If it makes it to this blog, I guess it's not news. I didn't know about Nick Saban's weird rant about scholarship numbers until I got into my car to go to work yesterday. The radio was abuzz about it.
In case you haven't heard, at his post-Spring press conference, Nick Saban was asked how he was going to make the scholarship numbers work out, considering he has too many people on scholarship now to add 25 more in the Fall and still be at the 85 limit. His response started with the statement that they have a plan, but it didn't end there.
He got really worked up about the question and was clearly bothered by it. He then said, "The media doesn't need to know and the fans don't need to know. The fans don't want to know." The exchange continued uncomfortably thereafter, with Saban clearly again bothered by a journalist's intrusiveness. The journalist in question was not some rookie or a national media plant. It was Birmingham beat writer Ian Rapaport, who is very Bama-friendly but appears to have gotten under Nick Saban's skin more than once.
Two things about this incident struck me. First, it's not that Saban refuses to answer the question that is really troubling. It's the way he refuses to answer it. It's his tone and his body language, which denotes an air of hostility. Les Miles refuses to answer certain questions to. The man has never honestly answered a question about a player injury except when the injury has ended the player's season. He refused for several months to ever say when Ryan Perrilloux would rejoin the team last season, and then quietly reinstated him at the start of Fall Practice. His manner of refusing to divulge information does not come off quite as disrespectfully as Saban's refusals to answer questions.
Saban is by most accounts a pretty smooth recruiter, which is why it is so surprising that he is so stiff and uncomfortable in front of media. And this was friendly media. I have always heard that when he wants to be charming, he can charm anyone and any crowd, but he gets downright surly with the media, which is where most people see him.
I also think he's wrong about the fans not caring what his plan for dealing with scholarship numbers is. After all, if a major beat writer asked the question, it's probably because the beat writer believes his readers are interested in the answer. Now, many of them, if faced with the response "I have a plan that I won't talk about", would probably be satisfied at least for the time-being, knowing they would eventually find out one way or another. But they care. They're not indifferent to the answers to questions like, "Who are going to be the players on the roster when we play a game?" And that's what the question really is.
Let me just say that I think it's an absolute right of a college football coach not to divulge sensitive information about his team and his players. That's a different thing from saying it's a good idea to hold back certain information, but if a college coach wants to keep information about his program out of the media, I don't think the media is right to claim they need the information for any reason.
This brings me to my second thought about this. Not only does this incident illustrate one of the key differences between Nick Saban and Les Miles, it also illustrates a difference between the LSU fan base and the Alabama fan base. The difference is that I think the Alabama fan base takes a more proprietary view towards their team than does the LSU fan base. By this I mean that the Bama fans feel more ownership of their team than we do of ours. I think there are good effects of this and bad effects of this.
Among the good effects are that the fans continue to come out in droves even when the team is not being successful. The fans continue to identify with the team, buy merchandise, follow the team, travel for road games, and generally care even when the team is losing. If not for this effect, I really don't think Bama draws 92,000 for a Spring Game last year, and I don't think Bama draws in the recruiting class they got in 2008. LSU fan activity dropped off considerably during the Hallman years and the latter Dinardo years, and the team reached a doldrums (particularly in the Hallman years) that led to a lot of fan apathy.
The bad effects are that the fans demand information and accountability. They feel they have a right to know what is going on with the program, and if they don't like it, they want things changed. They can also turn on a coach in a heartbeat. See Shula, Mike. Saban, though he is a good coach, is also a control freak. He is not comfortable with the idea of anyone else but him thinking they have a right to control the team or demand changes. He doesn't even let his assistants talk about the team publicly for fear he will lose message discipline. (Because, as we've seen, Saban is the master of media manipulation and discipline). Presidential candidates aren't this obsessive about controlling message discipline.
These factors are some of the reasons I was skeptical back in 2006 that Saban was a good match for Bama. At LSU, he was allowed to control the message without running into a lot of opposition. He was allowed to be surly with reporters without anyone really caring that much. He was allowed to disregard invitations for public appearances. Here, I don't think he will be able to do those things without taking a little damage. Now, the media and the fans will tolerate it if they win, but only if they win a lot. If 2009 rolls around and Bama is still looking average, the fans could get pretty surly themselves.
Showing posts with label saban. Show all posts
Showing posts with label saban. Show all posts
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Les Can Buy a Lot of New Hats
Q: How does the $3.751 million man wear his hat?
A: However he likes.
Those jokes never get old.
Les Miles finally finished renegotiating his contract, and obviously it's the talk of the football world for a day or two. Being here in Alabama, obviously I get an ear-full of the Alabama perspective.
When certain balding, deliberately provocative radio personalities deliberately try to provoke us, the best thing to do is not to respond at all. That's the last word about that particular subject, but there are others.
Obviously, the figure of $3.751 million per year was not chosen randomly or on accident. It happens to be $1,000 per year more than Nick Saban's salary at Alabama. If Les Miles cares about money (and I suspect deep down he probably doesn't), Nick Saban is his best friend in the world, because without Nick Saban's return to Alabama, Les wouldn't be nearly as wealthy.
The reason for this, as is apparent to those paying attention, is that Les Miles' previous contract called for him to be the 3rd highest paid coach in the country if he won the National Championship. He did it, but it became hard to determine exactly how much Charlie Weis and Pete Carroll made, because they are at private schools and need not report their salaries. LSU and Miles settled on his becoming the highest-paid coach in the SEC. The previous highest-paid SEC coach was Nick Saban, at $3.75 million per year.
If you're trying to read more into it than that, I think you're wrong.
On the JOX morning show, one of the guys recalled Alabama getting criticism for paying Saban so much while living in a poor state with a poor education system, and wondered if LSU would get the same criticism for overspending. It's an interesting point, but I believe there is a significant difference in the situations.
When Alabama gave Nick Saban his contract, Alabama dramatically escalated the arms race between big-time football programs. It was expected that this signaled an acceleration in the rise in coaches' salaries nation-wide, which had already been escalating quickly for years. Alabama was seen as raising the bar further, which would lead to rising ticket prices and the decline of non-football sports, as football took up more and more of the entertainment money at football schools.
LSU giving Miles a salary roughly equal to Saban's is the result. It is the realization of the fear that Saban's salary would increase coaches' salaries nation-wide. People feared Alabama's actions signaled a change in the way football programs worked across the country, and LSU's actions confirm it. We will see more and more of it in the coming months and years as coaches like Mark Richt, Urban Meyer, and Tommy Tuberville are probably going to be looking at big raises next time it comes time to renegotiate their contracts.
The difference is that LSU is reacting to market trends while Bama rocked the market and changed the trends.
If you want to know the long term impact, you can look more at what has become of Alabama. In recent weeks, Alabama has taken several actions that appear to be designed to save money:
One More Thing: Get your teams in before games start tomorrow.
A: However he likes.
Those jokes never get old.
Les Miles finally finished renegotiating his contract, and obviously it's the talk of the football world for a day or two. Being here in Alabama, obviously I get an ear-full of the Alabama perspective.
When certain balding, deliberately provocative radio personalities deliberately try to provoke us, the best thing to do is not to respond at all. That's the last word about that particular subject, but there are others.
