J. Brady McCullough (LA Times)  —  They’ve done everything but the one thing that has to be done to fix USC football. They’ve swapped out nearly every assistant coach, bolstered the recruiting staff and hired away young people who create impressive videos that are meant to make something that isn’t very cool right now look way cooler on social media.

The natural pop culture reference is that USC athletic director Mike Bohn has spent much of his short tenure rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, but, days before the Trojans’ latest inexplicable embarrassment — a 42-28 loss to Stanford on Saturday night at the Coliseum — another apt Hollywood comparison for the Clay Helton era at USC casually surfaced.

At a USC practice this week, Helton was asked by a TV reporter, looking for something offbeat, if he’d ever seen “Ted Lasso.”

“One of my favorite shows,” Helton said happily, revealing that the hit feel-good comedy of the pandemic has become his Sunday night go-to.

The reporter continued, “Instead of Xs and Os, because he doesn’t know the game, he is more about psychology. Is that your approach?”

Most head coaches would not have gone any further, but Helton engaged.

“I get to deal with 18- to 21-year-olds. It’s not only the Xs and Os on the field, but you’re also teaching them life,” he said. “The combination of that is what I’ve always liked. I saw my dad coach in the NFL, and my niche was here. I really like being not only their coach, but their friend, their mentor, some of them their adopted father and bringing them along. Maybe that’s the reason I like the show. I appreciate that question.”

That was quite a soundbite. It summed up everything that is novel about the idea of Clay Helton as a major college football coach, the qualities that make you want to root for the guy to rise above his limitations. It also summed up why USC has to move on from Helton as soon as possible: The Trojans don’t appear serious about winning anymore, not as long as he’s their leader.

Those who witnessed Helton’s “Ted Lasso” exchange say the question wasn’t a setup to compare the coach to Jason Sudeikis’ lovable character who has never coached soccer before but is hired to coach a sad-sack British club for the purpose of tanking it, unbeknownst to him. But the fact that it was so easy to fashion Helton as USC’s bungling, affable Lasso points to the problem that Bohn — and USC President Carol Folt — must finally address.

USC fans don’t need to be reminded of the reasons that Helton must go. They’ve been gnawing on them for three years now (heck, some weren’t even swayed by Helton’s 2016 Rose Bowl win and 2017 Pac-12 championship, and those folks turned out to be prescient).

During the 2016 and 2017 seasons, Helton was coaching kids recruited by Lane Kiffin and Steve Sarkisian. Those coaches didn’t re-create the Pete Carroll years either, but they knew how to recruit, particularly Sark. After Sark’s grand fall, Helton must have seemed safe to Pat Haden, then the athletic director trying to stabilize a shaky program.

How bad could Helton be, anyway? USC recruits itself, right? The problem was Haden and his successor, Lynn Swann, were in denial about how far behind the Trojans were in program infrastructure. USC is in this spot today because Swann made the ultimate folly — after the Trojans won the league in 2017, he staged a bidding war with himself and signed an extension so advantageous to Helton that it has kept the USC bean counters from pulling the plug.

It’s important to remember Haden and Swann were King Nero in the scenario of this former empire, not Helton. Clay Helton has given all of himself to USC — it’s just not enough to win when it counts and we’ve known that for a while now.

Bohn has bought himself two years off that extension and whatever is included within the contract that has tied his hands. The time is now to put an end to this.

USC should be better than losing 42-28 to a Stanford team that just got waxed by Kansas State. USC should be better than watching most of the best players from its own backyard playing in all the big games across the country Saturday after Saturday. USC should be better than living in fear of having to buy its way out of mediocrity — the school and its donors certainly used to have the money.

There are only two words left that can fix USC’s tired script with Clay Helton as a leading man:

And cut.

latimes.com

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