Farewell to the GOAT. There will never be another like Nick Saban
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Ryan McGee, ESPN Senior Writer
Nick Saban is the best who has ever done it.
There is no argument to be made against that. None. It is a statement of fact. Any historian who says otherwise is one of those folks who spends their days surrounded by dust-covered books about the single wing, watching black-and-white films on their pocket computers, the ones who so desperately hang on to that overcooked idea that things were always better way back when. Any current observer of college football who pushes back on that point is likely a bitter fan of a team Saban’s squads regularly drubbed, or one the players or coaches who were on the rosters of those teams, denied greatness by greatness.
He’s the best. Period. And now there is a period at the end of his unparalleled career. On Wednesday afternoon, ESPN’s Chris Low broke the news that after 17 seasons as the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide, Saban is hanging up his headset.
Over those 17 seasons, he won a half-dozen national titles, 201 games, and 11 SEC championships during the most competitive era of any conference in the 154-year history of college football. He had a team ranked No. 1 at least once during all but two of those seasons.
Statistics like that make no sense. They don’t look real. The math looks like it cheated, and yet it all adds up to the greatest college football résumé ever written. That point is inarguable.
Bear Bryant, he who built Bama and previously held GOAT status in most minds, also won six national championships in Tuscaloosa, thanks to a willingness — after an admitted initial reluctance — to evolve, modernizing his offensive mind. At Notre Dame, Knute Rockne revolutionized the way a true college football program is constructed and steered. Frank Leahy saved what Rockne had built, revitalizing a struggling program and returning it to its former glory. At Florida State, Bobby Bowden forever changed the way rosters are recruited and assembled. Pop Warner championed safety innovations and managed to balance a hefty ego by continually campaigning to keep football healthy at its grassroots. Woody Hayes had a temper that was only slightly less combustible than a barrelful of gunpowder, but he won big games and planted a coaching tree with more branches than one could possibly keep track of.
Nick Saban did all of the above. Not only that, but he also did it all better. And while he has filled college football with his proteges — Kirby Smart, Steve Sarkisian, Lane Kiffin and Dan Lanning, to name just a few — he has also done all of the above for so long that we have forgotten exactly how long. As good as he has always looked in Crimson, he also looked pretty spiffy in Toledo blue and gold, Michigan State green and white, and LSU purple and gold. His first head coaching job was at Toledo in 1990. In the nearly 30 seasons spent on a sideline since, he posted one losing record.
At LSU and Alabama, it is tempting to slash a historical line between his arrival and everything prior. Let’s call it “Before Saban” and “After Saban” but not use the acronyms. Why? Because anyone who has ever talked with the coach knows there is no BS about him.
Before Saban, LSU hadn’t won a national title since 1958. In 2003, he fixed that. After Saban, the Tigers have added two more.
Before Saban, Bama hadn’t won a national title since 1992 and only one since Bryant’s sixth in 1979. After Saban, it has won six since 2009.
Before Saban, no Tide player had ever won a Heisman Trophy. After Saban, they’ve brought home four stiff-armed awards.
The list goes on and on. But perhaps the most telling and impactful dividing line is less BS/AS and more OS/NS, as in “Old Saban” and “New Saban.” Football-wise, that’s about his Bryant-like willingness to change his offensive philosophy. As the game increasingly sped up and spread out, he openly campaigned for rules that would keep offensive football slower and closer to his longtime pro-set, run-first beliefs. When he realized that was a losing battle, he not only embraced up-tempo offenses, he accelerated their development. He hired west coasters like Kiffin and Sarkisian. Against all odds, Alabama became the new Wide Receiver U.
But anyone who has spent even the tiniest amount of time around the coach in recent seasons knows his personal evolution has outpaced his on-field one. There has been a noticeable change in demeanor. The intensity has never wavered, but he has learned to pick his explosive spots. During a conversation in the days leading up to what turned out to be his final game as Alabama’s head coach, the 2024 Rose Bowl, he became emotional when talking about how this team and its collective personality had kept him laughing all season, even when that team looked lost just three weeks into the season. He credits his last national title team – the 2020 squad that was forced into a close-quarters bubble due to the Covid-19 pandemic – for teaching him to appreciate what was around him more, while keeping his legendary hyperfocus toward maintaining the Crimson Tide empire.
“People tell me that I smile more now. I don’t know if that is true or not. I do know that I pause to enjoy things more now than I did before. Perhaps that’s just getting older, aight? But I like to think that it’s growth. Personal growth. Proof that we never stopped growing, even when you are an old West Virginia guy with stiff joints and grandkids and dealing with a hundred teenagers every day.”
Saban chuckled.
“Here’s the deal. I love what I do, aight? I always have and always will. But yes, maybe I do appreciate it more. One day I will look back and miss it. But I don’t think that will be anytime soon. I’m too busy right now.”
That was on Dec. 15. Anytime soon, it turns out, was less than a month later. But his impact certainly won’t subside anytime soon. Because that line, the one between “Before Saban” and “After Saban” has never applied to just Alabama, or LSU, or even the SEC. As of Jan. 10, 2024, that designation of eras applies to the entirety of college football.
Aight?
CLEVELAND — A full-fledged meet and greet was the first order of business for the Minnesota Twins upon their arrival at the ballpark Friday.
Making nine trades and jettisoning nearly 40% of their team before the deadline the previous day meant there were plenty of new faces in the visiting clubhouse when the Twins began their three-game series against the Cleveland Guardians.
Minnesota traded players including standout shortstop Carlos Correa, closer Jhoan Duran and four high-leverage relievers several years away from free agency, among them St. Paul native Louis Varland.
