Paul Finebaum, host of The Paul Finebaum Show, was a guest this week on the Sports Media Podcast with Richard Deitsch. One of the main topics for the first half of the show was Nick Saban and his retirement. The two, specifically, talked about the prospect of Saban ending up at ESPN.
“I think we all know he’s probably going into tv,” Finebaum said, and then added, “Hate to break it to anyone, but being on TV is not quite being the head coach at Alabama.”
Deitcsh stated very clearly, “I would be absolutely stunned if Nick Saban were not at ESPN in short order. I would probably be stunned if he’s not on College GameDay.”
Deitsch continued, saying “Nick Saban is one of the people they have wanted to hire forever, its sort of a dream hire for them. I think they would love him to be on College GameDay, but they would obviously take him as a studio analyst, they would take him as a game analyst, they’d take him as the cohost of First Take,” he joked.
Finebaum then went in to a story which took place more than 10 years ago, where ESPN executives were courting Saban, having heard he was contemplating his future as a coach. Deitsch then asked Finebaum if he thought GameDay would be what Saban would be interested in, as opposed to potentially working in the studio breaking down games.
Finebaum talked about his time with GameDay and television work in general, saying, “There is mostly boredom waiting to go on. I wonder how (Saban) would handle that.”
As for studio work, Finebaum said, “I think Saban would like it to a degree, but I don’t know if he wants to sit around and have somebody say, ‘Hey Coach, we need you on the 8 o’clock SportsCenter.'”
Finebaum then gave his opinion on which specific role he thought Saban might like. “I think he would probably…enjoy doing games more,” he said. “(He would) get to look at film all week, get to dig down on Friday and will talk to the coaches. As opposed to GameDay which is totally unorthodoxed at times.”
In wrapping up on the topic, Finebaum added, “He’s going to be great. He’s analytical, I ve seen him be very funny, he’s just not a very patient person.”
