Alabama Football: Four wide receivers shaking up Crimson Tide records

A quartet of Alabama football wide receivers is doing something never achieved before throughout Crimson Tide football history.

For a program never known as a passing school, Alabama football has produced some great receivers. Former Crimson Tide receivers Don Hutson, Dennis Homan, David Bailey, Ray Perkins, Ozzie Newsome, Julio Jones and Amari Cooper are legendary.

Writing for CBS, Charlie Potter recently explained that never before has the Crimson Tide had four such productive wide receivers as it has in 2019. According to Potter, the closest the Crimson Tide has come was the 2016 season when three Alabama football receivers had over 1,000 career receiving yards; Calvin Ridley, Ardarius Stewart and O.J. Howard.

The 2019 Alabama Crimson Tide has four, career 1,000-yard receivers in Jerry Jeudy (1,887 yards), Henry Ruggs III (1,172 yards), Devonta Smith (1,090 yards) and Jaylen Waddle (1,002 yards.) Only three games into the 2019 season, none of the four are finished amassing bigger numbers.

Jerry Jeudy is already in the Crimson Tide record book. He is No. 12 in career receptions, No. 6 in career receiving yards and No. 2 in career touchdown receptions. Among the other three, currently, only Henry Ruggs III is inside the top 15 Crimson Tide career receiving records. Ruggs is tied for No. 3 in career touchdown receptions, just one TD catch behind Jerry Jeudy.

Amari Cooper is the Crimson Tide No. 1 in career receptions, receiving yards and touchdown receptions. Jeudy is not on pace to catch Cooper in career receptions and receiving yards. He could pass Cooper’s record of 31 career touchdown receptions with 12 more TD receptions this season. And Ruggs would need just 13 more TD receptions to establish a new Alabama football record.

Looking at single-season records, Jeudy, Ruggs and Waddle are already in the top 10 of Crimson Tide records, all from the 2018 season. Jeudy is No. 2 in receiving yards (1,315) and TD receptions (14) and No. 6 in receptions (68). Ruggs is No. 3 in TD receptions (11). Jaylen Waddle is No. 8 in TD receptions (7) and No. 10 in receiving yards (848).

Asked to comment on his outstanding wide receiver group, Nick Saban said,

"I would think, all things being considered, to have four guys of this caliber on the same team … that have the skill level, the talent level, the competitive spirit, not selfish kind of hardworking, really do it for the team kind of guys that we have on this team. As a group, this is probably the best that I’ve ever had on a team, collectively."

Not to question the GOAT but his last sentence did not need the word probably.

All stats in this post are provided by sports-reference.com.

Over a year ago when the list linked above was compiled, there was no thought if any of the Top 10 would be displaced by current players. Normally such a list would not be updated to include current players. So we have not added Jerry Jeudy yet. We will once his Crimson Tide career ends. The big question is will any of his current teammates join him.