Alabama has been college football’s No. 1 team since the moment Tua Tagovailoa threw a touchdown pass in overtime of last season’s national title game. The Tide were No. 1 after the 2017 season, No. 1 before the 2018 season, and No. 1 in every human poll to come out all year. S&P+ has concurred with the Tide being the obvious best team in FBS.
Nick Saban’s very Saban Coaches Poll ballot has Clemson at No. 1
Bama’s coach is eternally on guard against media hype.
Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports
But Nick Saban, who’s perpetually horrified at his players being made complacent by media and fans accurately calling them the best, is keeping dutiful watch to prevent that.
As noticed by AL.com’s Michael Casagrande, Saban’s post-Championship Weekend Coaches Poll ballot has the Tide at No. 2 and Clemson at No. 1.
There’s a good chance Saban doesn’t fill out the whole ballot on his own. Many, many coaches do not, and it’s an open secret that programs’ communications staffers often handle the voting on behalf of their bosses.
This specific thing feels quintessentially Saban, though. You can be your own judge of whether some other Tide employee made the call to put Bama at No. 2, but I doubt it.
Only one other coach didn’t have Bama at No. 1: the guy who just got blown out by Clemson on Saturday:
Saban going out of his way to act like his team hasn’t been No. 1 so far is not out of character for him at all.
He often praises college football’s big press corps for all the attention it lavishes on the sport and his program. But more frequently, he does a curmudgeonly thing — maybe part bit, maybe an honest expression — where he chastises the press for being too kind to his unbeaten collection of four- and five-star players. At other points, he and his staff have tried to create the notion of MEDIA DISRESPECT to get players riled up before big moments.
Three recent, famous examples:
- Before a Playoff semifinal against Washington at the end of 2016, the Tide put up fake quotes attributed to the “National Media” that said Washington would beat them.
National Media is not the name of any one person, at least not that I’ve met. And few members of the national media picked Bama to lose.
- After one 2017 game, Saban told off reporters for telling his players they were good, likening media praise of his football team to rodent toxins:
I’m trying to get our players to listen to me, instead of listening to you guys. You know, all that stuff you write about how good we are? And all that stuff they hear on ESPN? It’s like poison. You know what I mean? It’s like poison. It’s like taking poison. Like rat poison. All right, so I’m asking them, ‘Are you gonna listen to me, or are you gonna listen to these guys about how good you are?
Like rat poison.
- In September 2018, he asked media members to please start writing stories about Bama’s weaknesses, so he could show them to his players and tell them to improve on them. We decided to play along and nitpicked some of the Tide’s relative shortcomings.
Saban’s certainly just being Saban here, but he isn’t wrong to put Clemson pretty much on the same level as his own team.
S&P+ projects the Tide are about 2 points better on a neutral field. And if everything’s chalk in the Playoff semifinals, we’ll get to see how close they really are in their personal Round 4.
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