Nick Saban outlines what he would like to see accomplished at SEC spring meetings

Throughout the offseason, multiple problems in college athletics have been put under the microscope. The most notable issues being talked about revolve around the transfer portal and NIL. A few coaches have spoken out about the issues within the current NCAA landscape over recent weeks and months, including Alabama head football coach Nick Saban, who hopes to discuss what could change at the upcoming SEC spring meetings.

Saban recently joined The Paul Finebaum Show, where he explained his goals moving forward when it comes to the issues across college football. At the SEC spring meetings, Saban hopes that coaches can have honest conversations about what is best for the sport, both now and in the future.

“Well I think everybody always looks for a competitive advantage,” Saban said. “That’s the nature of the beast when you’re in coaching because it’s a lot of competition. So if you can create an advantage for yourself, you’re going to try. So you can’t really criticize anybody for doing that. But when you look at the big picture, what’s good for the good of the game? Then that’s a little different story. We all have to have a lot of honesty and integrity about what’s going to be good for the game in the future, and what kind of changes we need to make to get us there.”

Saban hopes to discuss these important issues at the SEC meetings

Throughout the previous few months, the NCAA has received a lot of criticism for the issues that have plagued college sports over the last year. Saban sees and understands the issues at hand, but he also sees the other side of things. The NCAA doesn’t have a ton that it can do to fix things, which is another reason that Saban is hoping for more open and honest discourse at the SEC meetings.

“I think a lot of people criticize the NCAA, but because of a lot of the laws that have been passed, the NCAA really has a difficult time — if they don’t get protection from litigation — to be able to enforce some of the rules that they even have. I think that is where the transfer portal came from,” Saban said. “People had to sit out, but everybody applied for a waiver. And if they did not get a waiver, they sued. Eventually you just say enough is enough and you just pass a rule now that everybody can transfer whenever they can.

“I think NIL is good for players. I don’t think that — players should go earn what they get, which is what our players did last year and did very well — but when you start having collectives and things like that, that raise money to pay players. And then you’re talking about influencing players to go to a school in terms of what they’re going to get — I’m not sure that’s good for the game.”