Paul Finebaum forecasts what this season means for the future of Alabama football
During the course of Nick Saban’s time at Alabama, there have been few people with more to say about the Crimson Tide head coach than Paul Finebaum. This season has been one of the most frustrating for Alabama during the Saban era. After all, this is just the eighth season out of sixteen where the Crimson Tide have lost two or more games under Saban. In only four of those, Alabama lost those two or more games in the regular season. Now, there are questions about the future at Alabama.
During an appearance on McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning, Paul Finebaum spoke about Alabama’s future, where he believes Nick Saban needs to make major changes.
“I think the future of the program is okay,” Paul Finebaum said.
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“I think, for this year, everybody can accept the path back is extremely narrow. So, I don’t know exactly what’s gonna happen at the end of the season. I suspect will be some significant changes. I know that’s what the public seems to want, and I think, in this case, I don’t think Nick Saban can avoid tweaking some things. But, he’s been down this road before. So, I don’t think that’s a terribly awkward position for him.”
Paul Finebaum then pointed out that you can view this season at Alabama in a number of different ways. Maybe the Crimson Tide lost to two top-10 teams on the road on the final play. On paper, that’s really not a bad thing. On the other hand, you can see where the team has struggled in ways that it hasn’t during past seasons.
“But, I think you can take a look at this season any way that you want. You can say Alabama’s lost two games on the final play or Alabama has won two games on the final play and has lost two games, so maybe it’s all even,” Paul Finebaum said.
At the end of the day, though, it’s clear that this season didn’t meet expectations for Alabama already, especially given the hype around the program in the preseason.
“But, in the end, there’s no way you can look at where we are right now without saying it’s a bitter disappointment, considering what Alabama had coming into the season and where the expectations were.”
Paul Finebaum says that Nick Saban looks disgruntled
Paul Finebaum seems to think that things have changed for Nick Saban. In fact, Finebaum thinks Saban looks like a disgruntled employee. This isn’t because he doesn’t feel fairly compensated though, it’s more about working conditions in a changing landscape.
“Matt you work at a big corporation where there are happy campers and disgruntled people, we have seen it all. I’m about to say something you may laugh at, Nick Saban seems like a disgruntled employee. Now as I say that, he’s the highest-paid coach in college football, he’s got a lifetime contract. What he’s disgruntled about isn’t his salary, isn’t his contract, it’s not his working conditions, he’s disgruntled about the condition of college football, he hates it,” Paul Finebaum said.
“And I don’t care what he says about NIL, he doesn’t like that, he doesn’t like giving players freedom, he doesn’t like entitled players and it just seems like when we saw him that night that created that firestorm that now seems like ancient history with Jimbo Fisher, that was really him talking…And I know that was real because I had heard the same thing from Nick Saban a couple weeks earlier in a private phone conversation.”