TEXAS Strike Gold: Jalen Milroe Leaves ALABAMA to Join Longhorns Roster He Announced…
No caked is baking at the Mal M. Moore Athletic Facility this August.
Of course, Nick Saban isn’t the coach anymore to make that analogy like he did a year ago when Alabama football had a quarterback competition brewing. But there also is no starting quarterback competition. That cake was baked a long time ago.
Jalen Milroe is the starting quarterback, and any chance new coach Kalen DeBoer has had to say otherwise, he has always pointed to Milroe being the top guy at the position and the passer getting the reps with the first team.
And it sounds like Milroe has not only gotten those reps but also made the most of them. On Sunday, DeBoer praised Milroe for the weekend he had. The coach also said his quarterback threw the deep ball Sunday as well as he’d seen him throw it.
“I thought yesterday and today, took the best steps I’ve seen since I’ve been here,” DeBoer said on Sunday. “The way he’s intentional about coming out. Even not just what you say, but how you do things. What your body language is and he gets that. That’s important, but he’s actually just really leading that way and then it leads to really him playing well and the other guys following suit.”
AL.com spent Wednesday morning watching Milroe and the quarterbacks work during the media viewing period that lasted about 25 minutes. Here’s what we noticed.
Alabama football observations: Quarterbacks
- The Crimson Tide held practice inside the Hank Crisp Indoor Facility on Wednesday during the viewing period.
- No drills during the media viewing period provided an opportunity to see offense vs. defense. So the quarterback drills we witnessed primarily included working against air or offensive players standing in for defensive players.
- The pecking order through drills always started with Milroe. Then Ty Simpson always went next. For the third quarterback, it depended on the drill. In full offense walk throughs, Dylan Lonergan and Austin Mack split reps with the third offense. Then in a handoff drill, the order went Milroe, Simpson, Mack, Lonergan then walk-on Cade Carruth. That order continued in a passing drill where quarterbacks threw to tight ends.
- Mack is literally head and shoulders above the rest of the quarterbacks. His height stands out immediately when looking at the group as a tall quarterback. He’s listed at 6-6, four inches taller than Milroe, who’s certainly not a short quarterback.
- It’s clear Milroe and Simpson have a leg up on the other quarterbacks in the room. Simpson seems to be the second option behind Milroe, which
