Saban pleased with young defensive backs,
Alabama has to replace six defensive backs from last season’s national championship team, including five who were drafted by NFL teams in April.
Coach Nick Saban doesn’t expect to fill that void overnight, but he does like the newcomers who are looking to help. The Crimson Tide held their first of 28 preseason practices Friday afternoon, working out for two hours in helmets and shorts.
“I’m very encouraged by the young players,” Saban said Friday evening in a news conference. “I like all three young corners that we have: Patrick (Surtain II), Josh Jobe and Jalyn Armour-Davis. Those guys are really what we’re looking for at that position.
“Eddie Smith is a young safety, and it takes a little longer to develop at safety.”
The Crimson Tide ended spring with Shyheim Carter and Saivion Smith as the firstteam cornerbacks, Trevon Diggs at the “star” and Deionte Thompson and Xavier McKinney as the first-team safeties. Saivion Smith began his career at LSU and transferred to Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College, where he played last season before enrolling at Alabama in January.
Surtain was the nation’s top high school cornerback in the 2018 class, while Armour-Davis and Jobe were in the top 15. Eddie Smith was a three-star cornerback prospect but is getting his first look at safety.
“How these guys develop will go a long way in determining what kind of depth we can develop in the back end,” Saban said.
Alabama practiced Friday with two players in black, noncontact jerseys: freshman outside linebacker Eyabi Anoma and redshirt sophomore cornerback Nigel Knott. Saban said Anoma had a jaw injury but would be “full-go by the time we put on pads.”
Junior outside linebacker Terrell Lewis, who tore his ACL in summer training, was the only player who couldn’t participate at all.
Developing depth behind inside linebackers Mack Wilson and Dylan Moses is also among the many objectives this month, but Saban said testing after the summer conditioning yielded some of the best results he’s experienced.
“Our players have always talked about what we do around here, thinking that they do more than other people,” he said. “I think more and more people are trying to do what we do. More and more people have people from our organization in their organization, so I think it’s not what we do, it’s how we do what we do, and we’ve got to do it better.”