Obviously, the figure of $3.751 million per year was not chosen randomly or on accident. It happens to be $1,000 per year more than Nick Saban's salary at Alabama. If Les Miles cares about money (and I suspect deep down he probably doesn't), Nick Saban is his best friend in the world, because without Nick Saban's return to Alabama, Les wouldn't be nearly as wealthy.
The reason for this, as is apparent to those paying attention, is that Les Miles' previous contract called for him to be the 3rd highest paid coach in the country if he won the National Championship. He did it, but it became hard to determine exactly how much Charlie Weis and Pete Carroll made, because they are at private schools and need not report their salaries. LSU and Miles settled on his becoming the highest-paid coach in the SEC. The previous highest-paid SEC coach was Nick Saban, at $3.75 million per year.
If you're trying to read more into it than that, I think you're wrong.
On the JOX morning show, one of the guys recalled Alabama getting criticism for paying Saban so much while living in a poor state with a poor education system, and wondered if LSU would get the same criticism for overspending. It's an interesting point, but I believe there is a significant difference in the situations.
When Alabama gave Nick Saban his contract, Alabama dramatically escalated the arms race between big-time football programs. It was expected that this signaled an acceleration in the rise in coaches' salaries nation-wide, which had already been escalating quickly for years. Alabama was seen as raising the bar further, which would lead to rising ticket prices and the decline of non-football sports, as football took up more and more of the entertainment money at football schools.
LSU giving Miles a salary roughly equal to Saban's is the result. It is the realization of the fear that Saban's salary would increase coaches' salaries nation-wide. People feared Alabama's actions signaled a change in the way football programs worked across the country, and LSU's actions confirm it. We will see more and more of it in the coming months and years as coaches like Mark Richt, Urban Meyer, and Tommy Tuberville are probably going to be looking at big raises next time it comes time to renegotiate their contracts.
The difference is that LSU is reacting to market trends while Bama rocked the market and changed the trends.
If you want to know the long term impact, you can look more at what has become of Alabama. In recent weeks, Alabama has taken several actions that appear to be designed to save money:
- Announced a cancellation of plans to expand Bryant-Denny Stadium, specifically naming economic concerns as the primary factor.
- Apparently decided not to fire Mark Gottfried at least in part to avoid paying a hefty severance.
- Hired a women's basketball coach on the cheap from within the current University payroll, a guy with little or no qualifications for the job other than the fact that he apparently doesn't cost much money.
One More Thing: Get your teams in before games start tomorrow.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
The Return of the King?
My last post is now somewhat confirmed, as Skip Bertman has said that Michigan officials have asked for permission to speak to Les Miles. Skip has given them that permission, so long as they wait until after Saturday. I'm now almost unwilling to even consider the possibility that Miles is not leaving.
That leaves us wondering, who is going to be the next head coach at LSU. Right now, the message boards are lighting up with 3 names above all: 1) Jack Del Rio, 2) Nick Saban, and 3) Steve Spurrier.
Wait, what was that second one again? Nick Saban? Surely I jest?
No, I do not. In fact, I would say that the Saban name has been the most mentioned among supposed insiders with supposed inside information.
The most common story is that there are several important LSU people in the process who are pushing for us to pursue Saban. This is allegedly not exactly being discouraged by Saban's agent Jimmy Sexton. The fact also remains that Saban has no buyout in his contract with Alabama, and he did this by negotiation. Meaning, he really wanted the option of an easy way out of Bama.
When this first started surfacing a couple weeks ago, I thought it was absolute foolishness. It seemed ludicrous on multiple levels. LSU fans weren't that fond of him any more, and such a move would further hurt Saban's reputation as an unprincipled mercenary. But now I'm thinking it's just crazy enough to be true. After all, did anything that's happened this year in college football really go by the book?
Now, just because there is some outside possibility that it's true does not mean it's a good thing. While I'm not willing to take the Saban-to-LSU rumors seriously enough to discuss them, my discussion will focus on why I think it's a bad idea.
First, correct or incorrect, Nick Saban has a reputation now for being an unprincipled mercenary, as mentioned above. He is, therefore, damaged goods. He simply does not have the cachet he had when he left LSU, but we'd have to pay him a lot more to get him now than we did to keep him then.
Second, while I think Saban is a very good coach, I do not think he is an exceptional coach. I think there are many people around who are just as good at being head coach as is Nick Saban. In fact, I think Saban's the 2nd best coach in the state of Alabama. He's the highest paid coach in college football, but not the best coach in college football, and we'd have to give him a raise to hire him.
Third, Saban's reputation for being difficult to work with is legendary. In an age when coordinators are at least as important as the head man who hires them, I think Saban is going to have a problem moving forward, wherever he is, with hiring quality coordinators. This is a problem that Bama is having right now, according to many. At LSU, he found stability with Jimbo Fischer and Will Muschamp, but those guys aren't returning. I'm not sure he can find coordinators that good anymore who will stay with him for more than a year or two. He also ran through position coaches like a man runs through socks and underwear. This takes a toll on a program.
Fourth, it is well reported that Saban lost the team during the 2004 season, one which can be characterized as a major disappointment. Reports are the team spontaneously erupted in applause when it was announced that he was leaving. There are still a few players from that team here now. Not to mention, the Saban personality traits that caused him to lose that team still exist. I think he's the kind of coach whose life span at any particular place is limited. He can whip a program into shape (I think), but he will also kill the morale around the football offices and eventually wear the whole program out, including the players, who will tire of his shenanigans.
While there is a certain amount of deliciousness in thinking about this (it would, after all, be a great story), I really hope LSU does not seriously pursue this. I would prefer going in another direction.
That leaves us wondering, who is going to be the next head coach at LSU. Right now, the message boards are lighting up with 3 names above all: 1) Jack Del Rio, 2) Nick Saban, and 3) Steve Spurrier.
Wait, what was that second one again? Nick Saban? Surely I jest?
No, I do not. In fact, I would say that the Saban name has been the most mentioned among supposed insiders with supposed inside information.
The most common story is that there are several important LSU people in the process who are pushing for us to pursue Saban. This is allegedly not exactly being discouraged by Saban's agent Jimmy Sexton. The fact also remains that Saban has no buyout in his contract with Alabama, and he did this by negotiation. Meaning, he really wanted the option of an easy way out of Bama.
When this first started surfacing a couple weeks ago, I thought it was absolute foolishness. It seemed ludicrous on multiple levels. LSU fans weren't that fond of him any more, and such a move would further hurt Saban's reputation as an unprincipled mercenary. But now I'm thinking it's just crazy enough to be true. After all, did anything that's happened this year in college football really go by the book?
Now, just because there is some outside possibility that it's true does not mean it's a good thing. While I'm not willing to take the Saban-to-LSU rumors seriously enough to discuss them, my discussion will focus on why I think it's a bad idea.
First, correct or incorrect, Nick Saban has a reputation now for being an unprincipled mercenary, as mentioned above. He is, therefore, damaged goods. He simply does not have the cachet he had when he left LSU, but we'd have to pay him a lot more to get him now than we did to keep him then.
Second, while I think Saban is a very good coach, I do not think he is an exceptional coach. I think there are many people around who are just as good at being head coach as is Nick Saban. In fact, I think Saban's the 2nd best coach in the state of Alabama. He's the highest paid coach in college football, but not the best coach in college football, and we'd have to give him a raise to hire him.
