Alabama's Kalen DeBoer Makes Emphatic Statement on the Offensive Line

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Ask anyone you know that watches college football about what went wrong last season for the Alabama Crimson Tide.

They’ll either tell you that it was the run game or the offensive line.

But those two go hand in hand.

Quarterback Ty Simpson was in the midst of a Heisman-caliber season, until the hits he was absorbing was starting to break his body down.

The offensive line is the straw that stirs the drink for the offense. If all five men aren’t on the same page, then the drink isn’t evenly distributed.

Left tackle Kadyn Proctor and center Parker Brailsford were two members of the O-line last season that were doing the heavy lifting. But as they venture off to the NFL, it’s become a clear need that the offensive line is hardly a finished product.

Alabama only has one returning player to the starting line, in right tackle Michael Carroll, who performed admirably as a freshman.

Head coach Kalen DeBoer addressed the offensive line during SEC Media Day today.

"We aren't there yet. We got to have a great fall camp, execution-wise, and I think that's what it comes down to is execution… We had a lot of new faces that were in the lineup… That lack of continuity — you try to make a positive out of it, but in the end, there's got to be some type of gelling of those guys up front to where one guy makes a call and it just gets relayed all the way down from one guy to another…”

When it comes to the run game, last season, that line had a hard time creating space for a revolving door of running backs.

Jam Miller was in and out of the injury report, as was Kevin Riley. The only real constant was Daniel Hill, and while he served a major purpose, his stat line was less than stellar.

Hill had averaged less than four yards per carry, and hauled in the second most carries on the team.

The offensive line couldn't consistently open holes, Hill wasn't maximizing the opportunities he got, Alabama couldn't establish a reliable ground game, and the offense became increasingly dependent on Simpson's arm.

And it made Simpson more vulnerable to injury.

Offensive line isn’t the sexiest position in football, but it’s the second most important behind the quarterback.

With there being four new members to this offensive line, creating that continuity that DeBoer mentioned on Media Day will be more crucial than ever.

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