Nick Saban Gets it

Nick Saban

In the era of fancy football that is lead by offensively minded Dr. Jekyll’s, the game has found it’s Mr. Hyde in Alabama’s Nick Saban.  Names like Chip Kelley, Mike Leach, Urban Meyer, Brian Kelly have been on the forefront in changing the landscape of college football.  Much of what’s changed about the game has has had an alternating positive and negative effect on the game.

Football in it’s nature is a thrilling game that can’t just be watched, it has to be experienced.  The experience of a football game was once thought only to be enhanced by vicious hits and nasty demeanors that is now shunned at every level of the game.  The ole Woody Hayes, four yards and a cloud of dust epitomized the definition of what “good” football was.  But now there is a new, more efficient way to to heighten college football fan’s game experience, scoring.

Spread offenses allow teams to create mismatches not through better personnel but with pure numbers and schemes.  Similar to good defensive teams, spread offenses present multiple looks that make it difficult for opposing defenses to mentally keep up and a tempo that wears downs even the toughest of defensive units.  This mental fatigue mixed with an eventual level of physical fatigue is a molotov cocktail that often leads to explosive offensive production for spread teams.  I love touchdowns just as much as the next fan, this is why I play Madden on rookie level and select the team with the highest offensive rating.  But the electronic world I can reside in within my living room isn’t hampering the essence of the game in reality.

College football is the de facto farm league for the National Football League.  Since there isn’t a team in the NFL that runs a spread style offense, what fruit is the collegiate farm system bearing?  Each year we deal with the deafening scrutiny of quarterbacks that sharpen their teeth in the spread offense.  These kids are supposed to be the future of the NFL, but it’s a risky proposition each and every year to draft quarterbacks into a league thats not going to change for them but will demand their change.  Over a period of time, if college football continues to produce more and more Tim Tebow’s and less Cam Newton’s, the integrity of this game is damaged.

I can travel down many different roads to examine every aspect of the potential problem the NFL is going to have on it’s hands with it’s talent base but I’ll just highlight what’s dear to my heart, the offensive line.  Each team in the NFL is looking to establish a “franchise” quarterback.  With the title of “franchise” quarterback comes lots of the franchise’s money.  Teams that are heavily invested at the quarterback position are usually as financially invested along the offensive line.  It’s just not smart business to leave a dollar bill in the backfield with pennies protecting it.

Collegiate spread offenses aren’t the place to nurture the growth of future NFL talent along the offensive line.  Often, spread offenses don’t even require their linemen to line up in a three point stance.  When guys go through their college careers constantly playing in three point stances it could be disastrous to assume that said player will be “ok” at the next level.  Spread linemen aren’t asked to play with power they are asked to play within the system but the NFL removes the Charlie Brown blanky and forces players to beat their man.  If the farm system is producing more cumquates and less watermelons the star fruit in the backfield will end up in a nice fruit salad.

But just when we thought things were to the point of no return, enters Mr. Hyde himself, Nick Saban.  Wether or not  you love Nick Saban or hate him, you have to recognize he is one of the greatest college football coaches of this era.  Nick Saban hasn’t got caught up in the many different fads within college football, he sticks to the basics.  Saban coached teams are notorious for smothering defenses and powerful offensive line play.  From his days at Michigan State producing great linemen like Flozell Adams to his tenure at LSU with Rudy Niswanger, Ben Wilkerson, Steve Peterman, now with his Alabama coached teams that have birthed names like Andre Smith, James Carpenter, Mike Johnson, and Antoine Caldwell.  After experiencing the LSU-Alabama matchup, it’s evident that this trend of churning out great future NFL offensive line talent will not be ceasing any time soon.  Alabama’s right tackle, DJ FLuker is one of the best I have seen in a very long time.  Chance Warmack at the left guard spot looks like a future NFL starter.  Left tackle Barrett Jones and center William Vlachos will be on an NFL roster at some point in their football careers.  Ironically, the youngest of the bunch right guard Anthony Steen is just as good as the rest of elder statesmen.

Nick Saban understands that football is a game of scheming with great talent, not schematics with fancy coaching.  The latter is sure to dilute the level of play throughout the National Football league.  But with Mr. Hyde on the job, their is still hope of continuing to build this great game that so many of us love.