Nick Saban Position Quotations

Philosophically, I don't there's a lot of difference in terms of what we like to do. His knowledge of the league and being able to define things internally in the organization, so you have everybody on the same page, are probably his greatest assets. That and recognition of what people can do - the strength of players, coaches and people in the organization - and putting them in position where they can have success doing it.

My focus is on trying to get our players in the best position we can to have an opportunity to be successful. The other stuff is pretty minor.

I wouldn't say that he has been demoted. The way I'd rather say it is that Sage Rosenfels has earned, through his efforts and consistency and performance through this preseason, the opportunity to compete for the number two position, and he's been put in a position to do that. I don't think anybody has been demoted.

I don't think it's just that position (quarterback),

Lamar did a good job for us here. He worked hard. When you look at some of these circumstances, everybody has to have a role on the team. Some of the guys at that position are very good special teams contributors, and that certainly played a role in the backs that we've selected.

Reggie had a chance to make a play on the ball, ... In trying to intercept it I think he put himself in a bad position to tackle the guy. It turned out to be a big play.

Jason has had a great camp and has done a great job in every regard. He's probably one of the guys who has had a lot more to learn because he's never really played that position as a professional player. He's playing a combination of two positions right now, but he's done a tremendous job of adapting and making plays.

We have another one, Sammy (Morris). I think that's something we've always looked at as a two-starter position, the running-back position. That has been my history as a coach, to always have two guys at that position that can play and share the load.

We have a sense of urgency about trying to get him ready, but we're not going to rush him and put him in a position where it's not going to be something he can have success at.

There is no doubt that quarterback is a critical position in every organization. That really has to be something that we look at to make a good assessment on how we move ahead at that position. We like all of the quarterbacks that we have here, but if we get an opportunity to improve the quality at that position, we most certainly will.

We're not making any changes at that position right now. This should not be an issue. We don't want it to be an issue. I know y'all are going to try to make it an issue.

It would be very unfair to put it on that position when things aren't being done well around them.

We had a great first drive. We looked like a good football team, but we've got to do that with consistency. We just have to take advantage of field position when we get it.

We are going to get the quarterback ready that is going to play in the game and we are going to try and get the backup ready to be the backup. It is really insignificant to me, because there are players at every position that get limited amounts of reps to be backups and if something happens to the guy ahead of him, whether they are having trouble performing, they get injured or whatever, that guy has got to get you through the game.

The No. 1 thing is we want somebody who is going to manage the game and give us the best opportunity to be successful. We were going to make the decision based on this position based on who we felt would give us the best opportunity to win, and managing the game is a really important part of that.

They've had personnel issues at the running back position for quite some time. They are getting those guys back now and I think those guys are playing better and better. I think they're as healthy as they've been all year. I think that's the key to it. They ran the ball effectively down here. Heath Evans was basically playing tailback. I don't think there is anything wrong with their running game; I just think that they haven't had all the players available in all the right spots being healthy this year that can help them develop the running game more quickly, but it's certainly developing nicely now.

The number-one thing is we want somebody who is going to manage the game and give us the best opportunity to be successful. We were going to make the decision based on this position based on who we felt would give us the best opportunity to win, and managing the game is a really important part of that.

We missed a couple of throws and had a couple of turnovers. . . We made some big plays on defense, which helped us. We just have to take advantage of the field position when we get it.

We tried to put ourselves in a position that that wouldn't be a factor for us right now.