Nick Saban Responds to Greg McElroy Remarks
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — During his time on the airwaves on the Always College Football radio show on Tuesday, former Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy did not shy away from his thoughts on the Crimson Tide under Nick Saban this season.
Last weekend, Alabama suffered its second loss of the season to drop to 7-2 on the year. With the first loss being by a last-second field goal at Tennessee and this last weekend's loss being a 32-31 overtime defeat at the hands of LSU, the Crimson Tide is having one of its worse seasons in recent memory.
The loss caused McElroy to take time on the radio to address his concerns with the program.
“This is the first time that I have ever actually been concerned about the future of the program," McElroy said. "I’ve always thought regardless of where the program was at, as long as Nick Saban was there, they would be fine. I’ve also never gone as far to say that Nick Saban should leave, or this coach should be fired and this guy is terrible and needs to be benched. I’ve never gone about it in that fashion. Right now, Alabama feels like its at a bit of a crossroads. Nick Saban is a guy that has always preached discipline, effort, toughness, pride. If you don’t believe me, those 4 words are the pillar of the 4th quarter program which is the foundation of what Alabama football has always been about.”
“Here’s the problem right now — there are a lot of guys on that roster, and a lot of coaches frankly on that staff, that didn’t really have anything to do with the foundation of the program being created,” McElroy said. “There’s really only one guy that’s been there from the beginning, that has a great understanding of how that program was built, and that’s Nick Saban. There needs to be a legitimate effort from Nick Saban to bring in coaches that understand what this program once looked like and what this program needs to look like.”
McElroy spoke much more on the topic, but this quote establishes his sentiments.
On Wednesday morning during the SEC coaches weekly teleconference, Saban fielded a question by a reporter and was asked to give a response to McElroy's comments.
Saban's response was much briefer than McElroy's criticisms.
“We work every day to try to get our players to play to a standard and we’ve had a lot of good teams around here for a long time‚” Saban said. “We lost two games by a total of four points, both on the last play of the game. So are there are a lot of things we could do better? Are we satisfied with where we are as a team? Absolutely not.
“But at the same time, sometimes when the standard is so high, there may be some occasion where you don’t quite meet the standard and the expectation that everybody has for you. I do think that standard and expectation has not been something that has helped this team focus on the right things — stay focused on the process, not get so concerned about the results you get — but what you’ve got to do to get the results and that’s something we’ve been trying to emphasize with them.”
With the advent of NIL and the transfer portal, Saban and his staff seemed to adapt with relative ease. However, the primary concern of McElroy with today's program is having to adapt to today's modern athletes and the challenges that accompany them. While Saban and his coaches have been able to adapt thus far, McElroy believes that the Crimson Tide's 7-2 record might say otherwise.
While Alabama might not be bound for the College Football Playoff this season, it still has three more regular-season games to play in order to secure a spot in a solid bowl game. However, the Crimson Tide will face a tough Ole Miss team this weekend and should Alabama lose, it will be the first time since 2010 that the program has suffered three regular-season losses in a single season.
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