Kalen DeBoer comments on where backup Alabama quarterbacks stand in pecking order

It’s been a little over a week since Alabama football’s head coach Kalen DeBoer and his offensive staff told Ty Simpson he earned the starting quarterback job for the 2025 football season.

Simpson beat out Austin Mack and true freshman Keelon Russell, but the competition for backup quarterback is still ongoing, according to what DeBoer told the media on Thursday.

“We won’t really get into that, as far as who’s the second,” DeBoer says. “These guys are going to keep competing. That’s for every position.”

Mack and Russell might be closer to each other in terms of where each is at in their respective development than they were at the start of fall camp, but DeBoer says there’s certainly an intentional strategy for each quarterback when it comes to reps in practice.

“So, right now, there’s a balance between in some things that we do, the reps. There’s certainly coordination on who’s getting those reps as well.”