This Incredible Rant By Nick Saban In 2014 About Giving People Second Chances Is Making The Rounds Because It Spits In The Face Of Cancel Culture

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I have no idea why this clip from December 2014 is making the rounds again, but it’s the first time I’ve heard it, and it’s the perfect verbal antidote to the rise of Cancel Culture. I’ve always been kind of indifferent on Nick Saban, but he just earned an admirer in me.

Saban, on the cusp of facing Ohio State in the 2014 Sugar Bowl, was asked by reporters about defensive lineman D.J. Pettway making the most of his second chance at Alabama and recently earning his degree. Pettway was dismissed from the team after being present for two assaults on campus, but after spending a year at East Mississippi Community College (the school featured in Last Chance U), was allowed to re-enroll.

That’s when the Alabama coach took the opportunity to enlighten the media with some much needed perspective.

“There’s always a lot of criticism out there when somebody does something wrong, everybody wants to know how are you going to punish the guy? But there’s not enough for 19-and-20 year-old kids people out there saying ‘why don’t you give him another chance?’

So I’m going to give a speech right now about this.

Like, where do you want him to be? Guy makes a mistake. Where do you want him to be? You want him to be in the street? Or do you want him to be here graduating?

You know when I was over there at the Nagurski (Award banquet in Charlotte, N.C.), Muhsin Muhammad, who played 15 years for the Carolina Panthers, played for me at Michigan State.

Everybody in the school, every newspaper guy, everybody was killing the guy because he got in trouble and said there’s no way he should be on our team.

I didn’t kick him off the team. I suspended him, I made him do stuff.

He graduated from Michigan State. He played 15 years in the league, he’s the president of a company now, and he has seven children, and his oldest daughter goes to Princeton.

SO WHO WAS RIGHT?

I feel strong about this now, really strong.

About all the criticism out there of every guy that’s 19 years old that makes a mistake and you all kill him. And then some people won’t stand up for him.

So my question to you is ‘where do you want him to be?’ You want to condemn him to a life sentence or do you want the guy to have his children going to Princeton?

You want to close on that?”

Expanding on Muhsin Muhammad–in 1993 campus police discovered a gun in the glove compartment of his car following a previous marijuana possession charge, Muhammad served jail time for violating probation, but was not kicked off the MSU football team.

Muhammed is now a managing director at the private equity firm Axum Capital Partners, a firm he co-founded. He created the “M2 Foundation for Kids”, dedicated to improving the mental and physical development of children and is a spokesperson for the Men For Change, an organization which helps raise money for impoverished women’s shelters. He’s adopted two of his six children from Ethiopia and his high school’s fitness center was named after him after he donated $50,000 worth of equipment.

My high school basketball coach used to say, “It’s not what happens that matters. It’s what you make happen after whatever happens happened.”

You just gotta be given the opportunity, and I think that’s what Saban is fighting for.