Saban again leads the way as SEC’s elder statesman

He’s not the SEC’s longest-tenured coach. That’s LSU’s Les Miles.

But he’s the oldest SEC coach (topping Miles by two years), and perhaps that’s why everyone listens like they do when Nick Saban takes the stand.

Or probably because of the other things – a fistful of national championship rings, including one from last season.

Saban again used his influence on the game to push some topics he feels strongly about during his turn at SEC Football Media Days on Wednesday, touching on a potential Junior Day for college players, the sport’s disturbing amount of “macho man” behavior involving assault and guns and his personal Power of One philosophy. He didn’t talk much about his pet peeve of the offseason – satellite camps – perhaps because he knows they’re already out and about.

And perhaps because he realizes he lost that battle, so another to be won is around the corner.

“I think that people are listening, that there is a lot of support in our conference,” Saban said of Junior Day. “I think that the NFL is very much interested in this. We have a meeting scheduled in the near future to discuss some ways to implement this.”

Junior Day is a topic Saban broached when he viewed the amount of players who declared to go early to the NFL and weren’t rewarded with a high draft pick. Citing the need to eliminate players’ entourages and potential agents giving them life advice, Saban wants the NFL to begin looking at players before they begin their junior seasons, then issuing an evaluation when the season is over.

These days, there are many players who declare in December, work out for five months before finding out if they should’ve declared for the draft. Under Saban’s proposal, programs would put forward five or six juniors at the beginning of the year, maybe after spring practice; the NFL would test them and look at them throughout the season; then say, “You should/shouldn’t go.”

“There’s a cross section of people who maybe aren’t giving young people responsible information on making this kind of decision,” Saban said. “Probably at least half of those guys shouldn’t have made that decision. They’d have been better off enhancing their draft status by staying in school.”

Two of Saban’s players – playoff hero O.J. Howard and defensive end Jonathan Allen – turned down the NFL for another year at Alabama while Heisman Trophy winner Derrick Henry and defensive tackle A’Shawn Robinson left. Each was drafted in the second round.

“Some things, not satellite camps, but coach usually talks about NFL preparation, declaring for the draft if you feel the need to,” Howard described as topics Saban discusses during the season. “That whole process of leaving early, he makes sure we know the pros and cons of whether or not to do it.”

Mississippi State’s Dan Mullen danced around a case of violence toward women on Tuesday, but Saban confronted it. He can’t control what every player on his team does, but he can educate and supply information on how to act.

“We have a lot of people working hard to try to develop that. What I think we do helps our players to a large degree,” he said. “This is something that we are very serious about. We are doing everything we can in our program to try to influence everyone in our program on how to treat the opposite sex.”

That tied into the Power of One, which Saban described as trying to help out one person if they’re going through a tough situation. That becomes one, that person may help out two others and paying it forward branches throughout the organization.

“You just keep setting good examples and developing trust on your team,” he said. “It might be helpful in developing a little respect and trust as well.”

And when it results in winning four national championships in nine years, people can’t help but listen.