Interesting Comment

[FL GMAN]

While watching the college football pre game show Nick Saban made the following comment. "At Alabama we valued our safeties more than our QB's. I don't think he was kidding as it was offered in relation to the defense the team was playing that day. I know college isn't pro's, but with the devaluation of the safety position in the pro's or at least on this website I found his comment intriguing.

[DaveBrown74]

Interesting.

The first reaction I have to that is to just observe the caliber of NFL safeties Alabama has produced versus the caliber of QBs. Outside of Tua, who has been in a pretty amazing situation, I can't really say Alabama has produced many (if any) meaningfully good NFL QBs out of the Saban era. Maybe I'm forgetting someone but I'm struggling after Tua. If people want to say the jury is still out on Bryce Young, ok I guess, but I am pretty sure we are not exactly looking at a future HOF'er with him. Same with Mac Jones, who pretty much stinks.

Safety has been another story. They have produced multiple safeties from the Saban era who have been all-pros. McKinney, Collins, Clinton-Dix, and Minkah Fitzpatrick immediately come to mind. Brian Branch is 23 and pretty promising.

So, given the relative output, I'm actually not surprised to hear Saban say that. His program certainly gave the NFL much better safeties than QBs.

[ozzie]

Nick Saban is also a defensive minded guy who comes from that side of the ball, so I take that comment with a grain of salt. But, I guess he figures if you can shut down the other team's QB / Offense you have a good chance of winning.

[Jclayton92]

I think safeties are hugely underrated, just look at the Ravens, their defense was 26th-29th in most statistical categories for the first half of the season until they moved Hamilton back to deep safety and started playing the other safety. Then magically they are 1st in most major defensive stats for the 2nd half of the season.

[Bob In PA]

While watching the college football pre game show Nick Saban made the following comment. "At Alabama we valued our safeties more than our QB's. I don't think he was kidding as it was offered in relation to the defense the team was playing that day. I know college isn't pro's, but with the devaluation of the safety position in the pro's or at least on this website I found his comment intriguing.

FL-G: There's nothing wrong with that approach, but you have to consider that his school had no trouble recruiting players, which means there was always a "usable" QB or two (along with other really good skill position players) who wanted to play for Alabama. That being said, finding a safety who can cover the width of the field (enabling a lot more single-deep defenses to be employed) is like finding gold, and I agree with Nick that they are rarer than good QB's (which reminds me to continue to be pissed off that the Giants let McKinney go lol). Bob 

[TDToomer]

Safeties may be devalued and unappreciated by the Giants current and past GMS but not throughout the NFL. Hopefully Schoen has learned his lesson.