Let Kalen DeBoer be judged in Year 2, for better or worse, for how his quarterback evaluation pans out.
Alabama not taking a transfer quarterback puts faith in longtime backup Ty Simpson.
Transfer quarterbacks dominated latest College Football Playoff. Alabama starting Ty Simpson would be a vintage move, a throwback to Nick Saban’s heyday.
No matter what happens in Kalen DeBoer’s encore season at Alabama, remember that he did not add a transfer quarterback.
That’s not a criticism. Not yet, anyway. For now, it’s just a fact.
Considering how few meaningful snaps Ty Simpson played throughout three seasons as an Alabama backup, most evaluation of him must come from what he does in practice. And, apparently, DeBoer saw enough to determine Simpson would fare better atop Alabama’s quarterback competition than one of the quarterbacks the Tide could have secured from the transfer portal.
Let DeBoer be judged on how that evaluation pans out.
Quarterback evaluation and development is supposed to rate among DeBoer’s strengths. That reputation absorbed a ding after Jalen Milroe regressed in his lone season operating under DeBoer.
In fairness to DeBoer, his hiring last mid-January put him behind the 8-ball as far as roster construction. Rolling with Milroe became the obvious and best option. Milroe’s union with DeBoer started well enough. The quarterback became a Heisman Trophy front-runner after a dazzling September, before devolving into a turnover machine.
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Onward.
DeBoer already took one step toward energizing Alabama’s offense. He’s hiring offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb, the Tuscaloosa News reported Sunday. Grubb was DeBoer’s long-time right-hand man that helped Washington reach the national title game in 2023 before spending last season in the NFL with the Seattle Seahawks.
Next up, solving Alabama’s quarterback vacancy.
DeBoer puts his faith in a quarterback who arrived at Alabama as a five-star recruit before throwing a grand total of 50 passes the past three seasons.
Simpson has not been named starter. No need for such proclamations before the dogwoods bloom. Five-star true freshman Keelon Russell spices up the competition, as DeBoer’s first quarterback signee at Alabama. Plus, there’s Austin Mack, a career backup who followed DeBoer to Alabama from Washington.
This job sure seems like Simpson’s to lose, though.
Simpson built “relationships to get ready for this chance that he has right in front of him,” DeBoer told reporters at the Senior Bowl, “to not just step up as a leader, because I think he’s been doing that, but to have that opportunity to step in and be the quarterback.’
Evaluating whether to trust incumbent options or pivot to a transfer quarterback ranks among a coach’s most important roster construction duties. Blowing that evaluation can derail a season.
For evidence of that, look no further than Alabama’s chief rival, Auburn.
Will Kalen DeBoer’s evaluation fare better than Hugh Freeze’s Auburn mistake?
A year ago, Hugh Freeze determined no transfer quarterback was worth the NIL cost it would take it to fetch him. He stuck with Payton Thorne, a veteran who’d proven an average quarterback. Freeze erred in that evaluation. Interceptions piled up throughout Auburn’s fourth consecutive losing season.
Freeze altered tactics this offseason and secured Oklahoma transfer Jackson Arnold to replace Thorne. Arnold should find Auburn’s talented wide receiving corps and veteran offensive line more to his liking than the rag-tag supporting cast who contributed to Arnold’s fizzle as Oklahoma’s starter.
Freeze, speaking to reporters at the Senior Bowl, dubbed Arnold “a natural fit” for Auburn’s needs.
Within months, Arnold went from Oklahoma’s quarterback of the future to Auburn’s solution for its problems. Such is the modern college quarterback.
Back in Nick Saban’s heyday, you’d do it like this: Sign a quarterback every year, stack them up on the depth chart, start a guy who’d waited his turn, develop younger quarterbacks, rinse and repeat.
Saban’s tenure prominently featured just one transfer quarterback, Jake Coker, and even he spent a year as an Alabama backup after transferring from Florida State.
Those were different times, with different transfer rules.
Transfer quarterbacks took over College Football Playoff
Five of the eight quarterbacks who started in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals transferred during their careers.
In this microwave age, with so many programs embracing transfers as solutions, I’m skeptical of a quarterback who’s been a backup as long Simpson.
“I love this place,” Simpson explained to the Tuscaloosa News. “If I didn’t, I would have left, you know what I mean?”
There’s no shame in staying at a premier program rather than boarding the transfer carousel, but why hasn’t he broken through? And, if he doesn’t this year, how long until Russell becomes ready?
DeBoer’s Alabama honeymoon ended months ago, around the time he lost to Vanderbilt, well before the Tide flopped in their bowl game to complete their worst season since Saban’s 2007 debut. DeBoer told me before the season he embraced Alabama’s standard to always make the playoff, and he’s not tried to spin this season into something other than what it was: a shortcoming.
The stakes couldn’t be higher or DeBoer’s second season. Saban won 12 games in his Year 2. DeBoer can’t afford to whiff on this quarterback decision. If Simpson does not steer Alabama into national championship contention – because, let’s be real, that’s the standard both quarterback and coach accepted by coming to Alabama – then that reflects on the coach who trusted him.
Eleven of the 12 quarterbacks of playoff qualifiers had become a starter within their first three collegiate seasons. The majority became starters within their first two years. Some, like Ohio State’s Will Howard, Notre Dame’s Riley Leonard and Oregon’s Dillon Gabriel, later transferred up the ladder and continued as starters at better programs.
DeBoer’s sticking with Simpson embraces a vintage roster strategy, but, perhaps, Carson Beck serves as a model for what’s possible. He spent three seasons as a Georgia backup before becoming one of the nation’s best quarterbacks in 2023. He qualified Georgia for the playoff this season before an injury kept him out of the postseason.
Never mind Beck’s regression in 2024, if Simpson mirrors Beck’s trajectory, that would be a boon for DeBoer and a credit to his trusting the veteran backup. Or, if Simpson sputters, fault DeBoer for replicating Freeze’s mistake.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer. Subscribe to read all of his columns.