After experiencing a year trying to repair the handy work of former Alabama head football coach Mike Shula, it would be beyond interesting to hear a proven winner like Nick Saban’s true assessment of the overall damage that an inexperienced commander can do to a major college football program.
Coach Saban would admit the lack of depth created by NCAA probation has been hard enough to overcome. But Coach Shula’s soft leadership had a lingering affect; no team discipline and a loser mentality.
Apparently, when Nick arrived, he found a place where the inmates had been running the show for so long they actually believed they could get away with this childish behavior. Had Saban followed a real coach, like Dennis Franchione (ed.: Huh?), the transition would’ve been much smoother, allowing Nick to teach his new system and techniques without having to focus on reestablishing a winning attitude.
Saban knows there are no excuses, but those like myself who’ve witnessed firsthand the pathetic state of the Alabama program, simply expected too much from the man in the first year of his “process”. Nick Saban is an great coach, but he is not a miracle worker. He got more from this team through the first eight games than anyone expected. Judging from the Shula era players I’ve seen up close and in person, it is amazing that he was able to produce a 6-2 record early on.
One thing is certain; the late season collapse of the Tide is a well-established tradition that was impossible to conquer this year, and will be something the coaches and players must eliminate next November. This season, Saban and his assistants spent more time trying to purge the fourth quarter fold tendencies and policing attitudes and behavior, than they did teaching x’s and o’s.
That said, Saban had two paths to choose from when fall camp started. He could break out the axe and cut off the bad branches, or wipe the slate clean and start out new. He chose the latter. This seemed a clear path to success, but three quarters of the way through his first outing, disaster struck.
There are bad seeds on this team, consumed by a lifestyle that doesn’t mesh with being a champion. Saban’s clean-slate policy put him in a quandary, by allowing certain “elite” players too much rope. As a result, the thugs not only hung themselves, but their teammates as well.
Crimson Tide fans may never get the real story on how this program got to this point, and in the end it doesn’t matter. However, a full disclosure on the topic would be fair. After all, the people in the seats deserve to be informed. Does Nick Saban need to explain why his team fell apart this year? No. His job is to fix the problem this off-season, and teach Bama players to never let it happen again.
Sometimes, a new head coach’s first year is a mild transition. In other words, the program basically picks up right where it left off. In most cases, the conversion is more difficult. At Alabama, the task has been monumental, because the players now have a taskmaster, when their former headman was their buddy.
With most experts picking Alabama to finish with a record of 7-5 (I expected more at 9-3), Saban slightly underachieved in his first year at 6-6. When you dig a little deeper and realize that too much teaching time this year was consumed changing the Shula-tainted thug culture, you get a much clearer image that Nick has been earning his money.
Only time will tell the story on Nick Saban’s effectiveness, but history says that great things are just over the horizon.