Let the games begin!
As we all know, Alabama head football coach Nick Saban wants to finish first in everything that does in life, especially when it comes to football.
Well, when it comes to recruiting, Saban and the Crimson Tide failed to land the top class for 2022 as their SEC rival Texas A&M stole the show by landing a whopping eight 5-star recruits (Alabama had three).
On Wednesday, Saban spoke at an event with local business leaders in Birmingham and he did not mince words when it came to how he believes A&M landed their top-ranked class.
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“I mean, we were second in recruiting last year,” Saban told the audience. “A&M was first. A&M bought every player on their team — made a deal for name, image, likeness. We didn’t buy one player, all right? But I don’t know if we’re gonna be able to sustain that in the future because more and more people are doing it. It’s tough.”
Saban added that NCAA coaches know exactly how much money is available from their school’s group of supporters. He said coaches pool that money and resources to offer student-athletes, and “how much he can promise every player.”
“That’s not what it was supposed to be,” he said. “That’s what it’s become. And that’s the problem in college athletics right now. Now every player is saying, ‘Well, what am I going to get?'”
[irp]
Nick Saban also fires shot at Jackson State head coach, Deion Sanders
But Saban did not stop there as he also called out Jackson State, which is coached by NFL Hall of Famer, Deion Sanders.
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“If the NCAA doesn’t get some protection from litigation, whether we gotta get an antitrust or whatever it is, from a federal government standpoint, this is not going to change because they cannot enforce their rules,” Saban said. “Just like [Alabama basketball coach Nate Oats] said, we have a rule right now that says you cannot use name, image, likeness to entice a player to come to your school.
“Hell, read about it in the paper. I mean, Jackson State paid a guy $1 million last year that was a really good Division I player to come to the school. It was in the paper, and they bragged about it. Nobody did anything about it. I mean, these guys at Miami that are going to play basketball there for $400,000, it’s in the newspaper. The guy tells you how he’s doing it.”
It should be a fun day as both Jimbo Fisher and Deion Sanders are sure to have some solid responses to Saban’s accusations!
