Lessons that can be learned from this Bama exodus?

I know the coach in waiting model hasn't seemed to work out in the past, but maybe that transparency and foreknowledge helps smooth the transition

You'd have to do like Duke basketball and announce retirement before final season and give someone on staff the Head Coach in Waiting title.

Only works if the replacement is already on staff.

There’s no lesson to be learned. Anytime you are overhauling a coaching staff, you are going to have guys leave. The fact that the coach leaving is the greatest coach of all time just amplifies it. The majority of those kids went to Alabama because of Nick Saban. I still think Alabama will be able to recruit well because they have built up that brand, but they were bound to have a bunch of guys leave no matter what. I think the only coach that could have somewhat limited the amount of players that leave would have been Kirby.

I think the biggest lesson was that Saban had become the brand at Alabama and the school itself was not the draw. Once he left, all those national recruits had no reason to want to stay.

The lesson is to have a great plan for NIL. Bama was getting the Saban discount. When he left, that discount expired with players and Bama clearly didn't have an answer.

That’s like observing a car wreck and saying, “Henceforth one must avoid collisions with other cars.” All you did was state the problem and say we need a solution.

Not really as applicable as you think it is,

The gumps are falling especially hard because Saban was the brand and cult figure. Now that he’s gone those arrogant fricking gumps are finding out there’s really no such thing as “Alabama tradition,” at least to the extent they thought.

Those (paid off) players came to play for Saban, not Alabama. Sure, if CBK left here would be some player loss but not to that extent. We’d get another good coach who would not be following a cult figure like Saban.

I do think this is a bit of a one-off. Saban is the greatest coach of his time, if not ever. Whoever replaced him was not going to be as good as Saban was, as of now.

I have no doubt many players there were going purely to play for Saban, because they thought that was the best way to maximize their draft value.

If Saban did not retire but instead went to another school, a ton of kids would have followed him to the new school.

Could some of this have been avoided by promoting a coordiator, promoting a position coach to coordinator, and adding a new position coach, but keeping rest of staff intact?

Maybe. But Bama really didn't have anyone on staff right now that would be a good candidate to be promoted to HC.

If Kirby or Kiffin were still on staff, maybe that works and maybe that helps to slow the bleeding but it would not stop it.

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As long as the portal is set up the way it is now you must figure out a way to clot the bleeding going from one coach to another.

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I think they already cracked the code with Jay Johnson. Hire a great coach and have all his great players follow him.

It’s almost like the majority of Alabama players didn’t grow die hard fans of Bama. I’ve wondered with NIL what is to stop Stanford, Duke, etc. to become powerhouses in football. Lots of booster money in those schools. Just lower academic requirements and start fundraising.