Hitting coach Eddie Smith received his first opportunity to be a head coach at Utah Valley University and now recruiting coordinator and Mainieri’s right hand man, Nolan Cain, is off to Texas A&M.
He returned to the program in 2014 as a baseball operations coach in 2014 but since the 2017 season he’s helped the Tigers reel in a number of top five recruiting classes, including the No.
With Mainieri’s neck issues over the past three seasons, Cain has taken on even more responsibilities and the hope was to possibly retain him with the next coach the purple and gold brought in.
With high level recruits like catcher Ian Moller and pitchers Brock Selvidge and Ben Kudrna all out of state prospects, the cache of the LSU name is not all they committed to but rather to be coached by Mainieri and his assistant staff as well.
However, there is a double edged sword to hiring a coach right away as the Tigers could wait to see how the College World Series shakes out and go after some of the top names on the market.
If LSU really wanted one of them as the next coach, it’s a move that would’ve been made by now, hinting that Scott Woodward and the administration have their eye on one or two candidates in Omaha.
The loss of Cain to an SEC West rival no doubt stings and has a potential trickle down effect on the recruiting class this year and moving forward.
Glen West has been with LSUCountry for over a year now, covering the Tigers 2019 championship run.