When we got Saban from Michigan State what stood out about him?

i would honestly like to know this as well. Saban's first year at LSU was my first year so i didn't pay attention to hiring at the time.

How much the NFL power brokers and insiders thought of him and coveted him as a NFL Head Coach. I seem to recall he was offered the Colts and and Giants job before and turned them down.

Skip had nothing to do with Saban's hire. Skip was the Baseball coach at that time not the AD. Joe Dean was the one that wanted to low ball him. Dean told Emmert that I think I can get him for 900,000 a year. Emmert told him no, you give him our best offer, and that was 1.2 million I think. At that point Dean was a lame duck AD and vertually had no real power. Emmert was the power behind the hire and even lead the interviews

He had a deep Assistant Coach NFL background and a strong pedigree as a Belicheck coaching disciple. Then takes over a down in the dumps Michigan St program and makes then very competitive during an era where only Michigan is the Big Dog in that state for decades. He saw a sleeping Tiger in LSU who could own the state recruiting as the Big Dog versus always having to compete against Michigan. No brained decision for him and LSU. Was a perfect match.

Joe Dean's cheap arse made the hire not Bertman.

......sell the City of New Orleans and throw the checkbook at Nick Saban.

Not a whole lot because of track record at the time, but he had great experience in NFL and College ranks and I'm sure, being the man he is, he killed during the interviews.

I worked in the AD when we hired him. One of the biggest driving forces was the fact that he had success both on the field and in recruiting at a school that wasn't the dominant team in their state.

The idea was if he could have success while having to battle the dominant state team in Michigan, how much more successful would he be in Louisiana with no in-state competition and a better recruiting talent base.

Much like Arnsbarger, football people thought he was a defensive genius and great coach. He was a hell of a lot younger and had a recent college background. All of this was on paper. Emmert spoke to Nick one on one and he blew them away as he asked all of the why questions fans asked for years. He then asked for certain things to establish the “program” —-facilities, support staff, etc. they could see his vision at that point.

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He had Michigan State on the upswing after they'd kinda faded into mediocrity under Perles.

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Really, it wasn't until his final season at MSU that they had gotten beyond right around .500. Saban had an NFL background, but it wasn't like Belichek was Bleichek at that time. Bill was probably seen as more of "brains" behind the defense even with Saban as the DC just like some Saban's DC's are looked at now. What sold LSU the most was Nick had a very detailed plan/vision of how he was going to tap into the "natural resources" LSU was wasting (tremendous talent pool both in state and regionally).

Many may not want to admit it, but in a lot of ways Mel Tucker's resume mirrors Saban's before he came to LSU. Lots of NFL experience and the same year the LSU job comes open he is having a great season with MSU. Even their ages are about the same at that point in their careers (Saban was ~49 when LSU hired him; Tucker is 49 now)

NO DOUBT that is what Tucker's agent (a guy named Jimmy Sexton) is selling to MSU. He's probably saying "You had Nick Saban here and you let him get away to LSU. Don't make the same mistake twice!!"

Now, is it realistic to think Tucker would achieve the same level of success Saban has? Of course not. But if you want to see who has probably the most pre-LSU Saban-esque resume, it is probably Tucker.