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Editor’s Note: This is the fourth year local television host and regular 225 contributor Lee Feinswog has offered pre-season LSU football analysis and predictions.

So it comes to pass that 225 wants, as it does every year, a definitive prediction for the 2010 LSU football season.

Easier said than done.

My first answer: Somewhere between 6-6 and 10-2.

Not good enough, came the response.

No, seriously. I don’t know if these guys can bounce back and be world beaters or simply limp through the whole thing.

Gotta have better than that, came the response.

Well, you know, there are so many things at play here.

Defensive back Jai Eugene and kicker Josh Jasper should be standout players for LSU this season.

The tenure of LSU coach Les Miles after two sub-par seasons, low-lighted by the last minutes against Ole Miss and Penn State.

“There’s more pressure on him than you would expect for a coach who’s only a couple of years removed from a national title,” offers Stewart Mandel, national college football writer for SI.com.

The brutal schedule.

Alabama and Florida.

And that pesky quarterback situation. Aaargggh. The LSU quarterback is going to be the death of us all.

“I have a lot of respect for Les Miles and what he’s done there,” says Tony Barnhart of Atlanta, who has covered the SEC and national scene for three decades as a sportswriter and now as an analyst for CBS. “But I’ve got LSU picked fourth in the division right now, because I don’t think they have a clue as to what they’re doing on the offensive side of the football. A year ago they had no offensive identity. Jordan Jefferson did not get one bit better as a quarterback first game to last game. Lord knows let’s not even get into the clock-management issues.”

Yeah, let’s not.

You think it’s easy to predict these things? A year ago, I called on NFL talent expert Mike Detillier. He said on these pages LSU offensive lineman Ciron Black and wide receiver Brandon LaFell would be first-round draft picks. Black never got taken at all! And LaFell went in the third round to Carolina.

Just two of the reasons why the Tigers finished 9-4 with so many shaky victories.

So I gave Detillier another shot.

What happened?

“Medical issues with Ciron. I’m convinced the knee problems affected him,” Detillier says from his home in Raceland.

And LaFell? “Brandon, bottom line, didn’t play well as a senior.”

OK, so I asked him what he thought about this season, offering that it’s a pretty simply in and out. Teams that contend for or win the national title have lots of first- and second-round draft picks. Last year, LSU’s top pick was Chad Jones, who went in the third round to the Giants, two picks before LaFell.

LSU junior Patrick Peterson “is the best cornerback in college football,” Detillier says. “He’s going to be a top 10 pick. He’s the best cover cornerback I’ve seen in the Southeastern Conference since Champ Bailey.” That’s pretty strong praise, considering Bailey, who played at Georgia, is entering his 12th NFL season.

Detillier also has good ratings for senior receiver Terrence Toliver (probably a second-rounder) and offensive tackle Joseph Barksdale (likely a third- or fourth-rounder).

Detillier also thinks defensive tackle Drake Nevis and linebacker Kelvin Sheppard will get drafted and so might defensive back Jai Eugene and place-kicker Josh Jasper.

Not that I don’t trust Detillier, but after last year figured it was worth a call to Baton Rouge talent scout Chris Landry for his opinions. He agrees with my NFL draft/national championship theory.

“There is a direct correlation with draft prospects and the amount of them and how good you are,” Landry says.

Landry, who rates players like Black and LaFell lower than Detillier this time last year, thinks Peterson “has got mid- to high-first-round ability, but quite frankly there are three or four corners in the league who play better. But he’s got everything you look for, long arms, can play press man—he’s just got tremendous ability.”

Toliver, Barksdale, Sheppard and Eugene fit into the draft mix, too, Landry says, and he threw punter Derek Helton in there as well.

“With good years a lot of them have a shot at that second- and third-round range,” Landry says.

As he was saying it, I was taking 10-2 off my prediction list and thinking 9-3 is optimistic.

LSU could win six to 10 games, predicts author Feinswog, pictured here on the set of his television show interviewing Miles over the summer.

Of course, two years ago—the year after the national championship—I went with 8-4, took a lot of grief and then LSU went 7-5 before winning a bowl game. Last year I took 8-4 again and the Tigers were 9-3 before losing a bowl, the first bowl defeat in Miles’ tenure.

LSU, by the way, opens against North Carolina in Atlanta.

“North Carolina has six guys on defense who have a chance to be first-rounders,” Landry says. “… LSU had more guys than anybody invited to the combine, but they weren’t difference-makers … That talent level is good, but it’s not as good as it used to be, and it’s not as good as Alabama’s and Florida’s. Those two programs are clearly the best in the conference in terms of talent and the development of talent.”

But, Landry says, he thinks LSU has the third-best talent in the SEC.

Hmmm … 9-3 takes the lead.

But there’s that QB situation. LSU has put a lot of eggs in the Jordan Jefferson basket.

“It would help him as a college player, and it wouldn’t hurt him as a pro player, to embrace his athleticism a little more,” Landry offers. “He was never a guy even in high school who liked to run the football, but that is a big drive extender. He has the ability to make some big plays with his feet.”

Shreveport’s own Tim Brando, host of CBS Sports’ College Football Today, is never one to pull punches.

“Les and his staff need to answer the challenge in a significant manner,” Brando says. “You cannot be .500 or sub-.500 in the league. You cannot afford that.”

My look at the schedule shows: two probable defeats (Alabama, Florida); two definite victories (McNeese State and Louisiana-Monroe); and three probable victories (Vanderbilt, Mississippi State and West Virginia). That’s five up and two down.

That leaves five games making this so tough to figure: the North Carolina opener, Tennessee at home, at Auburn, Ole Miss at home and at Arkansas.

So here you go: LSU should be OK on defense. People who know way more than me say in this second year under defensive coordinator John Chavis, the Tigers will be outstanding. LSU also has a fabulous kicking game. But the Tigers have to be prepared to win ugly on offense. Run the ball and run it well. Jefferson has to make strong, timely short passes to three outstanding receivers, big Terrence Toliver and speedy Rueben Randle and Russell Shepard, and hope they make good things happen. In other words, don’t be themselves.

Out of those five pick ’em games, I say LSU beats Tennessee, Ole Miss and Arkansas and loses to North Carolina and Auburn.

Which brings me back to 8-4. At least that’s what I’m telling 225.

But just between us, let me just say they’ll go somewhere between 10-2 and 6-6.