Thom Sigel

Andrew Whitworth says Nick Saban was the only coach willing to tell him the uncomfortable truth during his recruitment, while other schools promised he could remain a tight end, Saban told him he was actually an offensive tackle and framed the decision in a way Whitworth would remember for the rest of his life “Then Nick Saban got the job at LSU and came to my house. And basically he said, ‘I’m going to be honest with you. I don’t think anybody else is telling you this. You can go to these schools and they’ll sign you as a tight end, but eventually they’re going to move you to tackle. I want to tell you that from the beginning. If you move to tackle, I think you can play in the NFL for as long as you want and have an unbelievable career.’” “Then he told me, ‘It won’t be a 4-year decision, it’ll be a 40-year one.’ And boy, he couldn’t have nailed it much better.” “That’s what makes Nick Saban who he is. He had the ability to have a vision for his players, what they were and what they could become, and deliver that message in a way where you had to respect it.” “I think having tough conversations is probably the mark of some of the best leaders and coaches I’ve ever been around. There are a lot of people who can coach well. There are a lot of people who can lead well.” “But the elite ones can have the tough, hard conversations.” “You might not walk out of the room loving what they said, but you appreciate the message. And you appreciate the guts it takes for somebody to tell you something you might not want to hear.”