Nick Saban Kinda, Sorta Showed Some Emotion!

Nick Saban was sad once!

Alabama football is, for the most part, emotionless. They're not flashy, but they're ruthless—you don't start SEC play by outscoring your first two opponents 126-3 if you care about feelings. 

The No. 1-ranked Crimson Tide are also led by a man who would thrive just as well in Sparta as he does in Tuscaloosa. Nick Saban is stoicism personified; the only time you'll see him crack a smile is after Alabama wins the national championship, and even those are usually strained. He's just locked in, 24/7, 365. 

That's what made his press conference on Wednesday a bit unusual. Alabama plays at Texas A&M this week at Kyle Field, which is about 95 miles from Houston, and Saban was asked whether he'd do anything special for native Texans on his team who may be returning to their home state for the first time since Hurricane Harvey. 

Predictably, Saban said the team will approach the game as a business trip. Then, he told a story which revealed that he was once a normal child who gets upset about relationships and the like. 

"It's kind of like my dad used to tell me when I used to go to work at the station, my girlfriend broke up with so I was treating the customers bad," Saban said. "He said 'What's wrong with you today?' I said 'My girlfriend broke up with me.' He said 'Well, you've got one problem, but if you keep treating the customers bad you're going to have two more. I'm going to fire you and then I'm going to whip your ass for getting fired."

"Whatever happened in the hurricane happened and it's a bad thing and we want to support everybody every way we can and we certainly did that as much as we could," Saban said. "But if we don't go out there and play a good game, then we're going to have all the problems that we had with the hurricane and we're going to have the problem that we lost. So, it kind of goes back to what my dad said, I think."

I like this! Had any other coach told this anecdote, it wouldn't be news. But when someone as deadpan as Saban reveals that he actually has feelings, we can't help but feel some type of way. It's like when a girl who always ignores you finally shows you some attention.

See what I did there? I used my own childhood girl analogy!