Alabama SI Cover Tournament: The Snake is Back vs. The Tide Rolls to the Top

The first matchup is in the books.

BamaCentral is holding a 48-field single-elimination tournament to determine the best Alabama Sports Illustrated cover.

Vote on Twitter (@BamaCentral) or Facebook (@AlabamaonSI). The voting goes 24 hours for each matchup and the result added to the original post on BamaCentral.

First round

Nick Saban Regional

Game 2: The Snake is Back vs. The Tide Rolls to the Top

The Snake Is Back:

Kenny Stabler Comes out Flingin' and Feudin'

Story headline: SHHHH! All's quiet in Oakland

Subhead: Especially between Kenny Stabler and Al Davis, who aren't speaking; But the Snake has silenced the discord created when he criticized several teammates

Excerpt (by Ron Reid): Kenny Stabler, scraggly bearded and feisty, finished a rap session with the press one afternoon last week and strode onto the field at the Oakland Raiders' training camp in Santa Rosa, Calif. He took the snap from Center Dave Dalby, dropped back and scanned the coverage. Finding Morris Bradshaw free, he connected with him on a 50-yard scoring pass. The play was vintage Stabler, and the members of the Raiders' offense cheered, happily drinking it in.

For all of the above, it was a whole new ball game. Snake Stabler had refused to talk to the press most of last season, preferring not to discuss the fact that he rarely connected on any pass longer than 30 yards—to someone wearing a Raider jersey, that is. As recently as two weeks ago not many of Stabler's teammates were of a mood to cheer anything he did. Indeed, not only had Stabler failed to report to camp on schedule with the other Raiders, not only had he demanded to be traded, but he also had ripped a number of his teammates in print—Receivers Bradshaw and Cliff Branch because they dropped too many of his passes last season, Offensive Linemen Henry Lawrence and Mickey Marvin because they hadn't blocked well enough for Stabler on pass plays.

But controversy has long been more a Raider tradition than a disruptive force.

BCS Commemorative Issue (2011 Season):

The Tide Rolls to the Top

Story headline: Total control

Subhead: With its suffocating defense and surprisingly strong passing game, the Crimson Tide mastered LSU, leaving no doubt about who was No. 1

Excerpt (by Austin Murphy): Tony McCarron was asleep in his dorm room at Station No. 11 in Mobile when his phone went off around midnight on Nov. 7. It wasn't an emergency. It was an epiphany. McCarron is a fireman; his eldest son, AJ, is the starting quarterback at Alabama. AJ was calling a little more than 24 hours after the Tide's 9-6 overtime loss to LSU. "I could tell he was shook-up," recalls Tony. While AJ's numbers in that game were decent—he completed 16 of 28 passes for 199 yards, with an interception—he was quick to don a hair shirt after the game, beating himself up for playing with excessive caution. The moment had called for a daredevil, and he'd channeled his inner actuary.

"He felt as if he'd let his teammates down," Tony recalls, "and he was torn up about it." AJ made this vow to his old man: "Daddy, I will never play another game where I allow the other team to dictate how I play. I was so worried about losing the game for my team, I didn't go out and win it."

True to his word, and to the surprise and delight of an Alabama fan base that had seldom, if ever, seen such a virtuoso performance by a quarterback in a national championship game, the redshirt sophomore flat out shredded LSU's defense in their BCS title match in New Orleans on Monday night. The only thing more remarkable than McCarron's line in 'Bama's methodical 21-0 dismantling of the top-ranked Tigers—he completed 23 of 34 passes for 234 yards—was the fact that, finally, after seven-plus quarters of play this season, one of these teams finally carried the football into that rectangle known as the end zone.

Result

The initial voting led to an even 50-50 split, with the majority of the ballots cast on Twitter for The Snake is Back, while Facebook was lopsided in favor of the 2011 national championship commemorative edition.

The Tide Rolls to the Top won the tiebreaker, 67-33 percent.