re: Official Portal Thread

Hopefully the new TE coach can bring our TE's up to at least the good mark. 45 and 81 are so average. Hell, there uniforms were never dirty because all the did was push and shove.

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There isn't anything for me to believe that Bond would be substainally better in this offense than Bernard

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Come on, no one is starting Bernard over Bond. He caught a bag and it is what it is, but based on what they've shown on the field we took a step back and lost a guy who should've been taking the top off defenses if used effectively the last two years and was without doubt or question going to be WR1 next year.

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however if you believe the current core of receivers will be worse overall and is clearly less talented than last year fair enough we will see in the fall.

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I see no evidence whatsoever we will be better at WR next year.

Can we get reasonable production out of those guys? Maybe.

Do we have anyone going into the spring who is a proven WR1 talent?
Not that I've seen.

Anyone who will require a double team?
Not as of now. Williams might grow into that role, I haven't watched him enough to know what to expect out of the gate.

Would any of these guys likely start over the guys we had last year which was itself somewhat pedestrian compared to past groups to begin with?
I think Bernard would start over Benson at WR3, but that's it.

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Also we could easily get better TE play out of Odom or this system could fit one of other TE better.

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Can you think of many TF TE's who have come in and contributed early? I cant. Dipre should be enough to get us production until Odom is ready, but almost every team in the country would've loved to have Niblack and we shouldn't pretend he doesn't matter just because he jumped ship.

He would've been ideal in DeBoer's system as a big WR / flex TE and just because our QB wasnt seeing the field doesn't mean he wasn't doing his job in getting open. He can't throw the ball to himself, just like we found during the Hurts era where the same guys were all the sudden twice as effective when Tua showed up.

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Again the Proctor thing, if the line is better overall which it should be, why would care if we lost Proctor

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We lost a starting LT who was a #1 OT in the country out of HS the same year we lost our other starting tackle who happens to be a projected top 10 NFL draft pick to the NFL.

We replace the LT with a guy who lost the job to the guy who left last year and a transfer from A&M who hasn't ever started a game.

There is reason to think both Pritchett and the kid from A&M can be productive, but that doesn't mean what we will run out there is equal to what we would've had.

At a minimum the coaches would've much preferred to have Pritchett (who is facing charges BTW) fight it out with the transfer for the other spot. Now we have to bank on both of them staying healthy and being productive or we have major problems on the edges like we did while Proctor figured things out early in 2023.

I agree C is a major upgrade and a perfect fit for the new blocking scheme. The IOL looks outstanding on paper and I'm really excited to see what the run game can do with Haynes/Miller/Young without major issues up the middle like we last year.

But this is how I see it:
LT-downgrade
LG-equal but more experienced
C-improved
RG-equal but more experienced
RT-downgrade

I don't see that we will be worse at WR. Maybe not better, but not worse.

I agree with you on the loss of Bond being significant. And we will see who WR1 will be this year. That being said, nothing in Bonds career points at him being a guy who would require a double team, or that he would be WR1. He has the potential, but to say that no one on the roster has shown it, you have to admit that he hasn't shown it either. In a different offense, maybe he is up crazy numbers, or maybe he never gets it together.

However, and this is just my opinion, I don't think we lost much with Burton leaving. I was never overly impressed with him. I did think he stepped up later in the season and made some physical catches. I also think he wasn't a great route runner and was having to make those catches because he couldn't get consistent separation. Which hurts more because I think he was Milroe's first read the majority of the time. I think you could have plugged in Prentice or Law and gotten the same results as Burton, but I think Burton was Milroe's security blanket, a role that Bond started to take over later in the season. With the exception of the TAMU game for Burton, neither he, nor Bond really took over and became a worry for a defense. Bond had more catches, but played in two more games.

I also wasn't impressed with Benson. He wasn't nearly as good as advertised, so I think replacing at least Burton and Benton's performance will not be hard.

I think ( hope) DeBoer will use our WR guys in space and get a lot more production out of them than Rees

Let’s not sleep on Hurley. He is a Bama kid that chose to stay. Appears to be the ONLY one aside from Jackson who is a xfer. I will be rooting especially for this guy to ball.

Tony Mitchell stuck around too. Hopefully he will take steps to earn a starting spot.

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When I say "replace" I was obviously referring to production or potential production.

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Your point just reinforces for me how potentially short-sighted the transfers of Bond and Niblack were.

Both of those guys had the potential to put up excellent numbers in this offense. Now, they might do the same thing at Texas -- Sark is an offensive genius as well. But to my mind they sold themselves short by focusing only on NIL for 2024.

In essence, they traded one unknown situation -- the new coaching staff -- for two unknowns: a different coaching staff at Texas, AND their new teammates. Who knows how they'll be received or how they'll fit in with the Texas players?

I believe they might have cost themselves money in the long run (i.e., their initial NFL deals) by taking a short-term payout. In essence, they sold their stock in themselves just as the market was about to take off.

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Your point just reinforces for me how potentially short-sighted the transfers of Bond and Niblack were.

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I think they ran to a bag and away from Jalen Milroe.

To your point, if we get improved play from him or whoever else ends up taking snaps at QB, DeBoer is going to make pros out of guys at WR and the number of receptions to be split is going to be back to 2018-2019 level.

My guess is you are going to see an offensive transition much like what we experienced going from Daboll & Jalen Hurts to Mike Locksley and Tua. We just need to make sure we have someone to trigger the system he desperately wants to run and some guys who can get open deep to spread the field and make plays.

Germie Bernard will have a role. DeBoer brought him to Alabama because he knows the offense. It’s going to be interesting to see how the quarterback competition goes this spring with a new staff and clean slate.

My biggest concern about Prentice is that his role seemed to regress from the previous year. He looked like he was going to be a weapon at the beginning of the year last year, but really tapered off after the Tennessee game. I like Prentice and I'm excited to see what he can do in Grubb's system. Honestly, I think we have a ton of talent and I'm pumped to see what happens this spring.