Third, Saban's reputation for being difficult to work with is legendary. In an age when coordinators are at least as important as the head man who hires them, I think Saban is going to have a problem moving forward, wherever he is, with hiring quality coordinators. This is a problem that Bama is having right now, according to many. At LSU, he found stability with Jimbo Fischer and Will Muschamp, but those guys aren't returning. I'm not sure he can find coordinators that good anymore who will stay with him for more than a year or two. He also ran through position coaches like a man runs through socks and underwear. This takes a toll on a program.
Fourth, it is well reported that Saban lost the team during the 2004 season, one which can be characterized as a major disappointment. Reports are the team spontaneously erupted in applause when it was announced that he was leaving. There are still a few players from that team here now. Not to mention, the Saban personality traits that caused him to lose that team still exist. I think he's the kind of coach whose life span at any particular place is limited. He can whip a program into shape (I think), but he will also kill the morale around the football offices and eventually wear the whole program out, including the players, who will tire of his shenanigans.
While there is a certain amount of deliciousness in thinking about this (it would, after all, be a great story), I really hope LSU does not seriously pursue this. I would prefer going in another direction.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
What's With All the Belly-Aching About Discipline
Both of the teams I follow have made some headlines recently revolving around football players getting into trouble.
Bama has had four players arrested in the offseason, all for what I would consider minor charges, including Simeone Castille who was arrested for disorderly conduct. Another player was arrested and allegedly mouthed off to the police, insulting Nick Saban in the process. LSU has also had 4 players arrested in the offseason, but for more serious violations, including the most recent incident involving Derrick Odom allegedly trying to kick a door down to get into an apartment. In addition, Bama has suspended two starters for the season opener for undisclosed reasons.
Sports talk radio here in Tuscaloosa has been all aflutter about what the Bama issues mean. I've heard a great deal of expression of disappointment in Nick Saban's hold over this team. Paul Finebaum said yesterday that he expected Saban to get to Tuscaloosa and crack the whip, having heard that he had a reputation for being a stickler about team discipline.
I have two questions:
Then when he got to the Miami Dolphins, he went on a well-publicized effort to get Ricky Williams back to the team. Ricky Williams had a well-publicized marijuana habit, and had pretty much told Dolphins and NFL officials that he'd rather smoke marijuana and travel the world than play in the NFL. Saban very publicly tried to get him back to the Dolphins, succeeding for a time before Williams tested positive again.
This is the guy with a reputation for cracking the whip on discipline? I'm not saying he's a permissive coach, but I don't see why he'd have a reputation for being particularly impermissive.
Also, what is the deal with the Bama fans' fetish for punishing their own players? Some were complaining that Prince Hall and Keith Brown (whose offenses were not disclosed) were only suspended for the Western Carolina game, rather than a conference game. It's like they really want to lose to Vandy and Arkansas. We don't even know what these kids did.
Why is it so necessary to have a football team whose players never get into trouble? Sure, you want to get the true bad actors and the malcontents off the team. Those guys will never help you. But a guy like Simeone Castille? He's been in the program for 3 years without getting into any trouble at all, and by all accounts is a leader of the team. He may have screwed up in some minor way, but if so, what's the big deal? The courts will punish him. Why should the football team punish him more?
If I went out on the Strip this weekend and starting talking too loud or yelling curse words and got arrested for disorderly conduct, would my employer suspend me or fire me? I sincerely doubt it. I sincerely doubt any of the people reading this would be in a great deal of trouble at their work over something like that. The punishment would be limited to whatever the courts did to you.
I think people are kind of bloodthirsty. They really want to see punishment, and want to see people suffer, with no regard for proportion or rationality. If I was Nick Saban, Castille wouldn't be suspended for even one second. Roy Upchurch, who reportedly told the police, "F--- [Nick Saban" and f--- all y'all," would probably be suspended for half a season, but only because he disrespected the coach and the team. Not because he got arrested.
I agree with Les Miles that Zhamal Thomas and Troy Giddens had to go, because they committed pretty serious crimes, and based on that, we can presume they would have been trouble during their careers. Kyle Anderson reportedly was a big-time trouble maker who got himself into even more trouble by supposedly attacking a man outside of a bar. I agree those guys, under those situations, probably had to go. But it wasn't about punishment. It was about protecting the team from bad influences. There's no reason to believe that Simeone Castille is a bad influence on this team. All reports are quite to the contrary in fact.
So my advice would be to just settle down and let the coaches handle the team without getting all bent out of shape over it.
Bama has had four players arrested in the offseason, all for what I would consider minor charges, including Simeone Castille who was arrested for disorderly conduct. Another player was arrested and allegedly mouthed off to the police, insulting Nick Saban in the process. LSU has also had 4 players arrested in the offseason, but for more serious violations, including the most recent incident involving Derrick Odom allegedly trying to kick a door down to get into an apartment. In addition, Bama has suspended two starters for the season opener for undisclosed reasons.
Sports talk radio here in Tuscaloosa has been all aflutter about what the Bama issues mean. I've heard a great deal of expression of disappointment in Nick Saban's hold over this team. Paul Finebaum said yesterday that he expected Saban to get to Tuscaloosa and crack the whip, having heard that he had a reputation for being a stickler about team discipline.
I have two questions:
- Where did Nick Saban get a reputation for being a strict disciplinarian?
- What's the big deal anyway?
Then when he got to the Miami Dolphins, he went on a well-publicized effort to get Ricky Williams back to the team. Ricky Williams had a well-publicized marijuana habit, and had pretty much told Dolphins and NFL officials that he'd rather smoke marijuana and travel the world than play in the NFL. Saban very publicly tried to get him back to the Dolphins, succeeding for a time before Williams tested positive again.
This is the guy with a reputation for cracking the whip on discipline? I'm not saying he's a permissive coach, but I don't see why he'd have a reputation for being particularly impermissive.
Also, what is the deal with the Bama fans' fetish for punishing their own players? Some were complaining that Prince Hall and Keith Brown (whose offenses were not disclosed) were only suspended for the Western Carolina game, rather than a conference game. It's like they really want to lose to Vandy and Arkansas. We don't even know what these kids did.
Why is it so necessary to have a football team whose players never get into trouble? Sure, you want to get the true bad actors and the malcontents off the team. Those guys will never help you. But a guy like Simeone Castille? He's been in the program for 3 years without getting into any trouble at all, and by all accounts is a leader of the team. He may have screwed up in some minor way, but if so, what's the big deal? The courts will punish him. Why should the football team punish him more?
If I went out on the Strip this weekend and starting talking too loud or yelling curse words and got arrested for disorderly conduct, would my employer suspend me or fire me? I sincerely doubt it. I sincerely doubt any of the people reading this would be in a great deal of trouble at their work over something like that. The punishment would be limited to whatever the courts did to you.
I think people are kind of bloodthirsty. They really want to see punishment, and want to see people suffer, with no regard for proportion or rationality. If I was Nick Saban, Castille wouldn't be suspended for even one second. Roy Upchurch, who reportedly told the police, "F--- [Nick Saban" and f--- all y'all," would probably be suspended for half a season, but only because he disrespected the coach and the team. Not because he got arrested.
I agree with Les Miles that Zhamal Thomas and Troy Giddens had to go, because they committed pretty serious crimes, and based on that, we can presume they would have been trouble during their careers. Kyle Anderson reportedly was a big-time trouble maker who got himself into even more trouble by supposedly attacking a man outside of a bar. I agree those guys, under those situations, probably had to go. But it wasn't about punishment. It was about protecting the team from bad influences. There's no reason to believe that Simeone Castille is a bad influence on this team. All reports are quite to the contrary in fact.
