Link: Just coach speak or is there a real chance Hurts may not be the starter at OU?

KrAzY3

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Again, love Jalen, but Tua was better. Tua should have been elevated to starter sometime during the 2017 season because he was more capable. Tua offered Alabama the best chance to win.
I guess there's no way to avoid rehashing things somewhat, unless I just don't respond so here goes.

I'll start with this. I believe if you just swapped out Daboll and the Locksley/Enos combination for 2017 and 2018 respectively, and kept the same starters throughout, Alabama probably wins two championships. I'll break that down as a way to explain the complexities of the situation.

In 2017, Daboll simply was a bad fit for Hurts. That was one reason for the "revolt". He wasn't capable of drawing up plays for Hurts, he had to have someone else do it, and he was never the right guy for Hurts. He was, willfully or not undercutting Hurts. The fact that Hurts performed noticeably better the following season, under the guy who had to kind of try to make Daboll's offense work for Hurts mind you, is proof enough of that. If it was Locksley, focused on his job, as he would have been in 2017 drawing up the offense for Hurts (with Enos providing support in his development) there's no question in my mind we'd have seen better performance from Hurts. The proof lies in what we saw last season.

However, and I said this at the time actually, Daboll was the better fit for Tua! We saw some proof of that when Tua faced tougher offenses. Daboll had a more pro-style offense with more expertise in going against top tier (NFL) defenses. I don't think Daboll would have struggled as much against Clemson, especially considering he likely wouldn't have lost focus as well.

We can't avoid the fact that Tua's QBR against Georgia was 29.2 and 58.8 against Clemson. In his much lamented performance against Auburn, Hurts had a QBR of 78.6 and against Georgia in 2017 he was 49.2. So, when both were bad they were bad in similar fashion. Not only did Hurts struggle mightily against Georgia (the first time, second time under Locksley he was amazing), but Tua struggled mightily against Clemson. On the flip side, Tua was 90.4 against Georgia in 2017 and Hurts was 99.4 against Georgia 2018!

What we can take away from that, is that under similar circumstances we saw similar performances! It's just that a lot of the trouble was with the offensive coordinators. Yes, Tua still is a better passer, but as you can see his on field performance wasn't always better and in the biggest games the differences shrunk considerably.

That gets into the choice of who to start. I don't care who the receivers wanted, that's irrelevant. Saban's job is to win championships. If you could watch Tua in the Clemson game and not realize deficiencies in his game, you're not paying any attention. He didn't perform better than a true freshman Hurts against Clemson in 2016. In fact, he performed worse (Hurts had a 60.5 QBR and put his team in the lead late) The notion that a younger, less experienced Tua than the one we saw struggle considerably against Clemson was demonstrably better than Hurts is not supported by anything substantive. This isn't pro potential, this isn't abilities to make throws in practice, we're talking about winning games.

Saban chose Hurts because he was the guy to get Alabama to the championship game. There's simply no guarantee that a true freshman Tua could have done that. Tua also offered Alabama more chances to lose, because he took risks Hurts never took.
 
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JustNeedMe81

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In 2017, Daboll simply was a bad fit for Hurts. That was one reason for the "revolt". He wasn't capable of drawing up plays for Hurts, he had to have someone else do it, and he was never the right guy for Hurts.

Daboll was the better fit for Tua! We saw some proof of that when Tua faced tougher offenses. Daboll had a more pro-style offense with more expertise in going against top tier (NFL) defenses.
I don't think Daboll would have struggled as much against Clemson, especially considering he likely wouldn't have lost focus as well.
Okay, I used to think that Jalen couldn't play in Daboll's system, but I'm not sure if that's the truth here. The fact Eno worked with Jalen and he improved so much this past season, and we saw Jalen running few pro-style offense plays, that led me to think that Daboll didn't do great job developing Jalen. Tua was already ready and developed.

I think Locksley/Eno did great job with Tua and Jalen and it worked out well for them. If Daboll had stayed another year, I think Jalen would've transferred early than expected. There is lot of if's could've and what not.... At the end of the day, Jalen is in a great position at Oklahoma, and Tua is in great position at Alabama.

FYI... We will learn a lot about Jalen in a different perspective as a player and etc. If he does extremely well there, then it would probably mean that there would be questions to how he was coached at Alabama. To be fair, he've had Kiffin, Daboll, and Locksley.... and now he is in his 4th year with a different coach at different school.
 

RollTide_HTTR

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Idk how y'all aren't exhausted by this Jalen vs Tua thing at this point.

Here's how it is. Jalen is a good player. Tua is a great one. Jalen is a good QB. Tua is a great one.

The end.
 
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TiderJack

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He said that so Rattler doesn’t enter the transfer portal before he gets moved in. Jalen will beat him out and Riley might play Rattler to keep him satisfied (might even play him in game 5 to burn his shirt) which could ultimately pay dividends for next year.


