Alabama 2014 Position Preview: Quarterbacks
As we inch closer to the 2014 Alabama football season, it’s time to take a look at each and every position on the Crimson Tide squad, breaking down man-to-man what we can expect and look forward to this year. First up, we’ll take a look at the key question mark on the 2014 Alabama team: who will replace AJ McCarron?
Quarterback
Key Departures: AJ McCarron (NFL Draft/graduation), Parker McLeod (transfer), Luke Del Rio (transfer)
Key Additions: Jacob Coker (transfer from FSU), David Cornwell (freshman)
Returning Players: Cooper Bateman, Alec Morris, Blake Sims
Breakthrough Players to Watch: Jacob Coker, Blake Sims
The quarterback position is unquestionably the most talked about battle on the Alabama roster, and all eyes will be on fifth-year senior Blake Sims and Florida State transfer Jacob Coker.
Coker battled for the job with eventual 2013 Heisman winner Jameis Winston at Florida State last year. Later in the season, Coker suffered a torn ACL that ended his season, before he transferred to Alabama in the summer.
Coker has a huge arm, which several FSU coaches and players referred to as one of the strongest arms they had ever seen. He’s also big at 6-foot-5 and 230 pounds, and has been working on his skill set since the end of the 2013 season with QB coach Davis Morris, who has worked with AJ McCarron and Matt Barkley among others.
Coker’s biggest competition will be fifth-year senior Blake Sims, the only other quarterback on roster to throw a pass in a college game
Sims is a completely different type of QB than Coker, who is the more traditional, big-armed pro-style QB. Sims is an athletic, dual-threat quarterback who has worked hard over the last several years to improve his decision making, accuracy, and arm strength.
Sims’ biggest advantage is his ability to extend plays with his legs. He brings a dynamic to the position that no other quarterback on the roster brings with his mobility, scrambling, and the chance to use the read option.
According to Nick Saban, Sims had a terrific spring, though his A-Day performance was lackluster due in part to his being kept in the pocket because of pass rush rules in the game. Like Coker, he has also been working with a private QB coach when not working with the team, as he is determined to go all out in this battle for the starting job.
The dark horse candidates for the job could be redshirt freshman Cooper Bateman and incoming freshman David Cornwell.
Bateman is big-armed and more mobile than expected, and has been able to get a good grasp on the Alabama offense. It was Bateman who looked the best during A-Day, even if even that wasn’t the greatest performance. Cornwell’s size is much like that of Coker (6-foot-5, 234 pounds), and he is also coming off of a severe knee injury in 2013.
Bateman came to Alabama in the spring, so he got a jump on learning the offense and this deadly accurate youngster is going to attempt to make a push in the wide open quarterback battle.
Regardless, it will be well into the fall before we know which quarterback has gained the upper hand in this battle. Let’s not forget that Alabama started the 2011 season with both AJ McCarron and Phillip Sims sharing the spot in the opener, before McCarron eventually wrestled away the starting job.