{"id":639544,"date":"2026-04-30T01:35:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T01:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/639544\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T01:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T01:35:11","slug":"nick-sabans-hot-mic-moment-at-nfl-draft-is-sparking-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/639544\/","title":{"rendered":"Nick Saban’s Hot-Mic Moment At NFL Draft Is Sparking Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"

NFL<\/a> fans got a little bit annoyed at College GameDay’s Nick Saban<\/a> for calling a Dallas Cowboys<\/a> draft pick “a reach” last week. But one NFL reporter believes that the fans who are annoyed at Saban are a bigger problem than the comments.<\/p>\n

On Monday’s edition of PFT Live<\/a>, ProFootballTalk’s Mike Florio posed the question why it’s suddenly become wrong to criticize player selections on draft night.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen did it become a faux pas, when did it become frowned upon to say a guy\u2019s a reach?\u201d Florio asked. \u201cWhat\u2019s wrong with that? That used to be OK, but now it\u2019s \u2018Oh, no, no, no, no, we can\u2019t\u2026\u2019 And I think it\u2019s all under the guise of, we can\u2019t undermine this kid\u2019s moment, so we\u2019re not going to say anything. They can take anyone in that spot; they can take a punter in that spot. They could take a long snapper in that spot. They could take me in that spot, and they\u2019re never going to say, \u2018Maybe we could\u2019ve gotten this guy later.’\u201d<\/p>\n

Duty to the Audience<\/p>\n

Florio’s broadcast partner Chris Simms argued that nobody wants to upset the apple cart and anger teams to the point that they lose access. But Florio wasn’t buying that argument.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhat you get with the ex-coaches is they have relationships with these teams, and these people and they don\u2019t want to offend them either. That\u2019s always going to be the question with coaches when they\u2019re on TV. Are they gonna really let you know the truth? Are they going to really let it be known, or are they going to be worried about hurting the feelings of their other coach friends in the business?\u201d Simms argued.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour loyalty is to the audience,\u201d Florio replied. \u201cYour duty is to the audience. You need to be honest with the audience. This isn\u2019t some political game. You can\u2019t worry about who may be upset because you speak the truth. If they\u2019re upset, that\u2019s their problem. Now, look, I understand that doing that can create some complications in your life. Then don\u2019t take the job. Don\u2019t put yourself in a position where you\u2019re like, \u2018Oh, I\u2019ve got to be careful what I say here. I might piss off this person. I might piss off that person.\u2019 You\u2019re going to piss off the audience because you\u2019re going to be untruthful to the audience.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JanJan 21, 2023; Kansas City, Missouri, USA; NBC Sports sideline announcer Mike Florio on field prior to an AFC divisional round game between the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> and Jacksonville Jaguars<\/a> at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-Imagn Images\u00a9 Denny Medley-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Florio might not like it, but NFL analysts are always going to be reluctant to speak critically of the people they’re in the industry with. He might feel that analysts and TV pundits have a “loyalty” or “duty” to the audience, but that’s not true.<\/p>\n

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Loyalty and duty belong to the company that employs them.<\/p>\n

If Florio is looking for more honest analysis from analysts and pundits, he should be watching how people who are self-employed with nothing to lose by making a controversial take react to the daily news of the day.<\/p>\n

This story was originally published by The Spun<\/a> on Apr 29, 2026, where it first appeared in the NFL<\/a> section. Add The Spun as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NFL fans got a little bit annoyed at College GameDay’s Nick Saban for calling a Dallas Cowboys draft…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":639545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,258676,309719,1234,1237,1240,58748,593,16751,85],"class_list":["post-639544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-chris-simms","tag-college-gameday","tag-dallas-cowboys","tag-jacksonville-jaguars","tag-kansas-city-chiefs","tag-mike-florio","tag-nfl","tag-nick-saban","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=639544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/639545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=639544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=639544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=639544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}