ClayNation: 'Bama folks have plenty to do in April ... but opt for football

So, 92,138 Alabama fans showed up for the spring football game in Tuscaloosa last weekend. That's a higher attendance than any regular season NFL game last season, even though people got turned away from the spring game because the stadium was full.

Not bad for a basketball school like Alabama. Imagine how many people would have gone if people actually cared about football in the state. No matter how you slice it, that's a pretty impressive turnout. Although I was a bit disappointed that Nick Saban didn't bring out Mike Shula to announce that henceforth, in Shula's honor, all field goals from inside of 10 yards were going to be referred to as Shulas in the Alabama record book.

More than 92,000 at a spring football game? That's Alabama for you. (AP)

That would have been a really nice gesture.

But for some reason, everyone wants to know what I think about this massive attendance. And, of course, by everyone I mean six readers who e-mailed me about the Alabama spring game. First of all, I'm going to have to reconsider my suggestion that Alabama football fans look at Kentucky basketball fans and think they're crazy.

I said that a couple of months ago, but it's gotten to the point where week to week I'm torn on which fan base is crazier. I have the same issues when it comes to deciding between Flavor Flav and New York. Secondly, just wow. I've been to spring football games before. And they're incredibly boring. I can't even imagine going to one where I didn't have a row in front of me to stretch out my feet and couldn't get to the front of the nacho line in a hurry.

So congrats to Alabama fans for bumping up the craziness quotient to an even higher degree in the ongoing Alabama football vs. Kentucky basketball craziness battle. I'm sure Kentucky basketball fans consider themselves suitably challenged and I can't wait to see what their response will be.

Since 92,138 people are willing to show up for a scrimmage featuring a Nick Saban-coached team, here's another fun debate without an answer: What sort of outlandish stuff could Nick Saban get away with in Tuscaloosa right now? I mean, if Saban showed up at the Tuscaloosa country club shirtless, wearing a straw hat, made it rain at the club bar and put his cigar out in a maitre d's eye, how many people in Alabama would be like, "Awww y'all hush. Coach didn't do nothin' wrong, just a little makin' it rain."

Put another way, if Saban did every single thing Mike Price was alleged to have done, would he even get reprimanded? (For the record, Mike Price's, "It's rollin' baby, oh, it's rollin'" line is my favorite alleged SEC coach quote of my lifetime.) I think Saban could pull the Price antics off right now. To tie this all together in one pretty bow, thanks to reader John who points out that Mike Price has been retroactively credited with "making it rain" at the Alabama strip club in his Wikipedia entry. Price just got retroactive street cred. This should be worth quite a bit on the UTEP recruiting trail. Can't you see Price sidling up to a recruit in Texas and saying, "Son, lemme ask you this, has Mike Leach ever made it rain before?"

What can Nick Saban get away with in Tuscaloosa right now? (AP)

But the worst thing about the reporting on the Alabama spring game crowds has been the responses from Yankee media members who act like the only reason 92,138 people went to the Alabama spring football game was because there was nothing better to do in Alabama during the month of April. This is just ridiculous and is a textbook example of geographism. As I'm sure y'all know, geographism is the new racism. Haven't we come too far as a country for hate language like this from Northern media? These disparaging statements are almost as dumb as every sentence uttered by hockey fans. And to put it plainly, I just won't stand for them.

So in an effort to spare my Southern brethren from unjust ridicule, I undertook some diligent research to find out what other events in the state the Alabama spring football game beat out. To ensure nothing slipped my journalistic scrutiny, I even became the first person in six years and three months to visit the Alabama Bureau of Tourism's Web site. That's why I'm confidently refuting all that hateful geographism with 12 other things to do in Alabama on a Saturday in April:

1. Go to the high school football spring game.

2. The Racking Horse Spring Celebration. Billed as the "Second largest Racking Horse Show in the U.S. with entrants from more than 25 states competiting for prestigiuos honors, cash and awards." Those two misspelled words are actually on the Alabama Bureau of Tourism's Web site. Sometimes you can't make this stuff up. Also, for the record, I have no idea what a racking horse is.

3. Go to the Auburn spring game. (Technically this was in March, but March and April are pretty close together as months go.)