Alabama Football: Crimson Tide CFB Dominance valued and hated

Alabama Football has brought serious discontent to the rest of college football. Everybody claims to ‘want Bama’ but the core wish is for teams to squash the Crimson Tide. LSU had a great football team in 2019. The Bengal Tigers deserved the National Championship. Across the nation, some college football fans thought the Championship was no more momentous than LSU taking down the Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa.

Most everybody wants somebody – and almost any team will do – to slay the Alabama Crimson Tide dragon. To the dismay of the college football world, the dragon did not die.

A recent poll published by Andy Staples showed 80-plus percent of college football fans want the Playoff expanded.

Most fans say they are tired of seeing the same few teams in the Playoff, season after season. What they hate even more is the dominance of Alabama Football winning so many National Championships.

Everybody wants their team invited to a Playoff party. When that happens, and it will be sooner than later, the hatred of Alabama Football will not dissipate. It is not outlandish to believe Nick Saban will coach the Crimson Tide to one or more National Championships before retirement. Should that occur after the Playoff format has expanded, a Crimson Tide National Championship will not be hated any less than they were six out of the last 12 seasons.

Sports Dynasties attain acknowledged greatness, but it does not make them any less hated. It happened with the New York Yankees when they won the World Series 12 times from 1936-1953. At the peaks of their championship performance, the Green Bay Packers and the New England Patriots have been hated as much as the Crimson Tide.

Alabama Football is not the only college football program to go through eras as the game’s most hated. It happened to Fielding Yost’s ‘Point-A-Minute’ Michigan teams in the early years of the 20th century. Yost was widely hated for the Wolverine’s dominance, with his method’s once described,

"tramp on the injured and hurdle the dead."

Notre Dame has generated large amounts of love and hate in multiple eras. So has Oklahoma and Miami. Paul Bryant’s Alabama Football program was widely hated outside the state of Alabama, and particularly outside the South.

As Bryant’s legend grew and age mellowed him, much of the hate turned into respect. A few weeks ago, we talked about something similar happening with Nick Saban. The GOAT is no longer at the top of the hate list of every, not Crimson Tide fan.

A worthy question is do the dynasties, like the Yankees, the Packers (winner of five NFL or Super Bowl Championships in seven seasons in the 1960s) and the Crimson Tide, hurt their respective games. Many fans of opposing teams are convinced such dominance does damage others.

With the possible exception of Vanderbilt, it can be argued Nick Saban has made every SEC program better. Opponents unwilling to admit that fact should focus instead on trying to catch up.