Alabama's season begins Saturday afternoon (3:30 p.m. ET vs. Duke) but Nick Saban was in midseason form during his weekly radio show on Thursday night.
As we've seen in previousrants, Saban's anger can shift gears as quickly as a Maserati, and the topic of "self-indulgent behavior" got him going last night.
Here's how it went down, via AL.com:
“I watch football on TV sometimes and there’s a lot of things I see,” Saban said unprompted by a question. “Self-indulgent behavior. Players bringing attention to themselves. A lack of discipline. When you don’t have respect for discipline.
“A lot of bad things happen. You get a lot of penalties. You get a lot of late hits. You get a lot of bad decisions. You don’t really play smart in critical situations. That’s never been the trademark of our team and that’s something we really want to reestablish with our players.”
Splash gas on the fire.
“We’ve always had a rule where the players don’t talk to the opposing team,” Saban said, his voice rising.
And then …
“I tell the players,” Saban said, “if you want to talk shit to the other team, join the god damn debate team.”
Saban quickly downshifted and apologized for taking the Lord's name in vain, but clearly the crowd loved it.