After sleeping on it, I'm more convinced than ever that Ms. Terry never intended for her comments to sound quite as portrayed in the article and we are probably making a bigger deal out of this than we should. It was poorly worded and ill-timed, but I don't want to rehash all of that again. However, I would like to weigh in on the "fan expectations" discussion just a bit.
What exactly is wrong with Bama fans expecting to win every game? Good Lord, that's part of what makes this place so special. For years I've heard other fans say "You Bama fans expect too much, you can't accept that you can't win them all." My response to that is "You're doggone right we expect too much. I wouldn't want it any other way". Now, our own fans are starting to say that's not acceptable? Please. If we settle for anything less we are no better than that cow college in Lee County.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not approving of any sense of entitlement - quite the opposite. I don't get excited when we bellyache after losses - all fans do that - but we bellyache after sloppy wins and if it's done in a spirit of wanting our team to be the best it can be then that's just fine with me. To me, that's the antithesis of entitlement, not the symptom of it. Entitlement says "Yeah, we play like crap sometimes but it's OK, we're Alabama and we'll win anyway". Instead, I think Coach Saban has "processed" us to the point that we say "Hey, we played like crap and were fortunate to win that one. We better get our act together or freakin' Ole Miss will beat us next week". I'm not talking about unnecessary hand wringing (of course we have too much of that, too) but legitimate, intelligent analysis of our team's vulnerabilities and the desire to eradicate every one of them, dominate our opponent, and make them quit!
I'd much rather have that than the "moral victories" other fans cling to and I much prefer that to the general indifference and bandwagon fan mentality of, say, Miami or USC fans. I'm still going to support Bama no matter their record and I think most true fans would say the same, but that doesn't mean we have to eschew our love for winning. We are Bama fans - winning with class is the only expectation that there should be.
