Rob Carr / AP

Nick Saban left the Miami Dolphins to become the new coach at Alabama.

Saban wants to be understood -- and embraced. Little Nick from the hills of West Virginia is a happily married man. Wife Terry has been described as "bubbly" to me. Opposites attract, right?

"She got me on Valentine's Day last year," he says, smiling. "She wanted a grandfather clock. I told her we already had enough furniture and asked her for another idea. She said: Well, just take me out to eat. I told her: Go out and get your clock."

It's not that Saban doesn't enjoy eating out, he just knows folks will congregate around his table.

"I don't mind it," he says. "I love people. But I feel for the people sitting with me. My wife and children like to have time with their father. It bothers them more than me."

Yeah, Saban really has a home life. But he fesses his 16-year-old daughter Kristen is impacted by the things she reads about her father.

"I tell her not to worry about it," he says.

Saban's 20-year-old son Nicholas goes to school at Piedmont College in Georgia. Football isn't his thing. Music is. He plays in a band. And, no, he doesn't have an earring or tattoo.

"He burns all of my CDs for me," says Saban. "It amazes me how kids of his generation are into music from when I was in college. He really likes Jimi Hendrix, The Who, The Eagles, bands like that."

Before I leave, Saban shows me around. He has many artifacts from his career displayed. But he focuses on a picture on his desk of his daughter in a cheerleading outfit. Behind his desk on a shelf is a photo of Saban playing catch with Nicholas during Saban's days with the Cleveland Browns. He smiles.

"Family time is important," he says. "We have a place in northern Georgia in the mountains. We go up there in the summer and wake board, go tubing. If people could see me in that setting ..."

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