This concerns me over the next hire. Clearly Tua was a better fit for Daboll's offense, yet it took several weak performances before Saban to make the switch.
How does this affect any future OC? With Saban clearly dictating who starts, will OCs be leery of coming here?
Part of this feels like much ado about nothing. First, as awesome as Tua was, and clearly he was awesome, the risk was abundantly clear. We saw several of the things you might worry about with a young, inexperienced quarterback in just one half of football. Turnovers, not knowing the play, clock management issues, big negative plays... this was a risky move and while it was the right move, I still don't buy the idea it was the right move going all the way back to November. Look no further than the Miss. State game, where any of those sorts of things could have altered the outcome (edit: obviously that's highly speculative, I can see why people would feel otherwise).
But, setting that aside. Clearly Saban was the impetus behind landing Tua. Kiffin was on the way out, Sark was barely there, Daboll wasn't even a college guy, so it's hard to imagine Saban wasn't in the driver's seat when it came to landing Tua. Furthermore, who sets up the plan to take off Tua's redshirt? That has to be Saban to right? Finally, who puts Tua in every chance he got when the game wasn't on the line? Saban right?
So, if anyone is unhappy with the Tua situation as it relates to Saban, well... without Saban there is no Tua ready to play when he was needed. This situation was Saban's creation, and I mean that in a good way.
What else did you want him to call for Jalen ?
I'm really not trying to argue, because he's gone and this is all behind the team. But how about the stuff he stripped from the playbook that Kiffin used? It worked, it got yards, it got points, and there's simply no question his play calling was different right? My point was Daboll's playcalling was suited more for Tua than it was for Hurts, and part of that has to be on Daboll. We saw Kiffin mold the offense around three different quarterbacks, Daboll seemed to lack that ingenuity and flexibility.