The race to succeed Jalen Milroe should extend through spring, and perhaps even into the season
Don’t get your hopes up: Nothing that happens Saturday during Alabama’s new A-Day format will be the deciding factor in who debuts as the Crimson Tide’s starting quarterback Week 1 against Florida State.
Anticlimactic, yes, but that doesn’t mean spring isn’t an important data point in one of the most fascinating quarterback battles in college football that bears following.
For Alabama, it remains a three-headed battle.
Veteran Ty Simpson entered spring practice as the prohibitive favorite to win the starting job and leaves with that same favored status. The former five-star quarterback has the most experience and patiently waited for his chance to run the offense after battling Jalen Milroe for the job two seasons ago.
Simpson is more athletic than he gets credit for, and he’s been around the program for a long time. Last season, he elicited strong support from those within the program even if he never started over Milroe. There’s a reason he didn’t transfer either of the last two offseasons despite plenty of opportunities. Even with all the time at Alabama, though, he has still only thrown 39 career passes with zero touchdowns.
Austin Mack is Simpson’s biggest competition, though there are mixed opinions on how real of a chance he has at winning the job. There have already been transfer rumblings around Mack, a California native who initially signed with Kalen DeBoer’s Washington program and then became the first player to follow him to Tuscaloosa. The 6-foot-6 quarterback should benefit from offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb being back at Alabama, and he has a raw skillset that’s enticing. Mack is still a mystery to fans in many ways and might be the most interesting player to watch Saturday when he runs with the first-team.
And then you have true freshman Keelon Russell, the No. 2 overall recruit in 247Sports’ Class of 2025 rankings. Russell is a special player and the future for Alabama’s offense, but the question is when does the future become the present? Those around the program have publicly and privately raved about Russell and believe he’s a star in the making, but it can still be tough for a true freshman to start in the Southeastern Conference. At minimum, if you think Russell might be the guy, you need to slow-play him in the spring to avoid the veteran QBs from hitting the transfer portal.
There’s a trickiness to managing a crowded QB room. If DeBoer goes with Russell, Simpson and Mack could both be gone. The safer play, at least to start the season, is to go with the most experienced option in Simpson and tell the younger guys to keep fighting for the job and see what happens. We’ve even seen this play out at Alabama when Blake Barnett got the first start in 2016 but quickly lost the job to true freshman Jalen Hurts.
To that point, DeBoer and his staff have emphasized it is an open competition and everyone still has a chance to win the job.
“I don’t think anybody has separated,” Grubb, the offensive coordinator, recently told ESPN. “They’re all playing good, but they’re not playing great yet. You’re looking for the guy that’s going to be consistent, that can show up the same and make the same plays all the time.”
Saturday will give fans plenty of offseason fodder. How the three quarterbacks look in the final spring practice will be the inspiration for plenty of debates across the Yellowhammer State. And if one looks particularly great (or the opposite, for that matter), it could require some deft maneuvering from the coaching staff to keep all three on board and committed to competing for the position through the fall.
It’s a long way until Aug. 30 in Tallahassee. The way it looks now, there’s a real chance the competition stretches into the season, where even the starter of Game 1 may not be on the surest of footing.
Simpson is the current favorite, but there could be twists and turns along the way. This Alabama quarterback battle looks like a marathon, not anything the spring football sprint could definitively decide.
