Marketing 101: Nick Saban Promotes Former Players Following NFL Draft
If Alabama head coach Nick Saban hadn’t had gone into football as a career, he would have been excellent at marketing and advertising.
Everyone knows how well Saban does at selling his program to recruits, bringing in top class after top class year after year. However, his ability to promote his athletes after their days with the Crimson Tide have ended is also worthy of mentioning.
Since the NFL draft in late April, Saban has been making the rounds in the media, heaping praise and discussing the benefits his former players will have on their newfound NFL homes.
On May 11, Saban joined the “Giants Huddle” podcast to talk about safety Xavier McKinney, who joined the New York Giants with the No. 36 pick in the second round.
“I think [the pick was a steal]," Saban said. "Normally, statistically, there are two safeties picked in the first round, if you look at historical data. So he should have been a first-round pick based on historical information. And certainly as a player, I think most people had him graded there. I just think sometimes in the draft when there’s an overload at another position, whether it’s receiver or offensive line or whatever it is, that guys don’t always get picked where their grade says. … So I think this is a really, really good pick for the Giants.”
Saban did not stop there. In addition to discussing how McKinney was a steal for the Giants, Saban also discussed the benefits that McKinney will bring to the Giants organization.
“I think the guy’s got some dog in him,” Saban said. “He’s a competitive guy. He’s a playmaker. We have a production point system here that we use, and he was always high on that board because he forces fumbles, shows up in the right place, does a good job of executing. He’s instinctive, he’s a quick reactor, he’s got a burst. He can be a knock-back tackler. So he’s always been a real playmaker for us and it comes in a lot of different ways, but that’s probably his greatest strength — his production.”
McKinney is not the only player that Saban has been on the campaign trail for. In addition to the Giants safety, Saban has also spoken regarding several other former Alabama players, including No. 5-overall pick and new Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa.
Prior to the draft taking place, Saban was featured in an ESPN segment where he hoped that the teams of the NFL would not make the same mistake that he and his staff did when he was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins. That mistake? In 2006, Saban passed on an opportunity to sign then-free agent Drew Brees due to injury concerns.
The Dolphins did not make the same mistake twice, and drafted Tagovailoa as their first pick.
Saban couldn’t be happier.
“I was really, really hopeful that Miami would take him,” Saban said in a conference call with three south Florida publications. “Tua’s such a great person. Really was a very, very good leader here. One of the most popular players that we’ve ever had with our fans and our fan base. I think he will be a great face of the organization there.
“I was just rooting for the guy. I felt so bad about him getting injured. Would those consequences of that injury affect his draft status dramatically? Probably as anxious as I ever was about a player getting drafted, so I was really excited about the fact that Miami ended up taking him. I think this is going to work out great. Tua’s a great player, and he’s going to be an even better person in the community and the organization.”
Tagovailoa officially signed his contract with the Dolphins on Monday, inking a four-year, $30 million deal.
Two more players that Saban has been high on since draft day are wide receivers Henry Ruggs III and Jerry Jeudy.
Not long after Tagovailoa was drafted, Ruggs soon went as the first receiver off the board, being drafted No. 12 overall by the Las Vegas Raiders. While Ruggs brings his incredible speed to the Raiders roster, Saban was quick to note that it’s not his speed alone that will benefit his new organization.
“He’s a hard worker and a guy with great character who is a very explosive and talented guy,” Saban said in an interview with Raiders.com. “He has great speed and is a good special teams player, which is unusual sometimes. He’s a receiver who can play gunner and is in on kickoffs. He has a lot of mental and physical toughness to him relative to the position.
"I think he’s what you would categorize as a speed receiver who can get on top of people running straight line routes, but he drops his weight and gets out of breaks pretty good, too.”
Jeudy also received praise and analysis from Saban in an interview with DenverBroncos.com. While many expected Jeudy to be the first receiver off the board over Ruggs, the Broncos landed Jeudy as the No. 15-overall pick.
Despite being passed by Ruggs in the draft, Saban has no doubt that Jeudy will have plenty of opportunities to shine in the NFL.
“I don't think there's any question that he'll have a lot of success in the NFL,” Saban said. “I don't like to compare players, but if you compare their output and their production here as a player, Jerry certainly in his own way and his own style was just as productive as any of those guys. Some of those guys were really good outside receivers, some of them were good slot guys. Jerry's kind of a combination of both, but I think he can really do his damage when he's playing in the slot.
"He did a fabulous job for us. He was really, really productive. He's a hard worker. Really good guy to have in your organization."
When it comes to marketing players for the NFL, there is no one better than Saban. His record speaks for itself. In the 2020 draft, Saban cemented his name in NFL history, becoming the first coach in the common draft era to have all 11 players on both the offensive and defensive sides of the ball to be drafted in the first round.
By promoting his players after the NFL draft, Saban accomplishes multiple items. First, he creates a lot of hype among the fanbases of the teams, thereby promoting value among fans and programs alike for Crimson Tide players. This, in turn, increases the appeal of Alabama to recruits, bringing in a new class of high-quality players.
The cycle repeats itself again and again, and Saban has become a master of it.
If Saban were to teach a class, it would most definitely be Marketing 101.
At the end of the day, all that matters to Saban is that he’s giving his players the opportunity to pursue their professional football dreams.
“For all the players that we recruit, I think their dream -- even getting an education, being a good person is important in their career development -- I think that their dream is they want to play in the NFL some day,” Saban said in an interview with ESPN. “It always makes me extremely proud and extremely happy for them and their family when our guys have that dream come true, which is what happens in the draft.”