So my advice would be to just settle down and let the coaches handle the team without getting all bent out of shape over it.
Friday, August 10, 2007
Saban steps in it
Nick Saban inadvertently stepped on a land mine this week by advocating a statewide education lottery. In doing so, he provided everyone with a cautionary tale illustrating why public figures who are new to an area should avoid getting involved in local political issues. Local sports talk radio has been littered all week with discussions of whether the lottery is a good idea or not.
In Alabama, the lottery is a lot more controversial than it is in many other states. The politics of lotteries are strange, with the very conservative and the very liberal aligned with one another opposing it, and the middle usually in favor. The conservatives, particularly the religious conservative, don't like the lottery because it is a form of legalized gambling. The liberals don't like the lottery because of its negative impact on the poor and working class.
The problem is that Alabama has a lot more poor people and a lot more religious conservatives than many other states. Alabama has never been able to get a lottery passed, despite a couple of proposals making their way to voters. The last time this came to a vote, it was narrowly rejected.
Saban's comments that a lottery could help college athletics, in addition to showing his own single-mindedness, shows a certain clumsy side to him. The smart action would have been to not say anything at all on this subject. He just doesn't know enough about the political landscape in Alabama to start getting involved in local politics without making missteps like this one. Instead, he perhaps gave up a little of his prestige by coming out publicly in favor of a proposal that many of his constituents (for lack of a better word) oppose.
Personally, I'm against a lottery. I agree with the liberals that they damage the poor and working class, and I have as evidence my own observations from living in two states that have used lotteries. I saw who lined up at the convenience stores and the supermarkets to buy lottery tickets when the jackpots got big. But there's more to it.
I simply think it's bad economics for a state to use a lottery as a revenue generator. States that have lotteries hire outside companies to run them, meaning that a big part of the money spent on a lottery by the people of the state actually leaves the state. Some of the rest returns to the people in the form of winnings, but and the remainder goes to the state. I don't have any statistics, but if I remember correctly it is something like $0.40 of every dollar goes to the state. The rest goes to out-of-state corporations running the lottery.
It's like if the state decided to raise revenue with a sales tax, and then paid an out of state accounting firm most of the money spent on it to monitor it. It just doesn't make any sense from a revenue standpoint. It makes a lot more economic sense just to tax people. Then, for every dollar spent on the tax, the state raises one dollar in revenue. Using my estimate of lotteries making the state $0.40 on the dollar, a tax (whatever the form) is a 150% more economically more efficient method of generating revenue.
My other philosophical problem with lotteries is the fact that they are state-granted monopolies on a form of entertainment. I have no idea why the libertarians aren't out in force against lotteries on this ground, but they aren't, and they should be. Lotteries put the state in the entertainment business, and they grant one company a monopoly on that business in partnership with themselves. This is the sort of thing they normally rail against.
If we're going to have lotteries, we should just legalize lotteries and open up the state to competition. Tax and regulate it heavily, but treat it just like you'd treat movie theaters. Let anyone who wants to do so start up their own lottery and simply tax the proceeds. Let the best-run lottery, with the highest payouts and best marketing win. It's the capitalistic way of legalizing lotteries.
That won't happen, not because we're not capitalists, but because people seem to instinctively know lotteries can't survive competition. Lotteries exist in an economic feedback loop. They are viable because people buy a lot of tickets. When people buy a lot of tickets, the jackpots go up. When the jackpots go up, people buy more tickets, raising the jackpot even higher, leading to even more tickets being bought.
If there was more than one lottery in an area, neither can get all the business and the jackpots go down. With lower jackpots, fewer overall people will buy tickets, lowering the jackpots further. Eventually, people pretty much stop buying all-together. This is why, I believe, competition destroys lotteries. Two lotteries can't co-exist in one market. Both will die. I think people instinctively understand this and this is why no one even suggests this model of running a lottery, even though no one would even dream of running, say, a movie theater the way they run a lottery.
Plus, I get the impression, perhaps a naive one, that people aren't really interested in lotteries so much anymore. You rarely hear about lottery jackpots getting enormous anymore, and everyone seems to have finally gotten their heads around the fact that it is extremely unlikely you'll strike it rich. So no one really seems to care. Except the naive poor and the mentally deficient of course. But maybe I'm wrong.
Sorry this one is only tangentially about sports. I promise more light-heartedness in the future.
In Alabama, the lottery is a lot more controversial than it is in many other states. The politics of lotteries are strange, with the very conservative and the very liberal aligned with one another opposing it, and the middle usually in favor. The conservatives, particularly the religious conservative, don't like the lottery because it is a form of legalized gambling. The liberals don't like the lottery because of its negative impact on the poor and working class.
The problem is that Alabama has a lot more poor people and a lot more religious conservatives than many other states. Alabama has never been able to get a lottery passed, despite a couple of proposals making their way to voters. The last time this came to a vote, it was narrowly rejected.
Saban's comments that a lottery could help college athletics, in addition to showing his own single-mindedness, shows a certain clumsy side to him. The smart action would have been to not say anything at all on this subject. He just doesn't know enough about the political landscape in Alabama to start getting involved in local politics without making missteps like this one. Instead, he perhaps gave up a little of his prestige by coming out publicly in favor of a proposal that many of his constituents (for lack of a better word) oppose.
Personally, I'm against a lottery. I agree with the liberals that they damage the poor and working class, and I have as evidence my own observations from living in two states that have used lotteries. I saw who lined up at the convenience stores and the supermarkets to buy lottery tickets when the jackpots got big. But there's more to it.
I simply think it's bad economics for a state to use a lottery as a revenue generator. States that have lotteries hire outside companies to run them, meaning that a big part of the money spent on a lottery by the people of the state actually leaves the state. Some of the rest returns to the people in the form of winnings, but and the remainder goes to the state. I don't have any statistics, but if I remember correctly it is something like $0.40 of every dollar goes to the state. The rest goes to out-of-state corporations running the lottery.
It's like if the state decided to raise revenue with a sales tax, and then paid an out of state accounting firm most of the money spent on it to monitor it. It just doesn't make any sense from a revenue standpoint. It makes a lot more economic sense just to tax people. Then, for every dollar spent on the tax, the state raises one dollar in revenue. Using my estimate of lotteries making the state $0.40 on the dollar, a tax (whatever the form) is a 150% more economically more efficient method of generating revenue.
My other philosophical problem with lotteries is the fact that they are state-granted monopolies on a form of entertainment. I have no idea why the libertarians aren't out in force against lotteries on this ground, but they aren't, and they should be. Lotteries put the state in the entertainment business, and they grant one company a monopoly on that business in partnership with themselves. This is the sort of thing they normally rail against.
If we're going to have lotteries, we should just legalize lotteries and open up the state to competition. Tax and regulate it heavily, but treat it just like you'd treat movie theaters. Let anyone who wants to do so start up their own lottery and simply tax the proceeds. Let the best-run lottery, with the highest payouts and best marketing win. It's the capitalistic way of legalizing lotteries.
