PARADISE VALLEY, ARIZ. —
Bear Bryant recruited my Uncle Rob. My first SEC road game covering Kentucky was against Bryant’s 1980 team at Legion Field. (Alabama won 45-0. Big shock.) I am not unfamiliar with Paul William Bryant, whom I’ve considered the greatest college football coach ever – until now.
Nicolas Lou Saban has usurped that title, same as he has seized everything else. Having won four of the past seven national championships, we’ve reached the point where Alabama not winning has become the exception, not the rule. Back in September, this was seen as the flawed Bama team that would reduce this lordly program to the level of the merely mortal.