ATLANTA — If you’re bored of Alabama as the standard of college football, I get it.

A team that wins 5 of the past 9 national championships tends to have that kind of impact. Add in the fact that the program is led by a man who makes headlines when he smiles, and yeah, it’s understandable if the general public is a bit Alabama-fatigued.

But 47 days out from the 2018 season, I’d argue that the Tide have never been more interesting.

I’m not just saying that because there was a packed media room Wednesday in Atlanta for SEC Media Days. That’s par for the course. So was the sea of Alabama fans who welcomed Saban when he stepped onto the scene (of course ring hat guy made the trip to the new venue).

Shortly after Saban arrived to the podium, he reminded everyone that this was his 17th SEC Media Days. It showed. Before Saban even opened it up for questions, he tried to pour cold water on arguably the hottest offseason storyline since he arrived in Tuscaloosa. He might as well have told the media “you will get nothing on the quarterback battle and like it.”

“We’ll see. So some of your questions when you ask me that, I’m gonna say, ‘We’ll see.’ So don’t get mad at me,” Saban said.

We’re not mad. We’re entertained.

Credit: Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

But to be clear, we in the media didn’t just cook up this juicy Alabama storyline of Jalen Hurts vs. Tua Tagovailoa, as Saban accused us of doing. After all, we weren’t the ones who benched the 25-2 starter at halftime and put in a true freshman to lead one of the most improbable national championship comebacks ever. We didn’t spend all offseason refusing to declare a starting quarterback.

That was all Saban.

He knows better than anyone that if he wanted it to be another ho-hum Alabama offseason, he could’ve said “Jalen is still our starter” immediately after the national championship. Instead, Saban insisted on the belief that anything regarding Hurts and Tagovailoa is “still to be determined.”

Well, it wasn’t “still to be determined” in 2013 when AJ McCarron arrived at SEC Media Days following 2 years as a starter. Hurts has been a starter for 2 years, yet he was neither declared the starter, nor was he an Alabama representative at SEC Media Days.

In both cases, Alabama was coming off a national title. To suggest that those programs had the same level of offseason interest would be absurd. Had Tagovailoa stayed on the bench and watched Hurts play the rest of the title game, it would’ve been awfully similar, win or lose. Instead, Saban answered questions Wednesday about whether he thought Hurts would be on the roster when Alabama opened in Orlando in 47 days (Saban said he had no idea but that he expected that he would be there).

Much to Saban’s chagrin, Alabama is the story of the offseason. And what an offseason it’s been for the Tide. I mean, my goodness.

You had Hurts’ dad saying his son will become “the biggest free agent in college football history” if he isn’t named the starter at Alabama. You had Tagovailoa missing virtually all of the spring with a hand injury, which only added to this quarterback battle intrigue. Shoot, you even had Alabama players getting stranded on Saban’s boat and posting all sorts of videos on social media.

“It was fun to see (Saban) get worked up about something other than football,” Alabama running back Damien Harris admitted. 

(Saban made sure the world knew that the brand new boat didn’t run out of gas, but that the fuel pump didn’t work and he added that he’s been sent about 100 gas cans.)

Credit: Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

In terms of actual football business, perhaps part of this increased Alabama intrigue is partially related to Georgia’s rise. Kirby Smart being the best threat to Saban’s run of dominance certainly adds to the pressure facing Alabama. As we saw a few short months ago, the 2 programs were separated by one play, which happened to be the pass of Tagovailoa’s life.

Whether Saban admits it or not, Tagovailoa’s potential is a huge reason that his team is the talk of the sport. People like Trent Dilfer came out and said that Tagovailoa was the best quarterback prospect he has ever seen. He flashed the potential to be arguably the most talented quarterback that Alabama has ever had, at least since Saban has been in town.

That’s what this all comes down to. We saw one half of what Alabama can become. The thought of Tagovailoa starting an entire season instead of just one half is enough to intrigue any college football fan, no matter how boring they think Alabama is.

Nothing that Saban or any Alabama player said Wednesday was going to pump the brakes on the anticipation heading into 2018.

After Saban finished 30 minutes of speaking to the media in the main room at the College Football Hall of Fame, he had an off-the-cuff reaction that drew a few laughs.

“Was that it? That was easy today,” Saban said as he stepped away from the podium.

Go ahead, Saban. Keep pretending it’s another boring year for Alabama.