Many of y’all know that I live in the beautiful state of Alabama, a place where people revere God, country, family, and college football. Not necessarily in that order.
And while you may not know that The University of Alabama fired their head football coach (bless his heart – he’s cute as a button) back in November, please allow me to give you a little glimpse into what the news headlines have looked like around here for the last six weeks:
Shula Fired
Spurrier to ‘Bama?
Rodriguez to ‘Bama?
Saban to ‘Bama?
Saban Says “No” to ‘Bama
Saban May Not Have Meant “No” When He Said “No”
‘Bama Still Wants Saban
Saban Needs More Time To Decide
Saban Wore A Blue Shirt Today
We Hear That Tomorrow Saban Will Wear A Yellow Shirt
Rest Assured That If Saban Wears A Purple Shirt We’ll Report It Immediately
Saban was supposed to make an Official Announcement about whether or not he would take the job by 9 this morning, and OH MY WORD I’ve never seen such news coverage. The Birmingham TV stations interrupted regular programming a little before nine to cover the Saban Saga. The station I was watching had reporters on the story in Tuscaloosa, with one reporter stationed outside the athletic department offices and another reporter live on the runway at the airport just in case Saban flew into town. They also had reporters in Miami, where Saban has been employed for a couple of years as the head coach of the Dolphins.
But an unfortunate thing happened. Saban didn’t make an announcement at 9. Or 9:10. Or 9:20, even. Reporters were scrambling like crazy to fill up the empty minutes. At one point I thought they’d just give up altogether and start doing each other’s hair, maybe giving their viewers some instruction on how to create a nice French braid or a chignon.
But after forty-five minutes of awkward, painful, cringe-inducing television (seriously, I wanted to call in and say, “Okay, people, you need a topic. I think I can help. Would you rather eat a gallon of hair ice cream or slide down a razor blade into a pool of rubbing alcohol? Discuss.”), the newspeople finally got a break when the Dolphins owner announced that Saban is leaving Miami and will in fact be the new head coach at ‘Bama.
I THINK WE CAN ALL REST A LITTLE EASIER NOW.
And we have even more live coverage coming up this afternoon (y’all think I’m kidding. I’m so not kidding. I couldn’t be kidding any less, in fact) because Saban is supposed to arrive at the Tuscaloosa airport around 4 or 5.
I’ll be sure to liveblog the whole event for y’all. I know you’ll be waiting on pins and needles.
And seriously, I bet you a dollar to a donut that there will be hoardes of fans waiting for Saban at the airport.
Maybe that nice reporter man who’s been standing on the runway all day will finally have something to do.
Yah – for BooMama to tout our state’s great breaking news.
My mama has called me every 30 minutes with updates and my husband had to be where he could see the tv when we met for lunch.
I do this weekly article called Wednesday’s Woman and my daddy has already told me he thinks it should be Terry Saban, the wife of Nick Saban. I’m still mulling that one over since I haven’t published my Wednesday’s Woman yet.
As a diehard Arkansas fan – I can tell you the talk as been almost as much here. We are none too happy that he will be bama’s coach.
I love how college football is more earth shattering to the people in the south than any world news.
I am laughing out loud, because after Kelly’s comments above, I clicked over to Hogwired.com to see what Arkansas fans were saying about Saban, and (speaking of ridiculous sports headlines) THIS was the headline that greeted me:
Hogs Wake Up for Early Practice
I am so glad to know that they don’t practice in their sleep.
My daughter just started school in Tuscaloosa this fall, coming from a MS college and she said people are wildly serious for football there! She’s still in MS for Christmas break but her roommate text messaged her this morning to wake her up & tell her they had a new coach! That town will be CRAZY!
They were crazy to chew up & spit out Shula, one of their own; what will they do to this guy if he doesn’t produce. We heard they offered an obnoxious amount of money.
ROFL! I so relate. The news was much the same when Bob Stoops came to town some years ago. :)
ROLLLLLLL TIDE! :)
I’m not a bama fan but we have friends who are SERIOUS fans. They drive from NC to make every single home game. Wow.
I’m a Dukie myself.
I spent this crucial time in history switching back between Miami news (local for me), AL news and ESPN (who by the way were WAY behind the hoopla). My husband was in a meeting and could not get to his computer. Last night he said he was having trouble falling asleep b/c he wanted to know Saban’s decision. ROLL TIDE!
