I actually feel better about this Alabama team after the game

irNate · Sep 21, 2015

The stats back you up, the turnovers caused the loss. I'll give credit to Ole Miss where Credit is due, they capitalized off those turnovers and beat us, but the stats speak volumes about how good this team CAN BE on all cylinders.

GCtidefan · Sep 21, 2015

Good post Krazy. I think this team found out who they were and who their field general was in the loss.
At least from an O-line and D-line perspective. They could have conceded the game in the third quarter and again in the fourth, but didn't. They fought back tenaciously.
Coker showed a lot of fight, and the team seemed to feed off of that.
I hate a loss, but that was a very good Ole Sis team out there and you can't turn the ball over that many times against them.
I also watched the GA and LSU games and don't believe we'll have a problem with either of them. Neither can throw the ball downfield with consistency and I think that is what it will take to beat us again.

crimsonbleeder · Sep 21, 2015

Absolute gold, Krazy...as usual. Thanks for the Rationality on A monday where we're gonna be bombarded with the "Alabama sux" mentality on radio (I'm avoiding it altogether this week) and tv.

rtcjny · Sep 21, 2015

I can't feel better. The team played horrible. The turnovers are huge problem. The qb situation is still very unsettling. I want to be positive and say we will turn it around but it don't look good. We may have fewer problems than Auburn and Arkansas but things are still looking bad.

derek4tide · Sep 21, 2015

AlistarWills said:
As I posted in the game thread, I think the QB competition is over. Bateman had his shot, unless he was given 'zone read-give' plays where his run option is removed as a setup, then he didn't believe in himself enough to run the ball and take command of the game. I think Coker showed some toughness and grit and I'll tell you, linemen don't mind playing for a QB that ain't afraid to get dirty with em. He's got a crazy strong arm, and he can fit balls into spots downfield that others haven't shown the ability to. He's gonna get you a pick here and there, he looks to be making the same errors a young AJ made, but I think it is now Coker's team going forward.

I'm beginning to think that those INTs are not his fault, but the WRs. Our WRs seem to run the wrong route at times and are still a work in progress.

CrimSonami · Sep 21, 2015

Don't necessarily feel better but not pushing the panic button either.

As I stated in another thread we need to publicly name a starter for better or worse and GO!

RTR!!!

92tide · Sep 21, 2015

crimsonbleeder said:
Absolute gold, Krazy...as usual. Thanks for the Rationality on A monday where we're gonna be bombarded with the "Alabama sux" mentality on radio (I'm avoiding it altogether this week) and tv.

hell, we're getting bombarded by it on our own boards by our own fans

92tide · Sep 21, 2015

derek4tide said:
I'm beginning to think that those INTs are not his fault, but the WRs. Our WRs seem to run the wrong route at times and are still a work in progress.

i think someone pointed out that the wr and qb seem not to be on the same page and that it may be an issue with the way we are trying to call plays in

pbearbryant · Sep 21, 2015

KrAzY3 said:
There's no denying the fact that the loss hurts, it removes the margin of error for Alabama. However, the same basic thing happened last year and Alabama ended up with a #1 seed in the playoff, Ohio State played a softer schedule, had a far worse loss and ended up being champions. So, if Alabama can build off of where they are now, they can get better, and the path will likely be cleared. I was a very concerned about Ole Miss because of how good their team was, I never imagined it would take so many fluke plays for them to win the game.

I think a lot of people want to nitpick certain aspects of Alabama's play last game aside from the fluke plays. I'm not really sure I see that many bad things once you remove the crazy stuff. If you want me to pinpoint what I see as the biggest correctable mistake, it was to play Cooper Bateman if he wasn't going to be running the ball. Otherwise, you have a comedy of errors against a very good football team that lead to a 6 point loss. It could have been far worse.

When Jacob Coker entered the game Alabama was down 17-3 in the second quarter. He scored a touchdown, then Ole Miss, in one of the craziest plays we'll ever see scored another touchdown. At this point the fates had conspired against Alabama, Ole Miss was up 14 in the third quarter and Alabama simply couldn't play the type of game they wanted to play, and Ole Miss on the other hand had the luxury of playing exactly how they wanted to.

