Tua Tagovailoa has become a better quarterback than Jalen Hurts

Some Tide Fans may strongly disagree with this conclusion. I fully expect to get some flack for expressing it. Oh, well. How many other fanbases can even have this discussion?  You, dear readers, and discussions like this one are the reason why the CFB media hate Alabama football. So... onwards.

The September 14, 2019 game against Gamecocks in Columbia, South Carolina has convinced me. Allow me to try and convince you that

Tua > Jalen

In the 2018 season, Jalen Hurts swallowed his pride and accepted his role as the backup quarterback to the sensational and immensely talented Tua Tagovailoa. Even after leading the 2017 team to the national championship game against Georgia, Hurts became the more-than-capable backup in a quarterback depth chart unequaled in college football.

Hurts' greatest weakness: An all-to-quick willingness to pull the ball down and run when the target receiver in a pass play was covered. If the receiver wasn't open or blew his route, Hurts used his God-given athletic talent to make something happen on the ground. Prior to the 2018 Championship Game, no one had fielded the defensive talent and coaching acumen to take away Hurts' first receiver and limit his scrambling. Georgia and Saban disciple Kirby Smart brought that in the first half.

Master Nick Saban inserted Tua Tagovailoa in the second half. Georgia had no answer for Tua's different skill set and the rest is football history.

Tagovailoa brings a similar-but-distinct talent to the quarterback position. He has a great arm, he's pinpoint accurate and he's a formidable ball carrier. Tua also has an uncanny ability to read defenses at the line of scrimmage and check into the right play before the ball is snapped. Jalen can read defenses, but not like Tua can.

Prior to the 2018 SEC Championship game, no one could stop Tua. Again Georgia and Smart brought skills and abilities what no one else had. Again Master Saban shapeshifted, swapped in Jalen for Tua and...

For the second time in two seasons, Georgia had no good answer for a backup quarterback coming in and snatching a sure win away from them. Just like the Championship Game the previous January, the entry of the backup signal caller completely changed the texture and flow of the game and just like last time, Alabama snatched the glory from Georgia at the very end.

This time though, Alabama ran into a Clemson defense that had the athleticism and coaching talent to show Tua one thing in the pre-snap formation and  drop or shift into something different. Tua simply couldn't adapt quickly enough. His greatest weakness was an inability to check down into a receiver rotation and get the ball to the guy who's open.

Take away what he thought he was being given and Tua played the 2019 Championship Game almost like a lost child. Inserting Jalen didn't help--Clemson had seen this trick played twice before and wasn't falling for it. Alabama got whipped in their only loss of the 2018 season. It is what it is, aight?

Something has changed though,  y'all.  In the first three games of the 2019 season, Tua has shown that he has begun conquering that weakness.  In fact, he may already have done so and is now honing himself into a breathtakingly dangerous quarterback.  He has learned that when the defense takes something away, it must give up something else. Tua has learned how to quickly find out what has been given up, and put the ball where the defense doesn't want it to be.

South Carolina s a talented and well coached team. So was Duke (New Mexico State was a tackle-duumy scrimmage). Tua carved those defenses up with pre-snap reads, methodical check-downs and his ever present pinpoint accuracy.

Honestly, Tua has become a better, faster, stronger AJ McCarron. McCarron is a gifted pre-snap reader and receiver checker-downer. He won two BCS Championships and shredded Alabama passing records. The only things he lacked was sprinter run speed and a fleet of 4-6 elite receivers. Tua has all of that and McCarron's ability to find the right guy at the right time. He's in the process of re-shredding MCcarron's records.

Against Duke on a neutral field and South Carolina on the road, Tua is 54-67 for 780 yards and nine touchdowns. For all three games to date, he is 70-91 for 1,002 yards and 11 TDs. His completion percentage is 77%, he has a QB Rating of 213.4, he has yet to throw a single interception and he has a touchdown pass for every eight times he drops back to throw. These numbers are obscene.

Like all Tide faithful, I hold a special place in my heart for Jalen Hurts. His willingness to give it all for Alabama in unquestionable. His sense of being a team player exemplifies what Nick Saban hopes every one of his pupils develops. He demonstrates the kind of selflessness and humility that every parent wants their kids to show in everything they do. When asked to be a leader, Jalen is a leader. When asked to be a clipboard carrier, Jalen is the best clipboard carrier ever. He is 100% awesome and we are blessed to have had him on our championship teams. I wish him the very best at Oklahoma.

