If you follow either team in Alabama, you could see it coming from miles away last week. Auburn fans rarely mentioned their upcoming game with LSU. They kept living, reliving and talking about the huge upset over Georgia. Across the state, Bama fans kept up the pity party about the officiating in the Georgia loss and lack of offense against Tennessee. Texas A&M was almost an afterthought.
Auburn played LSU tough for a quarter then the wheels came off and a 50 million dollar roster’s talent overwhelmed one with a 30 million dollar payroll. Like most games, you can often pinpoint one play that was the turning point. It was the overturned interception call that went against Auburn.
To Auburn’s credit, they continued to play hard which differs from some recent years when games got out of hand. As for the Tigers, they now stand at 4-3 with 5 games remaining. They will be underdogs this weekend against Ole Miss and in the Iron Bowl (where you can throw the proverbial book out of the proverbial window.) They will be favored over Arkansas and Samford and the Mississippi State game should be a toss-up.
If chalk holds, they should make a bowl game with either 6 or 7 wins. Six wins get you to Birmingham. Seven gets you to a warm weather bowl or at least one in a domed stadium. There is still a lot of football to be played and for a team which beat Georgia on the road, anything is possible.
Years ago, Gene Stallings said there is no such thing as an ugly win. I was in the South Zone at Bryant Denny for Bama’s win over A&M and it WAS an ugly win. Sitting in the endzone suites, allows you to see the plays develop from behind the team. Former coaches and players notice poor alignments and mismatches before the snap from that angle.
The Tide’s defense keeps getting turnovers, including an early pick six by defensive back, Dijon “Jekyll and Hyde” Lee. No other player dressed in crimson can take you from the penthouse to the outhouse and back, all in one quarter. Unless you study the personnel close, you might have missed the subtle benching of Keon Sabb at safety. He is an older player, but his missed tackles and slow break on the ball has cost us too many times.
The key play in the Bama game was when A&M lined up to go for it on 4th down and fumbled the ball. According to Coach Elko, the center wasn’t supposed to snap the ball but he did and it changed the momentum of the game for the Tide.
Here is my critique of Alabama:
Keelon Russell is a special talent at quarterback. He has proven that he can make throws to change a game for the better. He has also shown he is still a first-year quarterback. Rookies try to do too much. On Saturday, he made a bone-headed throw/interception. Russell must learn to take the short checkdown or swing pass and let the other athletes do their thing with the ball.
The popular criticism for Tide fans is to throw offensive coordinator, Ryan Grubb, under the bus for his play calls. Yes, as a former college coach involved in developing an offensive game plan, there must be continuity by using one play to set up another one. Most of Bama’s plays are RPOs. That stands for “Run, Pass, Option.”
For simplicity, the quarterback “reads” a certain defender to decide whether to hand the ball off, pass it or run with it. Example: if the “read” player is the outside linebacker and he rushes in to tackle the running back, the QB pulls the ball out and hits the receiver on a slant pass where the linebacker came from.
This is a “slight” cover/excuse for Grubb’s play calling. For fans cussing and pulling their hair out over certain play calls, it might be that the quarterback missed his read and the running back got stuffed. It’s not always the play caller. I will call him out however on the quarterback sweep where Russell got upended and luckily, the fumble was overturned since his elbow hit the ground. We were sitting on a 2-score lead.
On Saturday with an 11-point lead in the 4th quarter, Bama had the perfect opportunity to check their “manhood” by going to 13 personnel (one back and 3 tight ends) and grinding it out. Coach Bryant and Coach Saban famously said, when the game’s on the line, we are going to take the ball and “outphysical”you at the point of attack. Ask any offensive lineman. They LIVE for that opportunity to put the game away without any “cutesy” plays.
The only complaint about the defense is the extra cushion our defensive backs are giving their receivers. Almost like clockwork, teams are pitching and catching on first down so we face 2nd and 2. Coach Wommack must come up with a better pass rush to slow down Kiffin’s passing attack at LSU next week. AND, eliminate stupid presnap penalties and late hits on the quarterback.
Key injuries: to run a successful RPO offense, the key players are the center (to make the line call), a wide receiver that must be double-teamed and the quarterback. For the last 2 weeks, the center and best wideout have been injured. Hopefully the off date will get both of them back.
The overall question is simple: “Is DeBoer the right person to lead the Tide?” MY short answer is “Yes.” Alabama can’t get in the “fire ‘em every third year” syndrome. I get as frustrated as any Bama fan but try to be realistic about the state of college football today. Too many spoiled fan bases (not just Alabama), want to bring up the past glory days and can’t understand why it can’t be the same. How about Nebraska, FSU, Clemson, Penn State, Michigan, Southern Cal, and Oklahoma?
Also, if you fire a coach, you better have another one lined up and ready to go. It’s like going: “Ready, Fire, Aim.” It doesn’t work.
Guess what most college coaches spend much of their time doing during the open week? Meeting with the players’ agents and representatives who are threatening to enter the transfer portal if they don’t get more playing time or more money.
And I remember when Monday Morning quarterbacking meant hitting the road recruiting during the open week.