Nick Saban has never been more wrong than he was about Brock Purdy

Nick Saban can’t get them all right, but he could not have been more wrong about Brock Purdy.

Though he did offer him coming out of high school, Nick Saban slept on Brock Purdy big time.

While Saban has won six national titles at Alabama, Purdy is well on his way to being the newest sensation in the NFL. Mr. Irrelevant has yet to lose a game in his rookie season with the San Francisco 49ers. He may have only gone 5-0 down the stretch, but San Francisco might be the favorite to come out of the NFC. No team in football is hotter than the team Purdy quarterbacks.

Though nobody could have foreseen this, Saban supposedly told Purdy during his visit back in high school, “You’re below average in height. Your arm strength is whatever. Your accuracy is average.”

Purdy was a three-star prospect coming out of high school in Gilbert, Arizona. The 6-foot-1, 220-pound quarterback had 13 offers, including Alabama, but opted to play for Matt Campbell at Iowa State. Together, they achieved extraordinary things in Ames for Cyclones standards, such as playing for a Big 12 championship and winning the Fiesta Bowl over Pac-12 champion Oregon.

Clearly, Purdy is doing just fine having not played for Saban’s powerhouse program in Tuscaloosa.

Nick Saban could not have been more wrong when it came to Brock Purdy

While Saban has done just fine with his quarterbacks, as three of his former signal-callers start for NFL teams, we collectively did a disservice to Purdy by shorting him coming out of Iowa State. He may have had a down last season in Ames, but Purdy played a huge part in Iowa State becoming a force in the Big 12. They are historically a bottom-feeder and Purdy had them playing for titles…

Although Purdy landed in the absolutely perfect situation for him in San Francisco, the talent was always there. He had a way of galvanizing his teammates back in college. Now, we are so lucky to see him do that at the professional level. For him to take the reins so seamlessly after Jimmy Garoppolo went down is the stuff of legend. Purdy has made Trey Lance … largely irrelevant now.

Ultimately, this is a story about the size of the fight in the dog and not the size of the dog in the fight. Everybody loves a good underdog story, but anyone who watched Iowa State football over the last five years could have told you Purdy had the “it” factor. Though it did not work out well for him in his last year in Ames, his struggles have largely been forgotten after his great play of late.

It is way better to be good than lucky, just ask Purdy and Saban about that and they will tell you.

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