The Sooners are perfectly suited to a man of his talent, experience and character. He will leave Norman a better place for having him, just as he left Tuscaloosa with the gratitude of the Bama Nation. However, Jalen is still being Jalen and the best thing he has going for him at Oklahoma is that he won't have to face many defenses built by Saban or his pupils between now and the Holiday Season.

 I honestly hope Bama doesn't have to face him in the 2019 playoffs, should both the Tide and Sooners make it that far this year. He is a dangerous man with the ball in his hands. If that game happens though, Oklahoma will look at the aftermath and say, "we wish we had gotten Tua when we had the chance to recruit him because Tua's even better than Jalen."

Is Mizzou a ‘trap’ game for Alabama?

I’m just looking under the hood at a not-to-shabby Missouri offense coming in to face a suddenly vulnerable defensive secondary. The backfield that was already young and already showing it against the not-to-shabby offenses of Texas A&M and Arkansas needs growth. If you watched those games, you saw a lot of guys running around in the open field. There have been a few costly injuries too, but the loss of Trevon Diggs is going to hurt. Some guys are gonna need to step up back there. But I am not suggesting that Alabama will lose to Missouri at home this Saturday.

Missouri has what could be an NFL starter at quarterback someday. Drew Lock doesn’t have stellar numbers. He’s just under 60% completion-wise and has a blue collar-ish 137.7 QB rating. But he is a fourth year senior, he’s a good athlete and has a John Elway, Brett Favre hellwithit attitude. He’s also playing behind one of the SEC’s better pass blocking offensive lines. Missouri may be a 3-2 team, but their losses were to Georgia and South Carolina, and they put up 29 and 35 points respectively.

Alabama’s offense almost couldn’t get any better. That is a historic statement, y’all.  Tua Tagovailoa has been unearthly in his first year as a starter. He has a fleet of receivers to throw to, and he’s been spreading it around like a Democrat on election day. The guy had more touchdowns than incompletions against Arkansas. Alabama has averaged 56 points per game through the first six outings, and Tua hasn’t taken a single 4th quarter snap since 2nd and 26 in overtime against Georgia in the National Championship Game last January.

Forget any notion that Alabama’s front seven is vulnerable, porous, suspect or any other adjective meaning “less than capable.” It’s one of the meanest bunches that Bama has fielded since the 2011-12 teams. Besides, Mizzou throws first and runs later, just like the Big 12 teams they left to join the SEC. In fact, handing the ball off to a running back is almost a trick play for them.

So no, I am not suggesting that Mizzou notches the upset. I am suggesting that this game will be a tougher row to hoe than we’ve seen yet this season, and that Bama’s Heisman favorite QB may need to see some action late Saturday night.

Bama still wins it.

Alabama 49, Missouri 33

Bama, Richardson make a statement (VIDEO)

Alabama’s Nick Saban is not one to run up the score, especially not on a team coached by someone he holds in high regard. Question his judgment if you dare, but the Tide’s head dude has a great deal of respect for Ole Miss’ Houston Nutt. There is even scuttlebutt that when Saban left LSU for the Miami Dolphins after the 2004 season, he recommended Nutt as one of the people he’d like to see replace him.

But the 52-7 beatdown administered by Alabama last night was a statement to the nation—we are Bama. We are to be feared. You don’t want to play us. We’re gonna make your ass quit.

Junior Tailback Trent Richardson also made a statement last night. You can try to stop me, but you won’t. You can try to tackle me and I will either run over you or make you look stupid. He had a career high 183 yards and another career high four touchdowns. On his 76-yard “one for the ages” scamper for six, he broke two tackles and then came across Ole Miss’ Senquez Golson.  Golson appeared to have Richardson dead to rights at the corner and looked like he the angle on No. 4.

Just watch.

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That’s the kind of skill we thought was retired when Michael Jordan finally hunk up the sneakers.

In a Blogger Roundtable Q&A last month, I wrote that Richardson deserves to be a part of any serious Heisman Trophy discussion. I also wrote that if Alabama continues to win and Richardson continues to be a part of why, his Heisman stock will rise.

How do you like him now?

And how do you like an Alabama team that has yet to put together a complete, 60-minute football game but still leads the galaxy in defensive statistics and ground-game punishment? To beat Alabama, you have to mount multiple, sustained scoring drives and stop its running game. No one has even come close to doing that yet, and there may not be a team in the country that can do it.

Not only that plays on Saturdays, anyway.