Then, Alabama failed on a fourth down conversion leading to three more Ole Miss points. At this point Alabama turned almost exclusively to the pass, leading to the defense being pushed back onto the field, and another three points. The route was on... supposedly. Yet, despite everything conspiring against Alabama, and some fans walking out, Alabama fought back but twice.

It's very important to try and look at how Alabama played without just looking at fluke plays and the results of playing from behind. Despite being forced to pass, and a couple ridiculous TDs from Ole Miss, with Jacob Coker in, Alabama outscored Ole Miss 34-26. If Alabama wasn't playing from behind that margin would have almost certainly been larger.

In the first half, Alabama held Ole Miss to around 100 yards and accounted for 200 yards of offense. This also means for the record that the full half Coker played results in 300 yards of offense to go along with 27 points, against a very good defense! Is that enough to be pleased with how good the team is, the fact that Alabama's offense actually did fairly well with Coker in there? No, it goes beyond that.

Turnovers:
Alabama gave up 5 turnovers, and Ole Miss gave up 0. We can stop here and acknowledge that if this stat was flipped Alabama probably blows out Ole Miss by four touchdowns or more. This is the worst margin in the Saban era and unlikely to repeat itself. But, there were also the fourth down conversions, which were in part forced due to Alabama's desperation. Alabama was 1-4 on those plays and Ole Miss was 1-2. Now, it's oversimplifying, but failing a fourth down conversion is a lot like a turnover, so let's assign -.5 to a failed one and +.5 to a successful one. That means Ole Miss ends up with a 0 on turnovers, and Alabama ends up with 6. If you told me Alabama was going to be that far behind in the turnover margin, against a team as good as Ole Miss, I'd have expected the biggest blowout loss of the Saban era, not a 6 point one.

Jacob Coker:
I believe he showed the most important quality a quarterback can have, leadership. Ole Miss knew he was going to throw, they knew they could bring pressure, they knew they could play the pass, and he still hung in there and gave better than he got. He ended up being the team's second leading rusher, and just consider this fact. The Alabama's offense was not given anything! Ole Miss had 0 turnovers. Everything Coker and the Alabama offense did, they did against adversity, generally with bad field position, against a tough defense, and with the odds stacked against them.

Defense:
It's hard to puzzle it out, but someone said if you remove all the crazy stuff Ole Miss basically scored 12 points. I think you take a look at the first half to get an idea of how good this defense is, 100 yards and every single score was off a turnover, and then the next TD was off of a fluke play. When the defense had anything to work with they did a fantastic job. I have no real concerns about this defense anymore, Alabama just doesn't turn over the ball a lot and chances are these guys will get the job done. But, once Ole Miss had a nice lead, they could play even more aggressively, they could just take shots knowing that they were just playing to pad their lead. They had no real need to sustain drives, or desperation to score points. Alabama's defense was put in a horrible situation and if anyone wants to look at those 5 turnovers and three failed fourth downs, to go along with playing from behind and judge the defense, I simply think they are being irrational.

Kicking Game:
Lost in the shuffle a bit was the suspension of the long snapper, which for a struggling punter and place kicker was really bad news. As it was, JK Scott had a solid if unspectacular outing, and Adam Griffith had by far his best game of the year. He was perfect on PATs, his kickoffs looked pretty good, he hit his first field goal (laces if I understand correctly, always a bad thing for a kicker to have to kick the laces), and he had a beautiful on-sided kick. There's plenty of reason to believe that the kicking game has turned the corner and while there might be issues going forward, we've probably seen the worse already.

This was a crazy game, and honestly if another crazy game happens Alabama could lose. But, there's usually not more than one of these a year, so logically we can just hope it's the last one. I do have areas of concern, but nothing like a loss to get a team to try and clean up their mistakes. But, in the big picture I have a lot of confidence. This defense is very good and if you give them half a chance I think they'll get the job done. This offense can move the ball against a very good defense, and I believe that if you give the offense a decent chance they'll get the job done. The special teams remains a concern, but if offensive skill players don't revert to butterfingers again we're unlikely to see a repeat of what happened.

