While Alabama Football enters a re-tool period with the departures through the portal and to the NFL, the team returns one of the more talented rosters in all of college football. The team will certainly see some strong camp battles to fill positions like Edge Rusher, Cornerback, Wide Receiver, and Offensive Tackle the team has several positions set in stone.
The coaching staff will need to evaluate a few positions heading into the spring to weigh if they'll attack the spring transfer portal window or not but, overall the team is pretty set. It'll be hard for the team to find an offensive tackle or a cornerback more talented than what this team has coming in meaning Kalen DeBoer may just stand pat and stick with what he's got.
Alabama Football: Pre-Season Polls will provide an interesting perspective
The Alabama Crimson Tide's initial ranking from the Associated Press will give us the first idea of how this team is viewed nationally. The team returns enough talent to be ranked inside the top five but, with plenty of turnover the ranking may be shockingly high or shockingly low. Preseason polls typically don't hold much weight but, with a new era starting it'll be interesting to see where this group ranks.
5. Punter
While on Special Teams the Alabama Football team has lost the greatest kicker in program history in Will Reichard it will return a special team weapon in James Burnip. Burnip improved massively from 2022-2023 in 2023, Burnip punted 57 times for an average of 47.5 yards per punt with a long of 67 yards. The Australian became more consistent in 2023 landing 8.77% of his punts inside the 20 a massive improvement from his 2.27% mark in 2022.
Bringing back a punter as skilled and as experienced as Burnip is under-rated but, also wildly important. In the Rose Bowl, we almost saw James Burnip and good special teams beat Michigan as the Wolverines fumbled one punt and nearly took a safety on the other although the Alabama Football team ended up losing the game. We'd all love it if Burnip didn't have to punt at all in 2024, however, whenever he does, we will all be confident in his ability.