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How ESPN Created a Vocal Leader for Alabama: The New, Improved Trent Richardson

The old self-help adage goes: People who write down their goals every day achieve them. So we asked four of college football's best – Stanford's Andrew Luck, Alabama's Trent Richardson, Miami's Marcus Forston and Pitt's Brandon Lindsey -- to do just that and share them with us. We promised we'd check back during the season -- and that we wouldn't judge if they started to slide. After all, they may be busy winning games. – excerpt by Bruce Feldman, ESPN The Magazine

Teddy Roosevelt gave us another adage: Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.

If President Roosevelt had met Trent Richardson, he might have rephrased it to: Speak softly and carry big muscles. And No. 3 certainly has gone far – into contention as a national top-10 in the weight room; into an SEC-winning season in 2009 and an electric performance in the National Championship game for the 13th Alabama title; into the end zone 18 times in two years, racking up 2,495 all-purpose yards while increasing by 20% his average yards per carry to 6.25 in 2010; into the list of candidates expected to make a run at the Heisman; and into a potential first round NFL draft pick.

But about that speaking softly…

Coach Nick Saban’s philosophy of leadership is that “great leaders encourage greatness in others.” Richardson learned that lesson in abundance from Bama’s Heisman-winning running back Mark Ingram. However, as the backup for two years, there was no need to fully flex his vocal leadership muscles while Ingram handled those duties. In situations when more direct intervention fell to him, he found it difficult.

[L]ast season, when Alabama needed someone to step up, Richardson froze. "There were times when something needed to be said, and I had something to say, but I didn't know how to say it," he says. "So I would be quiet."

Before Ingram’s departure to the NFL, Richardson quietly led by example with his work ethic on and off the field, pushing his body to perform in games despite injury and maintaining a 3.3 GPA in hopes of being an Academic All-American. He is also one of the team's peer group leaders, where the players hold each other accountable for their actions with help from assigned leaders. But for the upcoming season, Richardson knew he had to somehow find within himself a more vocal leadership style to befit his new lead role in the Crimson Tide backfield.

Enter ESPN’s unintentional Big Stick Diplomacy.

By encouraging Richardson to write down his goals for each day, ESPN helped to unleash the massive potential of a vocal, in-your-face leadership force. Identifying his priorities has given Richardson a new confidence to stay on top of his responsibility to push teammates further for a bigger purpose.

At an early-morning practice in late July, Richardson arrived at the facility to find several of his teammates dragging and complaining about the heat. "I said, 'You've had all summer off and you're here now,’” Richardson says. "I told them, 'Run onto that field like you're walking into the ring. Run these drills like they're the last ones you'll ever run. Run them like we're in the championship game.'”

President Roosevelt, the original Driving Force, would be pleased:  Believe you can and you're halfway there.

Team Goal: Win the BCS title

Richardson’s story appears in the Aug. 22, 2011 issue of ESPN The Magazine.

P.S. -- don’t tell Steve Spurrier.

 

On twitter @LivingCrimson

BREAKING: Reggie Bush surrenders Heisman (statement)

It’s a sad day for Bush.  It’s a sad day for USC.  It’s a sad day for College Football.  It’s a sad day for the New Orleans Saints.

Statement, released today from New Orleans:

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"One of the greatest honors of my life was winning the Heisman Trophy in 2005. For me, it was a dream come true.

But I know that the Heisman is not mine alone. Far from it. I know that my victory was made possible by the discipline and hard work of my teammates, the steady guidance of my coaches, the inspiration of the fans, and the unconditional love of my family and friends. And I know that any young man fortunate enough to win the Heisman enters into a family of sorts. Each individual carries the legacy of the award and each one is entrusted with its good name.

It is for these reasons that I have made the difficult decision to forfeit my title as Heisman winner of 2005. The persistent media speculation regarding allegations dating back to my years at USC has been both painful and distracting. In no way should the storm around these allegations reflect in any way on the dignity of this award, nor on any other institutions or individuals. Nor should it distract from outstanding performances and hard-earned achievements either in the past, present or future.

For the rest of my days, I will continue to strive to demonstrate through my actions and words that I was deserving of the confidence placed in me by the Heisman Trophy Trust. I would like to begin in this effort by turning a negative situation into a positive one by working with the Trustees to establish an educational program which will assist student-athletes and their families avoid some of the mistakes that I made. I am determined to view this event as an opportunity to help others and to advance the values and mission of the Heisman Trophy Trust.

I will forever appreciate the honor bestowed upon me as a winner of the Heisman. While this decision is heart-breaking, I find solace in knowing that the award was made possible by the support and love of so many. Those are gifts that can never be taken away."