That won't happen, not because we're not capitalists, but because people seem to instinctively know lotteries can't survive competition. Lotteries exist in an economic feedback loop. They are viable because people buy a lot of tickets. When people buy a lot of tickets, the jackpots go up. When the jackpots go up, people buy more tickets, raising the jackpot even higher, leading to even more tickets being bought.
If there was more than one lottery in an area, neither can get all the business and the jackpots go down. With lower jackpots, fewer overall people will buy tickets, lowering the jackpots further. Eventually, people pretty much stop buying all-together. This is why, I believe, competition destroys lotteries. Two lotteries can't co-exist in one market. Both will die. I think people instinctively understand this and this is why no one even suggests this model of running a lottery, even though no one would even dream of running, say, a movie theater the way they run a lottery.
Plus, I get the impression, perhaps a naive one, that people aren't really interested in lotteries so much anymore. You rarely hear about lottery jackpots getting enormous anymore, and everyone seems to have finally gotten their heads around the fact that it is extremely unlikely you'll strike it rich. So no one really seems to care. Except the naive poor and the mentally deficient of course. But maybe I'm wrong.
Sorry this one is only tangentially about sports. I promise more light-heartedness in the future.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Football salaries
This article in USA Today was published before Bama decided to pay Nick Saban $4 million per year to be their football coach. It discusses coaches' salaries, with several basic statistical points:
But that's not my point. My brother brought up an interesting conundrum some college administrators face. These coaches' contracts are laced with incentives, and one common incentive is undoubtedly, "If Coach So-and-So wins the BCS National Championship, his salary is automatically to escalate to the highest salary in college football," or the average of the 5 highest salaries. With Nick Saban now breaking new salary ground, are certain schools priced out of the national championship hunt simply because they cannot afford to pay their coach the incentive bonus in his contract?
What would happen if, say, Vanderbilt were to put together a story-book undefeated run this season? If Bobby Johnson's contract has an expensive incentive tied to Nick Saban's salary, would they decline an invitation to the National Championship game? If you think this is so unlikely of a scenario, just ask yourself who would have thought Wake Forest would be a BCS team last year, or that Rutgers would be a serious National Championship contender through more than half of last season?
I remember back several years ago reading that small-money indie-rockers were actually asking friendly radio stations NOT to play their songs, because they couldn't afford the commissions they had to pay their promoters for getting on radio play lists. This strikes me as a similar scenario, whereby a university may pull itself out of national championship contention simply because it cannot afford to win it. It is a nightmare scenario for the NCAA and one which, honestly, I have no idea if it could really happen.
You can say, "If this happens, you can only blame the university for locking itself into a contract that it couldn't afford to pay." Fair enough, it would be the university that would be to blame, but that doesn't change the fact that this would be terribly embarrassing for the NCAA, would call into question the legitimacy of the national championship in that year, and would shine a very unwelcome light on the world of big-money college football.
Here's hoping it never happens.
- The average of Division 1-A schools is almost $1 million per year.
- The average at BCS conferences is $1.4 million per year.
- The average at non-BCS conferences in Division 1-A is about $0.5 million per year
- Nine coaches (as of last November) make more than $2 million per year. One can imagine that Urban Meyer is ahead of that benchmark now as well. The highest was Bob Stoops' almost $3.5 million per year, until Saban eclipsed it.
But that's not my point. My brother brought up an interesting conundrum some college administrators face. These coaches' contracts are laced with incentives, and one common incentive is undoubtedly, "If Coach So-and-So wins the BCS National Championship, his salary is automatically to escalate to the highest salary in college football," or the average of the 5 highest salaries. With Nick Saban now breaking new salary ground, are certain schools priced out of the national championship hunt simply because they cannot afford to pay their coach the incentive bonus in his contract?
What would happen if, say, Vanderbilt were to put together a story-book undefeated run this season? If Bobby Johnson's contract has an expensive incentive tied to Nick Saban's salary, would they decline an invitation to the National Championship game? If you think this is so unlikely of a scenario, just ask yourself who would have thought Wake Forest would be a BCS team last year, or that Rutgers would be a serious National Championship contender through more than half of last season?
I remember back several years ago reading that small-money indie-rockers were actually asking friendly radio stations NOT to play their songs, because they couldn't afford the commissions they had to pay their promoters for getting on radio play lists. This strikes me as a similar scenario, whereby a university may pull itself out of national championship contention simply because it cannot afford to win it. It is a nightmare scenario for the NCAA and one which, honestly, I have no idea if it could really happen.
You can say, "If this happens, you can only blame the university for locking itself into a contract that it couldn't afford to pay." Fair enough, it would be the university that would be to blame, but that doesn't change the fact that this would be terribly embarrassing for the NCAA, would call into question the legitimacy of the national championship in that year, and would shine a very unwelcome light on the world of big-money college football.
Here's hoping it never happens.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Document the Atrocities
This has been an exceedingly strange and difficult offseason for the LSU football team. There have certainly been some bright spots since the Sugar Bowl, most notably the 4 Tigers drafted in the first round of the NFL draft and the signing of a class that many believe may be the best ever at LSU. But other than that, we have dealt with a series of unfortunate or otherwise difficult circumstances.
Let's hope all this is just prologue to a great season.
- The hiring of former LSU coach Nick Saban by one of our biggest rivals, and the subsequent media storm. Technically, the hiring was announced on the day of the Sugar Bowl, so it wasn't strictly an offseason story, but much of the aftermath occurred in the offseason.
- While we signed a great recruiting class, the story was soured by the Joe McKnight and Luther Davis situations. To recap, Luther Davis committed to LSU, and then secretly took a visit to the University of Alabama and constructed an elaborate web of lies in an attempt to cover it up. Depending on who you believe, we either pulled his scholarship offer or he decided to de-commit and go to Bama. Joe McKnight, arguably the top prospect in the entire country and a Louisiana kid, decided to go to USC rather than LSU, and there was a big stink.
- Ryan Perrilloux's counterfeiting saga, wherein he was investigated by the Feds for suspected involvement in a counterfeiting ring. He has not been charged and it is believed he may have been cleared of wrongdoing.
- Kyle Anderson allegedly attacked a man outside of a bar, putting him in the hospital. Anderson, a backup OL, was kicked off the team permanently.
- Zhamal Thomas and Troy Giddens, backup OL and DB respectively, allegedly broke into an apartment, stole some stuff, and tried to use a stolen credit card. They were kicked off the team permanently.
- Ryan Perilloux allegedly tried to enter a casino underage using someone else's ID. Because of this and other transgressions, he was suspended from the team indefinitely, and his fate is not decided.
- LSU's live tiger mascot, Mike V, dies unexpectedly following surgery.
- Former LSU defensive end and a key member of the 2003 national championship team Marquise Hill died in a recreational accident on Lake Pontchartrain. Reports are that he died saving another person from drowning.
Let's hope all this is just prologue to a great season.
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Two teams, two coaches, similar results
Getting back to the "underachiever" meme, the more I think about it, the more I see great similarities between the 2004 and 2006 LSU football teams.
Which of course begs the question, why is Les Miles being treated so much differently than Les Miles over similar seasons? Well, for one, Saban gets credit for having the 2003 national championship team. Rightly so. Miles and his supporters can't respond to criticism by saying, "I won that national championship, didn't I?"
That's definitely one explanation, but I think there is another factor feeding this media chatter. I think that the sports media is trying to create the story, and the story is that Nick Saban is trying to overtake the program he himself was so instrumental in developing. The drama improves if you get people thinking that Les Miles has not been a good steward of that program.
