re: Tua went 54/58 in December

quote:

---

There also were times last year where Tua didn't look too good. So there was both.

He still should've gotten a chance against Auburn, though.

---

Maybe. But we saw in the national championship exactly why Saban probably didn't want to play Tua unless he absolutely had to. Throws an interception on a freaking running play when every WR was blocking. Another very near interception in the endzone. And not just an ugly sack...what would have been no doubt the worst QB sack in the history of college football. Sure, with Tua there was tremendous upside...which came to fruition. But there was also huge risk. I understand why Saban didn't play him until he literally had no choice.

quote:

---

. But we saw in the national championship exactly why Saban probably didn't want to play Tua unless he absolutely had to. Throws an interception on a freaking running play when every WR was blocking. Another very near interception in the endzone. And not just an ugly sack...what would have been no doubt the worst QB sack in the history of college football. Sure, with Tua there was tremendous upside...which came to fruition. But there was also huge risk. I understand why Saban didn't play him until he literally had no choice.

---

I understand why Saban was waiting, but I think you're exaggerating the risk just a little. Tua threw 77 passes last year, a third as many as Hurts, and he looked pretty solid for the vast majority of them.

quote:

---

2 interceptions the entire year and a touchdown every 7 pass attempts.

---

Pretty sure he is talking about first team reps, in which he had two bad series out of the first three that he was in there.

Don't get me wrong, I think that what Tua did that night was unbelievable and perhaps the most amazing sports scenario I've ever seen, and it clearly paid off. However, to act like Saban made some kind of big folly by hesitating to put in a true freshman during the biggest moments of the season in the biggest games of the season(both essentially away games, mind you) that had nothing but garbage time experience previously is asinine IMO.

quote:

---

2 interceptions the entire year and a touchdown every 7 pass attempts

---

You, and everyone else seems to forget you’re comparing that to a QB with a 17 to 1 TD to interception ratio, who simply didn’t turn the ball over.

I say this as someone who has been watching Tua since the 7 on 7 HS competition and was amazed at how great he was. I understand going with the safer pick at QB last year. The way the Auburn game went I understand not playing him.

Saban has always had a philosophy of don’t beat yourself on offense and win with great defense. It works.

Saban almost certainly knows how this is going to end, there is zero upside to this that I can see by making this public now, and a lot of ways this could go south.

Win the team he keeps saying. Well I can guarantee you someone is doing just that, and they’re not using a message board to do it

I think the problem some have with the way this has gone is Saban takes caution and protecting the football to a fault. By November last year it was clearly evident that we were in the same boat with Jalen as the year before: we would struggle down the stretch because we were playing better teams that could shut down the run. And Jalen can’t throw effectively. So we struggled. Jalen pulled out the State game because their secondary was so bad. Then Auburn beat our arse. Then we beat our mirror image in Clemson in a game that was closer than it should have been because our offense struggled. Then the UGA game. The common thread? No passing game that made us very one dimensional and thus very stoppable. And the answer was on the bench the entire time.
Who knows how that last few games go if Tua plays more. But because we won most of them anyway, it appears that Saban waited too long to get Tua more involved. Maybe he made the best decision. We’ll never know for sure, but our defense has been epic since Saban arrived. Is the risk of an extra turnover or two a game so great that it overrides making the offense an unstoppable juggernaut?
And this stubbornness not only affects individual games but recruiting as well. We lost players because we were too stubborn to play the QB that can utilize all our players, not just a few.
Saban’s record speaks for itself, he’s beyond reproach. But he’s human and he has one or two glaring flaws that raise their ugly heads repeatedly. One is being too loyal to favorite players over more talented players despite his rhetoric about the best player playing regardless. There are caveats to that statement that go unspoken if you notice. The best player plays only when there is an undeniable overwhelming body of evidence that he can’t ignore, especially if the player being benched is a personal favorite of his.
It all worked out in the end, but if you are completely honest, you have to wonder if Tua is inserted for the second half of Mississippi State and plays for the rest of the year, does he settle in and we run the table or what? Maybe the earlier experience allows him to work out the kinks and he doesn’t make the silly mistakes he made against UGA. Maybe Auburn has no answer for our offense and we win in Jordan-Hare. We’ll never know. But it’s pretty clear we played the wrong QB for too long and there were/are repercussions.

quote:

---

I think the problem some have with the way this has gone is Saban takes caution and protecting the football to a fault.

---

Somebody posted a quote from Saban; it was something along the lines of "For every turnover you commit, your chance of losing the game goes up by 25 percent." Whether that's right or not is debatable, but that's apparently one of his core beliefs.

quote:

---

Saban’s record speaks for itself, he’s beyond reproach. But he’s human and he has one or two glaring flaws that raise their ugly heads repeatedly. One is being too loyal to favorite players over more talented players despite his rhetoric about the best player playing regardless.

---

This is baseless rhetoric that I wish fans would stop parroting. It's ridiculous on the face of it.

I think what drives this is a myopic belief among fans that the "best" player is the one who has the highest star ranking, or who looks the "best" in situational game or practice experience. That's the proverbial tip of the iceberg.

Saban is process- and team-driven. Players have to prove they will do the right thing in every situation, every time, before he will trust them to play significant minutes. He preaches work ethic, dedication, doing your job correctly every time without fail, until it becomes second nature. Then, and only then, are you considered a viable option to play.

The man hasn't changed his philosophy on this at all. He's adapted in other ways, which is one of the things that makes him so successful ... but his core beliefs are the same.

And it works. It's been proven to work repeatedly. Why people want to question this, or suggest he change it, is insanity.

quote:

---

While I have lamented Hurts' play for two years, and wanted Tua in there as soon as possible, I don't think Saban really played it wrong. Maybe he could have played Tua toward the end of last season. But, from all accounts, the plan to do so was in the works. I guess the Auburn game is a little baffling. I can understand in games where we were winning, you don't want to throw the true freshman in. Maybe the game was close enough Saban didn't want to pull the trigger. I don't know. But, other than that game, the way Saban played it makes sense to me. I think I would have pulled the trigger sooner, but I can understand his rationale.

---

Get outta here with this common sense

quote:

---

Or how about Tua plays most of every game besides the ones against the small teams? There’s no reason to handicap the offense by having two QBs of which one isn’t the best passer.

---

I like this strategy.

I heard most of the guys didn’t like Ezell and that he was a cut up. You learn something new everyday. Either way Ezell was mired behind more talented players with better ball security. He definitely couldn’t do this.