Nick Saban Wants To Retroactively Fire Alabama Assistant Coach
01/01/2025 03:17 PM
Tez Johnson's success at Oregon has former Alabama head coach Nick Saban wishing he could go back and fire one of his old assistants.
On Wednesday's Playoff edition of "College GameDay," ESPN ran a touching feature on the Ducks wideout's relationship with Bo Nix's family and how he came to be a star in Eugene.
But at the end of it, all Saban could think about was how he didn't find a way to get Tez to suit up for the Tide when he was still on the sideline.
"What I'm sitting here thinking about is Tez Johnson's in Birmingham, 45 minutes away from Alabama. We didn't recruit the guy," the coach said. "Who was recruiting Birmingham? And I should have fired their ass."
Saban's comment got a good laugh out of the "GameDay" crew. But after some follow-up from host Rece Davis, he wasn't able to recall who the assistant was that would've been in charge of that.
"Could you imagine if he would have been able to get any players?" Davis joked with the rest of the panel.
In fairness to whoever the assistant was, it's not like Johnson was the typical "can't-miss" prospect that Bama usually went after under Saban. Tez was a three-star recruit in high school and the 208th-ranked receiver in the 2020 class.
His offers came from the likes of Arkansas State, Eastern Kentucky, Jacksonville State, Middle Tennessee State and Western Kentucky before committing to Troy and hopping in the transfer portal after three seasons with the Trojans.
Now he's one of the top weapons on the nation's best team with the chance to advance to the College Football Playoff semifinal with a win over Ohio State in the Rose Bowl.
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