This is not unusual. In theory, media reports stories to the public according to what the public wants. In actuality, the media is quite adept at engineering the public's attitudes and interests. In general, a self-interested media will then engineer the public's perception in order to maximize its own sales or viewership. This is hardly limited to sports media, as Fox News has virtually made this into a science.
In sports, you see it on ESPN all the time. Ever notice that SportsCenter's coverage of hockey has gone down precipitously since ESPN stopped broadcasting NHL games? Ever notice the SportsCenter's coverage of NASCAR has increased substantially since ESPN got a NASCAR broadcast contract? Did you notice how much SportsCenter hyped the Danica Patrick story when ESPN an IRL contract? ESPN knows that SportsCenter doesn't just report sports news; it creates sports buzz, and ESPN takes advantage of that to promote the stories that help ESPN make more money.
I think there is an element of that same principle at work here. The Finebaums and Mandels of the world know that this sort of provocation increase readership and listenership by focusing the attention on them. They take advantage of that.
- Both were immensely talented. The 2004 teams probably had a more talented secondary and defensive line, but the 2006 team had a more polished offense and better linebackers.
- Both had very unfavorable road schedules. The 2004 team played Auburn on the road early, Georgia and Florida in mid-season, and Arkansas late.
- Both teams lost close defensive struggles to Auburn in games with questionable officiating at critical times. In 2004, Ronnie Prude was called for a penalty on a missed Auburn extra point, giving Auburn a second chance in the waning seconds. Auburn ended up winning by one point, and no other person in the history of football has been called for the particular penalty called on Prude, a personal foul for jumping and landing on his own player. In 2006, Jessie Daniels was called for pass interference, negating a critical interception on a pass that never reached the receiver while no call was made on an Auburn defensive back who interfered with Early Doucet on a fourth down pass that also did not reach the receiver.
- Both teams were convincingly defeated by an Eastern Division opponent in a poorly played game in which the team did not really show up to play. In 2004, we lost to Georgia 45-16. In 2006, we lost to Florida 23-10.
- Both teams ended the season strong with 6 straight regular season wins, but got one of those wins in a late come-from-behind win over a lesser opponent. In 2004, we needed late scores to beat Troy 24-20. In 2006, we needed a late touchdown and overtime to beat Ole Miss.
- The 2004 team was coached by Nick Saban, who had one eye looking to the NFL, while the 2006 team was coached by Les Miles.
- The 2006 team dominated their bowl game against Notre Dame while the 2004 team struggled in the Cap One against Iowa before finally losing on a last-second Hail Mary, despite a heroic comeback orchestrated by Jamarcus Russell. JR, incidentally, was relegated to 3rd string before the bowl game, and only played because Marcus Randall and Matt Flynn were so ineffective.
Which of course begs the question, why is Les Miles being treated so much differently than Les Miles over similar seasons? Well, for one, Saban gets credit for having the 2003 national championship team. Rightly so. Miles and his supporters can't respond to criticism by saying, "I won that national championship, didn't I?"
That's definitely one explanation, but I think there is another factor feeding this media chatter. I think that the sports media is trying to create the story, and the story is that Nick Saban is trying to overtake the program he himself was so instrumental in developing. The drama improves if you get people thinking that Les Miles has not been a good steward of that program.
This is not unusual. In theory, media reports stories to the public according to what the public wants. In actuality, the media is quite adept at engineering the public's attitudes and interests. In general, a self-interested media will then engineer the public's perception in order to maximize its own sales or viewership. This is hardly limited to sports media, as Fox News has virtually made this into a science.
In sports, you see it on ESPN all the time. Ever notice that SportsCenter's coverage of hockey has gone down precipitously since ESPN stopped broadcasting NHL games? Ever notice the SportsCenter's coverage of NASCAR has increased substantially since ESPN got a NASCAR broadcast contract? Did you notice how much SportsCenter hyped the Danica Patrick story when ESPN an IRL contract? ESPN knows that SportsCenter doesn't just report sports news; it creates sports buzz, and ESPN takes advantage of that to promote the stories that help ESPN make more money.
I think there is an element of that same principle at work here. The Finebaums and Mandels of the world know that this sort of provocation increase readership and listenership by focusing the attention on them. They take advantage of that.
Friday, April 13, 2007
The media pushes back
It was inevitable, but it seems like the media is finally starting to push back a little on Nick Saban's unusual policies on media access. CNNSI's Stewart Mandel published a long, mostly positive column discussing Nick Saban. One small part of it discussed how Saban scheduled an interview with Mandel, who flew out to Tuscaloosa, only to have it abruptly canceled at the last minute. He has since published a follow-up column, in which he reveals that Saban called him days after the original column and apologized.
Mandel is not the first media type to publicly bristle at how Saban is treating them. Honestly, he has long been famous for being churlish with the media (and his underlings, and his assistants, and his bosses, and his players, and his neighbors). At least one writer, perhaps one gloating over his own level of access, has commented that this behavior by the media is more childish whining than it is legitimate criticism, and ultimately doesn't hurt Saban, and probably actually helps him.
Helps him? Well, think about it this way. If the team is, oh, average this year, and a certain Bama beat writer criticizes Saban's performance, that beat writer's opinion is more likely to be ignored if that writer has a history of also criticizing Saban's treatment of him. People can say, "Don't listen to that guy. He just hates Saban." Perhaps they'll even be right.
My hint to media types: if you don't like how Saban's treating you, stick it in your back pocket and remember it when it comes time to either defend him or throw him to the wolves.
And that time will come. Saban is not a miracle worker, which seems to be what many fans are expecting. He had a lot of success at LSU, and has only had one actual losing season in his long career, but his overall numbers are not that great. Even his record at LSU was hardly eye-popping before 2003.
In his first year, LSU was 8-4 including an embarrassing loss to UAB. If not for a couple of dramatic overtime wins, it would have been a very mediocre season.
In his second year, LSU had a terrific 10-3 season, ending in a top 10 finish and an SEC championship and Sugar Bowl victory, but even that season was on the brink of failure, as LSU was 4-3 heading into Tuscaloosa that year before record-setting performances by Rohan Davey and Josh Reed saved that season. Incidentally, Rohan Davey's career illustrates one of Saban's greatest weaknesses as a coach: he doesn't always play the best player. Davey only started one year, but set an LSU single-season record in most passing categories that year, and was a first-day draft pick. The previous year, he sat behind Josh Booty, who had long since lost the confidence of the team. This wasn't the only example.
In his third year, LSU regressed to an 8-5 season and a loss in the Cotton Bowl (a game we had no business being in, by the way). We needed the Bluegrass Miracle to get even that good of a record, and Saban's vaunted defensive genius managed to give up two late touchdowns to Arkansas to lose that game 21-20. To be fair, we started that season 6-1, and then an injury to our starting QB caught up to us. The backup was only 3-4.
So before the 2003 National Championship season, Saban's Tigers were 26-12. Not bad. Not great. That was quite good enough at LSU to avoid most criticism, but I don't think anyone was calling Saban a genius at that point. Not until the 2003 season. If Alabama's next three seasons show an average record of 8-4, will everyone be satisfied? No. Will he be vulnerable to media criticism? Yes. Will that media criticism sting? Yes. If the media is willing to come to his defense, would that help? Yes. Does his deliberate rankling of the media help him avoid that criticism? No, but the media's current complaints, not about his coaching, but about his treatment of him may insulate him from the effects of that criticism a little.
