THE TIDE HAS SOME QUARTERBACK QUESTIONS...

TIDE STILL SEARCHES FOR QB

Coker and Bateman struggle in latest audition...

 

Coker looked pretty shaky at times...

   In watching the Alabama quarterback play against Middle Tennessee, one thing is certain - 'Bama hasn't found the quarterback play Nick Saban and Lane Kiffin expect. Last week Jacob Coker made some great strides toward nailing down the QB position. Cooper Bateman didn't look that far behind behind Coker.  It seemed as if the Tide was going have a good quarterback after all. In one week, the Tide signal callers took a stumbling step in the wrong direction. I have no idea if all this talk about the confidence level of Jacob Coker is true or not. I would throw this out for discussion - if his ego is that is so  fragile, maybe playing quarterback at the University of Alabama isn't a good place to be. Of all the places to play football you better have nerves of steel to be an Alabama quarterback. A lot of people might argue that Coker has had more than a fair chance to prove himself. Perhaps, just perhaps, it is time to move on to a quarterback who will have a couple of seasons to play in the future. But, we all said that last season as well, and up jumped BS6 and a senior season not to soon forgotten. 

WHAT'S HAPPENED TO THE TIDE'S QUARTERBACK DEPTH?

Bateman played a decent half but...

     The short answer is maybe nothing at all. The longer answer raises a lot of questions in the minds of Tide Fans. For the preeminent college football program in the NCAA, you'd like to think that the Tide would be able to replace quarterbacks without a tremendous dropoff in performance. It might be better just to find a game manager who can hand off to Derrick Henry. In all fairness to the quarterbacks, Saban said at halftime that it was the entire offense playing poorly. I'll say that the difference between the current QB and wide outs is not just a gap, it's a canyon. To a lot of fans it seems like Alabama has a long way to go. It doesn't help to watch a freshman at South Carolina come in for an injured starter and look so composed and so ready to play.  No doubt that freshman threw one bad pass. It wasn't any worse than some of the wounded ducks that Coker put up. Coker is a fifth year senior. He has two years in Coach Kiffin's system and is still struggling. I can't help but remember what Bobby Jones said about golf. The really big tournaments are played in an eight inch field between your ears. If that is what is troubling Coker it's probably not going to get better. 

BAMA FAVORITE OVER THE REBELS....

      Now,  Alabama must play Ole Miss. Don't look now, but Ole Miss has scored over 70 points in each of their first two games. They also have done so without their best offensive lineman and a quarterback who had played exactly zero minutes in the SEC. No way the Tide wins this game without some real help from the offense. The real question is whether or not any Tide QB can do that. The QB's are not going to be able to just hand the ball off to Henry and Drake next Saturday. Alabama plays the toughest schedule in the nation. The Tide is like a Maserati without a steering wheel. It's tough to look at the Tide as the better team at this point in the season. Ole Miss will give the young Tide defensive backs a real test. The test will be of the pass/fail variety. The line is now at 7.  This is going  to be a stern test for 'Bama.