Tight race for second place

Nick Saban said yesterday that he thinks “there’s a lot of parity in our league”.

If he doesn’t include Alabama, he’s right.

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Friday morning buffet

Indulge yourself.

• Kirby Smart is “hoping and praying” the two players from the 2017 signing class not yet on campus are able to enroll.
• There are how many new coordinators in the SEC this season?
• Penn State and its former defensive coordinator Bob Shoop (now at Tennessee) are suing each other.  Play nice, fellas.
• Here’s a list of the ten teams that Phil Steele says will enjoy the biggest drop in schedule strength from 2016 to 2017.  (I’m not sure I’d argue Ole Miss is getting that big a drop from last year’s Georgia team to this year’s Kentucky team, though.)
• There’s more than one way to skin a cat, offensively speaking.
• Jeez, I hate this question.
• Dawg fans, if you’re looking for some nice UGA-themed photo work, take a peek here.

“… year in and year out, it’s still Saban and Meyer versus the field.”

This year’s Georgia class is certainly something worth getting excited about, but when you read this David Wunderlich piece comparing the talent of Alabama, FSU and Ohio State, you realize Kirby Smart still has a long way to go.

I mean, this is friggin’ impressive/depressing, depending on your point of view.

Looking more at the top end, I counted how many players each team had rated at 0.9400 and above. That will tell me how many players the programs have in the 5-star and top half of the 4-star range. Alabama wins, of course, with 45 such guys — more than half of its 84 scholarship players. Ohio State has 35, and Florida State has 28. These truly are three of the most talented teams in the country, yet Alabama outpaces the other two with startling ease in some ways.  [Emphasis added.]

This goes to show how much Saban and Urban Meyer are sitting on top of the game right now. Florida State is a consensus College Football Playoff contender and the expected champion of what was arguably the game’s best conference last year. It has a roster that nearly every other FBS program would gladly trade for its own. Yet Alabama and Ohio State have noticeable talent advantages over it.

When you recall what David had to say about Georgia’s roster, in comparison, it’s hard to avoid the depressing option.  You could make the argument that Alabama’s second team is talented enough on its own to make a run to win the SEC East.

Kirby’s got to keep grinding, that’s all.

It’s Nick Saban’s world, and he’s just living in it.

How’s this for a stat?

Fun fact: Alabama vs. Georgia would be the fourth straight SEC Championship Game in which Saban has faced either a former assistant or a former college teammate (see Gary Pinkel) for the conference title.

He’s the Kevin Bacon of SEC football.

Vanquished

Nick Saban is only SEC head coach still with same job after 10 years.

After his retirement, I wonder if we’ll ever see that again.

The SEC — it just means too much.

You know, for a conference that prides itself on being tougher than all the others, there sure is a lot of sanctimonious whining about playing Alabama going on lately.

I guess it’s easier to complain about playing Nick Saban than to advocate a nine-game conference schedule.

If you can’t beat him, change the rules?

al.com argues this year’s SEC spring meetings were All About Saban.

The SEC spring meetings have started to feel like an annual conference at the beach where coaches talk about how to keep Alabama from killing everyone on the football field. What rules can be put in place to cap Alabama’s spending? How can schedules be tweaked to make life easier for everyone else?

Nick Saban is in favor of fewer rules. Others want more rules. For example, the latest rule that discourages SEC football teams from hiring a high school coach as a support staffer. If a team hires a high school coach, then that team can’t recruit that high school for two years.

The rule sounds very well intentioned, of course. SEC teams with tons of money shouldn’t be able to hire a high school coach just to land a prospect from that coaches team. In reality, it sounds like just another rule to keep Alabama in check.

It’s a nice theory, except for one thing.  That’s a NCAA rule.