Alabama coach Saban's latest rant praises team's focus

After years of covering Alabama coach Nick Saban, members of the media can tell when a rant is coming.

But the rants are never personal and almost always aimed at the players or a larger group rather than the person actually asking the question.

Two of the best times for a Saban tongue-lashing come after a big win or when the Crimson Tide faces what is deemed by those outside the program as an inferior opponent.

Case in point, one of Saban's first rants of the season came during the week of the Middle Tennessee game, when a reporter asked Saban about being a heavy favorite.

This week -- coming off a 38-10 win over Georgia -- Saban was ready when a reporter teed up a question about how Saban would speak to the players with the outside perception of the team being so fluid.

"I'll say the same thing as when you all buried us last week," Saban said Monday. "It really doesn't matter what you think. It really doesn't matter what you say. And I'm hoping that nobody on our team is playing for you."

The collective "you" being aimed mostly at national writers who lambasted Alabama following its loss to Ole Miss. Many of those headlines and stories read like obituaries for how the game had passed Saban by and how Alabama had lost its edge.

Against Ole Miss, Alabama had an unforeseeable amount of things go against them -- including five turnovers and a touchdown off of a tipped pass -- but still only lost by six points. But on the other hand, Ole Miss didn't make any mistakes and also took advantage of the Tide's miscues to win the game.

Saban and the players have acknowledged the mistakes made in that game, and they took extra steps toward making sure those things didn't happen going forward.

One of those steps has been making an effort to ignore what's being said about or around the program.

"I hope they're playing for each other and their team and what they want to accomplish and not what you think," Saban said. "But that's certainly not what I'm doing. I'm coaching and working for our players and our team to be as good as it can be. And if that's not pleasing to someone else, it's not pleasing to somebody else."

Saban's voice got higher and his hand motions became even more animated as he continued on about how the media did their best to bury Alabama after just one loss.

"I do believe in our team, and we're going to work hard to make our team better and I hope the players respond the right way," Saban said. "And it's not going to be for you. The fans, yes. Because if it was up to you, we were six feet under already. We're dead and buried and gone. Gone. So if that was the case, we'd have to get some respirators out or something there to put the life back in people."

Tide center Ryan Kelly, a three-year starter who's been around the program for five years, said Saban is much harder on the players after a big win than he is after a loss.

"There's no doubt about that," Kelly said. "He's obviously excited that we won. But I think one of the messages that he said was, 'Look, this is the proof that we can do a lot of great things, we just have to keep on the right road.'"

The season doesn't get any easier for Alabama as it welcomes Arkansas into Bryant-Denny Stadium on Saturday for Homecoming. From there, it's SEC opponent after SEC opponent.

While Saban and the rest of the coaching staff can stress the importance of being consistent each day, it's still on the players to go out and perform.

"He coaches a lot of things, but he's not the one out there playing," Kelly said. "So, it's always about every player taking the message to heart and, I think, as a leadership group and an entire offense and team in general we've done that."

Contact Anniston Star sports writer Marq Burnett at mburnett@annistonstar.com. On Twitter: @Marq_Burnett

This story was originally published October 5, 2015 at 10:53 PM with the headline "Alabama coach Saban's latest rant praises team's focus ."