Saban is a wealthy Catholic. Everybody knows that automatically makes you a Dim like being a slave owner. :)
It’s all about recruiting. He needed to endorse a Democrat, so he endorsed the least radical one he could find.
It’s because he’s a government employee, a large number of them are Democrats.
Manchin was a family friend of the Saban family while they were growing up in WV. Saban’s dad even coached him when he played youth sports. Manchin is a rare Blue Dog Democrat who is more conservative than most GOP in his neighboring state of Ohio. Even though he did vote to confirm Kavanaugh, I still hope he loses.