Four days after his team dismantled Michigan, Nick Saban was not in the mood to hear any more praise of Alabama.
He took the opportunity Wednesday during his press conference to chastise the media about the positive coverage the Tide received and the lack of respect being given their next opponent - Western Kentucky.
The session with the press started with an ominous tone.
"How is everybody today?" Saban asked. "You might not be after I get done."
Then it started.
"You know, there's a tremendous balance between humility and confidence," Saban said. "And this game is a struggle. It's a struggle every day. And you've got to embrace it every day.
"And you've got to go out there and try to earn it every day, to be as good a player as you can be. You've got to have a tremendous amount of character, confidence, mental and physical toughness. You've got to be driven to be the best. And you've got to be able to handle success."
He then went into criticism of how the press was treating the Hilltoppers.
"I hate to be negative with anybody, but when you people start writing stuff about people that we're playing that doesn't give them the proper respect, that's not fair," Saban said. "It's not fair to them, to their players who work hard to earn it. It's not fair to our players, who need to respect them. And to make presumptions like you all make, it really really upsets me."
He grew more upset as he criticized the lack of coverage the media gave to other stories.
"You don't need to write about that. There are so many more good things you can write about happening around here that people would be interested in," Saban said. "I'd love to see some of you do a little bit of research, and figure it out. It would really do my heart good."
Saban's rant was similar to what you would see by mentor Bill Belichick. Clearly, he wanted to send a message to his players that all the positive talk after the opener shouldn't go to their heads.
While it might not make any difference this week. Saban knows there's a trip to No. 10 Arkansas looming on Sept. 15 that will be the next big test for his team.
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