Happy Thursday, everyone. Yesterday was Alabama’s time at SEC Media Days, and Kalen DeBoer is hyper-focused on the first game.
Kalen DeBoer knows how big Alabama’s opener against Florida State is.
It’s the only game the Crimson Tide coach brought up unprompted. It’s a test against a team that has “something to prove, as well.” It’s a true road game, a setting Alabama struggled with in its first year of the DeBoer era with losses to Vanderbilt, Tennessee and Oklahoma away from Tuscaloosa.
But to DeBoer,
ADit all boils down to one simple reality: Florida State is first up for Alabama. It’s the opponent currently in the way of each of the Crimson Tides 2025 hopes.
“We don’t need to look anything beyond that as far as our preparation or what might lie because none of it matters unless we take care of business and do what we’re doing, being our best in that week one game against Florida State,” DeBoer said.
This needs to be the approach. Lest anyone forget, Alabama’s last road trip as a heavy favorite was the 24-3 no show effort in Norman. Surely the guys who return will be motivated to get the taste of that late season swoon out of their mouths.
DeBoer has won an awful lot in his career, but playing down to competition has been a concerning trend.
Q. You’re 15-3 against top-25 teams. 10 of your 13 losses have come against unranked teams, games you were favored in. How do you find ways to be more consistent and win the games you’re ‘supposed to win’?
KALEN DeBOER: Yeah, I think it’s learning from those mistakes. A lot of those losses happened in year one at different places. So you want year two to be moments of growth, where you can polish and clean things up. Areas where you installed offense, defense, special teams schemes that are just now your foundation. You never are taking it for granted. You’re starting over from scratch every season. Now you build on tangents which you have that help you win more football games. A lot of it comes down to those big moments, building a culture where you keep fighting till the very end. There’s going to be a lot of close games. A lot of those wins you’re talking about came down to the very end, moments where it looked bleak at times. You fight, execute, find a way to win. That’s what we’ve got to do here going into year two at Alabama, as well.
One of the more absurd storylines of the offseason was addressed as well: Thomas Castellanos “disrespecting” the Tide.
Fast forward to Wednesday, and the Alabama linebacker was asked during an appearance on “SEC This Morning” about those comments.
“It definitely ignites us a little bit,” Lawson said, per On3. “We can’t really think too much on that, because it’s just going to come down to what we do, and how we prepare that week.’
At that point, Lawson sent a simple message: “All disrespect will be addressed accordingly.”
Later in the morning Keenan was even more succinct: “Disrespect will be addressed.”
Whatever. Just show up and execute, aight?
As you know, Kadyn Proctor is a massive human being. He spoke about his efforts to stay fresh in spite of that.
“The narrative right now is, if you’re big, you stink, you smell, you’re sweaty,” Proctor said. “That’s not how it goes for me.”
It goes back to Proctor’s days in elementary school in Iowa. His dad put a little cologne on him one day.
“Go to school smelling good for the little ladies,” Proctor said.
His passion for cologne only grew from there. He doesn’t yet have his own cologne brand, though.
“That’s not really the motive right now,” Proctor said. “It’s really about smelling good.”
Proctor has tried to get the good scents to spread to other Alabama players.
“Everybody is getting into it now,” Proctor said. “Wilkin Formby is the next best at it.”
We’re a long way from the days when offensive linemen embraced their stank.
Take this quote about Alabama’s 2024 offense as you will.
It’s not only because of Alabama’s addition of Ryan Grubb, the Crimson Tide’s new offensive coordinator who’s been closely tied to DeBoer throughout his coaching career. It’s a matter of reps and experience.
“I think football, if you’re doing what you should be doing, you should always be built around your personnel,” DeBoer said on ”The Millers’ Edge” podcast July 15. “Both sides of the ball, all phases. … It starts with your quarterback. I think you’re always going to evolve as you go through a season. And last year we evolved in some ways, but I think we were still limited. I don’t mean limited because of the players. I just think it’s limited because of the amount of work, the volume of work that you had together.”
Longtime LSU beat writer Scott Rabalais made this observation about the day.
1. Is Bama still Bama?
There’s a certain electricity absent from SEC media days, and it’s easy to define: Alabama’s mystique has left the building. The Crimson Tide looks like Alabama and talks like Alabama, and the Tide certainly still must be respected as a CFP contender. But after going 9-4 this past season, Kalen DeBoer’s bunch doesn’t strike preemptive fear into the hearts of other SEC teams like it did under … you know who. LSU plays at Alabama on Nov. 8.
Michael Casagrande noted something similar.
The lobby on Alabama day at SEC media days in Atlanta in 2018 and 2025. pic.twitter.com/tep6OZhKBv
— Michael Casagrande (@ByCasagrande) July 16, 2025
All KDB needs to do is win a national title and things will look a lot like that 2018 photo again.
No pressure, Kalen.
Surprise! The plaintiffs’ attorneys aren’t happy with the recent guidance from the NCAA that prohibits NIL collectives from directly signing players to NIL deals.
Kessler’s letter specifically targeted a memo sent to NCAA schools on Thursday from the College Sports Commission, the new enforcement entity designed to prevent what administrators describe as “phony” booster compensation to athletes. The CSC notified schools on Thursday it was denying dozens of NIL deals for not meeting the definition of a “valid business purpose,” many of those collective contracts with athletes. The memo explained that collectives, or any entity, whose sole existence is to raise money to pay college athletes does not meet the definition.
The plaintiff attorneys disagree. They hold authority over many decisions related to enforcement of the revenue share.
In the letter, Kessler writes that collectives should not be treated differently as other businesses. The letter requested that the power conferences — the creators and administrators of the CSC — retract the memo and, presumably, reinstate those NIL deals that were denied, or else attorneys will bring the matter to Judge Nathanael Cousins, the appointed magistrate in the settlement who has been appointed to resolve such disputes.
Sankey said Wednesday he believes that the College Sports Commission’s memo is “consistent” with settlement terms. Asked whether those collective deals not cleared would be reinstated, Sankey said, “It’s hard to predict the direction right now.”
There were seemingly easy workarounds here anyway, but when all is said and done the House settlement really isn’t going to have much of an effect on current players. Money has shifted away from the non-revenue sports, but that was already happening as booster donations to athletic departments were redirected to the NIL collectives.
Last, had to give a plug to Birmingham based Milo’s. Their burger gravy may be controversial, but shutting down one of the tea manufacturing plants in order to bottle water for the Texas flooding victims is pretty damn great.
Disasters. Yesterday, we made the decision to pause tea and lemonade production at Milo’s Tea Company, Inc. at our Tulsa, Oklahoma plant - not for a business reason, but because our neighbors in Texas need clean drinking water more than anything else right now, and disaster relief is something we feel strongly about.
On Sunday, five truckloads - 124 pallets and more than 119,000 bottles - of Milo’s bottled water will arrive at the San Antonio Food Bank to support flood relief efforts in a community that’s experienced unimaginable loss. As a mother, wife and human, my prayers go out to all those impacted by the horrific flooding in Texas.
Kudos to them.
That’s about it for now. Have a great day.
Roll Tide.
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