The Only Guy That Nick Saban Helped While In Miami

For the most part, Nick Saban was not a good coach for the Miami Dolphins. He never got the offense headed in the right direction, and there were questionable personnel moves that took place under his watch. One of the most questionable being the pickup of defensive tackle Manuel Wright during the NFL's Supplemental Draft in 2005.

Wright received All-Pac-10 Honorable Mention honors during his sophomore season at USC, and probably could have matured into a talented DT. However, he was ruled academically ineligible for the '05 season, and decided to leave college early. Wright showed that he had some skills during his stint at USC, but he probably wasn't worth the Dolphins spending a 5th round pick in the '06 NFL Draft on him. However, that wouldn't be the oddest occurence involving Wright and the Dolphins.



On July 26, 2005, after being berated by Coach Saban, Wright was filmed walking off the practice field crying. The video instantly made the rounds on network TV and the Internet. It further cemented Saban's legacy as a no bullshit type of coach, and cast Wright as a whining rookie who wasn't ready for the NFL. He lasted the season with the Dolphins, but missed numerous training camp workouts while battling depression and asking the team to trade or release him. He went on to miss the entire 2006 season, and eventhough he said he wanted another shot with Miami after Saban's departure he had already decided his fate with his past actions. However, getting out of Miami was probably the best thing that ever happened to him.

The Dolphins released Wright in May of '07, and the Bills claimed him. Though, they only kept him for a week. He went on to be signed by the Giants, where he's played in six games and is headed to the Super Bowl. Yes, that's right. Manuel Wright has gone from crying on the practice field to playing in the biggest NFL game there is.

Honestly, without the Dolphins drafting him in the Supplemental Draft, or Nick Saban subjecting him to a very public verbal asskicking I doubt that he would have ended up in New York. So thank Nick Saban for where you are today Manuel Wright. The rest of us Miami fans are still cursing his name.

Nick Saban: Open Mouth, Insert Foot

You may recall that back when he was first hired, Nick Saban came under fire for using a slang term that many consider derogatory towards Cajuns. Well, at this week's press conference he was at it again.

Sure, when you're the highest paid Division 1 football coach, coaching a storied program like Alabama, and you lose to one of the lowest paid coaches at a school like UL Monroe(whom your predecessor beat the previous season 41-7) you're going to be pretty pissed off. However, at some point either your brain has to catch up with your mouth, or your mouth has to become so full of feet that you just stop talking.



And for those you that don't want to, or can't, watch the video here's what 'ole Dick Satan said:

"Changes in history usually occur after some kind of catastrophic event,'' Saban said during the opening remarks of his weekly news conference. "It may be 9-11, which sort of changed the spirit of America relative to catastrophic events. Pearl Harbor kind of got us ready for World War II, or whatever, and that was a catastrophic event.''

Ouch.

Of course a "football spokesman" issued a statement saying "what Coach Saban said did not correlate losing a football game with tragedy; everyone needs to understand that. He was not equating losing football games to those catastrophic events." But the damage has already been done. You would think that with $4 million per year Saban could hire someone to write his press conference speeches for him.

Joe Scarborough Educates Us On SEC Football

Most of you probably know Joe Scarborough as the host of "Scarborough Country" on MSNBC. He's also taken over the fomer Don Imus morning timeslot with his new show "Morning Joe", and this morning he gave us all a little schooling on SEC football(if someone has the video please send me the link).

Apparently, an irate viewer had sent in an angry e-mail regarding something that had been said on the show about Germans "getting over the war". I'm not exactly sure what his point of contention was, but it's important to note that Scarborough believed that, for the most part, Germans had "gotten over the war". Then he said something to the effect of:

Do you know what the difference between Germans and Southerners is? Germans have gotten over their war. There's still a large percentage of Southerners that haven't gotten over the outcome of the Civil War, and that's why SEC football is so powerful. We(Southerners) pour everything into SEC football. Those Yankees aren't as passionate as we are. Bring Syracuse down into The Swamp and we'll whip them every time. You'll see it again this year, especially now that my man(Nick Saban) is back. Ah, I can't wait for SEC football to start back up, we should have a countdown clock for the beginning of the SEC season.

Wow. Obviously that's paraphrasing a bit, but you get the idea. Scarborough does have a pretty good idea of SEC football, as he received his bachelor's degree from the University of Alabama and his law degree from the University of Florida. However, I would like to think that it's because of the athletes, facilities, training methods and coaching. Not because we wish that the outcome of the Civil War would have been different so that we could show up on Saturdays waving our Confederate flags. Ole Miss even had to go as far as to enact a Confederate flag ban, and the last title they won was an SEC one in 1963. Though, with any luck the Orgeron will return them to prominence, so that we can see him and Scarborough discuss SEC football. Now that would be powerful.