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Alabama head coach Nick Saban smiles during a T.V. spot at the Rose Bowl before the NCAA BCS National Championship college football game between Auburn and Florida State Monday, Jan. 6, 2014, in Pasadena, Calif. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

TUSCALOOSA, Alabama -- Kirk Herbstreit never flinched, no matter how strong the rumors surrounding Nick Saban's future grew.

A longtime friend of the Alabama coach, the ESPN college football analyst read all about the Cleveland Browns' interest in Saban in 2012 during and after the Crimson Tide's run to a second consecutive BCS National Championship. And when the sports world waited to see whether Saban would entertain the longtime interest Texas had in him, Herbstreit simply waited for the coach to announce he was staying at Alabama.

Herbstreit doesn't pretend to know when Saban will call it quits at Alabama, but he has a fairly good sense of what the coach might do next.

"Nick Saban will be on the set with us before he's a coach in the NFL," said Herbstreit, who broke the news of Saban's agreement on a new contract with Alabama in December. "I really believe that after he's done at Alabama, whenever that time is, whether it's a year, five years, whatever it is, I really believe there's an itch there about becoming an analyst."

Those behind the scenes at ESPN would be thrilled to see Saban scratch that itch -- whenever it may be. Though the sample size of Saban's extended TV appearances is relatively minimal, most believe he'll be strong in the role.

"On camera, he's a magnet," said Lee Fitting, who produces the Worldwide Leader's wildly famous College GameDay pre-game show. "He's got a great way of expressing the game of football that hits both the hardcore fan and the casual fan by the way in which he explains it."

His status as one of the most successful coaches in college football history is certainly part of the draw. How comfortable he looks in front of a camera -- after years of glaring into them during some of his more heated press conference moments -- is what makes him so appealing to the Worldwide Leader.

"He's camera savvy, which is something that is very unusual for someone that hasn't done as much TV as Coach has," Fitting said. "He's sort of got it all, which is crazy."

Saban will have many more opportunities to grow even more comfortable before ESPN's cameras with Thursday's launch of the SEC Network. Already over the past month, Saban went through his annual "Car Wash" in Bristol, Connecticut, with ESPN and recorded an analysis segment with former Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy. A film crew from the network spent days with Saban during the first week of preseason camp for an upcoming "All-Access" segment and the GameDay bus was on campus today.

Nick Saban at ESPN Car Wash - July 22, 2014 6 Gallery: Nick Saban at ESPN Car Wash - July 22, 2014

Though South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier expressed concern with the amount of access granted to the network -- a similar complaint levied years ago by then-Texas coach Mack Brown about The Longhorn Network -- Saban casually brushed it off as no big deal.

"I think it's great. I think it's great exposure," Saban said. "There will be some obligations from a network standpoint that I would say that every coach in the league sort of welcomes relative to what it can do for the league and the exposure it can give your particular school or program."

The perception that Saban detests media coverage in the same fashion as one of his top mentors, New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick, is misleading, Herbstreit and Fitting said.

Herbstreit first connected with Saban during the coach's days at Michigan State in the late 1990s (by then, Herbstreit, a former quarterback at Ohio State, was at ESPN). The two bonded when Herbstreit stuck up for Saban amid a storm of criticism after he left for LSU. Fitting and Saban go back to Saban's early years with the Tigers, as Saban opened the doors to ESPN for a full week of all-access coverage leading into a game against Tennessee.

Saban first appeared in a "College GameDay" analyst role before the 2011 BCS National Championship between Auburn and Oregon.

Fitting said he's never surprised when Saban agrees to appear for extended segments on "College GameDay," even when it's hundreds of miles away from Tuscaloosa, in frigid Indianapolis, one week after a crushing Iron Bowl defeat. Saban joined the GameDay crew there to help break down the Auburn-Missouri SEC Championship and other games during the three-hour broadcast outside Lucas Oil Stadium.

One month later, he was on the GameDay set in Pasadena before, during and after Florida State's BCS National Championship victory over Auburn at the Rose Bowl. As he analyzed the Seminoles' second-half comeback win, a handful of Florida State fans nearby chanted, "We want 'Bama!"

"He loves ball," Herbstreit says. "I think it's the idea of sitting around with three or four guys he likes, talking about college football and having to do a little bit of homework on studying this offense or this defense...

"I think he enjoys it like you and I, two other guys talking about March Madness."

Like a freshman defensive lineman learning the college football playbook, Saban has improved with "a few reps," said Herbstreit. Saban takes lengthy notes during pre-production meetings, the analyst said, and asks everyone for feedback, including the cameramen.

Before heading to Pasadena, Saban watched hours of Florida State film.

"He's really attacking it and pursuing it as if he is studying and working as a football coach," Herbstreit said. "I think the idea of learning a new craft is something different is very intriguing. He's not just mailing it in by any stretch of the imagination. He really works at it and prepares. It's not just the football part of it, but the TV part of it he's enjoyed preparing (for) and trying to learn more about."

Richard Deitsch, a reporter for Sports Illustrated who covers sports media, said ESPN's top executives are "as high on Nick Saban as an analyst post-coaching as I've ever heard them talk about a current active coach working today." Beyond the reasons already stated, Saban adds value because he would be a defensive-focused coach on a network full of former quarterbacks, running backs and wide receivers.

Though Saban could certainly cut it as an in-game analyst – as Ohio State coach Urban Meyer did for a season after resigning from Florida – Deitsch said Saban would be best as a studio analyst alongside others whom he can feed off.

"He wouldn't just have to be focused on one game," Deitsch said. "He could talk about trends in the sport, he could talk about different games that are coming that weekend. He's also not over the top schtick like (Dick) Vitale or Lee Corso or some of these other guys. He's selling credibility. He's not selling persona."

Fitting said he expects to have a conversation with Saban whenever he decides to retire from coaching -- no matter how far down the road it is.

"It's definitely something he can do post-coaching. It's something he can do while he's coaching," Fitting said. "We're always keeping our options open."