Book: Tearful Saban wanted to stay at Michigan State

A remorseful Nick Saban really did consider reversing his decision to leave Michigan State for LSU in 1999, according to a new book about the Alabama football coach.

There were reports of it at the time — after comments by his friend, MSU trustee Joel Ferguson — but both Saban and Ferguson then issued statements saying that the coach just regretted leaving friends in East Lansing and had no second thoughts about the new job.

But in "Saban: The Making of a Coach," by Monte Burke — due out Aug. 4 — Ferguson paints a dramatic picture about a call he got from Saban from Baton Rouge a day or two after he had agreed to the move.

"He was down there by himself in a hotel room," Ferguson is quoted. "He was lonely without (wife) Terry there and seemed fragile. He told me that he didn't like it there, and that he didn't think he wanted the LSU job and he wanted to come back."

Burke writes that Ferguson alerted then-university president Peter McPherson, who said he "was open to Nick's return."

The next morning, Saban called then-MSU athletic director Clarence Underwood.

"It was five-thirty in the morning," Underwood is quoted. "He just said, 'I made a mistake, and I want to come back.' He said he was lonely. He was crying."

But while Ferguson tried to call him throughout the day to say, "Come back, Saban, come back," he couldn't reach him. When he did, Saban had changed his mind again.

Ferguson says: "He told me, 'Joel, this won't work. The first time I have a mediocre season up there, they'll remember this.'"

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Some LSU officials knew something was up, too, and — like a recruit they'd have to sit on until Signing Day — weren't comfortable until they introduced Saban at a news conference.

Says Charlie Weems, a member of LSU's search committee: "To this day, I believe that had the Michigan State president called Nick at any time up until the moment he stepped up to the press conference, he could have had Nick back. Nick makes these decisions reluctantly."

But often.

Saban left LSU after five seasons, for the Miami Dolphins, and the Dolphins after two seasons, for Alabama. Of course, the rest is history — he's extremely successful and still in Tuscaloosa, despite a flirtation with Texas in 2012.

The book traces Saban entire trek to Alabama and what made him the coach he is today. And author Burke said that Michigan State was an important part of that.

"This is really his first staying time as a head coach, where he was in charge of the whole program," Burke told the Free Press today. "I think he learned a lot during those five years. It's almost the apprenticeship that made LSU and Alabama possible."

In the meantime, after Saban left following his best season in East Lansing (9-2), the Spartans suffered through seven seasons and a 38-45 record with Bobby Williams and John L. Smith until Mark Dantonio — who had been a Saban assistant — resurrected the program.

But rewind to that call from Baton Rouge; Ferguson said Saban seemed fragile? That's not an adjective one usually hears associated with the Nick Saban image that fans know now.

"No — or 'sensitive,' which is how (former MSU athletic director) Merritt Norvell describes him as well," Burke said. "One of the reasons I wanted to do this book is because he seems — to those of us who just see him on on TV — kind of a one-dimensional guy. ...

"I knew there was more there. And, in the reporting of this book, found there's a lot more there. I think episodes like this, to my mind, kind of humanize him."

The Saban he found could be thin-skinned about criticism, real or perceived, incredibly tough on his assistants yet very charming to recruits and their families — especially the moms, according to former MSU coach George Perles.

"I think he's naturally shy and very introverted," Burke said. "But I found when I did my reporting with him that, in a small setting, when he's very comfortable, he's one of the most charismatic people I've ever written about."

The 324-page book grew out of a Forbes cover piece Burke did on Saban in 2008, early in his reign at Alabama, when he spent 2 1/2 days with him. For the book, Burke conducted more than 250 interviews with Saban's friends, former players, bosses, rivals, media and so on.

But not Saban.

"I actually kept him abreast of what was going on during the process of this," Burke said. "He didn't want to participate. But as far as I could tell, he didn't tell anyone not to talk to me."

Contact Steve Schrader: sschrader@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @schradz.