Aggies head coach Jimbo Fisher is never one to shy away from an opportunity to speak about the Texas A&M Football program under his leadership, as the team is officially two weeks away from their season opener on Sept. 3rd against Sam Houston State. In a recent sitdown interview with Chris Low, senior writer at ESPN, Fisher briefly expressed confidence going into the 2022 season, while asked in depth about the current status of his relationship with Alabama head coach Nick Saban, referring back to their early May spat after Saban accused Fisher of “buying” his 2022 recruiting class.
“We’re talented and have established that we can start stacking a huge number of the right guys in our program,”
“We’ve still got great challenges this year. We gotta go prove it. Hey, it’s time to shut up and play, just go play. Don’t worry about what people say. Don’t worry about what happened this summer between me and Nick.
“We feel really good about where we’re going.”
“Shut up and play” or “Do the talking on the field” are widely used sayings within the football landscape as teams fail to live up to preseason expectations, and for the Aggies, Fisher knows that consecutive 8-4 seasons is not even close to ideal. Further asked about Saban, Fisher stated that even though the spat is put to bed, their longtime friendship is completely separate from their professional lives.
“Nick and I ain’t got time to call each other,” Fisher said. “It doesn’t have anything to do with like or dislike. I mean, what am I going to say if I call him — ‘Our recruiting is going well. How is yours going?’ Hell, we’re recruiting the same damn guys.”
When asked what specifically led to his outburst towards Saban regarding the comment, Jimbo explained that the use of the term “bought” is what triggered the outrage due to its blatant offense towards the Texas A&M players, and coaching staff, and the Aggie community as a whole.
“All of a sudden it’s bad because we got a No. 1 class after going 8-4?”
“Look around. When I was at LSU in 2001 [with Saban], we got the No. 1 class and were 8-4 the year before. It’s happened at other places. Alabama had a great class after they went 7-6 in Nick’s first year. Why is that any different than us? So when somebody fires at you and it’s true, it’s one thing. If it ain’t true, it’s different. If I know I’m right — and I learned this from my mother and my father — then stand your ground.
“That’s what is wrong with the world today. We compromise too much.”
After what was an apparent reconciliation during the SEC spring meetings in Destin, Florida, Fisher said that the two haven’t spoken since then. Going back to Jimbo’s “shut up and play” comment earlier, the impending matchup against Alabama in Tuscaloosa on Oct. 8th came to the forefront.
“It’s not going to be personal when we play Alabama,” Fisher said. “It’s about the players and the team. It’s never personal to me, whether it’s Nick Saban or my brother or my best friend on the other side. I’m going to compete the same way.”
Fisher also noted the importance of beating the Tide last season for the first time in his career as a head coach to the recruiting success of the 2022 class,
“Beating Alabama, a really good Alabama team, shows what we’re capable of,” Fisher said. “It sends a message, but at the same time, you can’t just go beat Bama and not finish out the regular season. That’s something we still have to learn to do, deal with success, deal with failures and go on. But it does show that we’re talented enough to stand in there and win those games.”
Asked about the state of the team for the 2022 season, and the freshman class’s impact so far, Fisher opined,
“We’re right exactly where we knew we’d probably be right now,” Fisher said. “What I mean by that is we had to make some people understand we could win a championship here. I’d won one [at Florida State], but people do see that now. Players in the state, the first year or two, didn’t know. Now guys want to come here. They don’t want to leave the state.”
“It’s eliminated complacency, because competition eliminates complacency, right?” Fisher said. “We’re as deep as we’ve been at all positions, and you better not take a day off because you’ll lose your job.”
As Jimbo Fisher embarks on his 5th season with Texas A&M, the expectations are through the roof once again, and the fast-talking former quarterback from Clarksburg, West Virginia seems ready for the challenge.
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