Austin Thomas is coming home.

The former LSU general manager, Thomas was the first person ever to hold that title in the history of the SEC, had been a member of the Tigers’ staff since 2013. He also held a brief role at USC as an assistant athletics director before ultimately returning to LSU.

News of Thomas’ hiring at Tennessee was first reported by Patrick Brown of 247Sports. The hiring has since been confirmed on the LSU side by Ross Dellenger‏ of The Advocate.

In the five seasons Thomas spent on LSU’s staff, the Tigers have finished with the nation’s No. 2 recruiting class (2014), No. 5 class (2015), No. 2 class (2016), No. 7 class and currently have the No. 13 class for the 2018 cycle with the first signing period quickly approaching.

A graduate and native of Tennessee, he started his college career as a member of Phillip Fulmer’s final Tennessee staff. Monte Kiffin offered him a position on his defensive staff the following season. Lane Kiffin thought enough of Thomas after one year to bring him to USC when the former UT head coach left Knoxville in the middle of the night for Los Angeles. He’s been groomed by two of the best recruiters in modern SEC history in Ed Orgeron and former LSU recruiting coorindator, now UTSA head coach, Frank Wilson.

For the 2017 recruiting cycle, 247Sports named Thomas the nation’s 10th best individual recruiter. Pretty remarkable considering he’s not even on staff at LSU as a coach. Every other member of the individual top 25 recruiters list is an assistant or head coach.

That lofty ranking came after Thomas led the charge in LSU landing two five-star prospects from Tennessee — defensive back JaCoby Steven and linebacker Jacob Phillips. In an unusual move, LSU took defensive line coach Pete Jenkins off the road this time last year and replaced him with Thomas. The move obviously paid off for the Tigers with two crucial signatures.

How did LSU land the two prospects everyone in the nation wanted, including flipping Phillips’ Oklahoma commitment at the final hour?

“All Austin,” Orgeron said to James Bewers of The Advocate. “He got Jacob Phillips. I knew (Austin) was going to be good, but those results are phenomenal. I didn’t know we were going to get those results.

“Very rare to get two five-star recruits to come to LSU your first go around (at off-campus recruiting).”

His aspirations apparently don’t stop at the college game, either. According to those who know him best in the profession, Thomas will one day be running an NFL franchise.

“Austin I believe one day will be an NFL General Manager,” Orgeron said to Barton Simmons of 247Sports. “He’s very talented. He’s the general manager. I trust him in all aspects. He can have the keys to the car. I trust him in everything that he does.”

So what exactly are the job duties of a general manager at LSU? Simmons tried his best to list out the daily obligations Thomas was responsible for in Baton Rouge:

The General Manager tag that accompanies Thomas’ position is a valiant effort at corralling his responsibilities into one title but it still fails. At varying points during my day with Austin at LSU any of the following would have been apt descriptors: Director of Player Personnel, Position Coach, Recruiting Coordinator, Associate Athletic Director, Assistant to the Head Coach, Graduate Assistant and more.

In an in-depth article on the events leading up to LSU’s 2017 signing day, Bruce Feldman prominently mentioned Thomas several times in his FOX Sports piece. Included in the article was the origins of Thomas’ love for college football recruiting:

Seated immediately to Orgeron’s right is 31-year-old Austin Thomas, LSU’s general manager. Thomas grew up a recruiting junkie, getting trouble in school on National Signing Day two straight years for spending so much time in the library trying to get online updates on recruits, he says. “From that point on, we always looked at (Signing Day) as a ‘sick’ day, and I knew what I wanted to do. I didn’t want to coach. I always wanted to do personnel and was fascinated by putting things together.”

Thomas began his tenure at LSU by helping the Tigers secure the No. 2 overall class in the nation for the 2014 recruiting cycle. He briefly left Baton Rouge when USC offered him a promotion. However, LSU felt Thomas’ loss immediately and took drastic action to lure him back to the SEC. LSU made Thomas the SEC’s first general manager.

“When Austin left, this place went to chaos,” LSU head coach Ed Orgeron told Feldman, according to his FOX column. “It was crazy.”

Head coach Jeremy Pruitt and his new-look Tennessee staff have their work cut out for them when it comes to rebuilding the roster in Knoxville to make the Vols an SEC contender once again. While the climb to the top will take some time and persistence, Tennessee now has arguably the best operations manager in the nation leading the program’s efforts to return the glory back to the football team from Rocky Top.