And now we get some back-story to the Nick Saban contract extension. Per Michael Casagrande:

Speaking about the new contract extension approved this afternoon, Alabama coach Nick Saban said he was contacted about other jobs in January. But, with consultation with wife Terry, he decided to spend the rest of his career at Alabama. Saban did not identify the outside interests who made inquiries.

If that second line doesn't get your heart to racing, then you probably don't take your football seriously enough. Without checking, I imagine the odds are good that Twitter just died.

As to the school(s) in question, surely the primary culprit had to be Penn State, right? Given his youth, that probably had to be Saban's white whale on some level. Maybe, too, those Texas rumors were somewhat legitimate. It's hard to imagine any other college football job being a legitimate consideration this past season outside of those two, so you have to believe it was either Penn State or Texas if it were a college program. And if it was Penn State, we likely have no major concerns with other college programs from here on out, because the odds are very low that job comes open again in the next three or four years.

The NFL could have been a legitimate threat as well. Seven NFL teams changed head coaches this offseason, and though you can safely cross the Dolphins and Raiders off the list of potential threats, one for obvious reasons and the other for their institutional insanity, teams like the Rams, Bucs, Jaguars, Chiefs and Colts could have possibly been involved. If nothing else, surely Saban's name had to come up at some point simply as due diligence. For what it's worth, the Bucs ultimately hired Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano, so clearly they had no qualms over pursuing a college coach.

Of course, some will quickly point to Saban's ugly departure from the Dolphins as that bring being permanently burned, but that's just missing the point entirely. Anyone who doesn't legitimately believe in second acts in the NFL head coaching fraternity simply hasn't been paying attention very long, and that would almost certainly prove especially true for a head coach who rebuilt a program and won two national championships in five years following his NFL departure.

Either way, big, big relief here for obvious reasons. With Saban signing off on a long-term extension after being on the job for five years, you have to think that, even with the crimson kool-aid taken into account, he's serious that Tuscaloosa is his last stop.