“It’s a hard pill to swallow, but maybe a reset was needed,” catcher Ryan Jeffers said. “We were curious to see how far the front office would go, and they decided to go really far.
“The dominos just kept falling. It just kept coming. It felt like it never ended.”
Just two years ago, the Twins won the American League Central title and advanced to the division series. It turned out to be the high point of their post-pandemic era as they missed the playoffs in 2024 and are currently six games out of the final AL wild-card position.
“A lot of guys who were on our ’23 run aren’t here anymore because of the trades, so that hurt,” pitcher Bailey Ober said. “The business side of baseball sometimes shows its ugly face sometimes. It was surreal watching what happened.”
Ober was one of 10 players who spent Thursday together in a room in the team’s downtown Cleveland hotel, keeping track of the leaguewide activity. The upbeat mood changed when several of them received phone calls from Twins president Derek Falvey telling them they were on the move.
Manager Rocco Baldelli and Ober said no one took the news worse than hometown product Varland, an emerging reliever who was under team control through 2030.
“It was hardest on Lou, and I don’t think it’s close,” Baldelli said. “He loves the organization, and he loves being close to his family. Yeah, he took it hard.”
To field a full roster against the Guardians, the Twins recalled six players from Triple-A St. Paul and selected the contracts of two more Saints. Baldelli held a team meeting as soon as everyone arrived at Progressive Field, then spoke individually with many of his remaining veterans.
All-Star center fielder and unquestioned team leader Byron Buxton, who is on the 10-day injured list with left ribcage inflammation, also joined the Twins in Cleveland.
“Just having him here is huge,” outfielder Matt Wallner said. “That gives us some sense of normal.”
Starting pitcher Chris Paddack, one of six impending free agents, was the first to go Monday to the Detroit Tigers.
Duran, who had a 2.47 ERA with 292 strikeouts over 233⅔ innings in four seasons, was dealt Wednesday to the Philadelphia Phillies in the first sign that the Twins were serious about trading veterans. Duran fetched Triple-A starting pitcher Mick Abel and High-A catcher Eduardo Tait.
“It’s hard, but it’s about making sure that you’re constantly trying to find a way to not just sit on your heels, hope that it all goes better and keep your fingers crossed,” Falvey said. “It’s a way to actually go invest in the future of the team, hopefully the short-term and the long-term.”
Outfielder Harrison Bader followed Duran to the Phillies, and reliever Brock Stewart was sent to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Reliever Danny Coulombe went to the Texas Rangers. First baseman Ty France and Varland were packaged to Toronto for Triple-A outfielder Alan Roden and Triple-A starting pitcher Kendry Rojas.
“I was in uniform, ready to play for the Buffalo Bisons when it happened,” Roden said, chuckling. “It was a pretty normal day until it wasn’t.”
Popular multiposition player Willi Castro went to the Chicago Cubs and reliever Griffin Jax was sent to the Tampa Bay Rays. Then came the headliner. Correa went back to his original team, the Houston Astros, in what amounted to a salary dump while also bringing back High-A starting pitcher Matt Mikulski.
“It was sad that Carlos left,” catcher Christian Vázquez said. “It was a hard day yesterday. We’re like a family in the clubhouse, so it was hard. It was a fun ride with all of them.”
Less than 22 months ago, the Twins were celebrating at a packed Target Field after Duran closed out a two-game sweep of the Blue Jays in the wild-card round for their first playoff series win in 21 years and the end of their record 18-game postseason losing streak.
Since then, they’ve been in ownership-ordered payroll purgatory in light of the hefty hit they took in regional television revenue after the Diamond Sports Group bankruptcy that affected several other clubs from midsize and small markets.
Even the most aggressive scenarios the Twins envisioned prior to the deadline didn’t include Correa, who signed the richest contract in club history as a free agent after the 2022 season. But the Astros wanted him back and were willing to eat most of the roughly $103 million remaining on his deal through 2028, and Correa was willing to waive his no-trade clause to return to the team that drafted him. The Twins agreed to cover $33 million, due in four installments each Dec. 15.
Falvey was adamant that the Twins aren’t trying to bottom out with this rebuild as other clubs have done with varying degrees of success. The Twins kept both of their All-Stars: Buxton and starting pitcher Joe Ryan, who had plenty of suitors. They’re still confident in third baseman Royce Lewis, who has followed a series of injuries with inconsistency at the plate this season. Starting pitcher Pablo López, whose shoulder injury preceded a skid in June the Twins never corrected, will be back sooner rather than later.
“We’re here to win, let me be clear,” Baldelli said. “The locker room looks different, the team looks different, the lineup is different, but let’s go to work.”
PHILADELPHIA — Phillies slugger Bryce Harper was ejected in the seventh inning of Friday’s game against Detroit for arguing a called third strike on a check swing.
The Phillies scored three runs in the seventh to tie the score at 3-3 and had two runners on base with two outs when Harper faced Tigers reliever Will Vest.
Harper tried to check his swing on a full-count changeup from Vest, but third-base umpire Vic Carapazza rang up Harper, who ripped his helmet off his head in an outburst and shouted as he waved his arms at Carapazza.
Harper was promptly ejected and kept his helmet with him as he walked into the dugout.
“I left the batter’s box walking toward him, so I think it was warranted,” Harper said.
Harper said after the Phillies beat the Tigers 5-4 that he had yet to see the replay, which seemed to indicate he went around with his swing.
“Can’t get thrown out in that situation, especially with the ninth inning possibly coming around and my at-bat coming up,” Harper said.
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