The week's most specious and rootless gossip comes to you on Friday, the day for skipping the gym, eating that final office kitchen doughnut (inevitably the plain cake one), and indulging in the least reliable, secondhand anecdotery
--A great rumored story emanating from Nick Saban's first 100 days in Alabama. Saban was touring the facilities with Mal Moore. The two enter the Crimson Tide's palatial weight room, complete with televisions along the wall and a squad of weight room attendants. Saban tells Moore these is the nicest weight room he's ever seen, and then asks if there's a 24-hour attendant on duty. Moore says there is; Saban asks for him.
Saban then spoke with the attendant.
Saban: "Hi, I'm Nick Saban, the new football coach here. Nice to meet you."
Attendant: "Hi, I'm (weight room attendant guy we'll call Cletus for no particular reason.) "
Saban: "You see those tvs along the wall?"
Attendant Cletus: "Yes, sir?"
Saban: "I want those turned off at 7 a.m. sharp every day. This is a weight room. It's a place to work, not to watch Days of Our Lives."
Drink deep the aroma of Alabama fans oozing hormones at the notion that their coach is a badass disciplinarian. It's pungent, with a cigarette and High Karate edge, no?
--Jim Tressel did not fly back with the team after the national championship game--which they lost 41-14. Just a reminder. Tressel instead flew to Colorado Springs on America West. The visit was likely not recruiting-related as the timing coincides with a dead period in recruiting. We're guessing Tressel was consulting NORAD to properly identify the WMD that exploded his offensive line on Monday night.
USA Today and their trademark colored headers must be wholesome, though we imagine Tressel's tsk-tsking the articles about the game and muttering "that's COACH Jim Tressel to you, numbnuts."
This kind of coach-stalking will eventually culminate in the Lojacking of coaches with ankle bracelets. It's only a matter of time, really.
