Former Alabama head coach Nick Saban may be one of the greatest college football coaches in the history of the sport. But if the sport was anything like it is now when he got into coaching, he may have never had the legendary career that he
Due to the implementation of NIL deals and the transfer portal, collegiate athletes are now able to generate a significant income based on their abilities on the field.
While this has its benefits, it also quite clearly has its downside according to Nick Saban. On Tuesday, Saban spoke openly about the current state of college football, outlining how his coaching career would have looked very different if the collegiate game had NIL and the transfer portal when he started coaching.
“I loved coaching pro ball, and if I was going to coach today, based on the circumstances in college and in the NFL, I would coach in the NFL, because all those things in college have changed,” Saban said during an appearance on The Pivot Podcast with Ryan Clark. “The whole idea of what college used to be is not there anymore. It used to be you went to college to develop value for your future.
“Now people are going to college to see how much money they can make. And I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, but you change the whole dynamic of the importance of getting an education, making good decisions and choices about what you do and what you don’t do to create value for your future. You changed that whole dynamic.”
Saban did of course try his hand at coaching at the NFL level first as a defensive coordinator under Bill Belichick on the Cleveland Browns from 1991 to 1994.
Later, he got his own head coaching opportunity with the Miami Dolphins, a tenure that only lasted two seasons before returning to the college ranks for good at Alabama.
This revelation from Saban certainly raises a few questions. Would Saban ever have found success at the NFL level as a head coach? Would Alabama have become the dynasty that they were under Saban if he had never returned to coaching in college?
Both the NFL and college football could have looked entirely different had Saban never returned back to coach at Alabama. Regardless, college football fans are certainly happy that Saban ended up having the success that he did with the Crimson Tide.
“Can you blame him? CFB is insane at the moment,” one fan wrote on X.
Can you blame him? CFB is insane at the moment. https://t.co/GhUzDMAlrN
— Steve (@steve_t_88) January 22, 2025
“Understandable. NIL has been great for players but terrible for teams and for college football. Leave it to the NCAA to mooch off athletes for over a century and then break things when they can’t do it anymore,” wrote another fan on X.
Understandable – NIL has been great for players but terrible for teams and for college football. Leave it to the NCAA to mooch off athletes for over a century and then break things when they can’t do it any more.
— Monty Brewster (@KAB656) January 22, 2025
