The last time the subject of rat poison − Nick Saban’s nickname for overly lavish media praise for his program − really got the Alabama football coach fired up, I was sitting to his left at the end of his weekly radio show before the Crimson Tide’s season opener at Utah State. He made reference to preseason prognostications for each game on the Crimson Tide’s schedule, published by The Tuscaloosa News, and lamented the silliness of predicting November outcomes in August.
There’s a silliness to that, indeed. Readers enjoy consuming serious articles, but fun ones, too.
GUT PUNCH:What’s left for Alabama football after LSU loss? Soul-searching for Nick Saban and team | Goodbread
SABAN’S 15:Celebrate Nick Saban’s 15 epic seasons at Alabama football with our special book!
I penned one of the pieces in question, which projected an Alabama victory in each of its regular-season games. Fast-forward to today, and the Crimson Tide will enter this year’s Iron Bowl with at least two losses for the first time since 2010, making it look all the sillier in retrospect. At the time, however, it seemed a lot more sensible. As Tennessee pounded Ball State 59-10 on flat-screen TV’s all around Saban at Baumhower’s Victory Grille that night in the Vols’ Thursday opener, there was no real indication that UT would be among the nation’s elite teams this year.
There were even more questions about LSU, a dismal 6-7 in 2021, which had a new coach and a new quarterback who would eventually team up to dispatch Alabama in overtime Saturday. The preseason AP poll ranked Alabama No. 1 in the nation, and Saban’s peers in the coaching business, in the USA Today AFCA Coaches Poll, ranked Alabama No. 1 as well. There’s an undeniable weight that goes along with that for players. A pressure to win that can sit heavy on the shoulders of some, yet much lighter on others.
But does it come from media coverage, or does it come from a program’s own success? To some extent, the answer is both, but media or poll rankings aside, Alabama’s own history of winning really drives fan expectations more than anything. And tamping down the pressure that goes with playing at Alabama happens only one way: with losses. Saban addressed that pressure Monday in a lengthy response to a question about how this team has met or not met what’s known as the “Alabama standard.”
“You put pressure on yourself, whatever it is, which means you’re really focused on outcomes, not process, and I think that’s the biggest thing we’ve got to get our players back to doing,” Saban said. “When I say you’ve got to focus on what it takes to win and enjoy winning, that’s what I’m talking about. Not the pressure to win, and then the relief when you win, rather than the joy that you won. There’s a difference in all that. I’m not blaming anybody for it − it is what it is − but you’ve got to be able to handle that and not let it affect you. I’ve done, I guess, a pretty average job of getting our players out of that mode.”
It’s a standard Saban built, and one that calls for players to ignore outside noise. Yet it’s also one that history suggests includes championship contention. As much as Saban implores his players to avoid an outcome-based approach, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who would say the standard can be met without, at least, a trip to the SEC title game. That’s a level of expectation that not more than three or four programs in America hold as their own. Pull 10 random Power Five programs out of a hat, and you’ll likely draw 10 coaches, and fan bases, that would be thrilled with a two-loss year. But a program that’s notched six national titles over a 13-year stretch isn’t graded on the same curve. It’s the same perception that’s compelled oddsmakers to install Alabama as a 12-point favorite over Ole Miss this week despite all indications − from its road struggles to Ole Miss’ fabulous 8-1 mark − that suggest the Crimson Tide is certainly not 12 points better.
Hold to a high standard long enough, and the weight of expectations only gets heavier.
Reach Chase Goodbread at cgoodbread@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter @chasegoodbread
