Alabama football quarterback Jalen Milroe has been under high scrutiny this week after the Tennessee game.
He didn’t play well in the loss to the Vols on the road, completing 25 of 45 passes (55.6%) for 239 yards, one touchdown with two interceptions in the loss. His quarterback rating was 65.3. He also rushed for 11 yards on 14 carries and no scores.
Former Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron joined the discussion about Milroe this week while on the McCready and Siskey show. McCarron, who won multiple national championships at Alabama before an NFL career that spanned almost a decade, gave an in-depth and candid breakdown of Milroe’s recent play.
“It’s hard because I like the kid a lot and I think he’s a good college player,” McCarron said. “He’s just not the quarterback he wants to be, which is fine. There are many different quarterbacks now. But when have we seen him be accurate? I’ve been saying it from the get-go. He hasn’t progressed from last year to this year in any form.”
McCarron gave a breakdown of some of Milroe’s issues, such as getting “way up” on his front toe while throwing, locking his front leg out and that Milroe is “super over the top.”
“It reminds me of, the way he throws it sometimes, remember when Tyler Watts, they changed his throwing motion back in the day when he got to Alabama?” McCarron said. “He threw way over the top almost. He does that. We haven’t seen Jalen be accurate.”
Milroe’s accuracy peaked in the Georgia game, when he completed 27 of 33 passes (81.8%) for 374 yards and two touchdowns, also rushing for two scores. He was viewed as a Heisman Trophy favorite after that game. Ever since, his completion percentage has dropped each game: 75% against Vanderbilt, 69.6% against South Carolina and 55.6% against Tennessee.
He only had two games in 2023 with a worse completion percentage than the Tennessee game: Texas (51.9%) and Arkansas (47.6%).
McCarron attended the Texas game and thought Milroe looked like he was trying to prove he’s a passing quarterback.
“That’s not his forte,” McCarron said. “That’s not his positive. His biggest positive is also his biggest negative.”
McCarron said Milroe’s biggest positive is that of many quarterbacks in college football, nobody can run like Milroe.
“His biggest negative is, he doesn’t use his feet enough,” McCarron said. “He needs to be a one, two read guy, go. He doesn’t step up in the pocket.”
McCarron added that he hasn’t seen Milroe go “north” in the pocket much.
“He goes back, tries to stiff arm guys and end up going to his right,” McCarron said. “It’s easy to play. D-line, it’s easy to play. They understand your tendencies. It shows. The more games you play, teams start preparing for that. They coach their d-line to do that. It’s easier to play. I think you’ve seen that this year.”
McCarron isn’t opposed to Alabama looking at other options at quarterback.
“Now, you have an opportunity if you want to make a QB change, you can,” McCarron said. “If you feel more confident in Ty Simpson running your true offense and throwing the football, you can make that change. You’ve lost two games. You’re probably completely out of the playoff. I don’t see them getting in.”
So in McCarron‘s mind, he doesn’t think DeBoer and company have anything to lose if they choose to start another quarterback.
“I love Jalen,” McCarron said. “I think he’s a hell of a player. He’s just not a … pocket guy like he tries to be.”
Nick Kelly is an Alabama beat writer for AL.com and the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on X and Instagram.
