STARS STAY WITH TIDE
In long run, delaying pro careers helps players, Alabama
As he prepared for the College Football Playoff last year, linebacker Ryan Anderson believed he was about to play his final two games for Alabama. Though he technically wasn’t a starter among the Crimson Tide’s historically deep front seven, a strong close to the season had made entering the NFL draft after his junior year a real option, particularly given the lure of guaranteed money and what it could do for his mother, who raised Anderson and four siblings by herself.
But like so many Alabama players of late, Anderson had to make a calculation: Leave after
a championship and get paid, or come back to try for another title and possibly get paid even more after another year in the NFL factory that Nick Saban’s program has become?
“I wanted to be able to take care of my family,” Anderson said. “But I sat down, and my mom told me, ‘I’ve been good without having X, Y and Z this long, so it’s not about me.’ It was my decision, and that just made me feel a whole lot better. That was the ultimate decision when she said she wanted me to come back. That was it.”
As if Alabama didn’t already have every advantage in the current era of college football, from the best facilities to the biggest support staff to the most championship rings, it has another. Whereas many of the Crimson Tide’s competitors have been gutted in recent years by early departures to the NFL, the new trend at Alabama is for players to pass up the promise of millions and finish their eligibility with the expectation that it will pay off a year later.
“This is the next step to the NFL, and it’s almost ran like an NFL organization, so coming back here you can never go wrong,” said O.J. Howard, who could have gone pro last year after his breakout performance in the national title game but chose to come back and could be the first tight end picked in 2017. “You’re going to get better and compete with the best every day and compete in the big games, so there’s nothing wrong with coming back. You really have nothing to lose.” ‘STAY AS LONG AS YOU CAN’ The resonance of that message is a major reason Alabama rolled into the College Football Playoff with a dominant 13-0 record and stands in sharp contrast to Ohio State and Clemson, its biggest rivals on the national stage over the last two seasons.
Shortly after Alabama beat Clemson 45-40 to win its fourth national title in the last seven seasons, six juniors who started on Clemson’s defense declared for the draft, though only one of them, defensive end Shaq Lawson, was a lock to be picked in the first round (three others were drafted in the second round). Ohio State suffered a mass exodus of nine juniors, including star running back Ezekiel Elliott and defensive end Joey Bosa. Even UCLA, a team that wasn’t much of a factor nationally, had six players turn professional with eligibility remaining.
Meanwhile, only two Alabama players came out early: Heisman Trophy-winning running back Derrick Henry and first team All-America defensive tackle A’Shawn Robinson, who surprisingly fell into the second round. The rest of the draft decisions all fell in Alabama’s favor, including Anderson, Howard, defensive end Jonathan Allen, linebacker Reuben Foster, linebacker Tim Williams and safety Eddie Jackson.
It raises a natural question: Why are highly rated draft prospects at Alabama largely staying for their senior years when the national trend is skewing more toward leaving at the first opportunity, given the money and risk factors involved?
“Guys who’ve been at Alabama, the former players, they tell the guys to stay as long as you can,” defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt said. “Obviously sometimes from a business standpoint you have to make a decision, but I think that has something to do with it.
“I think it starts with the environment. Kids have fun. They believe in what’s going on. I asked Jonathan Allen, ‘Why did you decide to come back?’ And he looked right at me and he said, ‘I trusted (Saban). I got to where I’m at by doing the things he said and believing in him and what goes on here, and he got the information I needed and I trust him.’ ”
TIME TO IMPROVE STOCK It’s clear that Saban’s advice on whether players should stay or go is a big part of the equation. Some could view it cynically and say a coach whose $7 million-a-year salary depends on wins and losses shouldn’t be advising unpaid college players to pass up guaranteed money, but Saban approaches it as a value proposition.
And when the difference between guaranteed salary for firstround picks and those taken in the second can be millions of dollars, it’s worth careful consideration for those who have the potential to enhance their stock.
“I think the biggest thing we try to do with our players is we try to get them to make a quality business decision,” Saban said.
“You can’t improve your value once you get in the draft. It is what it is, and what a lot of people don’t realize is everybody wants you to come out for the draft, but once you say you’re in the draft every team looks for reasons not to draft you.
“They’re making a significant investment, and they want to make sure they’re getting quality for what they want to invest in, so if guys can improve that as college players, that’s certainly something we would like for them to do, and we’ve had a significant number of guys that have done that and come back and improved their draft value.
“We’ve had guys who have gone out because it was the right thing for them to do, and they’ve done extremely well.
“Every case is different, and I think our players, because they’ve seen both sides of this, sort of understand the business side.”
Allen, who received a secondround grade from the NFL draft advisory board last year, is the embodiment of that analysis as ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. now rates Allen the No. 3 overall player.
If he ultimately gets drafted somewhere in that range, Allen’s decision to come back will guarantee him at least $16 million more on his first contract than if he had been an early secondround pick.
Though Allen said he didn’t necessarily put pen to paper and do the math on how much money he was passing up last year, he took out an insurance policy and looked more at the long-term ceiling rather than the risk of getting injured or playing poorly.
“There’s a risk in anything,” Allen said. “I felt like there was more to gain by coming back than there was to lose. I knew I could make more money if I came back, but I just focused on what I had to do to improve my draft status. I wasn’t happy with a second- or third-round grade.”
That mentality has fed on itself at Alabama and created a situation that allows Saban not only to beat his competitors on the recruiting trail with a string of top-ranked classes but also lose fewer players after their junior years, a double whammy for programs trying to knock off the Crimson Tide.
“Thankfully we have a coach around here that shoots us straight, and he cares about us enough to tell us when to come and when to go,” Anderson said. “It’s a no-brainer when you think about it.
“You can sell yourself short, or you can go back and get what you’ve worked for all your life. That’s the ultimate payday.”