Saban's Heart Is In Alabama

It's a serious week for Alabama football, but things got a little light late in Coach Nick Saban's Wednesday press briefing. And in the banter, he indicated Alabama fans don't have to worry about him going to Hollywood or Baton Rouge.

The movie, "Blind Side," about former Ole Miss football star Michael Oher being adopted by former Ole Miss basketball star Sean Touhy when Oher was an extremely disadvantaged youngster is due out Nov. 20. A feature of the movie is a number of football coaches and former football coaches playing themselves.

Alabama Coach Nick Saban is one of those coaches, playing himself when he was head coach at LSU.

On Wednesday, Saban was asked if he had any input into the dialogue, particularly a line from Sandra Bullock: "I find him extremely handsome."

Saban didn't blush, but was quick to point out that the line was not from Bullock, but rather from her character. "That was really what Leah Ann said when I came to the house," Saban said. "It's in the book."

Bullock plays Sean Touhy’s wife and Tim McGraw plays Touhy.

Saban, who has not seen the movie, said he didn't have input into dialogue, but did say that the director gave him permission to ad lib.

Saban pointed out that he wouldn't say what the script said if he was on a recruiting call. The director said, "Say it however you want to say it."

Saban said, “Tim McGraw and Sandra Bullock were both – talk about consummate professionals in terms of helping people who had no experience in doing these things. They wee very helpful and it was actually fun.

You know I don’t do many things like this and I had turned down doing this to start with. I don’t want to want to say any names, but someone who is a very influential person called me and asked me to do it for Michael Oher and for the Touhy family, so I ended up doing it.

“I didn’t want the people from Alabama...but it’s a story thing. But my heart’s here, and nobody has to worry about any of that stuff, especially this week."

It was an eventful long weekend for Saban as his movie work was only part of his expereince.

“I actually did that on Friday and Talladega (where he was Grand Marshal) on Sunday. Neither of those have I ever experienced. It was like going on vacation with those two deals in entirely different ways.”