Nothing gets more grump out of old men than the belief that whippersnappers have it easier than they did back in the day.
That this generation doesn’t have to be tethered to the wall to make a phone call, can access an entire encyclopedia, any show on television and every movie that has ever been made with a few thumb taps on a handheld device, is so irritating.
Such jealousy is understandable, and often cute.
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It turns ugly when money is involved. Why begrudge youngsters who ask for and receive what they earn and deserve just because?
Nick Saban, who has made more money than any college football coach in the history of the sport, enters the chat …
Saban, who is 72 years old, laments that college football isn’t what it used to be when he got into the sport.
RELATED: Texas A&M coach Mike Elko's balancing act
He is right about that. But that doesn’t mean college football was better then. (It wasn’t.)
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The NIL situation is a mess because people like Saban were happy to accept the status quo for decades, despite how un-American it was.
Saban made $8,000 a year in his first full-time job as the linebackers coach at his alma mater Kent State.
When he quit his job at Alabama in January he was making four times that amount … per day.
Yes, Saban walked away from a job where he earned more than $32,000 A DAY.
Side note: The greatest coach in college football history was worth every penny.
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Yet, he has the nerve to be bothered that college athletes are now able to earn money for their work.
Saban’s comments are from a roundtable discussion on Capitol Hill titled, “Safeguarding Student-Athletes from NLRB misclassification,” which is a hint and a half as to where this is going.]
“All the things that I believed in for all these years, 50 years of coaching, no longer exist in college athletics,” Saban said. “It was always about developing players. It was always about helping people be more successful in life.”
Saban is right about many aspects of college football have changed in the last 50 years. Many of those changes, like exploiting players so people like him could be more successful in life, are for the better.
To be fair, Saban says he isn’t against players using Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) deals to create brands for themselves. But, clearly, he doesn’t want them to maximize their opportunities.
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You know, like he was able to throughout his some 50 years in the game?
Saban worked for 13 different schools/teams. Why did he keep moving? Money and opportunity.
He never apologized for any of his moves, not even at the places where he promised he wouldn’t leave just before he left.
Not when he left Toledo, his first head coaching job, with his players in tears after just one season to become a defensive coordinator in the NFL.
Not when he left Michigan State, his so-called dream job, before a bowl game, because the school wouldn’t match the raise LSU offered him.
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Not when he left LSU, which had doubled his salary in the four years he was there, for another double salary opportunity with the Miami Dolphins.
Not when he left Miami for Alabama two weeks after saying, “I guess I have to say it, I’m not going to be the Alabama coach.” He lied.
Everywhere along the way, Saban looked for bigger and better opportunities, as was his right.
Now that college athletes have a few more rights, he can’t stand it.
This is about control. Saban enjoyed being able to control his players current lives and livelihoods, and having a significant say in their future. Thus, he preferred the college game to the NFL.
With college athletes now allowed to reap some of the monetary benefits from monies they help generate, and transfer to wherever they feel is the best place for them to thrive, coaches have lost some of their power.
The man who is part of a group that owns a Ferrari dealership in Nashville and multiple Mercedes dealerships, including Mercedes-Benz of The Woodlands, doesn’t like it that more players can now afford to drive nice cars.
Saban says the competitive balance has been tilted.
“It’s whoever wants to pay the most money, raise the most money, buy the most players, is going to have the best opportunity to win,” Saban said.
That’s comical. As if that hasn’t always been the case. At least we can now see some of what was passed under the table before.
You think the only reason the Crimson Tide has been better at football than the University of Houston in recent years is that Saban is a much better coach than Dana Holgorsen?
Even in clean money, Alabama ranks in the top three in athletic revenue year after year, with triple the athletic budget as UH.
Methinks money might be a factor in the Crimson Tide’s success.
Coaches who have been around as long as Saban, know that players who are only about making money are not a new breed. And those money-driven players have always been less likely to succeed.
Players who factor money into the equation of these life-altering decisions, now that their earnings aren’t artificially restricted, are being smart.
Yes, there needs to be adjustments and regulations to keep the NIL situation from spiraling out of control, but we don’t need to go back 50 years to Saban’s good ol’ days.
He wouldn’t want that for himself and shouldn’t want it for the sport.
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