Jumbo Package: Has Alabama football improved enough to make the CFP in 2025?

Happy Friday, everyone. Alabama baseball has a big one to close out the home schedule this weekend.

The much-anticipated series between No. 23 Alabama baseball and No. 6 Georgia has arrived. The Bulldogs (39-11, 15-9 SEC) will travel to Tuscaloosa this weekend for the second-to-last SEC series before the conference tournament.

The Crimson Tide (37-12, 13-11 SEC) has split its last four games, with a 10-2 victory at No. 19 Troy on Tuesday as its most recent outing. Team captain Kade Snell had four hits in the game. Alabama lost its last SEC series to Vanderbilt after a walk-off, 9-7 defeat in Nashville last Sunday.

Georgia swept Missouri on the road last weekend and did not play a midweek, meaning the visitors are fresher than the Crimson Tide at a point in the season where teams are wrapping up their midweeks; the Troy game was Alabama’s last midweek of the campaign.

Better bring it, boys.

The Athletic examines which football programs may or may not have improved enough to make a run this season.

The offense faltered in some untimely situations, most obviously in a disastrous performance in a 24-3 loss at Oklahoma. The losses to Tennessee and Michigan weren’t any better. Alabama finished 22nd in yards per play (6.33) and scoring (33.8), but the offense was inconsistent. Opponents recorded 77 tackles for loss against the Crimson Tide, who ranked 97th nationally in TFLs allowed. They committed 21 turnovers as well, which also ranked 97th. That’s a lot of negative plays.

Jalen Milroe was an exciting quarterback with tantalizing highs but ugly lows. With Milroe off to the NFL, the Crimson Tide need more consistency at quarterback. Ty Simpson, last year’s backup, has the lead in a three-man race for the job.

DeBoer brought Ryan Grubb, his longtime offensive coordinator, to Tuscaloosa, which should benefit the offense. Alabama also added Miami transfer Isaiah Horton (56 catches for 616 yards and five touchdowns in 2024) to a receiving corps that already features star sophomore Ryan Williams and veteran Germie Bernard.

CBS explains just how free agency has destroyed depth and continuity.

The Longhorns — which came in at No. 4 in the 2024 Team Talent Composite — had two defensive tackles drafted on Day 2 of the 2025 NFL Draft. No problem, right? Just plug and go thanks to your recruiting wins.

Not so fast.

Seven DTs played 10-plus snaps behind that drafted pair for Texas last season. Two graduated. Four entered the transfer portal.

That’s how you get to a place where Texas, after four straight top-six recruiting classes, must sign FIVE defensive tackles in the portal.

You can see examples like that across all the top rosters. Georgia lost the No. 3 player in the portal, Damon Wilson, to Missouri. Alabama lost its starting right tackle Elijah Pritchett to Nebraska. Clemson lost part-time starting DT Tre Williams to Michigan.

The top programs still have more talent than anyone, but other teams spend big to upgrade their rosters through the transfer portal. That makes keeping depth pieces happy more difficult than it was a decade ago — when Nick Saban could basically stash a high-profile recruit for two or three years before they emerged as fully formed monsters. In this era, those players transfer after a season or two to get on the field.

Anyone who can’t objectively see that the product on the field is lesser for it simply doesn’t want to.

Lotzeir Brooks continues to get all the hype.

Top newcomer: WR Lotzeir Brooks (No. 102 in the ESPN 300)

Why: Alabama wasn’t particularly aggressive in the transfer portal, so there could be an opportunity for a freshman from its fourth-ranked recruiting class to emerge. The 5-9, 180-pound Brooks is the most decorated high school receiver to come out of New Jersey, setting the state record for receiving yards (4,615) and touchdowns (67). He arrived in Tuscaloosa early and turned heads in Alabama’s spring practices as a slot receiver.

What to expect: Playing alongside sophomore Ryan Williams, Brooks could emerge as a contributor in Kalen DeBoer’s offense as the season progresses. He’s small but dynamic and very quick and sudden in his movements. Brooks creates separation as a route runner, especially underneath. He’s a chain-mover after the catch with great burst and acceleration, and he sees the field well. Brooks could show off those attributes early on as a punt returner as well.

If you’re going to go to Minnesota for a recruit, it should be an offensive lineman.

Currently the No. 1 rated recruit via 247Sports rankings and the 247Compositie for Minnesota in their 2026 class is Jackson County Central four-star Roman Voss. Voss just announced on social media that he’s now got a top two schools of the in-state Golden Gophers and the Alabama Crimson Tide.

Minnesota coaches Eric Koehler, Greg Harbaugh, and head coach PJ Fleck have made it clear to Voss that he’s a massive priority for them for almost a year since the Gopher offer came. Voss came to a Gopher game last fall, was back on campus for a Junior Day during the winter, and most recently, was on campus for a spring practice.

Alabama is a newer offer to the party for Voss, but there are plenty of connections to the Crimson Tide coaches Kalen DeBoer and Ryan Grubb, who have strong connections to that part of the state.

Check out this nugget from the Michael Lynn Davis trial.

Johnson testified that his intention at the point he got in the driver’s seat was to go back to Birmingham.

Johnson turned right onto University Boulevard before making an immediate right into an alley on the other side of the Houndstooth bar in the direction of where the car of some friends, a red Chevy Impala, was parked.

The same Impala can be seen on surveillance video shown in court following Johnson on the short narrow space that connects to Grace Street. This is when the headlights of the Jeep were turned off. Johnson testified that he “didn’t know the lights had cut off.”

Cedric was headed home, but first he just needed to stop by a parking lot to meet up with his buddy to help him pull a rifle out of the trunk, then turn his lights off and pull around with his lights off like someone who intended on executing a drive-by shooting would.

Who among us hasn’t done that, am I right?

Oh yeah, he also gave his phone to the police that night but didn’t remember the password and got it wrong so many times that the phone was locked. There is no indication that the police tried any further to access his phone records. After all, somehow Cedric hasn’t been a suspect in this matter at all.

Last... just LOL.

The 24-year-old girlfriend of UNC-Chapel Hill football coach Bill Belichick, 73, is not allowed inside the football building or on the football field at the university, “higher-ups” at the school decided last week, according to ESPN’s Pablo Torre, who broke the news on his podcast on Friday, May 9.

Two sources provided the information to Torre, he said on Pablo Torre Finds Out.

“Don’t think you’ll be hearing much from Jordon moving forward,” one source reportedly told the broadcaster.

Hudson is set to compete in the Miss Maine USA pageant this weekend.

Meanwhile, Belichick — the highest-paid state employee in North Carolina at $10 million a year — and UNC will kick off the college football season when the team takes on TCU in the Aer Lingus College Football Classic in Dublin, Ireland on August 29.

That’s about it for today. Have a great weekend.

Roll Tide.