Video-gate, Tuscaloosa style

Things got a little chippy during Nick Saban's Monday press conference when an Atlanta reporter asked a question about the recent NFL videotaping scandal involving Patriots coach (and Saban mentor) Bill Belichick. The reporter mentioned that Saban had been accused of something similar while head coach of the Miami Dolphins last season.

Saban didn't take too kindly to that. The following is an unedited transcript of Saban's response:

“Where did you get the information that I was ever accused of that? We were never accused of that and we never did it. We were never accused of that, that I’m aware of, and we never did it. We didn’t have any video cameras that were taping. We never got anybody’s signals. We had somebody watch their signals to see if they could figure them out, which we were never smart enough to do, either. I don’t know where that information came from.”

When the reporter acknowledged that "an editor" tipped him off about the allegations regarding Saban, the Alabama coach continued.

“First of all, I have all the respect and admiration in the world for Bill Belichick. Bill Belichick’s a good friend of mine. I think he’s a great coach. I think he’s done a great job for a long time. I hear people say in the business world sometimes, that we’re always trying to create a winning edge. We’re always trying to gain an edge that’s going to give us a competitive advantage. I think that, in sports, we all like to try to do that, but we have to be careful that we always have total respect to the rules, aight, in terms of how we go about it. Because creating an unfair advantage for yourself by breaking the rules is not something I think, that anybody wants to do or anybody should do.

“And maybe creating an unfair advantage for yourself is technically how you’ll get ahead in business, because there may not be any ethical rules about that. We have them in sports. We have the NCAA; we respect the NCAA rules. Do you make mistakes sometimes? Absolutely. Every school probably does. Are they intentional? Probably not. I don’t think anybody can respect anybody trying to gain an unfair advantage by breaking the rules.

“But Bill Belichick is a good friend of mine; I have a tremendous amount of respect for him. I worked with him a long time. I learned a lot from him. And we didn’t do those kinds of things when I worked with him and that’s really all I can comment about.”

The reporter then asked if there were rules against such practices in college football. Saban's response:

“We have rules against using photography and all kinds of stuff, and we try to abide by the rules that we have. We don’t use anything, any technology, from the press box during the game, taking pictures or videotaping.”

Though Saban was not exactly accused of using videotape to learn New England's snap counts before a December 2006 victory, two of his own players admitted that the team tried to do it. Press here for a 2006 blog entry on the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's Web site, in which Saban responds to the allegations. (The original Palm Beach Post story quoting two unnamed players about the practice has apparently been removed from the Internet).

I'm not sure what to think about the way Saban reacted Monday. Judge for yourself ...