Calling Alabama’s performance in the first road game of the season and follow up to the loss against Texas a disaster would be an understatement. The Crimson Tide was lucky to escape with a 17-3 win over South Florida

A long rain delay in the first half was pretty symbolic for how things went on offense for the Tide: Stalled, ugly, and anything but methodical.

Of course, headed into this one, the big story of the week was that Jalen Milroe was being benched in favor of Notre Dame transfer Tyler Buchner. Buchner was anything but effective in his first ever start at Alabama. In fact, he was downright awful, finishing five of 14 for 34 yards.

There was one play toward the end of the first half, shortly before Buchner was ultimately benched for Ty Simpson. It was hard to see if, due to issues with ESPN cameras, Jermaine Burton dropped a long pass from Buchner or it was overthrown. But, overall, Buchner gave you really nothing to be excited about.

Once again, the story of the game for Alabama was the absolutely dreadful performance of the offensive line. Freshman 5-star left tackle Kadyn Proctor is a revolving door right now. Proctor is young and still may develop into a good player for Alabama, but he is simply not ready to play at a high level right.

Simpson came in and offered some excitement with his arm, throwing for 74 yards on five of nine passing and added a touchdown on the ground via a QB sneak in the final moments. He made some nice throws and offered a steadying presence at the QB position. But he held the ball too long and took too many sacks as well, five in total.

https://twitter.com/TSV__1/status/1703180128279519523

Headed into Ole Miss next week, Head Coach Nick Saban has a decision on his hands once again. If the issues on the line persist, the truth of the matter is that this team is not good enough to win a championship and Milroe is probably the best option to counteract the problems.

That being said, Simpson probably has the highest ceiling as a passer and shows poise and confidence when he gets some time to throw. If he can get rid of the ball a little bit quicker and build on some of the positive things he did today, then he is the best option moving forward.

No matter who Saban goes with moving forward, this team has big problems that it has not seen in a long time. If Alabama does not fix its issues on the offensive line, it could be a long season for the Crimson Tide.