Now, one might argue that the real fluke was not all the turnovers and crazy plays, but how Alabama's defense played in the first half, how Coker was able to lead Alabama back repeatedly (we know he has his shortcomings). Perhaps that's true, and if so we'll see, but something tells me somewhere in all the craziness we saw how great this team can be.

Spot on. Great Post!!

For all the Chicken Littles.....the sky isn't falling

Al A Bama · Sep 21, 2015

KrAzY3 said:
There's no denying the fact that the loss hurts, it removes the margin of error for Alabama. However, the same basic thing happened last year and Alabama ended up with a #1 seed in the playoff, Ohio State played a softer schedule, had a far worse loss and ended up being champions. So, if Alabama can build off of where they are now, they can get better, and the path will likely be cleared. I was a very concerned about Ole Miss because of how good their team was, I never imagined it would take so many fluke plays for them to win the game.

I think a lot of people want to nitpick certain aspects of Alabama's play last game aside from the fluke plays. I'm not really sure I see that many bad things once you remove the crazy stuff. If you want me to pinpoint what I see as the biggest correctable mistake, it was to play Cooper Bateman if he wasn't going to be running the ball. Otherwise, you have a comedy of errors against a very good football team that lead to a 6 point loss. It could have been far worse.

When Jacob Coker entered the game Alabama was down 17-3 in the second quarter. He scored a touchdown, then Ole Miss, in one of the craziest plays we'll ever see scored another touchdown. At this point the fates had conspired against Alabama, Ole Miss was up 14 in the third quarter and Alabama simply couldn't play the type of game they wanted to play, and Ole Miss on the other hand had the luxury of playing exactly how they wanted to.

Then, Alabama failed on a fourth down conversion leading to three more Ole Miss points. At this point Alabama turned almost exclusively to the pass, leading to the defense being pushed back onto the field, and another three points. The route was on... supposedly. Yet, despite everything conspiring against Alabama, and some fans walking out, Alabama fought back but twice.

It's very important to try and look at how Alabama played without just looking at fluke plays and the results of playing from behind. Despite being forced to pass, and a couple ridiculous TDs from Ole Miss, with Jacob Coker in, Alabama outscored Ole Miss 34-26. If Alabama wasn't playing from behind that margin would have almost certainly been larger.

In the first half, Alabama held Ole Miss to around 100 yards and accounted for 200 yards of offense. This also means for the record that the full half Coker played results in 300 yards of offense to go along with 27 points, against a very good defense! Is that enough to be pleased with how good the team is, the fact that Alabama's offense actually did fairly well with Coker in there? No, it goes beyond that.

Turnovers:
Alabama gave up 5 turnovers, and Ole Miss gave up 0. We can stop here and acknowledge that if this stat was flipped Alabama probably blows out Ole Miss by four touchdowns or more. This is the worst margin in the Saban era and unlikely to repeat itself. But, there were also the fourth down conversions, which were in part forced due to Alabama's desperation. Alabama was 1-4 on those plays and Ole Miss was 1-2. Now, it's oversimplifying, but failing a fourth down conversion is a lot like a turnover, so let's assign -.5 to a failed one and +.5 to a successful one. That means Ole Miss ends up with a 0 on turnovers, and Alabama ends up with 6. If you told me Alabama was going to be that far behind in the turnover margin, against a team as good as Ole Miss, I'd have expected the biggest blowout loss of the Saban era, not a 6 point one.

Jacob Coker:
I believe he showed the most important quality a quarterback can have, leadership. Ole Miss knew he was going to throw, they knew they could bring pressure, they knew they could play the pass, and he still hung in there and gave better than he got. He ended up being the team's second leading rusher, and just consider this fact. The Alabama's offense was not given anything! Ole Miss had 0 turnovers. Everything Coker and the Alabama offense did, they did against adversity, generally with bad field position, against a tough defense, and with the odds stacked against them.

