| It may be the new frontier of football rivalries. First battling for and swiping recruits. Then, coaches. Now, front-office personnel. LSU has picked up its second front-office staffer from Ole Miss, adding Preston Tiffany to be its new director of player personnel. This comes after LSU coach Brian Kelly brought back Austin Thomas from Ole Miss for a third stint with the Tigers to be their senior associate athletic director for football administration. Of course, LSU lost staffers to other schools, too. Tiffany replaces Will Redmond, who left for a similar job at Auburn. The Tigers have also lost a couple of other personnel assistants to other schools recently as well. These kinds of revolving door situations are going to happen. The point is LSU appears to be well poised to restock its positions with staffers other schools are likely not eager to let slip away. We're just a day away from the start of LSU baseball season, and coach Jay Johnson has named his starting pitchers for Friday's game against VMI and Saturday's game with Central Arkansas. Beyond that, Johnson wasn't willing to give too much away, though the expectation is that the Tigers have perhaps the deepest and most-talented pitching staff in Johnson's first three seasons at The Box. Just over a month from now it will be Selection Sunday for the NCAA men's and women's tournaments. The NCAA will have its first reveal of the women's top 16 tournament seeds Thursday (5:30 p.m., ESPN2) and we have our first look at LSU's NCAA Tournament projections and the Tigers' NCAA "nitty gritty" report. Also take note of a very interesting potential opponent that may get sent to Baton Rouge for the first two rounds, at least according to ESPN's Charlie Creme. To be perfectly frank, there's no point in doing a look at the men's basketball team's postseason hopes, because they're nonexistent at this point. The Tigers are regrouping after yet another close loss, this one 82-80 on Tuesday night at Florida after rallying from a 20-point second-half deficit to tie the Gators late. Next is a trip to surprising South Carolina, which got roasted 101-61 Auburn on Wednesday night. The Gamecocks will certainly be in none too hospitable a mood when the Tigers show up there Saturday. A couple more stories to link to before we put a wrap on today's newsletter. First, LSU is collecting a $1 million check from Amazon for an NIL documentary on the program that will be airing soon. LSU athletes in the series — Heisman winner Jayden Daniels, Angel Reese, Olivia Dunne and Flau'jae Johnson — will also receive talent fees. And the LSU softball team, which started the season with five straight shutouts at home, now heads on the road for a little stiffer competition in the Clearwater Invitational in Florida. That's all for now, folks. Thanks as ever for reading and subscribing. You are the clear water to our cloudy days, or something complimentary sounding like that. Scott Rabalais | 
