Saban said A&M bought every player in its class, and that Bama had 25 players get NIL, all of whom did it "the right way". Saying he didn't call Jimbo a cheater is semantics. The implication could not be more obvious.
Disappointed that you're backpedaling instead of doubling down on the ludicrous notion that corporations are lining up to funnel some kind of slush fund money to Bama NIL because Saban did some shitty AFLAC commercial.
The collective can’t do it either. Can they pay players for NIL? Absolutely. Can they offer NIL deals to recruits to lure them to a school? Absolutely not. This is what the NCAA hullabaloo a couple weeks ago was specifically about. The NCAA has attempted to create rules that make it black and white what NIL vs pay for play means. The problem is they can’t really enforce those rules without fear of the government cracking down on them.
He's specifically calling out the kids in the 2022 A&M signing class, along with Travis Hunter, saying "look this is wrong!"
i thought the implication was that Tamu paid for every recruit and that’s how they ended up #1 but Bama didn’t pay a single kid which is why they ended up #2. i also didn’t see the need to bring up Travis Hunter at all and pretty messed up to call out a kid.
The 25 players he referenced were current players on the team, not recruits. The "right way" to him is for a player to earn it while playing for the team, not just for signing.
I don't recall him getting money to sign? Iirc he didn't get anything until he was set to be starting QB. Like I said earlier though, as much as it changes the game, I don't mind the 5* player getting as much money as quick as he can bc there's no guarantee he pans out.
Not a fan of him saying it's getting to be about kids wanting to make as much money as they can wherever they can. Coaches have been doing that for 100 years.
If you want to split the hair between “getting paid before playing a snap is the right way,” but “getting paid to sign is the wrong way,” go right ahead. I don’t find them to be meaningfully different, though.
I thought the singled out comment was in regard to Hunter but I didn’t listen to the interview so I’m probably off here.
Why would he escalate? He's just going to spend an extra week this summer game planning for them so he can win by 30+
And now if you'll excuse me I'm going to drive to one of my vacation homes and sip 30 year old scotch.
Saban is saying the right thing in the moment, especially after having spoken with Sankey. That said, I still don’t think an apology was necessary.
Correct. I wasn't suggesting Saban said his recruits all got NIL "the right way". I just put the two thoughts together and it looked more confusing because of it. Point being, if you say you have kids who make $3M through NIL "the right way", the implication is clearly that others are making that money "the wrong way". You don't need to use the word "cheater" call a person that.
That didn't happen. And if it did, it wasn't that bad. And if it was, that's not a big deal. And if it is, that's not his fault. And if it was, he didn't mean it. And if he did, they deserved it.