Defense:
It's hard to puzzle it out, but someone said if you remove all the crazy stuff Ole Miss basically scored 12 points. I think you take a look at the first half to get an idea of how good this defense is, 100 yards and every single score was off a turnover, and then the next TD was off of a fluke play. When the defense had anything to work with they did a fantastic job. I have no real concerns about this defense anymore, Alabama just doesn't turn over the ball a lot and chances are these guys will get the job done. But, once Ole Miss had a nice lead, they could play even more aggressively, they could just take shots knowing that they were just playing to pad their lead. They had no real need to sustain drives, or desperation to score points. Alabama's defense was put in a horrible situation and if anyone wants to look at those 5 turnovers and three failed fourth downs, to go along with playing from behind and judge the defense, I simply think they are being irrational.

Kicking Game:
Lost in the shuffle a bit was the suspension of the long snapper, which for a struggling punter and place kicker was really bad news. As it was, JK Scott had a solid if unspectacular outing, and Adam Griffith had by far his best game of the year. He was perfect on PATs, his kickoffs looked pretty good, he hit his first field goal (laces if I understand correctly, always a bad thing for a kicker to have to kick the laces), and he had a beautiful on-sided kick. There's plenty of reason to believe that the kicking game has turned the corner and while there might be issues going forward, we've probably seen the worse already.

This was a crazy game, and honestly if another crazy game happens Alabama could lose. But, there's usually not more than one of these a year, so logically we can just hope it's the last one. I do have areas of concern, but nothing like a loss to get a team to try and clean up their mistakes. But, in the big picture I have a lot of confidence. This defense is very good and if you give them half a chance I think they'll get the job done. This offense can move the ball against a very good defense, and I believe that if you give the offense a decent chance they'll get the job done. The special teams remains a concern, but if offensive skill players don't revert to butterfingers again we're unlikely to see a repeat of what happened.

Now, one might argue that the real fluke was not all the turnovers and crazy plays, but how Alabama's defense played in the first half, how Coker was able to lead Alabama back repeatedly (we know he has his shortcomings). Perhaps that's true, and if so we'll see, but something tells me somewhere in all the craziness we saw how great this team can be.

Good post.

I think ALL Alabama players and the coaches and maybe even Alabama Fans just need to take a very good long shower to cleanse themselves after this UGLY, awful, horrendous, filthy defeat. I hope it never happens again! This was a NIGHTMARE between University and Paul W. Bryant Drive!

In my opinion, on kick-offs, we just need to take a knee in the end zone or let the ball bounce through the end zone and just take the gift of the ball on the 25 yard line so we don't have to worry about any fumbles on kick-offs. Seems like when we don't fumble, we're lucky to make it back to the 20 yard line, so this way we gain about 5 yards with no turnovers. If I were the head coach, the special teams coach would have been FIRED before midnight on Saturday!!!!!!!

Also, how can #5 get into the backfield with NO ONE even touching him much less blocking him!

For the rest of the season, we just need to Kick-_ _ _ and take names later!

Final thought! Ole Miss is good and very LUCKY! Alabama is good and very UNLUCKY.

If we don't change our luck, we could lose to Gawga, Mittittippi Tate, the Aggies, LSWho, and the Barn. That's six total losses! I'm still wondering what's happened to the Hogs?

Matt0424 · Sep 21, 2015

I agree Krazy. While it's hard to feel good about a team after a loss, here are positives I saw that make me feel good.

We have a starting QB with an exceptional will to win. I can put one of the INT's on Comers shoulders, but the one on the deep pass (while a horrible decision) was made in haste because our offensive line was horrible. When he entered the game, his body language was the first person's I saw that said "Dammit, I want to win tonight". I don't know what some of you watched, but this kid earned my respect.

This team doesn't quit. I was honestly worried that some of our guys might just lay down when the odds were stacked, and flukes kept happening. They didn't though. On offense it was like a virus of wanting to win spread. I saw it in Coker, then Henry, then Mullaney. It spread. On defense...man I can't say enough. If they ever stopped to look at the score they might have got discouraged, but they just kept their ears pinned back and fought for four quarters. When you're back is against the wall like it was because of the turnovers and early scores, it's easy to want to lay down...they didn't.

