From the AP comes Litke’s attack on Alabama Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban. (You can read the entire column below the choice excerpts.)

Litke writes this about Alabama Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban’s thoughts on agents as pimps, “Oh, I don’t know, maybe the same way some parents felt when their son came home and told them you decided not to renew his scholarship, which undoubtedly said more about the caliber of athlete he is than whether he was a good student.”

And you have proof of that Litke? Has any athlete said he lost a scholarship because it was canceled? There have been players who transferred or were placed on medical scholarship, but not one athlete that I have heard about has come forward to say Nick Saban has revoked a scholarship. It would be nice if the august Associated Press would prevent distortions like this from being published. If Litke can provide any evidence of the screwing he alleges in his column then he should present the actual QUOTES and NAMES of the injured parties. Until then he should be viewed as spreading BS better suited for message boards and not a professional news service.

Of course Jim Litke doesn’t stop with attacks on Nick Saban. He goes on the offensive against all of college football. Like this: “Big-time college football is effectively running a minor-league system for the NFL, and they’re doing it largely on the backs of kids whose football schoolwork is so demanding that many will never be able to take advantage of the scholarship that gets thrown in with it.”

Really? Many? Just how many is many? I guess all those students who graduate with degrees and become doctors, lawyers and business leaders didn’t take advantage of that scholarship. That is good to know.

You can read the whole Litke column embedded below.

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12 thoughts on “AP’s Litke attacks Alabama’s Nick Saban”

  1. I found Litke’s article earlier and already tore him a new arsehole in an e-mail. If he has any self esteem at all he’ll go home, sit in a tub of hot water and open a vein with a razor blade. However, I think it’s a fantasy to hope that any scum sucking journalist has any self esteem. There will never be another Walter Cronkite. RTR!

  2. this is great news! another member of the mainstream sports media that hates saban.

    really folks, do we want a coach that’s loved by the sporting intelligensia and opposing coaches and fans or do we want a leader who stands and delivers despite the predictable uninformed msm blowback??? (shula)

    now, mind you, i’m not buying the poor poor marcell line coming from his family lock, stock and barrel.

    i also believe the ncaa has much to do with creating this environment with this average-student-college-experience crapola they’ve been pushing for years.

    these elite athletes are NOT average students. nowhere close.

    but that doesn’t stop these “trading places” liberal intellectuals from conducting their grand social experiments on these kids.

    who better knows their people than the one’s closest to them than their coaches???

    but the ncaa in their infinite wisdom drives a wedge between the player and coach in an effort to transform the player into something he/she’s not, an average student.

    the fact is since the hiring of saban, he’s promoted a process. that process is based on personal accountability. he’s set up a system of peer review, team policing and support infrastructure designed to help boys become men. his process has tangible results dispite the roadblocks put in place by the ncaa.

    (he’s even railed against his employer – ua and the textbook scandal – when it was warranted)

    in other words, the players have bought in. the juwan simpson’s and jimmy john’s have been purged. an attitude of responsibility to team and each other permeates.

    does that mean there won’t be bumps in the road?? of course not, especially considering the social engineering impulses of the ncaa.

    but the fact is the system works. on and off the field. nick saban has made coming to play football for alabama a step up in life for the athlete and it sells on the recruiting trail to the player’s family. year after year.

    and the uninformed opinion of litke (or kronkite for that matter) matter to me as an alabama fan not one whit.

    in fact, i see it as a good thing. if they say it’s wrong, it’s the first sign it’s right.

    RTR.

  5. Pimps? Really, Nick? A: “All of the Above”
    America sees the entire collegiate & pro sports empires as one gigantic cesspool of greed, corruption & vicarious living. Colleges are the farm clubs for the “big leagues” like the NFL (national felon league).

  6. There is no fix for this…Ive heard the ESPN talking heads give their two cents…It varies from “Pay the players” wich is in my opinion, crazy…..If the CFB players ger paid it will open the door to lawsuits because the golf team isnt making anyhting , so why should the football team ?

    Then you have the camp that says the NCAA should just turn their heads..This again is stupid.

    The wau it is isnt perfect, but its the only thing that makes sense.

    If they could regulate the agents through the NFL in some capacity, it would be affective. Make agents of rookies go by a certain set of rules. If they dont comply, dont deal with them.

  7. Cappy, here’s my letter to Litke

    Jim,

    I’m guessing that you created a small firestorm with your article about Nick Saban. I would like for you to back up some of your accusations in the article.

    First, Nick Saban has never revoked a student athletes scholarship, unless he was caught breaking the law or team rules. Where on earth did you come up with that?

    Second, your accusation “sanctimonious college coaches who lie to kids while recruiting them” is shocking. Show me a kid that Nick Saban has lied to. I don’t doubt some coaches might resort to that, but you have no right, as a writer for AP, to make that charge about CNS without proof.

    Next, you criticize Saben about moving from one team to another and leaving kids behind. Have you only had one job in your life? That is how most executives move up the ladder. That goes for money and position in one’s field of choice. Name a college coach that hasn’t moved from one team to another. Even the greatest of all time, Bear Bryant, coached at Kentucky and Texas A&M before Alabama. Same can be said for Bowden and Paterno.

    Next, the University of Alabama is NOT under investigation as you suggest. “In short order, South Carolina, Florida and Alabama all learned they were officially under suspicion by the NCAA” Marcel Dareus, is under investigation and if he took money or gifts, he may not play again at Alabama.

    Finally, you wind up agreeing with Saban about agents “Saban is right in one important way about the greaseball agents and their runners. They know the temptations they’re dangling could not only derail a kid’s career, it could put an entire program underwater for years to come, a la Southern California after Reggie Bush”
    Hilarious!

  8. I find this telling:

    “I’ll give you an example. We had an issue a couple years ago with Smitty, who got suspended for the Sugar Bowl. You know, we probably could have prosecuted the guy. But in prosecuting the guy that did wrong, we would have put our institution in jeopardy – possibly – from an NCAA standpoint. We didn’t do it. But then the same guy is standing in line trying to give our players money this past year and nothing gets done about it. It’s not a good situation.”

  9. Note that the above quote from Nick Saban did NOT say “we may have” or “we could have,” but, instead, said “we would have put our institution in jeopardy …”

    I’m just sayin’, guys.

  10. “we would have put our institution in jeopardy …”

    “possibly”

    the word makes a difference, slug.

  12. Lipke
    should come to Australia were athletes dont get scholarships at all. and if they blow a knee the pump gas when their nest egg runs out.
    But then again as stupid as this guy is he would never find his way here, even if quantas offered him a free flight.

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