Team Building Alabama Style

[Yellowhammer]

I hadn't realized how lowly rated our star players were coming out of high school.

Recruiting at The University of Alabama is going through a metamorphosis.

Recruiting services have said Alabama closed top 5 finishes for the past 3 years.

Recruiting services award stars for speed, size, and highlight films. In person coaching evaluations introduce the person behind the stars and beneath the pads. The coaches meet the families. From these interactions the nature of a player’s character can be discerned. It is the players chosen that reveal what a coach is looking for.

Nick Saban is recruiting young men. He’s developing young men. He’s producing young men. Disciplined. Comitted. Tough.

Alabama is changing the type of player we recruit. No longer are we recruiting for dire need. We are now more selective. We are now settling in. We are now picking based on very stringent criteria. We don’t have to put up with nonsense. We don’t have to sign players that aren’t ready. That aren’t mature enough just yet.

A lot of these highly ranked players are the super studs. The stars. Everyone talking about how great they are. Fans, coaches, and recruiting reporters all fawning over them and hanging on to every word they have to say. Relentless attention. The more immature of the bunch take advantage of the spotlight to bring attention upon themselves.

Signing day press conference. TV cameras, family, fans in attendance. Several hats on the table. Live announcement of their decisions.

All “me”.

I think you’re going to see less and less signing day drama and hat swapping nonsense from players being recruited to the Capstone. I think you’re going to see more and more players finishing high school early and getting on campus in January. These are the players that are serious about their futures. To finish early shows maturity beyond your years. Take care of business. Focus. Discipline. Commitment.

Sound familiar?

Alabama had 7 high school players finish school early and enroll at the Capstone in January. Several of Alabama ’s biggest recruits are among this group. While the more immature players are mugging for the camera, soaking in the attention and focusing on me, these young men are on campus. And they’re working. Hard.

Sims is in the film room learning everything he can. Milliner is in the 4th quarter program getting in even better shape. 5 others are right there with them.

These players already enrolled and all other Tide players that commited before signing day and stayed committed have shown themselves to have signs of being mature. Of having competitive character that doesn't require "me" attention. They also don't follow the others who so choose.

These are the types of players that don't give up when things get tough. They don't get down on themselves and compound one problem by letting it cause another. They face adversity with tenacity, poise, and precise execution. These are the type of players that Saban is picking through the unrelenting recruiting service hype machines to find.

Other schools are appealing directly to the immature instincts of the super stud players in a desperate attempt to earn their signature on signing day. A lot of these players may buy into the hype and emotion being sold by these recruiting tactics. They are brought on campus as stars, treated as stars, and leave as stars yet never once did the stars fall into a cohesive, focused, disciplined, committed, tough team. They play down to their competition. They may even lose to far inferior teams. The media won't be able to explain it. They'll say upset. I think it all started with the type of players recruited and the way they were recruited.

Stars fall apart. Teams grow stronger. More resilient. Maturity is one of the foundations of team.

A recent example: a lot of talk is wasted by the media on Alabama “letting” Keenan Allen get away. If you were to get into the heads of the Tide brain trust you might see more focus on the “get away” part. As in, cut ties with questionable scenario and bring in someone a little more stable.

Allen chose to follow his brother and his posse, or Yelverton’s posse, to the west coast. All I will say about that is best of luck to him in all his future endeavors. California is a great school academically and athletically. I can’t say anything but good things about playing for and earning a college degree from the University of California-Berkley.

And that’s the end of any thoughts I spend on that subject. The only things we’re worried about are the players that chose to sign with The University of Alabama. Those are the stars we will be pulling for in every way.

Stars don’t mean anything, anyways.

For example, take a look back at the recruiting rankings for the most recent senior classes. These are the 2006 and 2007 recruiting classes. Auburn had the 9th and 6th ranked recruiting classes in the nation. Back-to-back top 10 recruiting rankings. Alabama was ranked 22nd and 18th.

Auburn suffered a losing season, fired their coach, hired a coach with a career losing record, and was ecstatic with a win over Northwestern in their bowl game.

Those two classes for The University of Alabama provide the upperclassmen for a team that hasn’t lost a home game in 2 consecutive seasons. 26-2 overall record. 17-1 SEC record. Heisman. Butkus. Outland. 12 First Team All-SEC. 10 First Team All-Americans. SEC champions. National champions.

Why?

Stars get attention. Teams win. Great teams win championships.

Truly great teams shine their brightest when the cameras are off. No signing day, national audience, hat swapping ceremonies. No press conferences.

Teams are built in the hearts and minds of the players. Hardened in the weight room. Perfected on the practice field. And unleashed in the fall.

Nobody does this better than Nick Saban.

