Could Alabama Have Won a National Championship With a Healthy Ty Simpson?

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There are always going to be “what ifs” in college football.

What if this player had stayed healthy? What if that call had gone differently? What if one turnover never happened? What if one play went the other way?

Alabama fans could probably write an entire book filled with them.

But when I look back at Alabama’s 2025 season, there is one question I keep coming back to: What if Ty Simpson had been 100 percent healthy? Could Alabama have won a national championship?

I think the answer is yes.

Notice I didn’t say Alabama would have won it. Indiana was an outstanding football team. They went 16-0, won the national championship and earned everything they accomplished.

But do I believe the version of Alabama we watched late in the season was the best version of Alabama? Absolutely not.

And more importantly, I don't think the version of Ty Simpson we watched down the stretch was remotely the best version of Ty Simpson.

After watching what Simpson just did in his NFL preseason debut with the Los Angeles Rams, I believe that even more.

Simpson finished his only season as Alabama’s starting quarterback with 3,567 passing yards, 28 touchdowns and only five interceptions while completing approximately 64 percent of his passes. He started all 15 games and established himself as one of the best quarterbacks in college football.

Those numbers alone are impressive.

But they become even more impressive when you start understanding what he was dealing with physically.

Late in the year, Simpson was battling health issues that went far beyond the normal bumps and bruises every college football player deals with. Reports after the season indicated that a back problem, medication-related gastritis and significant weight loss affected him during Alabama's stretch run. Simpson reportedly dropped below 200 pounds after losing more than 10 pounds. He also dealt with elbow bursitis around the SEC Championship Game before ultimately suffering a cracked rib against Indiana in the Rose Bowl.

Read that again.

A quarterback playing SEC football was trying to lead Alabama through a championship run while dealing with a bad back, stomach problems, substantial weight loss and then an elbow issue. And we wondered why he didn't look exactly like the quarterback we watched earlier in the season? Maybe we were asking the wrong question.

Instead of asking what happened to Ty Simpson, maybe we should be asking just how good Alabama could have been if its starting quarterback had remained healthy.

Because before everything started piling up physically, Simpson showed us exactly what he was capable of.

He showed toughness. He showed accuracy. He showed leadership. He showed the ability to make big throws in enormous moments.  And perhaps most importantly, he repeatedly showed that the moment wasn't too big for him.

Think about the Iron Bowl. Alabama went into Jordan-Hare Stadium knowing what was on the line, and Simpson delivered when Alabama desperately needed him. He threw three touchdown passes to Isaiah Horton, including the game-winning score on fourth down during a 15-play, 75-yard drive in the fourth quarter.

That isn't a quarterback shrinking under pressure. That's a quarterback embracing it.

Then look at what happened against Oklahoma in the College Football Playoff.

Alabama fell behind 17-0. Season basically hanging by a thread. On the road. Playoff football. Against a team that had already beaten Alabama earlier in the season. And Alabama came back.

Simpson threw for 232 yards and two touchdowns as the Crimson Tide erased that deficit and won 34-24 to advance to the Rose Bowl.

That game matters to me when evaluating this entire argument. Why?

Because it showed Alabama was capable of winning playoff games with Ty Simpson at quarterback. This wasn't some hypothetical situation where we're trying to convince ourselves Alabama belonged in the national championship conversation.

They were already there. They made the College Football Playoff. They beat Oklahoma. They advanced to the quarterfinals. They were one of eight teams remaining with an opportunity to win the national championship.

Then they ran into Indiana. And yes, Alabama got dominated. There is no reason to sugarcoat a 38-3 loss. Indiana outplayed Alabama. They controlled the game and ultimately went on to win the national championship.

Indiana deserves credit for that.

But here's where I struggle with simply looking at that score and deciding Alabama had absolutely no chance of winning a national title.

We didn't see healthy Alabama against Indiana.

More specifically, we didn't see healthy Ty Simpson against Indiana. Simpson suffered a cracked rib during the game and eventually had to leave. And once Alabama lost its starting quarterback, or even before he officially exited while trying to play through everything, the challenge became enormous.

Quarterback is the most important position in football.

When your quarterback isn't right, your offense isn't right.

Timing changes. Pocket movement changes. Mechanics can change. Your willingness to stand in against pressure changes. Your ability to extend plays changes. Even the play-calling can change because coaches know what their quarterback physically can and cannot handle.

Now combine that with Alabama's struggles running the football.

Against Georgia in the SEC Championship Game, Alabama finished with minus-3 rushing yards in a 28-7 loss. When you can't run the football consistently, everything gets placed on your quarterback. And Alabama needed Simpson to carry an enormous amount of the offensive responsibility at the exact time his body was beginning to betray him. That's why I refuse to look at the final few games of the season and suddenly pretend Simpson wasn't good enough.

We already saw that he was. And now the Los Angeles Rams are seeing it too.

His Rams debut only makes the “what if” bigger

Simpson was selected No. 13 overall by the Rams in the 2026 NFL Draft, and there were plenty of questions about the pick.

Was one season as Alabama's starter enough? Was Simpson really worthy of being a top-15 pick? Could his game translate to the NFL?

His first preseason appearance certainly didn't look like a player who was overwhelmed by the jump.

