Jimbo Fisher elaborates on relationship with Nick Saban during LSU days

Texas A&M head coach Jimbo Fisher clearly has a rocky relationship with his former boss and current Alabama head coach Nick Saban, but things might now be quite as bad as they seemed over recent weeks. Despite a war of words between the two, all in-person interactions since have been reported as civil.

While speaking at the SEC meetings in Destin, Florida, Jimbo Fisher backtracked on some of the insults he returned during the impromptu press conference where he questioned Nick Saban’s methods on more than one occasion. Now speaking with a clearer head, he recalls a much more civil history between the two while working together at LSU years ago.

“We were good,” said Fisher, via On3’s Jesse Simonton. “I was on offense. We had a great relationship. We had a lot of success, did well, and not many issues at all. He had normal staff issues and what you’re going to hear, but nothing – we had a great relationship.

Fisher doubled down by comparing the heated arguments between the two coaches to a pair of brothers who do not always get along.

“You ever argue with your brother?” asked Fisher. “Do you love your brother? Do you support your brother? That’s the way coaches are. You can’t get to where you’re trying to go on a staff if everybody’s ‘yes’ people and everybody says the same thing. You don’t ever get nowhere. So you can’t get better, that’s part of our nature and our competitive nature.”

Playing down Nick Saban-Jimbo Fisher feud

Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger joined Paul Finebaum live from Destin Wednesday to discuss his take on the whole debacle from start to finish, but instead of playing up to the hype – Dellenger shot the whole situation down, saying it’s something that happens all the time in athletics and has been blown way out of proportion.

“I mean, the mudslinging is pretty normal among coaches,” Dellenger told Finebaum. “I mean that one was a little obviously more public in the stature of those coaches, but it seems like every coach at some point has told a reporter, the coach from School B says School A cheats, well guess what? School A says school B cheats. That seems to happen everywhere.

“You’re always at a school that doesn’t cheat and everybody else cheats. That’s just kind of how it is. So no, I wasn’t too surprised to hear that come out.”