Tag Archives: Nick Saban

Alabama head football coach Nick Saban is known to make a joke or two towards his wife, Terry, in regards to which one wears the figurative pants in the household.

Coach Saban says “Ms. Terry” is the one in charge of affairs, and maybe she is. She clearly had her voice heard in Saban’s decision to leave the Miami Dolphins for the Crimson Tide.

“Mal comes to Miami when the season is over and I do the exit physicals and stuff like that with all the players and we have our final meeting,” Saban said. “I’m driving home in the car and call Terry and say, ‘You know what Terry, I’m feeling really bad abut this. I think I should stay here in Miami and I don’t think we should talk to Coach Moore.’

“Terry says, ‘Well I already talked to him today. He came over here ths afternoon. He’s a fine man and he’s coming over for dinner tonight.’”

Had Moore not coerced Terry into a few more hours to work with, Saban would not have come to Alabama and Moore’s love or the University might have delayed his return.

“My agent, Jimmy Sexton, and Mal went into the other room while Terry and I talked and decided what we wanted to do,” Saban said. “Jimmy asks Mal what he is going to do if Nick doesn’t take the job, and Mal says, ‘Well, I’m not going back to Alabama. I think I’ll just have them take me down to Cuba.’

“Mal, in his pleasant way, really convinced us, with his honesty, his sincerity, his obvious love for his school, that this was a genuine person. The honesty and sincerity he had made it really hard to say no to this opportunity.”

The relationship between Saban and Moore was more than what is normally seen between a coach and his AD.

“What people don’t know is, every game that we’ve lost since I’ve been here, every Sunday, when I go in the film room to watch the film, Mal would just come in and sit down,” Saban said. “Sometimes he wouldn’t even say anything.”

And in those moments, Saban reached out to Moore for wisdom.

“I can’t get this running back to carry the ball with their right hand,” Saban remembered telling Moore after one particular loss.

Moore did what he did best: told a story. Moore told Saban of a particular quarterback he coached under Paul “Bear” Bryant who was an All-American, but Moore noticed he would look down before he threw the ball.

When Moore approached Bryant about teaching the All-American quarterback out of this habit, Bryant responded by saying, “Don’t mess with him.”

Saban took the lesson, and left the running back alone. That back was Mark Ingram, the Crimson Tide’s only Heisman Trophy winner.

“Mark Ingram can carry the ball in whatever hand he wants to carry it in,” Saban said.