3 Coaches Texas A&M Football Fans Would Love To See Alabama Hire After Saban Retires

Coaches Texas A&M Football Fans Want To See Take Over in Tuscaloosa: Bill O'Brien

Back when the Tide replaced Steve Sarkisian with O'Brien, Aggie fans were ecstatic. Like Jimbo, the game had seemed to leave O'Brien's offensive ideas behind, presenting a huge opportunity for the Aggies to take advantage of what would likely be a much worse Tide offense.

While the offense did end up being much less schematically creative than it was under Sark, it was by no means bad—thanks in large part to the ability of Bryce Young. Even so, the Aggies were indeed able to take advantage of the reduced offensive execution on the Tide's part on one perfect night in College Station in 2021, holding Bama to 10 points in the first half en route to an extremely memorable 41-38 win.

This also has a lot to do with the extremely impressive job Mike Elko did to contain the Tide offense, who, at full strength, put up 41 points on a legendary Georgia defense. They scored much less in the national title against those same Bulldogs, no doubt due to missing both Jameson Williams and John Metchie, but Elko's defense was able to stifle O'Brien's offense more effectively than nearly everyone else on the schedule. With that in mind, and Elko back in College Station as the head coach, I'm sure he, along with Texas A&M football fans, wouldn't mind seeing O'Brien back in T-Town.