Nick Saban simply couldn’t let James Franklin get away with it.
During a Wednesday morning hit on ESPN College GameDay, Saban — the former Alabama head coach in his first year as an ESPN analyst — turned the tables on the Penn State coach after Franklin name-dropped Saban as the “obvious choice” to become the first-ever commissioner of college football earlier this week. Franklin appeared on the show following the Nittany Lions’ 31-14 win over Boise State in Tuesday night’s Fiesta Bowl College Football Playoff national quarterfinal.
“You know James, congratulations on a great win and I just wanted to ask, does this put you one step closer to being the commissioner of college football,” Saban deadpanned as the GameDay crew erupted in laugher.
Franklin, of course, just doubled-down.
“Coach, you can keep trying to avoid this all you want,” Franklin responded, “and I know ESPN and those guys don’t want to lose you, but I just think your impact on college football and your global understanding of what we need is important. And right now no one’s running it.”
Franklin reignited the discussion around the sport’s need for a single leader to oversee college football’s ever-changing landscape in the age of name, image and likeness (NIL), the transfer portal, and pending revenue sharing with student-athletes.
“Let’s get a commissioner of college football that is waking up every single morning and going to bed every single night making decisions that’s in the best interest of college football,” Franklin said at the Fiesta Bowl media day event ahead of Tuesday’s CFP quarterfinal win over Boise State. “I think Nick Saban would be the obvious choice if we made that decision. Now, Nick will probably call me tonight and say, ‘Don’t do this,’ but I think he’s the obvious choice, right?”
Of course, Franklin hasn’t been the only college football coach to endorse Saban for commissioner.
Both Ole Miss‘ Lane Kiffin and Georgia‘s Kirby Smart — who both worked under Saban as Alabama assistant coaches — believe their 73-year-old former boss would be perfect for the still uncreated role.
When asked about Franklin’s recent comments during a Sugar Bowl press conference Monday, Smart — who spent 11 seasons working under Saban, including eight as Alabama’s defensive coordinator before taking over at his alma mater in 2016 — cautioned that a “commissioner of college football” isn’t the end-all, be-all solution many are suggesting.
“I don’t know if it’s as simple as saying let’s name a commissioner and that solves all our problems, (because) I don’t think that’s the case,” Smart said Monday. “I think we’re governed by separate circumstances: conferences govern us, the NCAA governs us, now we have courts governing us, and nobody is over all of those. I think a commissioner would be a nice thing in theory, but what can they effectively get done if everybody can’t agree on something.”
That said, Smart knows if anyone has the proper wherewithal to make a positive difference as college football’s first “commissioner,” his mentor would be a “great” choice.
“And Nick would be great, I know he’s a huge advocate for college football, he wants to make it better. He’s always been a person that believed in leaving it better than you found it,” Smart said of Saban. “And I have a lot of respect for the way he does it. But I’m probably not the guy that can tell you what a commissioner can and can’t do in terms of making it a better process for all of us.”
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