Nick Saban
Nick Saban
Nicholas Lou Saban Jr. is an American football coach. He is the head football coach at the University of Alabama, a position he has held since the 2007 season. Saban previously served as head coach of the National Football League's Miami Dolphins and three other universities: Louisiana State University, Michigan State University, and the University of Toledo. His eight-year contract totaling US$32 million made him one of the highest paid football coaches, professional or collegiate, in the United States at the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth31 October 1951
CityFairmont, WV
CountryUnited States of America
That issue has gone under the bridge, under the next bridge, over the next dam and is gone.
He got picked before we could get him. Somebody else obviously tutored him up.
Jason has had a great camp and has done a great job in every regard. He's probably one of the guys who has had a lot more to learn because he's never really played that position as a professional player. He's playing a combination of two positions right now, but he's done a tremendous job of adapting and making plays.
I would say that if Jason Taylor had played in a 3-4 system somewhere, he would have been a Hall of Fame outside linebacker. There is no question about that based on the athletic ability the guy has. He's smart and he's got great instincts to learn things better than I ever hoped for. It gives us an opportunity to move him around and use him in a lot of different ways.
A good defense starts with defending the middle of the field, and that starts with being able to stop the run.
I'm not blaming anybody, because that's not my nature, but we certainly didn't have the energy and enthusiasm we've had up to this point. We just didn't look like the same team out there, and I can't give you any reason exactly why.
He's still hard to block. He does a great job of using his hands. He still plays with a lot of power. He still can rush and block people back to the quarterback. He's very instinctive on the field -- batting balls down and making a lot of plays. I think the guy is an astounding player and I think he's had a really good year doing what they expect him to do.
I'm getting too old to run (or) jog. We have fun. It's probably good for the staff that we get together and do something like that.
He did well, actually better than I thought he would. We did not want him to go the whole practice because we didn't want him to get in an overuse situation where he might fatigue that particular injury and have additional problems.
Ideally, we would like to keep many of those players on our roster, but we are simply not able to do that.
I'm not blaming it on anything because that's not my nature, ... but we certainly didn't have the energy and enthusiasm that we've played with to this point.
Gus did well, but he looked more comfortable and confident with the offense because he's played in the system before. I think we were a little tentative early in the game and I think the longer we played, the better we played.
Part of the things that we are doing is because of his unique abilities. I would say that if Jason Taylor had played in a 3-4 system somewhere, he would have been a Hall of Fame outside linebacker. He's smart, and he's got great instincts to learn things better than I ever hoped. It gives us an opportunity to move him around and use him in a lot of different ways.
It is what it is. So we can talk about 39 touchdowns or we can talk about however many fumbles. Half empty, half full.