Clay Helton's days as a USC coach are numbered ... UNLESS he beats both UCLA and Notre Dame in the next two weeks -- so says Trojan Rodney Peete.
The former USC superstar tells TMZ Sports he's a fan of Clay and likes him personally ... but with the way SC's looked this season -- Peete says the dude is about to get fired.
"I think that over time, it's shown that we've kind of fallen off a little bit," Peete says.
The ex-QB ain't lying ... the Trojans won the Pac-12 the last two years -- but are just 5-5 this year and are in danger of missin' out on a bowl game completely this season.