In his NFL debut against the Kansas City Chiefs, Simpson completed 21 of 25 passes for 190 yards, two touchdowns and zero interceptions, helping Los Angeles rally for a 20-12 victory.

That's an 84 percent completion rate.

In his first NFL game. Against NFL defenders. Simpson didn't look overwhelmed. He looked comfortable. He looked poised. He looked like the quarterback Alabama fans saw before injuries started taking their toll late last season.

There were little moments that stood out as much as the statistics. Simpson handled pressure, made smart decisions and remained composed when things didn't go perfectly. His performance earned strong reviews, with NFL.com describing him as having aced his first preseason test.

That matters to this conversation. No, an NFL preseason game does not prove Alabama would have beaten Indiana. That's not what I'm saying.

What it does is remind us of the talent Alabama had at quarterback. It reinforces that what happened late in Simpson's college season wasn't necessarily a quarterback suddenly forgetting how to play football.

His body was beaten up. Now he's healthy again, operating in Sean McVay's offense, and we immediately saw the poise, accuracy and decision-making that made him so good at Alabama. And maybe that should change the way we remember his final games in crimson. Because there were people who looked at Alabama's losses late in the season and placed a lot of the blame on Simpson.

But now?

A healthy Simpson stepped onto an NFL field and completed 21 of 25 passes with two touchdowns and no turnovers.

I know it's preseason. I know Kansas City wasn't playing its starting defense for four quarters. But you can't watch Simpson look that comfortable in an NFL offense and not wonder what a fully healthy version of him could have done during Alabama's playoff run.

That's the part I can't get past. What if Alabama had that Ty Simpson in the Rose Bowl?

The healthy one. The confident one. The one capable of standing in the pocket, making his reads and delivering the football without his back, stomach, elbow and ribs becoming part of the equation.

Would the final score have looked different? I think so.

Would Alabama have won? We'll never know.

But I absolutely believe they would have had a chance.

Alabama was closer than the ending makes it feel

That's why I think this Alabama team was closer than people realize. We tend to remember seasons based on their final game. If you lose badly, suddenly everything before it gets erased.

The wins don't feel as impressive. The adversity doesn't matter. The accomplishments start being minimized.

But Alabama won 11 games, reached the SEC Championship Game, won a College Football Playoff road game and advanced to the Rose Bowl. That's not a bad football team.mThat's a football team that was legitimately in the national championship race. And it was trying to finish that race without its quarterback anywhere near his best physically.

That should matter when we evaluate what happened. It should also make Alabama fans appreciate Ty Simpson even more. Because he never made excuses.

He kept playing. He kept taking hits. He kept trying to lead Alabama. He fought through circumstances that most of us watching probably didn't fully understand at the time. And even after his body had been beaten up for weeks, Alabama still found a way to go into Norman and erase a 17-point deficit in a playoff game.

That says something about him. It says something about that team.

And it makes the “what if” impossible for me to ignore.

What if Alabama had September Ty Simpson in January?

What if the quarterback throwing the football against Indiana was the same healthy quarterback who had established himself as one of the better quarterbacks in college football earlier in the season?

What if Alabama could have attacked downfield without worrying about Simpson's back?

What if he could move around the pocket normally?

What if he wasn't trying to compete after losing significant weight?

What if he never cracked that rib?

And now we can add another one:

What if the Ty Simpson we just watched make his NFL debut for the Rams was the Ty Simpson Alabama had physically during its championship run?

Because that quarterback looked pretty darn good. Again, we'll never know. That's the frustrating part about sports. There is no alternate universe where we can replay the Rose Bowl with a perfectly healthy Ty Simpson and see what happens.

All we can do is look at what we know.

And what I know is this: When Ty Simpson was healthy, Alabama was dangerous.

When Ty Simpson was playing his best football, Alabama could compete with anybody. When Alabama desperately needed its quarterback to make a play, he repeatedly showed that he was capable of making one. And months later, when Simpson finally got his first opportunity on an NFL field, he completed 21 of 25 passes, threw two touchdowns, didn't turn the football over and helped lead the Rams to a win.

That's not proof Alabama would have won a national championship. But it sure doesn't hurt my argument.

Would Alabama have beaten Indiana with a completely healthy Simpson? Maybe.

Would Alabama have reached the national championship? Maybe.

Would Alabama have won the whole thing? I believe they could have.

Not because I'm trying to make excuses for a 38-3 loss. Not because I'm taking anything away from Indiana. And not because I'm pretending Alabama didn't have other issues.

The offensive line needed to be better. The running game needed to be better. There were moments throughout the season when Alabama simply didn't play championship-level football. But championship runs often come down to health. And Alabama's most important player was nowhere near 100 percent when the Crimson Tide needed him most.

Give Alabama a completely healthy Ty Simpson entering December and January, and I believe we're talking about a completely different football team. Maybe we're talking about a different SEC Championship Game. Maybe we're talking about a very different Rose Bowl. And maybe, just maybe, we're talking about Alabama's 19th national championship.

We'll never know.

But after everything we've learned about what Simpson was battling, and after seeing what a healthy Simpson looked like in his first NFL action?

I believe it even more.

A healthy Ty Simpson wouldn't have guaranteed Alabama a national championship. But I absolutely believe he could have delivered one.

Roll Tide. 

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