I'll write more on this topic later. But for now, I have to go to work.
Mandel is not the first media type to publicly bristle at how Saban is treating them. Honestly, he has long been famous for being churlish with the media (and his underlings, and his assistants, and his bosses, and his players, and his neighbors). At least one writer, perhaps one gloating over his own level of access, has commented that this behavior by the media is more childish whining than it is legitimate criticism, and ultimately doesn't hurt Saban, and probably actually helps him.
Helps him? Well, think about it this way. If the team is, oh, average this year, and a certain Bama beat writer criticizes Saban's performance, that beat writer's opinion is more likely to be ignored if that writer has a history of also criticizing Saban's treatment of him. People can say, "Don't listen to that guy. He just hates Saban." Perhaps they'll even be right.
My hint to media types: if you don't like how Saban's treating you, stick it in your back pocket and remember it when it comes time to either defend him or throw him to the wolves.
And that time will come. Saban is not a miracle worker, which seems to be what many fans are expecting. He had a lot of success at LSU, and has only had one actual losing season in his long career, but his overall numbers are not that great. Even his record at LSU was hardly eye-popping before 2003.
In his first year, LSU was 8-4 including an embarrassing loss to UAB. If not for a couple of dramatic overtime wins, it would have been a very mediocre season.
In his second year, LSU had a terrific 10-3 season, ending in a top 10 finish and an SEC championship and Sugar Bowl victory, but even that season was on the brink of failure, as LSU was 4-3 heading into Tuscaloosa that year before record-setting performances by Rohan Davey and Josh Reed saved that season. Incidentally, Rohan Davey's career illustrates one of Saban's greatest weaknesses as a coach: he doesn't always play the best player. Davey only started one year, but set an LSU single-season record in most passing categories that year, and was a first-day draft pick. The previous year, he sat behind Josh Booty, who had long since lost the confidence of the team. This wasn't the only example.
In his third year, LSU regressed to an 8-5 season and a loss in the Cotton Bowl (a game we had no business being in, by the way). We needed the Bluegrass Miracle to get even that good of a record, and Saban's vaunted defensive genius managed to give up two late touchdowns to Arkansas to lose that game 21-20. To be fair, we started that season 6-1, and then an injury to our starting QB caught up to us. The backup was only 3-4.
So before the 2003 National Championship season, Saban's Tigers were 26-12. Not bad. Not great. That was quite good enough at LSU to avoid most criticism, but I don't think anyone was calling Saban a genius at that point. Not until the 2003 season. If Alabama's next three seasons show an average record of 8-4, will everyone be satisfied? No. Will he be vulnerable to media criticism? Yes. Will that media criticism sting? Yes. If the media is willing to come to his defense, would that help? Yes. Does his deliberate rankling of the media help him avoid that criticism? No, but the media's current complaints, not about his coaching, but about his treatment of him may insulate him from the effects of that criticism a little.
I'll write more on this topic later. But for now, I have to go to work.
Tuesday, March 6, 2007
Saban manages expectations; creeps everyone out
I meant to post on this topic yesterday, and wrote up a lot of it on Sunday, but the birth of my precious daughter yesterday interfered with those plans. Nick Saban news just didn't manage to find its way to this particular corner of the blogosphere yesterday. Many thanks to Poseur for making sure my dedicated readers had plenty of good content anyway.
Anyway, I read an article about Nick Saban in the Huntsville Times on Sunday. I have a few things to say about it. By way of introduction, I think Nick Saban is a lot of things. Some of them good; some of them bad. As the Saban-to-Bama story progresses, I'll give you my honest opinions about both. Here's a start.
More than once during the interview, Saban moved his hands from side to side - describing the program as a unified team with the coach, the AD, the players, the waterboys, the million-dollar boosters, the sidewalk alumni who exhaust their savings for one game a year all standing side by side by side.
It's not a caste system, it's not reflective of society. Not in Saban's mind.
It's not, in his words, a "totem pole" in which one person is more or less important than another.
"The role goes sideways," Saban said, hands moving from left to right to left again. "It's all dependent on each other. It doesn't go up and down. Everybody has a role in this."
It seems, gauging from his words, that the role of fans in the success of a program is one of Saban's absolute convictions.
"We need to have all shining lights, no blinking lights," said Saban, invoking another metaphor. "I'm not talking about just football players. If the people around this place want to have a great program and win a national championship, they need to contribute to it, too, by their positive energy and how they support the program. That's what good fans do."
Nick Saban is lots of things, but I never saw him as a new age, crystal-wearing football hippie. Maybe I just wasn't looking hard enough, or maybe I was just clapping too loud to notice.
Weird quotes aside, Saban is a smart man who is doing a smart thing. Picking that segment out of context, you don't quite see what he's doing, but let's look at the next paragraph:"If they come with the expectation next year that we're going to go 12-0 and it doesn't happen and they're all upset about it, then that's going to hurt us getting where we want to go. It's just the way it is."Get it yet? He's doing what a presidential candidate does on the eve of state primary vote he expects to lose. He's managing expectations. He's saying, "Fourth place is a victory!"
But he's doing more than that. He's not just saying, "Don't expect me to make us go 12-0." He's not just saying, "It's not my fault if we don't go 12-0." He's saying that it will hurt the team if the fans expect a national championship. Anyone think he saw the poll I referenced in my post on Friday? (I won't entertain the thought that he saw my post). He's asking the fans to avoid high expectations, and that it is not only important to him that they expect less-than-great performance. It's important to the team.
He gets two benefits from this:
- The fans cut him a break about a non-great 2007 season, meaning he may forestall the inevitable "off with his head" radio call-in trends, and
- He gets the fans to buy in, even have some ownership in, a rebuilding season.
Result: recruit or coach turns them down.
Saban is doing something that helps himself (no surprise there), with the added benefit that it could even help the team.
Friday, March 2, 2007
A little optimistic, aren't we?
The Tuscaloosa News ran a poll on Thursday asking, "How long will it take Nick Saban to win a national championship at Alabama?" 4.7% of respondents said "Next year". Almost 60% answered either "Next year", "Two Years", or "Three years".
I generally like Bama fans, and I will say that Bama looks like they are going to be better next year than they were this year (which is a post for another day). I think Bama fans are, in general, pretty knowledgeable about football and usually have pretty realistic expectations of their team's abilities. I tend to think that Bama fans have a bit of an inflated sense of where they SHOULD be in the football world, but I find that typical Bama fans are usually quite reasonable and articulate about the relative strengths and weaknesses of the team they are currently putting on the field.
That said, I think this whole Nick Saban thing has everybody going a little crazy (including LSU fans, but that's a post for another day too). This poll is Exhibit A. I will admit that it is certainly POSSIBLE that Bama will win a National Championship in the next few years. I think you have to be wearing crimson-colored glasses to think it is LIKELY, though.
