The 2024 Alabama football team was a massive disappointment. We’re starting to find out why.
The Crimson Tide players and coaches continue working toward the season opener in practice Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2024. Alabama offensive lineman Roq Montgomery (55) blocks Alabama offensive lineman Wade Estess (67).
The Crimson Tide players and coaches continue working toward the season opener in practice Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2024. Alabama offensive lineman Roq Montgomery (55) blocks Alabama offensive lineman Wade Estess (67). | Gary Cosby Jr.-Tuscaloosa News
Last season was a major disappointment for Alabama football in year one under Kalen DeBoer. At 9-4, the Crimson Tide finished with its worst record since 2007 and missed the College Football Playoff despite its expansion to 12 teams.
Alabama was undeniably talented, but suffered some baffling defeats, most notably on the road to Vanderbilt in early October and at Oklahoma in mid-November. The loss to the Sooners was too much to overcome and ultimately knocked the Tide out of the playoff.
Too often last season Alabama looked ill-prepared to play football. The talent was always there, but the execution frequently lacked. Reserve OL Roq Montgomery peeled back the curtain and helped everyone understand why in an appearance on The Bama Standard podcast.
Montgomery was talking about the renewed sense of purpose, focus, and hunger that the 2025 version of the Crimson Tide has as they prepare for spring practice and ultimately the new season, but his comments also give you an indication of why things went off the rails in Tuscaloosa this past season.
“You can’t be late to workouts no more. No more jewelry. No more necklaces. None of that. It’s not a fashion show. It’s football,” said Montgomery.
“Any team that has won before us, nobody was doing none of that. So why start doing it now? It’s a lot of stuff that happened last year, but we ain’t won a championship since 2020, so it’s like what the hell we doing? That’s not ‘Bama football.”
Of course, it’s nice to hear Montgomery make the comments he’s making about this new team. But it’s concerning to hear that some of these things were ever accepted at Alabama. Players being late to meetings? No showing workouts? This ain’t Nick Saban’s Alabama anymore.
DeBoer inherited a difficult situation and in the Transfer Portal era you have to approach a lot of things with kid gloves. He did what he thought he needed to do to hold on to last season’s roster and field a competitive football team in 2024.
Now, this roster is almost exclusively DeBoer’s. Alabama saw a big Transfer Portal exodus in December and flipped the roster with a highly ranked recruiting class and a few key pieces out of the portal.
I suppose now DeBoer feels more in charge of this team and isn’t as afraid to speak up and hold players accountable. Had Alabama fans known what was going on behind the scenes in Tuscaloosa last season, I suspect expectations would have been significantly lower.
Hopefully, Montgomery’s comments ring true and this Alabama team does the things the way they need to be done. But talk is cheap. The results will show if there was a cultural shift or not.
