Kirk Herbstreit reveals biggest problem with Alabama football

Alabama football lost its first game of the season last Saturday against Texas, and the Crimson Tide are struggling to find answers as to their issues, having lost three of their last nine games dating back to 2022.

The Crimson Tide will change starting quarterbacks, for one, giving Notre Dame transfer Tyler Buchner his first start for the team.

But ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit thinks Alabama’s problems go deeper than that.

“I think it’s easy, as you say, to kind of point out that (Jalen) Milroe had the turnovers and they’re unsettled at that position,” Herbstreit said on ESPN’s College GameDay. “That’s pretty obvious. I think the more glaring thing and the thing they’re going to have to address, in talking to some former Alabama players this week who were on some of those championship teams and even seeing them on social media being pretty active with their concerns, seeing Texas dominate, at times, the line of scrimmage, almost bully Alabama, one thing to me, the secret sauce for Alabama for a long time has been the older players on the team self-police the team. They set the example, the standard, as they call it.”

That self-policing takes care of any motivational issues. It’s no longer on the coaches to motivate, because the players themselves get each other going.

If that’s gone, it’s a lot harder to get a team rallied together and focused going into games.

“And for me, who are those players, last year and this year?” Herbstreit said. “Will Anderson and Bryce Young, they did it in a different way. I’m talking about guys like Ro McClain and Ryan Anderson and Jonathan Allen and Daron Payne. Like guys on the team feared those guys. They didn’t fear coach Saban. They feared those guys and those consequences if they didn’t live up to the standard in practice.”

The end result when players are pushing players in practice is pretty self-apparent.

“Then the games take care of themselves,” Herbstreit said. “How do you fix that? How do you fix that? That’s not just go put this guy in and OK. That’s in the fabric of the team. So somebody better step up and be Ro McClain. Who’s that going to be?”

Alabama football will return to action today at 3:30 p.m. ET with a game against South Florida on ABC.