Alabama Unwittingly Predicts Future Failure

The sign you see here has apparently popped up in the Alabama locker room to serve as both motivation and a reminder to always learn and improve. It's a pretty well-worn sentiment, a sort of weight-room Cliff's Notes of Santayana's condemned-to-repeat-the-past quote. But the message is clear: if you keep doing the same thing, you will lose. Guaranteed.

Here's a sign that popped up in the Alabama locker room—after a crushing loss to Auburn in the Iron Bowl—in January, 2011.

Prompting this sign was a 28-27 loss to Cam Newton's Tigers (who went on to win the BCS title that year) in the Iron Bowl. Alabama lost despite jumping out to 24-0 lead. Prompting this year's sign was a loss to Auburn (who went on to play in the BCS title game) in a ridiculous Iron Bowl that featured a game-winning touchdown return off a missed field goal (and a loss to Oklahoma in a Bowl game no one cares about).

Two bitter ends and two posters, the most recent of which perhaps foretelling all the bitterness yet to come. Maybe the new offensive coordinator can lead the program out of this vicious motivational-poster-in-the-locker-room cycle 'Bama finds itself in.