Saban's tenure has been the longest and most memorable honeymoon ever in the history of relationships.....He took a program that has long struggled...was at the bottom...and brought it as high as it will go within a relatively short period of time. How do you think we as LSU fans will react toward the tough times that will come? Bitch? Moan? Second guess? How will Saban react to the criticism....not that may come...but will come. Will LSU fans keep their mouths shut to not risk alienating our great leader....? Or will, after say failing to win SEC champ two years in a row ask what the hell he is doing to earn his 3 mil a year? I dunno..but I hope everyone appreciates how hard it is to get to the top...and stay at the top....and is realistic enough to understand that winning an NC even once every 10 years is an unbelievably hard task...or even every 40 sompin years for that matter.....
as long as we are contenders, both for the SEC and NC, I will not bitch one bit. granted we will always have lofty expectations from here on out under Saban, I think most Tiger fans are able to take the good with the bad....us not making the SECGC in 2002 is a perfect example. Even though we blew it against Arky and missed the SECGC, we still traveled very well to the Cotton Bowl. If we go the way of Penn State recently and just suck, I will have an issue with that, but I do not see that happening in the near future!
LSU fans will have the same reaction as we have always had when it comes to LSU football ... we will overreact when things don't go well and we will puff out our chest when things go well. There is no in between ...
You are probably right, some guys will even call for Saban's head if we finish second in the West and not make the SEC CG.
Coach Saban signs his contracts so one would have to assume he fully understands what the fans expectations are. However, I don't foresee coach Saban's program going down if it continues to operate at the same high level it is operating at now, which is the reason he is being compensated the big bucks. Indeed, if he keeps the high level of success up for another 6 or 7 more seasons, I would be supportive of giving coach Saban a lifetime contract similar to the one coach Bobby Bowden received at FSU.
We can dream can't we? I don't see Saban being a lifer in college football. I just want a few more good seasons, then a quality replacement thereafter.
If Saban continues to build this program the way he has to-date, LSU will be beating coaches down with a stick when Saban announces his departure. There's that dream part Hornet was talking 'bout.
I, too, was worried that winning the NC would spoil us. I mean, as much as I'd love for my Tigers to repeat next year, it's not very likely. Getting to the NC this year was arduous enough. We're going to have to take it in stride, and remember that all we ever really wanted was to be an elite program. With our 2003 NC, we're now members of the club--but we need some healthy follow-up seasons to cement that.
I have a feeling that the fan base will still become negative if a player makes a bad decision or Coach Saban makes a boneheaded (gutsy if it works Bengal B) call. That is just the nature of LSU fans. Do you remember how negative it got on here after the Ole Miss game? We won that game and there were still fans bitching about how if the offense didn't play better we wouldn't win another game. It didn't matter that we beat a top 20 team on the road even with the offense not clicking. All that mattered was that the offense sucked and we blew our shot at the national championship because we didn't win by 30 points.
I thought the secret for a long coaching career was to never ever follow a legend. Instead, follow the first one fired after the legend.
