Happy Gump Day, everyone. Sorry this is out a bit late. XFinity decided to upgrade the lines in my neighborhood overnight, and only now finished. Real, C U Next Tuesday move, without notice.
Let’s see what we have on tap for Gump Day, as the Tide stares down its third straight ranked opponent. That would be daunting for most teams (and even the Tide have rarely walked away unscathed), but per the research of intrepid/autistic reader Joe Smoke, this is sort of becoming old hat for ‘Bama:
2025 is the
14th season Alabama will play three consecutive ranked teams in the regular season.
It has gone 3-0 only twice (’99, ’16). Both of those teams won the SEC title.
This is the first time [Alabama has] played 5 consecutive teams who did not have a loss at the time of the game.
Deer Lowered, that’s filthy. Nevertheless, we shall Gump in the face of the gauntlet.
—
What’s fueling Alabama’s quest for redemption and self-improvement these days?
The perfectability of the human soul? Laudable, but probably not.
An ass-chewing here and there? Yes, to some degree.
But a lot of it is developing a good ole’ fashioned grudge in the face of criticism, their own failures, and most recently rumors — such as the one about ‘Bama hitting up GrubHub in the Tallahassee hotel room. Thta was a tidbit of gossip which the team, and the coaching staff, took a bit more seriously than I would have ever imagined.
And the Tide have interpreted it precisely as it was intended: an indictment of their discipline:
“I think the noise that people just want to make things up and aren’t real about what’s going on about the night before that are completely false and [not] factual,” DeBoer said. “Those are the things that just add to the chip on your shoulder that I’ve held on, and I know our team’s held on to, and aren’t who we are. That’s not the character of us. These guys are all-in and are doing the right things.
“That’s what I reminded them of. Again, we can’t control what everyone else wants to run with or whatever storyline or how they feel. We’ve just kept enough of it alive because we don’t want to take away the focus from what’s really important, which is our preparation.”
* * *
There’s an excitement about going to battle with these guys. We’ve proven it to us, and that’s what it starts with. But I also know there’s an edge where we’re proving it to everybody else, too.”
This whole story is great, frankly. You can tell how much KDB loves this team, and how they’re responding with buy-in to the staff and one another.
A followup interview with Wilkin Formby illustrates it better than I could:
“Nobody has the ‘poor me’s or is moping around,” Formby said on Tuesday. “We have team victories, team success. So when we’re on the sideline, and one of the guards is out, and they’re watching Kam Dewberry dump somebody, we’re the biggest fans supporting him, and we’re cheering. Or if Michael Carroll lays down a big block, I’m excited because it’s a team victory. That’s how we approach this.
“I just think the way our team is, and the way it’s trending, is just such a brotherhood,” Formby continued. “I think that Coach DeBoer and Coach Ballou this offseason put a huge emphasis on that, and especially Parker Brailsford, trying to get some unity in our room and stuff. Doing things off the field has really helped our brotherhood.”
Read More:
Alabama OL Combats ‘Poor Me’ Mindset Despite Rotations
Yes, it’s rat poison. Yes, it’s noise. But it’s also deserved, because we all know who’s rocketed to the top spot of the QB rankings, and is now firmly a Heisman favorite — if not the favorite, if he posts another stout showing this Saturday.
The former five-star prospect waited three years for this opportunity and even stuck around Bama during one of the most historically significant coaching changes of the 21st century. To some, the fact that Simpson never left signaled weakness. If he were really good enough to be a Power Four starter, why wouldn’t he have transferred to a school where he could play earlier?
Or, if Simpson was really a five-star talent, how come he didn’t beat out Jalen Milroe last season? Patience has become such a lost art in college football that it can now be viewed as a negative. But even after his offensive line and star receiver Ryan Williams let him down in Week 1, Simpson has shown this season that the hype he generated as a prospect was well warranted.
When you account for the high level of competition he’s faced the past two weeks, no one in college football is playing quarterback better than Simpson is entering Week 7.
My, my how the meta has changed, huh?
Remember when some benighted people on THMB were agonizing over Simpson before the season began, yet one far-seer of near omniscience tried to reassure you of Simpson’s quality while warning you that defensive line was the actual unit to worry about? That guy is pretty sharp. Vox should definitely pay him more.
It’s hard to objectively hate Simpson’s body of work either. Even noted non-enjoyer of ‘Bama ball, Joel Klatt, is having a hard time being smarmy, observing what we all have: If Ty’s name was Manning instead of Simpson, he’d already be running away with the race.
Simpson, true to his Saban-esque coach-speak, is having none of it. To his credit, he’s just chalking it up as more outside noise to ignore — the focus is on the team.
He went so far as to call it “absurd”
“Well, thanks to him,” Simpson said. “Thanks to the guys up front. Thanks to the wideouts and the running backs. Honestly, it’s kind of absurd the talk around it. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them, and if it wasn’t for the defense getting turnovers and whatnot. That’s all external to me. I just want to do my job and make sure I celebrate in the locker room.
