One thing I haven’t mentioned before now, that I will at this time, is a piece I saw in the NFL preseason. Now part of this is speculation on my part, but, I was watching a segment on Saban back in August and they were interviewing him from his vacation home at West Palm Beach. He was talking about how much he liked to go there and relax but how being a NFL coach did not give him as much time to go there, as he would like and how he had a lot more free time when he was coaching at LSU.
This reminded me of the rumors back when Spurrier left Washington. A lot of folks were talking about how coaching Florida was a 40 hour a week job for Spurrier and how he had plenty of free time for golf when he was in Gainesville, but not so much once he got to DC. I was thinking while I was watching that story how I would not be surprised to see Saban head back to college ball. Due to the limits the NCAA puts on practice time and recruiting, a college coach does have more free time for family and to enjoy the millions of dollars they make.
Today, while listening to Saban’s press conference, I started to think about all this again. He starts by telling the reports what a long and tiring day it had been. Then he goes on that little rant toward the end about how he got home at 1 a.m. last night and was back in early this morning to talk with some of his players. So if you ask me, if you want a reason why Saban would come to Bama, there it is. Some guys can be a successful College Head Coach by having it be a 40 hour a week job, but that’s just not possible in the NFL. So if Bama is going to pay him the same money to work 40 hours a week as opposed to the 72 he puts in every week for the Dolphins, why not?
I’m not saying he isn’t worth the money. He’s better at getting the most out of the 5 weeks of spring practice and the 5 or 6 weeks of summer practice than other coaches and that makes him worth every penny, if you ask me. The bottom line is what good is $4 million per year if you can’t enjoy it? At Miami, he isn’t getting to enjoy his millions. At Tuscaloosa, he would enjoy every penny of it.