🏈 My kids' package from Coach Saban

[BAMA JAMMA]

Very cool!!

 

[alagator]

Late in the season of Saban's first year in Tuscaloosa my younger cousin and her husband took their three young children (all under the age of about seven at the time) to Tuscaloosa and sat outside the restaurant where Saban held his weekly call-in show on the radio in the hope they could meet him as he left for home (or most likely back to the office).

Not only did Saban stop to say hello to the five of them, he agreed to have his picture made with the children (he had a glowing smile in the photo) but he also took their name and sent each a series of autographed items (much like he did your threesome).

My cousin sent a copy of the photo to Saban (I guess she thought he would frame it and put it on his wall) and then received it back a few weeks later, with a handwritten personal note and autograph from Saban on the image.

Neither my cousin nor her husband attended UA, but they love the football team. And they LOVE Nick Saban.

 

[bama29fan]

Not sure if the story is factual....some of you here might. But when I read it I thought of Sabans gesture to you and your kids.....enjoy

It Don't Cost Nuthin' to be Nice
>
> At a Touchdown Club meeting many years before his death, Coach Paul "Bear"
> Bryant told the following story:
>
> I had just been named the new head coach at Alabama and was off in my old
> car down in South Alabama recruiting a prospect who was supposed to have
> been a pretty good player and I was havin' trouble finding the place.
> Getting hungry I spied an old cinder block building with a small sign out
> front that simply said "Restaurant."
>
> I pull up, go in and every head in the place turns to stare at me. Seems I'm
> the only white fella in the place. But the food smelled good so I skip a
> table and go up to a cement bar and sit. A big ole man in a tee shirt and
> cap comes over and says, "What do you need?" I told him I needed lunch and
> what did they have today? He says, "You probably won't like it here, today
> we're having chitlins, collared greens and black eyed peas with cornbread.
> I'll bet you don't even know what chitlins (small intestines of hogs
> prepared as food in the deep South) are, do you?" I looked him square in the
> eye and said, "I'm from Arkansas , I've probably eaten a mile of them.
> Sounds like I'm in the right place." They all smiled as he left to serve me
> up a big plate. When he comes back he says, "You ain't from around here
> then?"
>
> I explain I'm the new football coach up in Tuscaloosa at the University and
> I'm here to find whatever that boy's name was and he says, yeah I've heard
> of him, he's supposed to be pretty good. And he gives me directions to the
> school so I can meet him and his coach.
>
> As I'm paying up to leave, I remember my manners and leave a tip, not too
> big to be flashy, but a good one and he told me lunch was on him, but I told
> him for a lunch that good, I felt I should pay.
>
> The big man asked me if I had a photograph or something he could hang up to
> show I'd been there. I was so new that I didn't have any yet. It really
> wasn't that big a thing back then to be asked for, but I took a napkin and
> wrote his name and address on it and told him I'd get him one.
>
> I met the kid I was lookin' for later that afternoon and I don't remember
> his name, but do remember I didn't think much of him when I met him. I had
> wasted a day, or so I thought.
>
> When I got back to Tuscaloosa late that night, I took that napkin from my
> shirt pocket and put it under my keys so I wouldn't forget it. Back then I
> was excited that anybody would want a picture of me. The next day we found a
> picture and I wrote on it, "Thanks for the best lunch I've ever had."
>
> Now let's go a whole buncha years down the road. Now we have black players
> at Alabama and I'm back down in that part of the country scouting an
> offensive lineman we sure needed.. Y'all remember, (and I forget the name,
> but it's not important to the story), well anyway, he's got two friends
> going to Auburn and he tells me he's got his heart set on Auburn too, so I
> leave empty handed and go on see some others while I'm down there.
>
> Two days later, I'm in my office in Tuscaloosa and the phone rings and it's
> this kid who just turned me down, and he says, "Coach, do you still want me
> at Alabama ?" And I said, "Yes I sure do." And he says OK, he'll come. And I
> say, "Well son, what changed your mind?" And he said, "When my grandpa found
> out that I had a chance to play for you and said no, he pitched a fit and
> told me I wasn't going nowhere but Alabama, and wasn't playing for nobody
> but you. He thinks a lot of you and has ever since y'all met." Well, I
> didn't know his granddad from Adam's housecat so I asked him who his
> granddaddy was and he said, "You probably don't remember him, but you ate in
> his restaurant your first year at Alabama and you sent him a picture that
> he's had hung in that place ever since. That picture's his pride and joy and
> he still tells everybody about the day that Bear Bryant came in and had
> chitlins with him."
>
> "My grandpa said that when you left there, he never expected you to remember
> him or to send him that picture, but you kept your word to him and to
> Grandpa, that's everything. He said you could teach me more than football
> and I had to play for a man like you, so I guess I'm going to."
>
> I was floored. But I learned that the lessons my mama taught me were always
> right. It don't cost nuthin' to be nice. It don't cost nuthin' to do the
> right thing most of the time, and it costs a lot to lose your good name by
> breakin ' your word to someone.
>
> When I went back to sign that boy, I looked up his Grandpa and he's still
> running that place, but it looks a lot better now; and he didn't have
> chitlins that day, but he had some ribs that woulda made Dreamland proud and
> I made sure I posed for a lot of pictures; and don't think I didn't leave
> some new ones for him, too, along with a signed football.
>
> I made it clear to all my assistants to keep this story and these lessons in
> mind when they're out on the road. If you remember anything else from me,
> remember this.. It really doesn't cost anything to be nice, and the rewards
> can be unimaginable.