Greeson: SEC mid-day from media days: Alabama embraces spotlight, challenge

Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa speaks to reporters during the NCAA college football Southeastern Conference Media Days, Wednesday, July 17, 2019, in Hoover, Ala. (AP Photo/Butch Dill)
Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa speaks to reporters during the NCAA college football Southeastern Conference Media Days, Wednesday, July 17, 2019, in Hoover, Ala. (AP Photo/Butch Dill)

HOOVER, Ala. - This the unofficial start to college football season, these media events designed for hype and lacking hyperbole.

Heck, even the unofficial king of college football said so.

"This is kind of the psychological kickoff to the new year," Alabama head coach Nick Saban told a packed house at the Wynfrey Hotel here on day three of SEC media days.

"This is about the time - this week - start shaking my leg again I've had just about enough of sitting around and relaxing and now (is when) I get excited about the season."

Saban's controlled version of energy was far surpassed by the masses of Saban worshippers and Alabama diehards that packed the lobby of the joint as earlier as 7 a.m.

There were cheers. There were chants. There was one cat dressed in a crimson jacket that was Bedazzled somewhere between Liberace and Charo.

And that's not including his hat, which was a papier-mâché championship ring. Seriously.

He was not alone, especially for an Alabama bunch that showed up in Hoover in the rare place of knowing the last time they took the field they suffered a four-touchdown loss - the worst in Saban's career with the Tide.

"I was kind of glad I got to experience that loss," Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, "because how much do you really learn from a win."

Well, there's that. And a vision of unfinished business and an air of irritation that comes with someone doing to Alabama what Alabama has been doing to everyone else for more of the last decade.

Said Saban to the packed room of hundreds of media folks: "I think if you're a great competitor and you are in a game like we were for the national championship and you didn't perform very well, and given all much the credit to the other team who beat us and took advantage of the opportunities that they have, not to take anything away from them, but if you're a competitor, you're going to respond in a positive way and learn from the things that you didn't do, whether those things were in preparation, game-day decisions, you know, the habits that you created leading up to the game the second half of the season. All of those things contribute to, are we going to be able to have success against one of the best teams, or the best team, in the country. And we obviously didn't do that. That's my responsibility."

And one we should all expect him to take very seriously this fall especially.

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