There were no games, there were no first-down markers, there was no scoreboard. The only helmets were those displayed on a dais. But the SEC football season began in earnest this past week in a hotel connected to a mall in suburban Birmingham, where Nick Saban posed for photos and signed autographs for fans gathered just steps from stores like Aldo and Zumiez.
Part pep rally, part press conference, and all promotional blitz, SEC Media Days encompassed four days, 14 head coaches, 42 players and hundreds of media members, spinning off thousands of words in the process. Downstairs in the lobby, fans gathered clutching souvenir footballs, dressed in school colors, and chanting slogans at the behest of TV cameras.