COMMENTARY: Recruiting increases Tide and Tiger fans' madness

[DKW 86 7,423]

COMMENTARY: Recruiting increases Tide and Tiger fans' madness

By Josh Moon

I came to a realization last week that Auburn and Ala bama fans are completely different people.

I know that seems like a rather obvious statement, but let me explain. You see, all this time I believed that AU and UA folks were essentially built the same way. They both have an unhealthy love of football. They both will defend their programs and coaches to the death. And they each despise the other's program.

Take away the orange and blue and crimson and white getups and these people are interchangeable, right?

Not so. We're dealing with two sets of people who are approaching life from vastly different perspectives. And last week's reaction to National Signing Day proved that.

The Auburn folks are building bunkers and waiting on the world to end. The Tide faithful are snatching up lottery tickets and washing their cars on cloudy days.

It's optimism vs. pessimism.

It's "The sun will come out tomorrow" vs. "We're all gonna die."

It's "It's gonna work" vs. "Ain't no way."

Honestly, I've never seen two groups go more overboard -- albeit in opposite directions -- in my life. You would have thought there was an actual football game played last Wednesday and that the Tide had steamrolled Auburn.

Instead, all of the cheering and hand wringing was over the signing of high school players who may or may not contribute to future successes. And based solely on that, Tide people are deciding where they'd like the next national title trophy to sit and the Tiger fans are putting together scrapbooks so they can remember what it was like when Auburn fielded a football program.

It's nuts.

Look, Alabama fans should be happy over this recruiting haul. In fact, they should be thrilled with what Nick Saban and his staff pulled off. Hopefully, it will be the starting point for turning the UA program around.

But that's all it is -- a starting point. It doesn't mean the Tide is now a favorite to win the SEC next year or even the next. It doesn't mean it can end the losing streak to Auburn. It just means that there's a good chance this program can do both at some point down the line.

On late Wednesday, for the most part, I think the majority of Alabama fans were saying just that. There was just the right amount of tempered optimism in regards to what this signing class truly meant.

But then Thursday and Friday rolled around, and people ran out of sane things to talk about. So instead of closing their mouths and moving on to other things, they kept talking. That's where the trouble started.

We were all treated to hours of discussions on how many future NFL draft picks are in this class. How this class is reminiscent of the 1975 class that won three SEC championships and a national title. And how this class has the potential to make Alabama an SEC contender as early as this season.

It went from ecstatic, yet relatively sane, to ecstatic with big doses of crazy.

Over on the other side of the state, the atmosphere was almost exactly the opposite. By the end of Wednesday, it was like everyone in Auburn had spent the day watching "Old Yeller."

Judging from the "May God help us" posts on message boards and calls to radio shows, you would've thought Tommy Tuberville and staff had forgotten about signing day altogether (you know, the way Jeff Lebo does).

Some speculated that this might really be the beginning of the end for Tuberville. They questioned his recruiting skills. They questioned his dedication to the program. They questioned Auburn's chances in future games against the Tide.

And what brought about this display of angst? Auburn's 19th-ranked recruiting class.

That's right, the Tigers had the 19th best class in the country. A class that 100 other Division I-A teams would've loved to sign.

But that didn't matter. Alabama was one of the 18 that did better. So Auburn fans, who for some reason still believe Alabama is the measuring stick for college football success, think their coaches failed miserably, and that the end of a pretty good run is now right around the corner.

The reaction from both sides is rather comical if you stop and think about it. You've got all this emotion, all of this excitement, all of this heartache over an absolute unknown. Because until those kids get on the field and prove it, no one knows how this year's recruiting classes are going to pan out.

But hey, why wait and see? It's a lot more fun to celebrate or worry now.

Josh Moon can be reached by e-mail at jmoon@gannett.com.

[BAMMERPERRY 0]

Moon is a barner.

[AUslug 1]

If Paul Gattis had wrote that you would have been all over his jock.

[OldNewby 27]

Moon is a barner.

Alabama signed a great class of recruits. Several programs did. The potential is there. Changing potential into results is the test. Would Auburn like to have some of the recruits Alabama signed? Yes. We signed who we signed, and they are the future players we have to work with. I believe we signed players with a lot of potential. Time will tell, along with consistently signing talented classes, and developing potential into winners on the field.

[WarTiger 3,901]

I'd like to know where all these auburn fans are that think uat is the measuring stick for college football success. I sure haven't ever encountered any, unless he's talking about the fake auburn fans like some we have here.

I also don't see any auburn fans saying our success is over because of some "on paper" success. He's obviously far out of touch with the auburn fan base if he really believes those two statements. I know we have a few doom and gloomers here that want nothing more than for auburn to fail, all while professing to be auburn fans themselves, but out in the real world, they simply aren't there.

[SouthLink02 8]

Saban will make Alabama an eventually SEC Champion, imo

Not an every year champion but a champion in either 3-4 years

But, I think that means the Iron Bowl will eventually start to be a battle of Top 10 teams which is good for you all (with wins) and good for people like me who enjoy watching football

AU has no real reason to worry though as Tubs has shown to be a consistent SOLID winner who will never put AU in a type of situation where you all will need to spend years "rebuilding" which is a plus

[mcgufcm 4,096]

I agree with slink with one rephrase: $aban will make them a championship CONTENDER in 3-4 years. It's almost impossible to predict what will happen in the SEC this coming year; there's no way to call it 4 years from now.

Heck, winning an SEC title all needs a touch of luck combined with great coaching and boatloads of talent. Here are some examples of what I mean by luck:

2002 UGA – arguably the best team UGA has fielded since the early 80s. They needed a fourth down miracle in Auburn or else THEY DON'T EVEN MAKE IT TO ATLANTA. That's right. Lose that game (assuming Auburn beats Bama the week later) and the SEC title would've been Auburn vs. Zook's Gators.

2005 UGA – this thing could've broken nine different ways. As it was LSU makes it to ATL on the back of five missed Auburn field goals and UF blows an eastern division lead by losing to Spurrier's Gamecock. All four of those teams could've won that thing.

2007 LSU – got miraculous comebacks on the field and every loss by an opposing team it needed all season long. This team was the definition of luck and talent.

I mean you could do this for days. My point is, $aban is going to get Bama back to the level where LSU and Auburn fans don't make fun of undefeated Tide teams (like we did in 2005 when they were never a threat). In 3 years or so I fully expect them to be on the same list as Auburn, LSU, UGA, UF, and UT... viable championship contenders when they have schedules and breaks in their favor. I won't go so far as to say that Bama will win an SEC title in that time. That's often a measure of luck as much as skill.

[WarTim 3,456]

The $4million dollar boy will have long since left town when ANY of these "signees" "graduate" from the smaller school in west vance.

sabear in just a better paid flipper-dumbose-fifthchoiceone.

Seven is on the way.

Any of you west vancesters taking this bait?

[runswithscissors 33]

Moon is a barner.

while he may be an AU beat writer, i don't see where the article is THAT far off. some of the main points:

-Alabama signed a great class. what they can/will do remains to be seen.

-this may be a turning point for our program, it may not be. we might go out and win the SECCG this coming season, we might not. who knows. but getting this amount of talent in is a good start to attaining that goal in a few years maybe.

-some of our fans turned outright stupid because of this class. yes, we brought in some top shelf talent. yes i am freaking ecstatic about it. but how about we not let it go to our heads too much until they start kicking some butt on the field? then we'll see about talking some smack.