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Exactly. Every college coach in America is having to figure out a way to massage the egos of today's QB's and keep them on the hook at lease for 1 year until they can recruit a replacement in the next class. It is what it is but the rate of QB transfer portal entries is ridiculous.
 

KrAzY3

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Seriously... It's turned into the white helmet discussion.
At this point I don't really care what people think about Tua or Hurts (I wish people had been right about Tua being invincible), but I would think they'd know better than to think Saban just forgot how to be a good football coach on his way to winning another national championship.
 
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B1GTide

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At this point I don't really care what people think about Tua or Hurts (I wish people had been right about Tua being invincible), but I would think they'd know better than to think Saban just forgot how to be a good football coach on his way to winning another national championship.
It is possible to see Saban as the greatest coach of all time and also see him as a human being who makes mistakes. They are not mutually exclusive.
 

KrAzY3

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It is possible to see Saban as the greatest coach of all time and also see him as a human being who makes mistakes. They are not mutually exclusive.
It isn't just a question of fallibility though, at least not when someone asserts that the choice was made for non-football reasons. The idea that Saban basically played favorites and there was nothing else to it is the antithesis of the type of coach Saban has been all along. That is what I disagree with strongly.

You can say the guy with the passer rating of 199 last season who struggled in his biggest games in 2018 deserved to start the previous year over the guy with the 196 rating last season who struggled in his biggest games in 2017. Everyone has a right to their opinion. But to make it out to be such a forgone conclusion that only bias in favor of one could have lead to the choice is insulting not just to Saban but to the other quarterback as well.

I'd have thought that the ending to last year would have made it abundantly clear that not only are both quarterbacks capable, but both are fallible as well. The choice (a proven Hurts over an unproven Tua) was always going to be a hard one.
 
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B1GTide

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We will have to agree to disagree. I can cite examples that prove my point, and many others here have noticed them as well, but it doesn't matter. That happened 2 seasons ago. Time to move on
 

The Ols

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At least you got a Clemson voice to agree with you???:Joker_PDT_06: on TideFans.com
I guess there's no way to avoid rehashing things somewhat, unless I just don't respond so here goes.

I'll start with this. I believe if you just swapped out Daboll and the Locksley/Enos combination for 2017 and 2018 respectively, and kept the same starters throughout, Alabama probably wins two championships. I'll break that down as a way to explain the complexities of the situation.

In 2017, Daboll simply was a bad fit for Hurts. That was one reason for the "revolt". He wasn't capable of drawing up plays for Hurts, he had to have someone else do it, and he was never the right guy for Hurts. He was, willfully or not undercutting Hurts. The fact that Hurts performed noticeably better the following season, under the guy who had to kind of try to make Daboll's offense work for Hurts mind you, is proof enough of that. If it was Locksley, focused on his job, as he would have been in 2017 drawing up the offense for Hurts (with Enos providing support in his development) there's no question in my mind we'd have seen better performance from Hurts. The proof lies in what we saw last season.

However, and I said this at the time actually, Daboll was the better fit for Tua! We saw some proof of that when Tua faced tougher offenses. Daboll had a more pro-style offense with more expertise in going against top tier (NFL) defenses. I don't think Daboll would have struggled as much against Clemson, especially considering he likely wouldn't have lost focus as well.

We can't avoid the fact that Tua's QBR against Georgia was 29.2 and 58.8 against Clemson. In his much lamented performance against Auburn, Hurts had a QBR of 78.6 and against Georgia in 2017 he was 49.2. So, when both were bad they were bad in similar fashion. Not only did Hurts struggle mightily against Georgia (the first time, second time under Locksley he was amazing), but Tua struggled mightily against Clemson. On the flip side, Tua was 90.4 against Georgia in 2017 and Hurts was 99.4 against Georgia 2018!

What we can take away from that, is that under similar circumstances we saw similar performances! It's just that a lot of the trouble was with the offensive coordinators. Yes, Tua still is a better passer, but as you can see his on field performance wasn't always better and in the biggest games the differences shrunk considerably.

That gets into the choice of who to start. I don't care who the receivers wanted, that's irrelevant. Saban's job is to win championships. If you could watch Tua in the Clemson game and not realize deficiencies in his game, you're not paying any attention. He didn't perform better than a true freshman Hurts against Clemson in 2016. In fact, he performed worse (Hurts had a 60.5 QBR and put his team in the lead late) The notion that a younger, less experienced Tua than the one we saw struggle considerably against Clemson was demonstrably better than Hurts is not supported by anything substantive. This isn't pro potential, this isn't abilities to make throws in practice, we're talking about winning games.

Saban chose Hurts because he was the guy to get Alabama to the championship game. There's simply no guarantee that a true freshman Tua could have done that. Tua also offered Alabama more chances to lose, because he took risks Hurts never took.
 

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