One of the most bizarre moments of the offseason happened in January, when LSU Tigers head coach Lane Kiffin flew to Knoxville to recruit Arizona State transfer quarterback Sam Leavitt after he visited the Tennessee Vols.

LSU ended up landing Leavitt thanks in part to Kiffin’s odd visit to Knoxville.

Kiffin, who was the head coach at Tennessee in 2009, met with reporters on Wednesday at LSU and was asked about the decision to show up in Knoxville in pursuit of Leavitt.

“I don’t know. I just know how I do things,” said Kiffin. “There’s a good and bad to it. I’m extremely competitive, and I don’t really do well with no — that just makes me more competitive when someone says no. So sometimes that happens in recruiting, they say no. But I think that’s my job. That’s my job to LSU.

“On kind of on a different note, when people ask about the social media and why do you do it — everything that I do is for the place where I coach at. For that school, for those players, and those fans. That makes me not very liked a lot of times by other [fan bases]. So, it’s the same in that. I’m hired here to go sign the best players, regardless of whether that means I’ve got to go get on another plane or find a plane and show up somewhere and walk through the Knoxville airport to find the guy. That’s just kind of how I work.”

There’s risk with signing Sam Leavitt

There’s no doubt that Tennessee was heavily interested in Leavitt, but the Vols weren’t in a position to go all-in on a quarterback coming off a Lisfranc injury.

“Here’s what I can factually say, is that every school that’s bringing him in on a visit is doing a medical evaluation to understand what his timeline looks like for recovery,” said On3’s Pete Nakos in January of Leavitt. “He obviously missed the back half of the season. I can factually say this — it is unclear if he’d be available for spring football.”

Leavitt is expected to at least be limited during spring practice (Kiffin said this week that Leavitt will throw and do some 7-on-7 stuff during spring practice).

There are also some locker room concerns with Leavitt.

CBS Sports college football insider Chris Hummer noted that “Arizona State did not provide kind feedback on him (Leavitt) behind the scenes” during the transfer process.

Additionally, Leavitt was was the only captain absent from Arizona State’s football banquet in early December, which was held nearly a month before the transfer portal opened.

“Sophomore quarterback Sam Leavitt was the lone Arizona State captain not at the team’s banquet, several attendees told Sun Devil Source,” reported Chris Karpman in December. “The team’s other captains went on stage individually to be recognized and greeted by ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham. When it came time to honor Leavitt, Dillingham told the entire audience that it would be cowardly not to mention Leavitt while recognizing the rest of the team’s captains, even though he wasn’t there, several attendees recounted.”

Maybe the Vols dodged a bullet.

Tennessee and LSU will face off in Knoxville on November 21.

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