I will share your sentiment about the kicking game, I feel like it's going to be on track now.

I know a loss clouds some people's vision, but there was a lot of growth Saturday night. Now it's time to clean up the mistakes, and take it one game at a time.

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Redwood Forrest · Sep 21, 2015

major tidefan said:
It wasn't a fluke that we lost the game.You pull this nonsense after every loss.Some of our fans just refuse to acknowledge the other team when they outplay us.Ole Miss deserved to win,end of story.

I am not sure how to describe "outplayed" but Alabama did have 70 more yards than Ole Miss, so to my mind we outplayed Ole Miss.

IBUY · Sep 21, 2015

The talking heads have been out and will come out talking about Alabama's position as a major power in college football being over....and some of our "fans" will listen to it. I won't. And it AIN"T!!

JDCrimson · Sep 21, 2015

Honestly I would have been more worried had we won this game given all the mistakes we made. Don't get me wrong I don't like that we lost. However these young men must learn what standard they have to play to in order to win. I think winning this game might have set a poor precedent for us for the remainder of them season thinking we can play sloppy and still win.

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TAKEPRIDE22 · Sep 21, 2015

I also agree with Krazy...I too feel better about this team...the mistakes that were made are correctable. The defense played well, even with the bad situations they were put in.

deliveryman35 · Sep 21, 2015

Your assessment sounds a little overly positive to me.

I predicted before the season that we would go 10-2 this season. Based on our performance Sat. night, I've downgraded that to 8-4. I'm not saying it will be a disaster where the wheels come totally off, but we're overdue for a down year and looks like we may just have one this season. Issues that have supposedly been addressed continue to rear their ugly heads and to compound those problems I really think the whole qb issue along with the offensive play-calling is creating some problems that others here have hinted at. Of course, some of this is speculation but I DO know this--we turn the ball over 5 times against Georgia and we'll get blown out between the hedges in two weeks.

Of course, I'll be glad to be wrong on this.

bobstod · Sep 21, 2015

I don't see how so many people on here can have seen the heart and courage and skill of this team when EVERYTHING was going against them, and still not understand that we came out of this game with a stronger team.

Adversity builds character. If you didn't see a different Jake Coker on Saturday, you were watching some other game. Here is a kid who gets beat out last year, gets benched this year, and he comes in and LEADS! My drill sergeant had a saying: "When the going gets tough, the tough get going!" Jake came out tough, and the team responded.

Are there problems? FIVE turnovers are a problem! I would like to wager anyone on this board (or in America) that we will not turn over the ball five times again in any game this year. Put up or shut up.

Ldlane · Sep 21, 2015

Agreed. Five turnovers a game was almost "par for the course" when we were running the Wishbone.

bobstod said:
I don't see how so many people on here can have seen the heart and courage and skill of this team when EVERYTHING was going against them, and still not understand that we came out of this game with a stronger team.

Adversity builds character. If you didn't see a different Jake Coker on Saturday, you were watching some other game. Here is a kid who gets beat out last year, gets benched this year, and he comes in and LEADS! My drill sergeant had a saying: "When the going gets tough, the tough get going!" Jake came out tough, and the team responded.

Are there problems? FIVE turnovers are a problem! I would like to wager anyone on this board (or in America) that we will not turn over the ball five times again in any game this year. Put up or shut up.

TahoeTider · Sep 21, 2015

While I don't have many posts here, and I know less about football than most of you, I just wanted to chime in here. I feel much more optimistic after this loss than I did after last year's loss to OM; the preview I read of this year's game clearly showed OM "winning" more categories than us--but we almost overcame that. I agree with those who saw leadership qualities emerge from Jake Coker, and I thought the players' effort, especially when we were down 3 scores, was inspiring. Of course, it still sucks to lose, but I'm looking forward to what this team does the rest of the year. RTR!

Ldlane · Sep 21, 2015

I actually feel better about this Alabama team after the game

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