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As I wrote in an earlier post,  I don’t blame Reggie Bush.  I don’t blame USC.  I blame a culture of corruption that lets skanky agents compromise the integrity of the game.  And as long as there’s money to be made by compromising the game—and the amateur status of the athletes who play it—it will continue until the consequences of the crimes are brought to bear on the perpetrators.  Right now, there are no consequences.  A few states have passed legislation that ostensibly makes a crime out compromising college athletes, but the laws are toothless and virtually unenforceable. 

What needs to happen is that the NFL (and NBA as well) need to step in and stiffen their own rules.  If one agent is caught compromising the amateur status of a student athlete, that agent should be banned for life.  Make an example or two out of these scumbags, and stuff like this will stop.

Reggie Bush to lose his Heisman

The University of Southern California will get another black eye later this month, as the Heisman Trophy Trust is planning to strip former USC running back Reggie Bush of the coveted trophy.

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Two sources close to the Heisman trust said the body’s investigation is coming to a close, and will ultimately concur with the NCAA’s determination that Bush was ineligible during his Heisman-winning season in 2005. Because of that independent conclusion, sources said the trust will relieve Bush of the award and leave the honor for that season vacant. The sources said Bush met with Heisman representatives last month at the New York law offices of Emmet, Marvin & Martin. The sources would not reveal details of that meeting.

The Heisman trust has been conducting its own independent inquiry into Bush’s eligibility since the NCAA ruled in June that the USC star had committed multiple violations by accepting cash, gifts and other impermissible benefits while playing for the Trojans. Yahoo! Sports first detailed the extra benefits in September 2006. In its findings, the NCAA retroactively ruled Bush ineligible for part of the 2004 season and all of 2005. The NCAA also ordered the USC program to remove all references to Bush from its sporting venues and promotional materials and vacate his statistics from all games in which he was ineligible.

In July, incoming USC president C.L. Max Nikias announced that the university would be returning its copy of Bush’s Heisman to the trust, stating the Trojans would honor and respect athletes who “did not compromise their athletic program or the opportunities of future USC student-athletes.” New USC athletic director Pat Haden followed up in August, stating during an interview with the Dan Patrick radio show that Bush should also voluntarily return his Heisman.

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It is a tragic moment in college football history.  In the 75 years since the Downtown Athletic Club has been selecting the most outstanding college football player of the year, no one has ever had the award taken away.  Instead of being remembered as the electrifying athlete who led USC past Oklahoma to the national title in the 2005 Rose Bowl, he’ll be remembered as the player who took “impermissible benefits” during his tenure with one of college football’s most storied programs.  Shame on you Reggie, for creating such a dark spot on USC’s history.

But who could blame him?  And, who really thinks that the atmosphere at Southern Cal was a rare anomaly? College football is big business, and the top prospects in NCAA are hotter commodities than credit default swaps were in 2007. At large institutions like USC, it is virtually impossible for athletic departments to keep up with who players come into contact with.  When you have agents and their runners throwing wads of cash at 20-something kids with little life experience, stuff like this is bound to happen.  When agents and their runners throw lavish parties and offer all of the pleasures a young man could want, what do you think is gonna happen?  Think it only happened at USC?  Think Reggie Bush is the only one this happened with?

I don’t blame Reggie Bush.  I don’t blame USC.  I blame a culture of corruption that lets skanky agents compromise the integrity of the game.  And as long as there’s money to be made by compromising the game—and the amateur status of the athletes who play it—it will continue until the consequences of the crimes are brought to bear on the perpetrators.  Right now, there are no consequences.  A few states have passed legislation that ostensibly makes a crime out compromising college athletes, but the laws are toothless and virtually unenforceable. 

What needs to happen is that the NFL (and NBA as well) need to step in and stiffen their own rules.  If one agent is caught compromising the amateur status of a student athlete, that agent should be banned for life.  Make an example or two out of these scumbags, and stuff like this will stop.

I feel sorry for Southern Cal because a fine institution has had its legacy tarnished.  I also feel sorry for Reggie Bush, who really was an outstanding college football player and probably deserved that Heisman.  But I really hate that a handful of people with no integrity at all have created such a dark time in the history of a great sport.  This shouldn’t be about Bush or USC.  It should be about cleaning up a very big mess created by a few unscrupulous agents and their shameless minions.

Update: The Heisman Trust is now telling ESPN news that no decision has been reached and that Yahoo! Sports reports are inaccurate.  However, the latter is sticking by their story that Bush will be stripped of the award.