When Nick Saban, the legendary University of Alabama football coach, announced his retirement at age 72 in January 2024, various analysts and colleagues depicted his departure as the end of an 'epic era' of coaching. 'WOW! College football just lost the GOAT to retirement,' the outspoken University of Colorado coach, Deion Sanders, stated on X. Sanders went on to lament how college football has changed so much that it 'chased the GOAT away.' However, as the author of a book on the racially exploitative nature of college sports, I don't see Saban as having been 'chased away.' Rather, I see Saban's retirement as his stepping away from an evolving college sports system that is increasingly empowering athletes in ways that he vocally condemned. Saban is outspoken about his discontent with recent rule changes concerning name, image and likeness, or NIL. The new rules allow college athletes to sign endorsement deals and profit from their reputation. Saban felt the NIL changes would allow...
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