Hypothetical poll: how long would it take Saban to win a championship here?

[jackets55]

Saban will only win with superior athletes to everyone elses. His gift is recruiting and average coaching, if you review his career. When the players are even, he has a 50/50 shot of winning. Since he would never have the advantage he does now with top athletes 3 deep, it would never happen. However, your question does not have that option, so I assume you think it would be inevitable.

 

[AlabamaBuzz]

Saban will only win with superior athletes to everyone elses. His gift is recruiting and average coaching, if you review his career. When the players are even, he has a 50/50 shot of winning. Since he would never have the advantage he does now with top athletes 3 deep, it would never happen. However, your question does not have that option, so I assume you think it would be inevitable.

Agreed. Saban knows this about himself as well, as he told Mal Moore this exact thing on the plane to Tuscaloosa.

 

[Lee]

I saw this and thought it was a good question



Jump in y’all

An interesting follow up is how long would it take Collins to win a NC at GT with the resources Saban has at Alabama?

One thing Collins can do is sell. You give him an unlimited budget to hire the best coaches on both sides of the ball and all he has to do is sell the program and recruit. That sounds good to me. I think we’d get a lot less fluff from him too.

 

[LibertyTurns]

2-5 because it would take him a while to get more money people to become donors and work them into funding tech like a factory. Lean more on the 2 year side.

It would take him about 30 secs to line up donors. He’d need 3-4 cellphones just to keep up. Getting a staff to come here might take a year, 2 additional years to round it out. Our recruiting would jump about 10-15 spots immediately. We might not like some of his techniques, but after about 6-7 games even the most inflexible GT fans would be clamoring for more processing. Years 1 & 2 we finish Top 25, Year 3 we’re Top 10, Year 4 we’re sniffing the playoffs. Year 5 we’re in & either win it or God forbid have to wait for Year 6.

As far as attendance goes, he’s worth about 20k extra per game, somewhere around $6M overall in increased ticket sales Year 1 and by Year 5 it’s probably closer to $18M. He’d be worth every penny.

 

[RamblinRed]

I think fans are overrating his ability to win here given the constraints.
In 5 years at Michigan St he went 34-24-1 and finished 5th or worse four out of 5 seasons.
Michigan St is a better job than GT,

I think it is 15+ years if he is able to do it at all.
GT lacks the alumni size, the state fanbase, and its student body does not match the college football fanbase on a national level. He also starts in a huge hole in terms of money, facilities and talent compared to LSU and AL - who largely get to pick their players.

He's won at the best college football program in the nation and one of the other blue bloods. GT is not a blue blood and will never be one. I think he could eventually win one here if he is here long enough, but I don't think GT would win consistently against the blue blood programs even with Saban.

 

[augustabuzz]

I don't know how long it took him to do it at Alabama, but I would say:
<Time it took at Alabama> + 5 years

Minimum

The whiners would never give him that long.

 

[augustabuzz]

An interesting follow up is how long would it take Collins to win a NC at GT with the resources Saban has at Alabama?

One thing Collins can do is sell. You give him an unlimited budget to hire the best coaches on both sides of the ball and all he has to do is sell the program and recruit. That sounds good to me. I think we’d get a lot less fluff from him too.

That's the reason Saban hired him in 2007. He stated that anyone who can recruit that talent to Ga. Tech. is the one he wants in charge of recruiting.

 

[4shotB]

I think fans are overrating his ability to win here given the constraints.
In 5 years at Michigan St he went 34-24-1 and finished 5th or worse four out of 5 seasons.
Michigan St is a better job than GT,



He's won at the best college football program in the nation and one of the other blue bloods. GT is not a blue blood and will never be one. I think he could eventually win one here if he is here long enough, but I don't think GT would win consistently against the blue blood programs even with Saban.

Michigan State is not in the center of the South, which is the most fertile recruiting region. Plus, to the young people of today, his time there was ancient history. They want to go pro (the type that he/Bama recruits) and he has that track record. Plus, he would compete in the ACC Coastal. GT would become the old FSU or the recent Clemson of this league in my mind.

 

[Vespidae]

Do you think Coach Collins could borrow this strategy? What if he asked his players and coaches to coach and play like a top 10 team? Would this work at this level?

I do think you can challenge players to think differently. I play a lot of golf. My game is decent enough, but I don't think around the golf course as a professional would. I still take too many chances.I have watched enough Saban videos. He never talks about cool plays, tricks or gimmicks. "All I want my players to do is to execute the play, perfectly and as designed." He mentioned that coaches need to know what plays are appropriate, but that's the essence.

Collins could easily learn how to think like a winner. I don't think he does.

 

[4shotB]

Collins could easily learn how to think like a winner. I don't think he does.

He is faced with what may people have faced in their careers. He, by all reasonable measures, has been heretofore successful in his career...an upward progression of responsibility, national awards, etc. No reason for him (or TStan or us) NOT to think he would be successful going forward. For the first time in his life, he is dealing with data that suggests he IS not. How many people have we seen who have found out it IS a huge leap from being Assitant (to the) Regional Manager vs. being the actual Regional Manager? It's been 3 years so he doesn't have too much time left to analyze and correct this. Is he capable and/or willing? That remains to be seen.

