Alabama football's biggest loss in 2024 Spring transfer portal window

05/05/2024 00:48

It seems like it was just yesterday that the college football season ended as Michigan topped Washington in the national title game in Houston. When the game ended, the worst time of the year began for college football fans: the dreaded offseason. Nearly eight months without college football. It feels like it just started, but we have somehow already made it to May. The weather is getting warmer, and we are getting closer to football season. Spring football just concluded for Alabama football, and Crimson Tide fans can’t wait for the 2024 season to roll around.

Spring football is one of the best times of the college football offseason as a sense of hope comes to every fan base around the country. It’s exciting to see your team in action in the first time, even though it’s just a scrimmage. You started to see the roster taking shape and projected depth charts start trickling out. Spring football is the first sign of the season, and now that it’s over, college football fans are really in the home stretch. The cold winter months are tough to survive without football, but the excitement that comes with spring football makes everything easier. There is still a ways to go before the new season, but it is coming.

This next season of college football is going to be an exciting one, and there are a ton of reasons to be looking forward to it. There are a lot of changes coming to the game like rule changes, coaching changes, conference changes and playoff changes. Perhaps the most intriguing part of the new season will be the new conferences. The Pac-12 is gone, and the Big Ten and SEC are going to be loaded. They both seem to be on the verge of forming super conferences.

The SEC will be welcoming Texas and Oklahoma to the conference next year, and the Big Ten is getting a good crop of Pac-12 teams as USC, UCLA, Oregon and Washington are all joining the conference. Both the Big Ten and the SEC are going to be absolutely loaded next year, and it seems like more schools will potentially join the conferences in the future.

Next season, the College Football Playoff will look different as well as it is expanding to 12 teams. There will also be first round games on college campuses. More teams will have a chance to make the CFP, and there will be more games. It’s going to be fun.

Alabama football is entering a new era

A lot of things are changing in college football, and one of the biggest changes next season will be seeing the Alabama football team without Nick Saban. The legendary Crimson Tide head coach decided to call it a season after 2023, and Kalen DeBoer is now the head coach at Alabama. DeBoer took Washington all the way to the national title game this past season before losing to Michigan, the same team that knocked out Saban and the Tide.

With a new head coach, everyone is curious how Alabama football will fare in 2024. Kalen DeBoer is coming into a great situation and he has all the tools to be successful, but can he keep the dynasty that Saban built going? There a lot of question marks, and this first season is going to be huge.

Alabama has a lot of good talent coming back from last year’s team, so DeBoer has to have a good season in year one. First year coaches sometimes get a pass, but that isn’t quite the case here. If the Crimson Tide have a bad season, recruits might start to think that they just won’t be the same without Saban, and the dynasty could quickly fall. Year one is massive.

When a head coach leaves the program, there are bound to be some departures in the transfer portal, and Alabama football has experienced that. In total, the Crimson Tide have lost 39 players to the transfer portal, and they have only brought in 12. Alabama lost most of their top talent during the first window of the portal as just 10 of the 39 players entered during the spring window. They didn’t take any major hits in this window, but there were still some that were a little bit of a surprise. He is the one that hurts the most.

Peyton Woodyard, S

Peyton Woodyard is transferring away from Alabama football, and this is surprising to see because of the fact that Woodyard is a true freshman. He is a member of the 2024 recruiting class and enrolled early back in January. He was in Tuscaloosa for just a few months before deciding that he wanted to look for a new home in the transfer portal.

This is a tough loss for Alabama because Peyton Woodyard came in as a highly-rated recruit and he should end up having a great college career. It’s always surprising to see a player leave as a true freshman before they have even seen a real game happen, but that is becoming more popular in today’s era of college football. We have seen this from other programs as well.

Peyton Woodyard was a four-star recruit coming out of college according to 247 Sports, and he was the #115 prospect in the 2024 class. Woodyard was ranked as the #8 safety in the class, and the #10 player in the state of California. He attended St. John Bosco in Bellflower, California for high school.

Now, it’s looking like Woodyard is thinking about heading back out west. He is visiting Oregon over the weekend and it looks like that could be where he ends up.

In terms of the 2024 season, this doesn’t have a huge effect on the Crimson Tide. It’s hard for a true freshman to come in and make a big difference, but this certainly stings for the future. You never want to see your true freshmen hit the portal before they even get to the season.

All in all, there were some tough losses in the transfer portal for Kalen DeBoer and this Alabama team this offseason. That’s how it goes when you lose the greatest coach of all time. Still, the Crimson Tide have a lot of talent on this team and they are more than capable of getting back to the College Football Playoff, especially with its expansion. Making it was the expectation every year with four teams. Now, it’s a major disappointment to miss it.

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