Forever in our hearts: A minute ago, Alabama QB Jalen Milroe died in car crash.
DALLAS — If you were wondering whether Nick Saban‘s allegiance to Alabama would color his actions in his post-coaching career as a television analyst for ESPN, his prediction for the SEC Championship Game early in the week at media days put that to rest. His pick to reach Atlanta: Georgia versus Texas.
“I really like Texas,” Saban said. “I think Georgia has got a really good team. I believe in our Alabama team, too. I believe in (quarterback) Jalen Milroe. I just think the question marks in the secondary — until those get resolved — it’s hard to, sort of, jump on that bandwagon.”
Saban’s former players — offensive guard Tyler Booker, Milroe and safety Malachi Moore — took his feeling that Alabama would come up short in repeating as SEC champions in stride Wednesday.
“It’s all love, man,” Moore said. “Coach has a job to do.”
Milroe said nothing’s changed.
“Still love coach,” he added. “That’s my guy. He’s the same guy I hugged at after the Iron Bowl. Ain’t nothing going to change there.”
From there, Milroe sounded an awful lot like his former coach.
“But it’s all about us,” Milroe continued. “You know, it’s all about attacking the task at hand and setting short-term goals and long-term goals that we want to accomplish as a group and never looking at external factors within the time we have together and the opportunity — the opportunity that’s presented, seize it and make the most of it. So it’s all about going 1-0 each and every day and just try to attack attack all tasks that we have in front of us.”
Again: Saban would be proud of that measured response.
As for Booker, Saban might get a chuckle.
Booker said Saban taught him not to pay attention to so-called “external factors.” He pointed out, “He works at the stadium, not the facility anymore.”
“He would get mad at me if I felt a way about what he said because he always used to say, ‘Don’t let some guy that lives in his mom’s basement determine how you feel,'” Booker said. “So I’m not gonna let a guy who plays golf all day determine how I feel.”
It’s true. Saban is playing a lot of golf after football. Saban joked earlier in the day about how he can’t get through nine holes without his wife sending him a to-do list.
But Saban’s also taking his responsibility as an analyst seriously. He said that he studied for the NFL Draft for hundreds out of hours. For media days, he said he spoke to coaches and watched each team’s spring game.
“I still view this from a coach’s perspective,” he said. “I just happen not to have a team.”
