It’s no secret that the QB is the general of the offense. Even in situations where the running game is the main priority, the man calling the plays has to be competent and confident enough to lead the other 10 men.
Nick Saban doesn’t currently see that in his QB’s at Alabama, and that’s beginning to sound like his main frustration. Via the Sporting News,
“Somebody’s gotta make it happen. I can’t make it happen,” Saban told reporters. “As bad as I’d like to make it happen, I can’t make it happen… If it doesn’t get decided, like it didn’t when AJ (McCarron) and Phillip Sims were here, they both played a quarter, a quarter, a quarter, a quarter in the first game, and that’s how we figured it out.
So, do I want it to happen that way? No. But I can’t make this happen, as bad as everybody wants it to happen, and they want to create this great hope. ‘Coach said this guy is the man.’ I can’t make it happen.”
The coach continued to elaborate:
“The way I see it happening is, as soon as we start gaining a little bit of confidence in a guy and we put him in the situation where you’ve got a chance to be the guy, they have to take advantage of that,” Saban said, via coachingsearch.com. “They have to take the ball and run with it. We’ve seen that a couple times, and it’s a little bit like, ‘Giddy-up, whoa.’ I’m just waiting for somebody, when they break out and have a couple good days, and say, ‘I’m going to do this.’ You’ve got to win the team, and I see guys starting to win the team, and then something happens. That’s gotta happen.”The Crimson Tide will open the season on Sept. 5 against Wisconsin at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Saban hopes one of his team’s five quarterbacks – senior Jacob Coker, freshmen Blake Barnett and David Cornwell, junior Alec Morris and sophomore Cooper Bateman – will “take the bull by the horns.”
Obviously this is a serious problem for the Tide if Saban is going off like this to the media. The QB’s and their coaches better get their things in gear before the season opener.
Nick Saban and Alabama only accept the best.