Nick Saban sends message: Stop creating epidemic of 'poor me'

Alabama head coach Nick Saban sent a blunt message to his team in his press conference on Wednesday.

“People can’t be overwhelmed by their circumstance,” Saban said. “You get overwhelmed by constantly talking about negative things: How I feel, how tired I am, whatever it is. Fall camp, practice at this time of year without playing a game every week is very challenging and we talk about that all the time, it just creates an epidemic of the ‘poor mes’.”

Saban continued, in an over two minute message to his team.

“The season is going to create tremendous challenges, challenges in every game,” he said. “You’ve got to have resiliency to be able to overcome difficult circumstance and that’s one of the things that fall camp is designed to do for players. The mental toughness, the self-discipline that you need to be able to make good choices and decisions for what you do and what you don’t do and a sense of purpose.”

He finished.

“I think we’re still working on that with a lot of our players,” Nick Saban said. “We got some guys that do a great job of that, set a good example for that but we got a lot of players that still get overwhelmed by their feelings. We’re going to do everything we can to get more and more players on our team to have the kind of mindset you need to be able to sustain difficult circumstances and overcome adversity in games and challenges in games that’s sure to come.”

Nick Saban’s message comes from experience. Entering his 16th year at Alabama, Saban has won six national championships and seven SEC championships.

Saban and the Crimson Tide enter 2021 with a relatively inexperienced team compared to previous years. With a large amount of talent to replace on both sides of the ball from last year’s national championship team, there comes a period of instilling a mentality in the young additions that made the teams before them as successful as they did. That’s why he made the message when he did.

With the season-opener against Miami fast approaching, Nick Saban will rely on the leadership from quarterback Bryce Young, who steps into the role after sitting behind Mac Jones last season, and experienced veterans like wide receiver John Metchie III and offensive lineman Evan Neal.

Defensively, the Tide are in a much better place, returning players like cornerback Josh Jobe, safety Jordan Battle, linebackers Will Anderson Jr and Christian Harris, while also adding Tennessee transfer Henry To’o To’o to the defense.

The Tide will have their hands full with D’Eriq King and the Miami Hurricanes to open the season, but as Saban said in his message, the team will have show resiliency and “can’t be overwhelmed by their circumstance” as they begin their journey to try and win back-to-back championships.