Nick Saban explains what makes Jalen Milroe so dangerous, how he progressed

One of the major reasons Alabama will enter the season as one of the favorites to reach the College Football Playoffs yet again is the return of starting quarterback Jalen Milroe, who emerged as a Heisman Trophy contender late in the 2023 season.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban spent some time at SEC Media Days breaking down exactly what makes Milroe so dangerous.

“Well Jalen Milroe is a fantastic competitor,” Saban said. “He’s got great ability with his feet, as well as make all the throws and he has continued to improve in his ability to process and make decisions.

“The biggest thing that he made improvement on last year, because people talk about the sacks, is he had to learn how to step up in the pocket. Sometimes when you’re a great athlete you think you’re going to outrun everybody sideways. Aight? But when he started to step up in the pocket he made more plays running and made some explosive plays down the field because you can break down the defense because — as a defensive coach you always want to defend the middle of the field — when a quarterback steps up and he can step up it makes it more difficult to do that.”

Jalen Milroe, of course, lost his starting job early in the season in 2023. He would later regain it and he never looked back from that point.

That turnaround underscored what Alabama had seen from him in the first place to make the starter. Saban said once Milroe lost his job he began to buy more into changing his style of play to help the rest of the offense.

“We had him in camp, so we had a first-hand view of what kind of passer he was, and we thought he was a really good passer,” Saban said. “He’s a great athlete. A lot of these guys play in high schools where they’re the great athlete, they make all the plays, and then that becomes a part of your M.O. as a player, I’ve got to make the play.

“Well one of the things that we tried to get Jalen to understand is, ‘Hey look, you’re a point guard. You’ve got all these other good players. Your job as the quarterback is to distribute the ball to all the other good players who can make plays, and then you’re going to have opportunities to make plays as well when those things don’t all work out. And that’s going to make you a better player. And the more he got into that mindset, where he didn’t have to make the play, he was a much more effective player and he got better and better and better as the season went on. And I think he’s going to have a great year this year.”

Now Alabama has a full-fledged quarterback who is not only capable, but he’s confident. That’s a dangerous combination when you add it to Milroe’s pure ability.

Because Saban was blunt about how he stresses defenses.

“The one thing about Jalen Milroe that a lot of these other quarterbacks can’t do: Make you play different on defense,” Saban said. “You can’t rush four guys, you’ve got to have a rat on the guy mirroring him, spying him. You’re just looking at the quarterback, you’re not rushing, so when he scrambles you can get him on the ground.

“Not easy to play man-to-man. You start playing man-to-man everybody has their back to the quarterback, he takes off, there’s nobody to get him on the ground. So he makes you play different on defense, which I think makes everybody else on their offense better.”

Even if it didn’t happen from Day 1 for Milroe, his journey has put him in place to lead a playoff contender.

Now that he has settled into himself, the sky is the limit for Jalen Milroe.

“First of all, the raw ability is the same. I mean the guy is impossible to defend,” SEC Network analyst Greg McElroy said. “It felt like early in the season he was trying to prove to everybody, ‘Hey, I’m a passer. I can throw. I’m going to hold it maybe way too long in some cases when instinctively I might be the most dangerous guy on the field with the ball in my hands.’

“By the time the LSU game rolled around he was like, ‘Forget it, I’m going to be a ballplayer,’ and he took off and made plays.”

Expect more of the same in 2024.