TUSCALOOSA, Ala.– The Alabama Crimson Tide football program opened spring practice on Monday with a mryiad of questions facing the program. Who will play quarterback? What is new offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb going to dial up? What is the plan for A-day?
A new question emerged as head coach Kalen DeBoer opened his first press conference of spring practice 2025. Who will play left tackle for these four weeks?
DeBoer included presumed starter Kadyn Proctor in his laundry list of injuries, designating him as limited and including him as one of the non-contact players and thus creating the aforementioned question.
The Crimson Tide turns to several fresh faces along the front as DeBoer specifically mentioned redshirt sophomore Olaus Alinen as an option.
“Yeah, it’ll be a combination, because we’ve got to have to some guys who can move out,” DeBoer said. “We’re thin at that position, especially when you look at the experience of that position. There’s a couple guys we can move out, Olaus [Alinen] played a little bit of tackle, some snaps, but we want to make sure he can focus on guard too. As we go through the spring we just didn’t want to throw a bunch of freshmen out there with the ones or some younger guys. That was kind of one of the rotations that we used in one of the team periods today for example.”
Alinen split reps with numerous players but one interesting name mentioned was freshman Michael Carroll.
“Yeah he [Michael Carroll] took some reps there today,” Deboer continued. “You don’t want to – especially for a young guy, there’s a lot of what I call bullets flying- and so you don’t want to make it harder than it needs to be for him, but actually try to keep him in the same position for multiple practices, but also that flexibility, for a guy like Michael, does exist. He does have that frame where he could play some tackle, even though like you said, he probably down the road end game will probably be more of a guard. That’s what I love about some of the guys that are athletes. They are versatile”
The Crimson Tide could also utilize Wilkin Formby, Geno VanDeMark, Casey Poe, transfer Arkel Anugwom, or even freshman Mal Waldrep Jr. throughout the spring practice period to play left tackle.
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