Saban's Hire An Embarassment to College Football

I can't help it.

I just can't keep quiet about this any longer. I'm a few days late, but what I'm saying has to be said. It needs to be said -- by a neutral observer.

Saban's departure from Miami, and subsequent hire in Tuscaloosa, has to rank among the Top 5 of "slimiest things ever to occur in college football."

Look. I'm a Florida fan. Florida has no rivalry with the Tide. Alabama's rivalry is with its in-state cousin, Auburn. And if I had to pick between Alabama and Auburn, I'd pick the latter, simply because their fans have been, in my experience, honorable, polite, and courteous. (They are also a hell of a lot more intelligent.) But I have no real beef with Alabama. I like their tradition, even like how they count fake national championships to come to their highly laughable count of "12" MNCs. (Like Saurian Sagacity has demonstrated, if Florida were to use Alabama's counting method, we'd have three national championships instead of one. What's not to like?)

Okay, okay, enough passive-aggressive doublespeak. In all seriousness, as an SEC fan, I've wanted to the Tide to get better. They're a traditional power; and aside from a great 2005 season, they haven't been very good for a long, long time. When people think of the SEC, they think of an "A-list" which always includes, at the least, Florida, Alabama, Tennessee and LSU. When Alabama doesn't do well, the national perception of the SEC drops. So the Tide being a contender is actually good for the SEC.

But the way this thing has played out... man.

Nick Saban is a very good college coach and I have no doubt that within a couple of seasons he'll be making waves with the Tide. You can't knock the guy's credentials. He has them. As a college coach I've always been impressed by his teams. The guy's good. On paper, he's a great hire for Alabama. Case closed.

But Saban's credibility has taken a huge hit. Huge. And with it, so has Alabama. Never have I seen such a universal, national backlash over the way a coach has handled a hiring situation. Had Saban simply refused to comment from the get-go, many of the negative issues involved in his flight from Miami would never have surfaced. Instead, he made a point of insisting that he wasn't interested in the Tide's overtures, that he "wasn't going to be the Alabama coach," and a number of other infamous missives which will now haunt him for all eternity.

Make no mistake about it. The only fans on the planet who think Saban's a great guy, featuring such qualities as honesty, virtue, and commitment to others, are Alabama fans. Everyone else thinks he's a snake. Including me.

Stupid me: after Saban's most rigorous denial that he'd leave the Dolphins for Bama, I finally believed him. Sure, he did the same thing at LSU, insisting he wasn't going anywhere, then disappearing to the pros. But even at LSU, while his denials were fairly strong, they didn't include multiple, emphatical statements directly contrary to the truth.

The dude lied. He cheated the fans, players, and management of the Miami Dolphins. And he embarassed college football when he flashed his smarmy smile and crimson-colored tie at Alabama's introductory press conference just a few hours later.

The way I see it, Auburn just picked up a huge recruiting advantage. Who will ever believe a word Nick Saban says? Will parents be able to delude themselves into thinking that Saban will have the best interests of their children at heart when they're recruited to play football at Alabama? If they are -- shame on them. They should know better.

Saban says his next stop is retirement and that his coaching carousel days are over.

Sure. I believe you, coach. Really.

Bottom line: Saban has shown his true colors. And now the SEC has a veritable snake in the grass in the form of the Crimson Tide's head coach. Don't want him here -- not because he's a threat, but because he's bad for college football and is now the most negative image I can imagine representing a program which purports to have the greatest pride and tradition of any team in the country. Here's to hoping he fails miserably, although he probably won't. But one thing he has already done is drag down the reputation of the Crimson Tide football program, and that won't change until he moves on to his next coaching stop.