Jumbo Package: Saban likes his clean as real as Ivory

Happy Friday, everyone. It’s something of an offseason free-for-all as news is less than scarce, so have at it. For those who have wondered about Coach Saban’s hygienic preferences, he provided some insight yesterday at the Nick’s Kids golf event in Vestavia Hills.

You know it’s the offseason when all we have to talk about is which brand of soap Coach uses to bathe in the lake.

“I think that both players, aight, need to know that they need to win the team, that’s what they need to do,” Saban said. “And the best way for them to do that is stay focused on what they need to do, and I think anything that they do that brings attention to themselves probably erodes the opportunity for that to happen.

“So, I’d appreciate your help in just allowing that to happen, because it’s not going to happen any faster. You can’t make it happen faster. It’s going to be a process that we go through, and that’s the way it’s going to be.”

Hmmm, we’re at his charity’s golf event in early June and the QB question is already drawing an “aight” with a polite request for the reporters to stop asking. The match has been lit, and some poor scribe will throw just enough gas on it to provide some real entertainment around mid-August.

Asked if he spoke with Holcombe since the draft concluded Wednesday, Saban said, “I didn’t talk to him yet. I talked to him before. He wanted to continue to try to pursue his baseball career, so I haven’t talked to him since that. I think he could actually come back and play another year of baseball if he chooses to do that. So, I will talk to him again, but when we had the last conversation, he was pretty much set on trying to play baseball.”

By all accounts, it seems likely that Keith Holcombe has played his last down of football. Good luck to him as he pursues his baseball dreams and whatever else life may hold. He wasn’t drafted, so returning to school and playing one more year of college is on the table.

In winning five national championships in 11 years in T-Town, Alabama’s coach has watched 27 coaching changes in the SEC. Six more this season is nothing new.

Saban’s own personal coaching tree has now grown to 17. That’s the number of current or former head coaches that have been on at least one of his staffs. In the SEC alone this year, four current head coaches have worked for Saban. Two of them, Fisher and Pruitt, represent a third of the 2018 changes.

Can you name all 17?

Alabama and Auburn are certainly not the only programs currently involved for the nation’s No. 1 inside linebacker. They are, however, two of the teams pushing hardest for the five-star ‘backer from just outside Memphis. Dean will be on campus at Alabama and Auburn on back-to-back weekends for official visits later this month. The Crystal Ball reads in favor of Georgia, followed by Ole Miss, Alabama, and LSU. Dean hopes to major in engineering at whichever program he decides on. This weekend Dean is expected at Texas A&M. He doesn’t plan to make a decision until the fall at the earliest.

Nakobe Dean is the uncommitted player that I would most like to see in Tuscaloosa. He can be the next great Alabama middle linebacker, and there will be opportunity in spades with Mack Wilson likely to depart after the season.

That’s about it for today. Have a great weekend.

Roll Tide.