Alabama football has a legacy of coaches who were great leaders. What separates Nick Saban from the other men whose statues stand tall outside Bryant-Denny?
Nick Saban has a personal assistant whose time working for the University of Alabama goes back to the last years of Paul Bryant’s career. For 36 years, Cedric Burns has helped Alabama football coaches navigate the demands of their jobs that do not include coaching football.
Burns is tight-lipped when talking about working for famous Alabama football coaches. Of course, he is. His job demands it. The gifted writer and Alabama football fan, Warren St. John pulled an observation out of Cedric once. Burns said, “There’s been two kind of coaches at Alabama.” St. John pressed Burns for more detail. Cedric’s response was “I ain’t saying.”
Eventually, at a later setting, after more cajoling by St. John, Cedric did provide an answer,
"“There’s the ones with statues and there’s the ones without. And the thing is, the ones without statues are all different. But the ones with statues are all the same.”"
Cedric Burns knows Alabama football going back more than 36 years. In fact, after Mal Moore’s passing, there may not be any person having a greater repository of intimate Alabama football knowledge. Unlike his boss, Burns is a man of few words. Just like his boss, the words shared should not go unnoticed.
On Thursday night, Nick Saban had much to say. He always does on the Hey Coach radio show. Nothing said on Thursday carries the same import as Cedric Burns’ summation of Alabama football championship coaches. But Nick said a lot and as always what Nick said was thoughtful and articulate.
If you have time, listen to whole the show. There was more good stuff than we can cover.
What Nick said …
On liking the 2017 team,
"This team has a kind of quiet character about ’em. Not a lot of real dominant sort of Alpha dog personalities but there is a lot of really good quality people that in their own quiet way do the right things and affect the temperature in the room … There’s a difference between a thermometer and a thermostat and we’ve got some guys like thermostats, they kinda set the tempo for what’s happening and how they do things and set a good example"
When asked about team weaknesses and specifically about the offensive line, Nick said,
"all mistakes are lack of attention to detail, the guys are playing hard but you’ve got to also play smart. It doesn’t always do great to just be emotional, most times when people get emotional they lose some of their intellect, they don’t play as smart, they don’t have good eye control, they don’t play with as good discipline"
The most compelling portion of the Thursday show was Nick talking about why he loves his job. His response was another example that first and foremost, Nick views himself as a teacher. He teaches life lessons as well as football lessons.
"I try to get the players to understand (to) respect your talent, invest in yourself … if you have talent and ability, and God gave you that opportunity, whether it is intelligence, whether it is physical capability, whether it is a combination of both. You almost owe it to yourself to make sure you bring that to fruition by doing as much work at a high standard and a high level as you possibly can, to be all you can be as a person, as a student and as a player and I don’t think you are respecting yourself if you don’t do that."
More observations on Nick Saban
We have written about the human side of Nick before and if such pondering interests you, take a look at the Saban Process is mostly a quest for clarity.
For a far better writing choice on the same theme, read all of the Warren St. John piece we referenced above, Nick Saban: Sympathy for the Devil.
For anyone seeking the best words ever written about Alabama football, we would suggest the authors, Howell Raines, Rick Bragg and Warren St. John.
Next: The 30 Greatest Games in Alabama Football History
The Hey Coach radio show is available each week on the University of Alabama Athletics Facebook page. It is always worth a listen.