instead.
Brian Kelly is not a good person. pic.twitter.com/etoTYAghBQ
— Trevor Woods (@WoodsFootball) November 30, 2021
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