Not a Bama or even SEC fan myself, although I’m from the great state of MS. We can afford to sit back and laugh at all of this. Our football coach has been with us for nearly two decades and we want him to stay. He’s happy, we’re happy and thankfully we don’t have this three-ring circus to deal with. I’m soooo glad they aren’t interrupting our TV here to cover the what-if’s and maybe’s! :)
Great post…. we love football around here!
Roll Tide!!!
Up here in Huntsvegas they only interupted The View for like 5 minutes so I was quite happy. Hubby, however, was glued to ESPN all morning awaiting the news.
And to think, I have been so busy being a Mama today I missed the whole darn thing. (I am a Bama Grad and everything!)
****ROLL TIDE****
My family is all HUGE Bama fans – except my mamaw who is the ultimate U of TN fan — but we still invite her over ;)
Blessings,
Karla
Well, whaddya know? I found you a little bit back through Rocks in my Dryer, I think (or maybe In the Midst of It…either way somehow it all started from Daring Young Mom!) I love reading your blog and loved even more that you were from the South. But heavens to betsey, girl! Alabama?! I am so at home now and I think you just moved up on my favorites list a few notches :) Roll Tide & prayin’ for a banner season! I totally missed the whole thing to, even though I called myself turing on the noon news ;) Glad I have you to fill me in!
Ahem…I shall now apologize for missing my typos, too ;)
God Bless Him.
He’ll earn every red cent of that $$$$$$$ contract. :)
And, he got a SWEET signing deal, sounds like to me. I am SO in the wrong business!
I hate news reports waiting for an event — you get to see how unbelievably inane some of those folks are!
I just found your blog yesterday and I absolutely LOVE it! I laughed until I cried when I read the Fish Camp story! I knew that I had to comment, though, when I saw this post… We are HUGE South Carolina Gamecock fans! (And very happy that Spurrier decided not to go to Bama!) Congrats on the new coach!
That’s sooo funny. I’m not surprised one bit they did that. We’re big Bama fans, but not like crazy. :) We’re living in Colorado right now, and it’s odd not hearing soo much here. We have to get any news like that on ESPN or Roll Tide website, or the CNN channel. (Here, everyone can’t quit talking about how Florida should not have gone to the Bowl Game and USC should have-or Michigan one…)
Oh well…
Joke told to me by a friend:
Where will Alabama find a head coach?????
Answer: Build-A-Bear
Get it? Bear…as in Bear Bryant. haha… :)
Well, anyways, since this is my first comment, I just love your blog. It’s great! :)
Sonja
P.S. What a great idea about the Tour of Homes for Christmas! :) I hope you’ll do that again, and I definitely will join for this year’s tour. It was great!
Hopefullly, all ‘Bama fans will sleep well tonight. I love your play by play descriptions of the news reporters in your area. That was a hoot! I thought ours (Cincinnati area) were the only ones like that. Since I’ve only been reading your blog for about 10 days now, I had been trying to guess if you were from AL, MS, or TN. AL’s great! Only a true Alabama native could have given such an accurate account of such earth-shattering news today. I LOVED IT!
P.S. I’ll be rooting for the OSU Buckeyes next week. GO BUCKS!!!
Im still ticked that they fired Shula! He won 11 games last year for christ sake. Though I will say the guys on ESPNews had it right at 9:30, might have saved some time.
I have a couple of thoughts really.
The first being that my beloved Texas A&M ultimately did Alabama the biggest favor ever by taking Fran off their hands, so that they can now pay Saban a gazillion dollars and probably actually win a national championship, as opposed to paying a coach a gazillion dollars to get completely embarrassed in a bowl game on national television.
The second thought is that when I saw Saban walking on the tarmac in Tuscaloosa, nothing gave me greater joy than hearing an obvious local saying “Whattya think coach, you gone get us a national championsheep?”
This whole thing cracked me up. Yes, because it IS hilarious that they interrupt live TV and go to the tarmac for this story, but it’s really funny because of YOU. That discussion topic (hair ice cream vs. razor blade slide) had me howling. Hearing me laugh, my 14-year-old son (quarterback of his team this year, I might add–sorry, proud Mama here) came in. This is my child who says he wants to be a college football coach when he grows up (for the Texas Longhorns, of course.) He reads your post and said, “Yeah, and the contract is $32 million for 8 years.” And that is when I told him that I wholeheartedly support his future career choice. : )
Anyway, is that really the contract??? Oh my word…..