It is the same with Tech students. All of us came to the school "highly recommended" and qualified to be admitted. A small % never struggled on North Avenue but most of us found that what we had done before in terms of work and study no longer created success in the classroom. Some eventually adapted and succeeded. But a good many either couldn't or wouldn't make the required changes to old habits. And left for other places.

 

[Backstreetbuzz]

Saban would do well at GT, but there is zero chance in today’s college football environment he wins a NC. Also, the first year he ran off 15 players who did not meet his playing standards, 40% of our fan base would go crazy.

 

[slugboy]

Saban will only win with superior athletes to everyone elses. His gift is recruiting and average coaching, if you review his career. When the players are even, he has a 50/50 shot of winning. Since he would never have the advantage he does now with top athletes 3 deep, it would never happen. However, your question does not have that option, so I assume you think it would be inevitable.

I mentally bucketed that in with “>15 years”, but I’ve added an option for “Never”.

I do think you can challenge players to think differently. I play a lot of golf. My game is decent enough, but I don't think around the golf course as a professional would. I still take too many chances.I have watched enough Saban videos. He never talks about cool plays, tricks or gimmicks. "All I want my players to do is to execute the play, perfectly and as designed." He mentioned that coaches need to know what plays are appropriate, but that's the essence.

Collins could easily learn how to think like a winner. I don't think he does.

I have heard the same thing about Urban Meyer—that he is fanatically detail-oriented, and he’d stop scrimmages if a lineman’s stance wasn’t perfect.

Oversimplifying, I think attention to detail has been an problem on the flats for years, especially on defense, but it’s been worse the last couple of seasons.

I put in 6-10 years, and I could see sooner or I could see later. I think Saban would have won a Natty at Michigan State, but he wouldn’t have won as many. He could have turned Michigan State into what Clemson is now.

 

[smokey_wasp]

I say 6-10 years, as well. Would go about 8-4 with our roster and schedule next year and probably start with a top 10-15 recruiting class. Would sign max size classes and process a lot. After he got us top 5 classes several years in a row, a natty would become a possibility. I say around year 7 or 8, we are in the CFP with a chance

 

[Skeptic]

I saw this and thought it was a good question



Jump in y’all

how long would it take to get Saban to coach here?

 

[MikeGT]

Are we talking about Saban from 15 years ago before he had the rep of putting players in the NFL or Saban of today? Has Saban ever had to sell academics? Has he ever coached anywhere that academics was even a consideration?
Don’t get me wrong, I think he’s a great coach, and would definitely be successful, I’m just not sure that same question is as applicable to us.
Who has shown they can take a school that’s not a football factory and make them a contender? Flick maybe? There’s a reason that list is very short.

 

[slugboy]

Are we talking about Saban from 15 years ago before he had the rep of putting players in the NFL or Saban of today? Has Saban ever had to sell academics? Has he ever coached anywhere that academics was even a consideration?

Saban at his best. Ultimate Saban.

 

[Sheboygan]

I mentally bucketed that in with “>15 years”, but I’ve added an option for “Never”.


I have heard the same thing about Urban Meyer—that he is fanatically detail-oriented, and he’d stop scrimmages if a lineman’s stance wasn’t perfect.

Oversimplifying, I think attention to detail has been an problem on the flats for years, especially on defense, but it’s been worse the last couple of seasons.

I put in 6-10 years, and I could see sooner or I could see later. I think Saban would have won a Natty at Michigan State, but he wouldn’t have won as many. He could have turned Michigan State into what Clemson is now.

I agree with you on this. It took Saban a while to get the experience , make the contacts, learn from his mistakes- I'm sure he made some - and become the coach he has been recently. He could have "been born" with his attention to detail , striving for perfection, not making the same mistakes over and over, etc. Some people never develop those traits. IMO, he could definitely win a NC at Tech. It would be on about a 5 year trajectory, IMO. Example :
Year 1 6-6 minor bowl
Year 2 8-4 better bowl
Year 3 11-1 ACC champs
Year 4 11-1 NC playoffs
Year 5 Undefeated NC champs
As the wins started coming, the momentum for funding and changes would exponentially improve. Nothing succeeds like success and he would give the program instant credibility. What a wonderful , but completely unrealistic , dream.......

 

[Heisman's Ghost]

For the purposes of this poll and thread

Championship = a top-level NCAA football title = “THE NATIONAL CHAMPION”

I don't think even Saban could win a national championship here with the current environment of paying 5 stars. The college football landscape has changed significantly in just the past five years.

 

[gtphd]

Current Saban shows up and brings 5* recruits and legitimately good assistants Day 1. If he lucked into a down Clemson, he could win a championship in year 3-4.

If it’s a Saban-like unknown coach, it would probably take a decade to build his reputation for winning and bring in the right level of recruits. Even so, he’d win more than 3 games in year 3.