After calling out Texas A&M for allegedly “buying every player” from their historic recruiting class on Wednesday, Alabama head coach Nick Saban appeared on Sirius XM radio on Thursday to try to clear the air.
“I should have never really singled anybody out. That was a mistake, and I really apologize for that part of it,” Saban said.
“I should have been more specific when I said ‘bought’ in saying you can buy players now through name, image, and likeness and never mentioned any specific school and just said ‘across the sport,'” Saban continued. “That’s on me. But other than that, I don’t have any regrets over what I said Wednesday.”
Saban stood behind his belief that the implementation of Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) rules could ruin college sports.
“It’s gotten completely out of control and not a sustainable model,” Saban said. “It’s to the point where you’ve got these attorneys, agents calling collectives and saying, ‘Pay my player $100,000 a year,’ and then they want their piece of that. They all want a cut.”
Saban made the initial remarks during a speaking event in Birmingham on Wednesday. He also called out Jackson State and Miami for allegedly buying players.
Texas A&M head coach Jimbo Fisher, who coached under Saban from 2000 to 2004, denounced the remarks, calling them “despicable” in a fiery news conference the following morning.
“Some people think they are God,” Fisher said of Saban. “Go dig into how God did his deal and you may find out a lot about a lot of things you don’t want to know. We build him up to be this czar of football; go dig into his past.”
Jackson State head coach Deion Sanders also rebuked Saban’s comments on Thursday, saying a conversation should happen between the two publicly.
“I haven’t talked to Coach Saban,” Sanders told ESPN’s Andscape. “I’m sure he’s tried to call. We need to talk publicly — not privately. What you said was public. That doesn’t require a conversation. Let’s talk publicly and let everybody hear the conversation.”
The allegation Saban lobbed against Sanders’ school was that the HBCU paid $1 million for a player to attend there. That player is assumed to be Travis Hunter, the No.1 ranked prospect in the 2022 recruiting class by 247 Sports. He was initially committed to Florida State before signing on to the 1-AA school Jackson State.
“I don’t make a million,” Sanders said. “Travis [Hunter] ain’t built like that. Travis ain’t chasing a dollar. Travis is chasing greatness. Travis and his family don’t get down like that. They never came to us in search of the bag. This kid wants to be great.”
Hunter took to social media to dispute he was paid $1 million to attend the HBCU.
“I got A mil?” wrote Hunter with a laughing emoji. “But my mom still stay in a 3 bed room house with five kids.”
Saban claimed Thursday that he did not say any of the schools he mentioned Wednesday night did anything illegal.
“I really wasn’t saying that anybody did anything illegal in using name, image, and likeness. I didn’t say that. That was something assumed by what I said. That’s not what I meant nor what I said,” Saban clarified. “There’s nothing illegal about this. It’s the system that allows you to do it, and that’s the issue that I have.”
On Thursday, Southeastern Conference (SEC) Commissioner Greg Sankey reprimanded Saban and Fisher for violating the conference’s “Ethical Conduct” policies.
“The membership of the Southeastern Conference has established expectations for conduct and sportsmanship that were not met last night nor today,” Sankey said. “A hallmark of the SEC is intense competition within an environment of collaboration. Public criticism of any kind does not resolve issues and creates a distraction from seeking solutions for the issues facing college athletics today.”
“There is tremendous frustration concerning the absence of consistent rules from state to state related to name, image, and likeness,” Sankey added. “We need to work together to find solutions, and that will be our focus at the upcoming SEC Spring Meetings.”
