Nick Saban discusses key to building player accountability in offseason

Nick Saban is big on accountability. From the top, down. Coaches hold coaches responsible. Coaches hold players responsible. And players hold each other accountable. But that last leg of the leadership ladder is harder to establish now, according to the long-time Alabama headman.

In the past, coaches were allowed less access to their teams. The players were on their own more often. And also, there were simply far less coaches on each staff a few decades ago when Saban entered the job compared to now. In the current age, a program like Alabama is able to and does employ a million coaches and staff members, because they can. They have the money, resources and necessity.

Years ago, with less coaches and less official practice time, players were on their own with each other more often. They had to establish a sort of pecking order and leadership system. Not that that has gone away completely. But it’s become harder, Saban says. He recently joined the Always College Football Podcast to explain why.

“Basically, we still have team-lead seven on seven where the coaches aren’t there, alright. But what we are allowed to do now is individual technique teaching for two hours a week. We have a couple seven-minute individual periods where we go out and teach the technique of whatever the install is for that day. So that players have a better chance that when we do do it in a team situation or seven on seven situation, especially the young players, they’ve had an opportunity to do it.”

So, there’s just not much time for players to practice exclusively with each other. He then continued:

“I think this whole concept is more challenging to get players to take the responsibility of leadership. I think a lot of guys are willing to go out there and work hard and set a good example, and actually be somebody that [others] want to emulate. But when you tale that next step of trying to help somebody for their benefit by making them be accountable — teammate to teammate — that’s a big step for a lot of guys to take.”

For a bunch of players all college aged, holding each other accountable isn’t easy. You have to have tough conversations with a possible buddy in order to do so. Nick Saban thinks he understands why that’s so hard for this generation of guys.

“Guys get so much self-gratification from social media. They grow up sort of concerned about what everybody thinks of them. So they don’t want their teammate to think poorly of them because they said something that maybe the guy didn’t like, even though it was in his best interest to do. I think getting guys to that point, where you’re holding people accountable, on and off the field — which is in their best interest — is more challenging than it used to be.”

Many teams struggle to find that rare leader. Who wins the support of his teammates, but also holds everyone accountable.