Some can point to Alabama ’s #1 recruiting class in 2008 and 2009 and say that’s why Alabama is as successful as we are. But the true Alabama fans know that the greatest bulk of those recruits are yet to see the field.

You hear that? Saban hasn’t unleashed that talent yet! We beat a whole lot of teams that have a whole lot more talent than we do simply because Saban is better and building a team, a true, committed team, than our opponents were. And he did so with 1 arm behind his back.

For example, Alabama had a record 6 first team All-Americans selected by the AP this year. Of the 6 All-Americans on Alabama ’s team this year none of them were rated as 5 star players.

Not one.

In fact, most of the players that earned All-American honors were ranked as 3-star players or less by Scout.com coming out of high school.

Think about this…of the 22 starters on offense and defense in the National Championship game 16 of them were 3 stars or less coming out of high school. Alabama only has two 5 star players that start: Julio Jones and Mark Barron.

Nick Saban led Alabama to a National Championship with 3 star or less players leading the way.

Stars are meaningless to Saban. He’s looking for intensity. He’s looking for heart. He’s looking for toughness. He’s looking for competitive character. None of which are measured on any recruiting ranking.

The greatest example can easily be summed up by the final big play of the BCS National Championship. Texas , who has been atop the recruiting rankings for years, is loaded with top shelf talent from top to bottom of their roster. Yet it was a player from the state of Texas , an unranked, unrecruited, 1-star nobody, that came blazing in from the quarterback’s blind side and rocked the quarterback’s world, knocking the ball loose for Courtney Upshaw to recover on the 2 yard line.

Eryk Anders broke the game open. He’s made plays for the Tide all season long. He’s laid shots on just about every quarterback we’ve played all season long. He’s been relentless, quick, constant pressure on all opposing teams.

Apparently, he forgot he was supposed to be a 1 star nobody according to the recruiting rankings. Maybe, he didn’t know better. Maybe, Saban made sure Eryk Anders only thought about getting better every minute of every hour of every day.

Maybe, Saban and his Alabama coaching staff is better at developing players than Scout.com is at ranking them.

Not maybe. Definitely.

Now imagine what Saban can do with the ones everyone else is drooling over…

For those of you that believe in stars consider this: Next year, there could be as many as four 5 star players added to the starting lineup. Nico Johnson, Dre Kirkpatrick, DJ Fluker, and Tyler Love. Trent Richardson doesn’t start but will get his share of the carries. Just about everyone else will be 4 star or better.

While a lot of other schools like to talk about Alabama , Nick Saban only thinks about doing everything he can to make sure every player on his team gets better every day. He doesn’t talk about what anyone else is doing…because he doesn’t think about what anyone else is doing…because he doesn’t care what anyone else is doing. He’s busy working his hardest to instill the mentality into his team that we’re going to dominate anyone who steps in front of us. Every rep. Every sprint. Every practice. Every play. Every down. Every minute. Every game. Every season.

Relentless competitive character. “Make their ass quit!” Dominate.

When Nick Saban brings in a 5-star player he puts those players to work. Trent Richardson running down the field on kickoff coverage. Julio Jones blocking his backside off for Mark and Trent. Everyone developing, learning, growing until they are ready to execute to the highest of their abilities. Every one becomes only one: the team...

Teams that win have players that get recognized for their individual achievements as a part of that team.

A lot of people are saying the 2009 squad could be one of the best Alabama football teams ever.

I say, the best Alabama football team ever may be patiently waiting, maturing, ripening as we speak right now on campus at the Capstone. They may be preparing to introduce themselves starting this fall in front of the largest home crowd ever to watch a University of Alabama football game.

Nick Saban agrees. According to Saban, “This is not the end. This is the beginning.”

Or, in other words, “You ain’t seen nothing yet!”

Roll Tide!

[BigBamaFan]

Bama will be more talented next year and the near future than at any point in Coach Saban's time at Alabama.

[Finnian]

The tide sure does seem to be getting progressively better.

They're playing better, and keep recruiting very well - they should be competing at a very high level for the next few years.

[1badnole]

Bama has it rolling right now. Player development is key and that Bama train is at full steam ahead.
Its made me wonder about how Jimbo will approach the HC position. He's a Saban disciple and uses alot of the same ideas. To early to tell but the dude has a plan and he got it from Saban. We'll see...

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sport...,7902073.story

[CTGator]

Nice write up Yellow. I'm happy the Gators have 11 players enrolled early.

[Finnian]

Does anyone buy the idea that there is going to be an even bigger gap between the top tier SEC teams and those below it.

Perhaps, LSU/Alabama, UGA/FLA being even further up the line and less reachable by the remainder of the conference?