Joel Klatt: Kalen DeBoer has a little Tiger Woods in him

It’d be easy to argue that new Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer has the biggest shoes to fill of all time in college football history as he takes over the Crimson Tide program following the retirement of Nick Saban.

Comparisons to Saban will come naturally during his tenure in Tuscaloosa, but college football analyst Joel Klatt made another lofty comparison for Alabama’s new head man recently on The Next Round.

“What I love about Kalen is that he’s got a little Tiger Woods in him,” Klatt said. “And I’m not trying to say he’s the greatest of all time.”

“I don’t know if you guys remember this, but the day after Nick retired I said Kalen DeBoer is gonna be the head coach at Alabama. But this is why, Tiger Woods used to talk about yes, I need to be technically proficient at my craft. But I also need to learn how to and be great at winning, which is why he was great at winning,” Klatt said.

Comparing unarguably one of the best golfers of all time to a college head coach entering his third season at the Power Five/Four level may seem unwarranted. But what’s undeniable about DeBoer’s resume, like Woods, is his ability to win. Boasting an impressive 104–12 overall record as a head coach with no more than three losses ever in a season between his stops at NAIA powerhouse Sioux Falls, Fresno State, and Washington.

“We see a lot of these prodigy golfers and they go out there and they never win but they look beautiful swinging. They’re technically proficient, they’re not competitively proficient. Kalen DeBoer is competitively proficient,” Klatt explained. “This guy wins at an insanely high level everywhere that he’s been and for that reason I’m bullish.

“I think that it will work, I just think it will look a little different.”

If there’s one thing Alabama fans value it’s winning, built upon a rich tradition and championship culture that Saban has been able to take to a new level since 2007. A standard that DeBoer seems like he can uphold based on his track record and has gotten off to on the right foot off the field before coaching in his first game for the Crimson Tide.

“I am happy for him that he has recruited at such a high level here and gotten on that swing. Because that’s the first way to start losing a fanbase that is used to getting the top recruiting class in the country, or second best recruiting class in the country,” Klatt said. “You start getting eighth, 12th, 13th [ranked recruiting class] everyone’s gonna be like hold on a second. Then losses become even worse during the year if they pop up, so that fact that he’s succeeding on the recruiting trail right now I think is a big feather in his cap.”

A lot will be made of DeBoer’s debut season for Alabama this fall, but until then bringing in the No. 2 ranked recruiting class followed by what’s currently the No. 1 class in the country for 2025 is certainly a promising sign. As only time will tell if he can translate his winning acumen to the SEC similar to Woods, Saban, and some of the other all-time great winners in sports.