Razor blade, definitely. While the rubbing alcohol will hurt like a mother, it will actually aid in clearing the wound out, and after a few hours, will probably start hurting. Hair ice cream? Would have to be digested. Enough said.
Erm, I meant “stop hurting.” Oi.
My DH is THE BIGGEST Dolphins fan- EVER!
So, right now he’s enjoying the Saban-bashing by the Miami media. I feel a bit sorry for the aging Dolphin players like Zach Thomas who really wanted to win a championship before retiring. Oh, well!
I bet Saban will be high-tailing it to Alabama today in fear of losing his life in Miami-seriously.
Sort of an unrelated topic. We were watching the LSU & Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl last night. The commentators mentioned that one of the LSU players was one of the biggest babies ever born. I can’t remember his name, but his birthweight was 15 lbs, 14 oz!!!! I have 2 boys that were born at 7lbs, 12 oz, and one at 7 lbs 5 oz. I cringe when some of my friends delivered 9-10 babies, but that’s almost 16 pounds. That’s like giving birth to a 3 month old. All that said, I really hope that mama had a c-section…..
And Roll Tide!
Exciting news for ‘Bama fans. We have recently hired a new coach at UNT too. He is a local HS superhero football coach and the excitement is over the top. I love football, especially college football.
Oh, don’t misunderstand, my friends. BooMama is a true Southern girl and is, indeed, a resident of the great state of Alabama, as am I. And while she is quite smitten with this wonderful state and its people, let there be NO misunderstanding…she is a native of the Magnolia State of Mississippi and a Mississippi State Bulldog NOW and FOREVER!
:)
I’m a huge fan of SEC football and have followed this story from a rivalry point of view. (War Eagle!) I must say that I have enjoyed seeing Bama turned down by so many coaches, but it is only because they’ve been through so many in the last decade that no one wants the job. Alabama has an incredible football reputation. The press certainly loves them and they always recruit well, no matter what their record is. I think Saban is a good coach and should be able to turn the program around (much to my chagrin). If he doesn’t deliver, I hate to think of them buying out that $4million per year contract.
RRRRRROOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLLLL TIDE, ROLL!
That is one of reasons why I am thankful not to live in AL anymore. I went to being surrounded by obsessive AL fans to obsessive OSU fans. I love SEC football (Go State and War Eagle), and miss getting to watch it us here in Ohio. You are so right on the news media down there. My DH loves reading the boards of the annoying fans from Tuscalooser.
I love the Build-A-Bear joke! No one will EVER replace him and Bama just keeps trying. It’s kinda sad really.
War Eagle!
I am also from the great state of Alabama & that has been in the news all this AM. As you might have guessed, I really don’t think they are talking about this enough. They shouldn’t even interrupt that show I was watching, they should just cancel it all together & have live coverage until football season begins. That way we don’t miss ONE thing!! Not one EXCITING moment!!
Yes, Daph…I second that emotion. Thanks for making it clear that BooMama is a Magnolia born and bred Mississippi State Bulldog. Hail State! :)
We watched this in our home as well. My husband’s biggest reaction was, “Well the SEC just got a little harder.” We of course are UGA fans (that’s the University of Georgia, btw) It’ll be interesting to see what happens. Then to the NFL, Atlanta Falcons just let go of their head coach on Sunday. So, who will we get there???
Having lived in Alabama and with a lot of my family still there, I completely get it. You should see it up here when Notre Dame is changing coaches.
I live in TX, where football is like salt, a staple food on everyone’s dining table. I can wholeheartedly agree with your take of wasted “breaking news” all in the name of football. I mean, aren’t there any greater concerns that they could discuss?!
Wow, I don’t think you should apologize for football posts (which you know I will always wholeheartedly support) given the number of comments this one has generated.
I’ll take a football post anyday. I might be able to contribute something, where as crafty, decorating posts makes me break out in hives!
And Saban would be a fool to pass up that money. He even got a signing bonus! Unheard of for coaches.
And Shula didn’t loose to much. ‘Bama had to buy out his contract. The man could do nothing for 50 years and still have money to sleep on.
Us Southern girls love us some football! First conversation at church every Sunday is the discussion of Saturday’s games. Thanks so much for keeping me laughing.
Here is where I insert my love of the Rebels of Ole Miss isnt it? :)