If part of Mike Slive’s purpose in rolling out details of his oversigning legislation in advance of the Destin meetings was to win the hearts and minds of a few coaches, it’s not working.
… In an unofficial survey of the SEC’s 12 head coaches, it sounds like it’s about 8-4 in favor of not drastically changing the rules. In addition to Saban, Ole Miss’ Houston Nutt is in that camp, along with South Carolina’s Steve Spurrier and Tennessee’s Derek Dooley.
That’s more coaches in opposition than Pennington and Barnhart counted in their tallies. Neither accounted for Dooley siding with Saban.
Reading between the lines of Low’s post, the sticking point, as I anticipated, is Slive’s proposal to drop the 28-player signing limit down to 25. The Tennessee head coach isn’t impressed.
“I think one of the best things we do in the SEC is manage scholarship numbers,” Dooley said.
Now that isn’t to say that SEC oversigning legislation is DOA. The presidents and chancellors may override their head coaches’ wishes. Slive may astutely settle for half a loaf instead of nothing at all. But it’s clear the coaches intend to signal their opposition. Loudly.
… How it all shakes out — and how all the athletic directors and presidents vote next week — remains to be seen. But this much is certain: It’s been communicated rather pointedly to Slive by several of the coaches that if he wants the SEC to continue winning national championships and likes trumpeting the fact that the league has won five in a row, then he’ll see to it that the rules concerning oversigning and grayshirting aren’t completely overhauled.
Imagine what they’re saying in-house to their athletic directors and presidents.
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UPDATE: Oh, to be a fly on the wall for this.
… The SEC’s annual spring meetings will begin Tuesday in Destin, Fla. The regularly scheduled football coaches meeting will start an hour earlier than normal. Slive has a few things he wants to discuss.
As for the example Barnhart gives of Slive making a “pretty forceful case”, everybody in the room at that meeting had the same opinion of Lane Kiffin (except for Junior himself, of course). The commissioner won’t enjoy the same level of agreement this time around.
It’s funny how Nick is so lucky that the players he has to kick off his team for not behaving are never ones who factor in games. Has he kicked an Ealey type off his team yet.
I’m sure he keeps a record so he has his excuse when the time comes, but I got a feeling a starter or backup with a lot of playing time has a good bit more rope.
Dooley is looking at the massive number of freshman and sophomores on his roster and thinking of recruiting in about 2 years.
Here’s the deal, the truth is guys like Dooley, Nutt, Petrino, etc. with their recruiting bases, they need to be able to do it. UTK will get a few more, but by and large they are gonna be lucky to sign half the four and five star players that Bama and UGA sign. That means they’ve got to do a great job of picking the undervalued three star talent or oversign and find ways to get rid of the ones not pulling their weight on Saturdays.
Saban doesn’t need to do this, but he does this anyway to give him a little edge on everyone else.
Yep. Same with the Hat.
For some reason, though, it doesn’t bother me as much that the Hat can do it. I guess it’s because Miles comes across as a lovable sociopath while Saban just seems like a machine set to the “destroy” mode.
Nick picked up the same vibe
Lovable Les
http://www.lostlettermen.com/top-10-les-miles-top-10-kookiest-moments/
versus Nick
http://www.lostlettermen.com/on-campus-nick-saban-in-hot-water-over-comments/
which is especially hard on Nick now that Les is no longer winning with Nick’s players. At least Doyel treats them the same
http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/story/13727507/bad-guys-utilize-oversigning-and-it-has-to-stop
What puzzles me is that oversigning at LSU is even more a case of overkill than it is at ‘Bama. At least Saban has a fierce in-state rivalry to deal with on the recruiting trail.
I wonder if Satan…er…Saban could set up a place for theses kids he kicks off the Bama team to go and play. After all, at one time they were considered to be good enough to warrant a scholly at Bama. OK, so things didn’t pan out for them with the Tide. Go (along with some similarly situated teammates) to the University of North Alabama (a solid D-II program) or Jacksonville State (a good D-IAA program) for example and play immediately. Good for Bama as it opens up a slot. Good for North Alabama or Jacksonville State which would get players that are still pretty good and have been coached up by the Bama staff.
Who will Saban hire as the next AD and/or President if Bama votes to pass the legislation in any form?