I don't think people realize how HARD it is to win a National Championship. As Auburn found out in 2004, you can sometimes do everything right, take care of all your business on the field, and still not even be given a chance. LSU's 2003 year was another case in point. We had a suffocating, smothering defense and an offense that put up 30 points per game. We lost to Florida at home (only game I attended that year) and ended up as one of 3 one-loss teams. We had a terrific team, with talent at every position. Almost every starter on the defense ended up in the NFL, as did most of the starters on offense. We ended the Heisman-hopes of at least two players (David Greene and Eli Manning) that year with suffocating press coverage and crazy blitzing.
Even so, if one or two plays had gone differently, we would not have been among the one-loss teams. I'm thinking in particular about the 4th and 10 play against Ole Miss where Eli Manning
tripped over his lineman's foot. If Manning kept his feet, we might have lost that game. Another play like that was where Skyler Green, having missed an audible, noticed his quarterback under pressure and simply improvised a streak to the end zone, catching a huge touchdown pass. The play was at least as lucky as it was good, and if we hadn't gotten it, we probably would have lost.
Not only could one or two plays have kept us out of the ranks of the once-beatens that year, any number of scenarios could have put USC in the championship game and left LSU out. I think I read that it came down to a game between Hawaii and some other weak team. If Hawaii won, USC would have went to the championship game. Because Hawaii lost, we went to it and USC went to the Rose Bowl. We had a great team. We needed luck to get a shot.
USC also had a great team. They had Reggie bush as a freshman, and sophomore Matt Leinart. They had bad luck, and they missed out.
If the question is when will Bama most likely win a National Championship, I think the answer has to be "not for a long time, if ever." I think that has to be the answer for all or almost all SEC teams, including LSU. Too much luck is involved in determining a National Championship. If the question is, "When will Bama be good enough to have a chance of winning the National Championship?" that becomes a much more interesting question, much more amenable to actual analysis. I think it's safe to say that next year is not the year, but beyond? Well, I'll go out on a limb and say that it probably won't be the 2008 season either, but it could happen beyond that, if Saban is able to accomplish certain things.
First things first, he has to not just close the recruiting gap with Auburn; he has to open up his own gap on them. I don't think it's certain that will ever happen, but it remains to be seen. No one wins consistently without recruiting "lights-out". Right now, Alabama isn't doing that. Keep an eye on Bama's recruiting for next year and see what happens.
Saban is a good coach, but more than once I have seen talk in the local media here about the talent Saban is inheriting here, and how it is better than the talent Saban inherited in Baton Rouge. Not so. Here is a brief and incomplete list of the players on LSU's 2000 roster, the team Nick Saban inherited, who went on the play in the NFL: Josh Booty, Rohan Davey, Craig Nall, Dominick Davis, Josh Reed, Devery Henderson, LeBrandon Toefield, Robert Royal, Fred Booker, Ryan Clark, Bradie James, Howard Green, Jarvis Green, Kenderick Allen, Chad Lavalais (OK, Saban recruited him), Eric Alexander, and Randall Gay. That doesn't include the offensive linemen, whose names wouldn't show up on the stat sheet I looked at to compile this list.
That gives you a flavor of what Saban had to build on. I don't think he's there at Bama yet. Not all of those guys spent a lot of time in the NFL, but some of them have been very successful there. The list included three quarterbacks, two running backs, two wide receivers, and a lot of defensive players as well. What did Saban do with that roster? He went 8-4 and won the Peach Bowl. He also lost to UAB.
I generally like Bama fans, and I will say that Bama looks like they are going to be better next year than they were this year (which is a post for another day). I think Bama fans are, in general, pretty knowledgeable about football and usually have pretty realistic expectations of their team's abilities. I tend to think that Bama fans have a bit of an inflated sense of where they SHOULD be in the football world, but I find that typical Bama fans are usually quite reasonable and articulate about the relative strengths and weaknesses of the team they are currently putting on the field.
That said, I think this whole Nick Saban thing has everybody going a little crazy (including LSU fans, but that's a post for another day too). This poll is Exhibit A. I will admit that it is certainly POSSIBLE that Bama will win a National Championship in the next few years. I think you have to be wearing crimson-colored glasses to think it is LIKELY, though.
I don't think people realize how HARD it is to win a National Championship. As Auburn found out in 2004, you can sometimes do everything right, take care of all your business on the field, and still not even be given a chance. LSU's 2003 year was another case in point. We had a suffocating, smothering defense and an offense that put up 30 points per game. We lost to Florida at home (only game I attended that year) and ended up as one of 3 one-loss teams. We had a terrific team, with talent at every position. Almost every starter on the defense ended up in the NFL, as did most of the starters on offense. We ended the Heisman-hopes of at least two players (David Greene and Eli Manning) that year with suffocating press coverage and crazy blitzing.
Even so, if one or two plays had gone differently, we would not have been among the one-loss teams. I'm thinking in particular about the 4th and 10 play against Ole Miss where Eli Manning
tripped over his lineman's foot. If Manning kept his feet, we might have lost that game. Another play like that was where Skyler Green, having missed an audible, noticed his quarterback under pressure and simply improvised a streak to the end zone, catching a huge touchdown pass. The play was at least as lucky as it was good, and if we hadn't gotten it, we probably would have lost.
Not only could one or two plays have kept us out of the ranks of the once-beatens that year, any number of scenarios could have put USC in the championship game and left LSU out. I think I read that it came down to a game between Hawaii and some other weak team. If Hawaii won, USC would have went to the championship game. Because Hawaii lost, we went to it and USC went to the Rose Bowl. We had a great team. We needed luck to get a shot.
USC also had a great team. They had Reggie bush as a freshman, and sophomore Matt Leinart. They had bad luck, and they missed out.
If the question is when will Bama most likely win a National Championship, I think the answer has to be "not for a long time, if ever." I think that has to be the answer for all or almost all SEC teams, including LSU. Too much luck is involved in determining a National Championship. If the question is, "When will Bama be good enough to have a chance of winning the National Championship?" that becomes a much more interesting question, much more amenable to actual analysis. I think it's safe to say that next year is not the year, but beyond? Well, I'll go out on a limb and say that it probably won't be the 2008 season either, but it could happen beyond that, if Saban is able to accomplish certain things.
First things first, he has to not just close the recruiting gap with Auburn; he has to open up his own gap on them. I don't think it's certain that will ever happen, but it remains to be seen. No one wins consistently without recruiting "lights-out". Right now, Alabama isn't doing that. Keep an eye on Bama's recruiting for next year and see what happens.
Saban is a good coach, but more than once I have seen talk in the local media here about the talent Saban is inheriting here, and how it is better than the talent Saban inherited in Baton Rouge. Not so. Here is a brief and incomplete list of the players on LSU's 2000 roster, the team Nick Saban inherited, who went on the play in the NFL: Josh Booty, Rohan Davey, Craig Nall, Dominick Davis, Josh Reed, Devery Henderson, LeBrandon Toefield, Robert Royal, Fred Booker, Ryan Clark, Bradie James, Howard Green, Jarvis Green, Kenderick Allen, Chad Lavalais (OK, Saban recruited him), Eric Alexander, and Randall Gay. That doesn't include the offensive linemen, whose names wouldn't show up on the stat sheet I looked at to compile this list.
That gives you a flavor of what Saban had to build on. I don't think he's there at Bama yet. Not all of those guys spent a lot of time in the NFL, but some of them have been very successful there. The list included three quarterbacks, two running backs, two wide receivers, and a lot of defensive players as well. What did Saban do with that roster? He went 8-4 and won the Peach Bowl. He also lost to UAB.
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