There were two changes finalized yesterday to the loathed/loved Transfer Portal. One was both welcome and long-anticipated. The other was a bolt out of the blue, pertaining to what happens after coaches lose their jobs or leave:
That window in 2026 will run for two weeks from Jan. 2-16. Because the 12-team College Football Playoff schedule extends deep into January, players participating in a postseason game on or after Jan. 12 will have an opportunity to start the transfer process during a five-day period that begins the day after their final postseason game.
The second alteration pertains to the transfer exceptions granted to players after coaching changes. The exception currently allows players to enter the transfer portal during a 30-day window that opens the day after their coach leaves or is fired. The committee approved a new format, however, that is shortened to 15 days and begins five days after a new coach is hired or announced, seemingly in an effort to crack down on midseason portal activity.
The latter rule may wind up being one of the most momentous, at the end of the day. The five-day cooling off period means ADs don’t have to scramble to find a replacement so as to save their roster. There’s almost a week now for the new staff to be brought on board, reach out to existing players, and try to re-sell them on Home Town U.
Coupled with the singular Spring Portal period, we finally have NCAA legislation heading in the right direction. And that’s the first time we can say that since at least 2021.
‘Bama Hoops is now just 26 days away from the start of its season (and we shall have a preview for you up soon), and of the many transfers that Oats brought in, one player he has consistently been high on is 6’10” swing man Taylor Bol Bowen:
“When we’ve had the bigger guys at the four, they can play athletic. When we had [Noah] Clowney — we had [Charles] Bediako at the five, who was a really good rim protector, but when Clowney was our starting four at 6-10, athletic, can stretch the floor, our defense was also third in the country. Hopefully a combination of both sides of the ball, he can really help us make a big jump at that four spot.”
With Bowen joining the roster and Aiden Sherrell still on the team, Alabama hopes to maintain tempo while restoring their interior presence it lost over the offseason. If Bowen can deliver on both ends of the court as Oats expects, he could become a crucial piece in helping the Crimson Tide remain one of the Southeastern Conference’s most dynamic and competitive teams.
Read More: Nate Oats on the Addition of Taylor Bol Bowen
FWIW, we love Bowen too. And after our sit-down two weeks ago with ‘Bama Hoops #sauces, we loved him even more. The words “potentially better than Clowney” may have left this person’s lips over breakfast.
Kalen DeBoer was on the “Bussin’ with the Boys” podcast yesterday, which I am assured is still of some quality, though McAfee-esque in its catering to meatheads. And one thing he said in particularly struck me as he was blandly reciting Mizzou’s raw stats against one of the worst schedules in the country.
See if you can spot it:
“Statistically, he has a missed tackle — and it shows up on film — every other carry,” DeBoer said. “He just keeps plays alive. People think they’ve got him down and he’s still running. The yards after contact just blow your mind.”
Hardy averages 5.3 yards after contact per rush, which ranks ninth among FBS running backs with at least 6.25 carries per game.
“We got to rally. We got to be there. The schemes they run and the things they run off the play — the plays off the plays,” DeBoer said. “Coach Drinkwitz and Kirby Moore, you can see their fingers all over it. I know those two well over the years. Coach Moore was with me four years together at Fresno State.”
Moore, the Tigers’ offensive coordinator, was DeBoer and current Tide offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb’s passing game coordinator at Fresno State from 2020-21. He also served as the Bulldogs’ wide receivers coach in 2017-18 alongside DeBoer as offensive coordinator.
Yep, the critical part isn’t what Hardy does against Central Arkansas; it’s an offensive scheme that DeBoer knows well, because he has both seen it, and (as he tipped his hat) some of the off-ball stuff has essentially been borrowed by one of his proteges.
They say that familiarity breeds contempt. In this case, it can also breed success.
That success, however, is going to be predicated on cleaning up mistakes and overcoming the inevitable ones:
“I looked at the film, and we looked at the film as a staff, and there were some mistakes that and things that we did early in the game in particular, as a team, that just can’t happen,” DeBoer said Monday on the Bussin’ with the Boys podcast. “It’s set in a direction early on — thank goodness we’ve been through the fight a little bit and we didn’t flinch, like people have probably have expected us to the last few weeks. We didn’t flinch when we got in that moment.
“But we got a lot of just things that we got to clean up and be better. It’s exciting, too, because it shows there’s a higher ceiling for our team, but we got to go make it happen. Because [if] we keep making those mistakes — we’re gonna have one of these teams going on the road at a Missouri, or whatever it might be, that are gonna get you.”
“We didn’t flinch, like people have probably have expected us to the last few weeks.”
There’s that chip on the shoulder again. This team, this staff knows what’s being said. And that’s because it had been earned through their first 14 games in Tuscaloosa. The last two weeks have been a necessary corrective, but I believe people will still be holding their breath to see how ‘Bama responds on the heels of back-to-back emotional ballgames.
I have faith in them. ‘Bama can wreck these Tigers in CoMo. #GumpSoHard
And, finally, your moment of levity: this hilariously stupid five second clip. If a picture can tell a thousand words, as this can, then the right sound track can elevate that story into high art.
That’s it for now. We’ll be back early this afternoon with GAM. Brent also has posted the Missouri offensive preview on the front page, if you’ve not seen that one.
Have a great morning,
Row Tahd.
