Mike Leach calls out own players vs Alabama: 'We spent a lot of time frightened of their jerseys'

Mike Leach was less than happy with his Mississippi State squad following the drubbing handed to them by the Alabama Crimson Tide.

During his postgame press conference, the Bulldogs leader called out his players for being too afraid of Alabama’s jerseys, instead of playing with pride and confidence.

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“I didn’t think we played well. I didn’t think we played well at all,” started Leach. “I’ll tell you one thing that they did that gives us trouble, we’ve got some guys that are afraid of the jersey that says Alabama on it. We spent a lot of time frightened of their jerseys.

“You want to scare some of the guys on our team, put an Alabama jersey on, you’ll scare the hell out of them.”

While the Alabama brand has become huge, Leach wondered why the Crimson Tide affected his team so much, as they play plenty of other gigantic brands in the SEC each week.

“There’s other really good teams that we’re not afraid of their jerseys,” elaborated Leach. “We’re afraid of Alabama’s jerseys. Then there were obviously some externals that you observed that you may or may not comment on that I’m not going to yet, and then you can evaluate that accordingly.”

Alas, it’s evident Mike Leach feels his team wasn’t out-played by much, and simply let a game slip out of their hands due to fear. Nevertheless, a 30-6 conference loss never feels good, regardless of how it’s delivered.

Paul Finebaum reveals what impressed him about Alabama’s bounceback performance against Mississippi State

Consider Paul Finebaum impressed with Alabama after their bounce back performance against Mississippi State on Saturday.

Speaking on SportsCenter, the SEC Network analyst explained what the Crimson Tide did following they demoralizing loss to Tennessee that made him a believer again.

“They played with so much more composure at home,” Finebaum responded, asked what impressed him the most about the Crimson Tide’s bounce back. “In Knoxville the week earlier, they looked intimidated. Nick Saban said they were anxious, and that showed. At home after, I’m sure a very difficult week of practice under Saban’s eye, they seemed to just take a little bit more time with everything. They weren’t so rushing, they weren’t going offsides. Ultimately, they got off to a great start.

“Some of that was helped by (Mississippi State head coach) Mike Leach, just simply making the wrong decision every time he went for it on fourth down, or went for it and went for a field goal then missed. Everything went wrong, but ultimately Alabama got through it and they have a bye week, they they get ready for the remainder of the schedule.”

As Paul Finebaum mentioned, Nick Saban and Alabama can take some positivity into their bye week with LSU and Ole Miss on the horizon afterwards. If the Crimson Tide can get through those challenges, an SEC Championship appearance is more than likely in their future.